by Donna Leon
'Good morning’ Brunetti said, walking towards the man and putting out his hand. His gesture surprised the man into taking it. 'I'm Commissario Guido Brunetti.'
‘Talazzi’ he said as he shook Brunetti's hand. 'Raffaele.'
Foa approached, and Brunetti introduced the two men, who also shook hands.
'Could you tell me what you're doing?' Palazzi asked in a more moderate tone.
'I'm in charge of the investigation into the death of I'uomo di notte. He worked in your factory, too, didn't he?'
'Yes,' Palazzi said, then pointed down at the bucket. 'But what's that?'
I'm taking a sample of the soil from Signor De Cal's property there,' Brunetti said, indicating with the spade the place where they had been when Palazzi first saw them.
'What for?' Palazzi asked with real curiosity.
'To examine,' Brunetti said.
'Because of Giorgio?' Palazzi asked.
'You knew him?' Brunetti asked.
'Oh, we all knew him,' Palazzi said with a bittersweet smile. 'Poor guy. I've known him for what, six years?' Palazzi shook his head, as if surprised to discover how long he had known the dead man.
'So you knew him before his daughter was born?' Brunetti asked.
'The poor devil’ Palazzi said. 'No one deserved that.'
'Deserved what, Signor Palazzi?' Brunetti asked and set the bucket on the ground, the better to convey the idea that he was mere for a long conversation. Foa moved his feet apart and relaxed.
"The baby. That she should be born like that. I've got two kids, and thank God they're normal.'
'Did you ever see Signor Tassini's daughter?'
'No, but he told me about her. He told us all about her.'
'Did he tell you why he thought she was that way?' Brunetti asked.
'Oh, Lord, he told us all a hundred times, told us until none of us would listen to him any more.' Palazzi thought about this and then said, 'I'm sorry now we didn't listen to him, now that he's gone. It probably wouldn't have cost us that much.' But then he thought better of it and said, 'But it was awful. Really. He'd start and he'd go on for an hour, or at least until you had to tell him to stop or you just walked away. He'd come in early sometimes, I think, just to talk to us about it, or stay after his shift was over in the morning.' Palazzi weighed it all up and said, 'I guess we stopped listening to him, or he realized we wouldn't listen to him. Anyway, he didn't have so much to say lately.'
'Was he crazy?' Brunetti surprised himself by asking.
Palazzi's mouth fell open at this affront to the dead. 'No. He wasn't crazy. He was just . . . well ... he was strange. I mean, he could talk about things, just like one of us, but as soon as some subjects came up, he was gone.'
'Did he ever threaten his employer, Signor De Cal? Or Signor Fasano?'
Palazzi laughed at the idea. 'Giorgio threaten somebody? You're the crazy one if you can ask that.'
'Did they ever threaten him?' Brunetti asked quickly.
This question really did astonish Palazzi. 'Why would they do that? They could have fired him. Just told him to leave. He was working in nero, so there was nothing he could have done. He'd have had to leave.'
'Are many of you working in nero?' Brunetti asked and regretted the words as soon as they were out of his mouth.
There was a long pause, and then Palazzi said, in a very formal, controlled voice, 'I wouldn't know about that, Commissario.' His tone told Brunetti how little Palazzi would know from now on. Rather than insist, Brunetti thanked him, shook his hand, waited for Foa to do the same, then bent and picked up the pink bucket. He abandoned the idea of going into the factory buildings to try to find the spots that would correspond to the other sets of coordinates.
Palazzi turned and started to walk across the field towards Fasano's factory, and it was then that Brunetti noticed the sun-faded letters painted above the back of the building. 'Vetreria Regini’ he made out.
'Signor Palazzi’ Brunetti called after the retreating man.
Palazzi stopped and turned around.
'What's that?' Brunetti asked, pointing at the letters.
Palazzi followed Brunetti's gesture. 'It's the name of the factory, Vetreria Regini’ Palazzi called back, saying it slowly, as though he doubted Brunetti would be able to read it without help.
He prepared to move off again, but Brunetti called after him, 'I thought it was Fasano's. In his family'
'It is,' Palazzi said. 'His mother's family' Palazzi turned and walked away.
22
Brunetti resisted the temptation to remain on Murano and return to Nanni's for fresh fish and polenta. Instead, he told Foa to take them back to the Questura, and when they got there, he asked the pilot to take the bucket to Bocchese and ask him to find out what was in the mud and water. Because Paola and the kids were at lunch with her parents that day, Brunetti ate at a restaurant in Castello, a meal he paid no attention to and forgot as soon as he left. After he had eaten, he walked down to San Pietro in Castello and went inside the church to have a look at the funeral stele with its carved Qur'anic verses. Continuing debate as to whether he was looking at evidence of cultural theft or multiculturalism in no way diminished his appreciation of the carving's beauty.
Slowly he made his way back to the Questura. Vianello came up a little before six, noticed the volumes of the Gazzetta on Brunetti's desk and asked what they were for. Brunetti explained, then asked the Inspector what he thought had gone on before the laws were passed.
"They did whatever they pleased’ Vianello said with predictable indignation, then surprised Brunetti by adding, 'but I doubt they did much harm on Murano.'
Brunetti pointed to the chair in front of his desk and asked, 'Why?'
Vianello sat. 'Well, it's a relative term,' he said, ' "harm." When you compare it to Marghera, that is. I know that doesn't change what happened on Murano. But Marghera's the real killer.'
'You really hate it, don't you?' Brunetti asked.
Vianello's face was deadly serious. 'Of course I do: any thinking person would. And Tassini said he hated Murano. But he never acted like he hated it.'
Brunetti failed to follow him. 'I don't understand.'
'If he had really believed it—that working for De Cal had caused what happened to his daughter—he would have done something to harm him. But all he did was talk to the men who worked with him at the fornace. And tell them that De Cal was to blame for everything.'
'Which means?' Brunetti asked.
'Which means it was just his guilt talking’ Vianello said.
This had always been Brunetti's opinion, so he let it pass unquestioned. 'But why do you hate Marghera so much?' he asked.
'Because I have children’ Vianello answered.
'So do I’ Brunetti countered.
'When you get home’ Vianello said, his voice suddenly moderate, 'ask your wife if she got the supplement to today's Gazzettino.'
'What supplement?'
Vianello got to his feet and moved over to the door. 'Just ask her’ he said. Standing at the door, he went on, 'I spoke to a few of De Cal's workers. They say business is bad, and everyone I spoke to heard he was selling, but everyone had heard he was asking a different price, though all of them were well above a million.'
'Anything else?' Brunetti asked.
'Tassini had been Fasano's uomo di notte only a month or two.'
'Before that?'
'He was already working as De Cal's uomo di notte; before that he worked in the molatura.'
'Is that a step up or a step down?' idle curiosity prompted Brunetti to ask. 'He had a wife and two kids to support.'
Vianello shrugged. 'I don't know. The guy who used to work for Fasano retired, and Tassini asked if he could have the job. At least that's what two of them told me. They said he liked working nights because it meant he could read, but they made it sound like he wanted to grow a second head.' Vianello laughed at this, and so did Brunetti, and the tension between them evaporated.
After the Inspector left, Brunetti used his curiosity about the Gazzettino supplement as an excuse to leave work early, which brought him home an hour before his usual time.
He went down to Paola's study and found her at her desk with what looked like a manuscript in front of her. He kissed her proffered cheek, then said, 'Vianello told me to ask if you read the supplement that came with the Gazzettino today.'
Her confusion was momentary, but then she set the manuscript to one side and bent to replace it with a disorganized pile of papers and magazines from the floor. 'He would ask about it, wouldn't he?' she asked with a smile, beginning to shuffle through the papers.
'What is it?'
She continued to hunt through the pile until she pulled something out and held it up in triumph. 'Porto Marghera,' she read aloud, 'Situazione e Prospettive.' She held it out so he could read the title on the cover. 'Do you think it's coincidental that this was given out with the newspaper at the same time as the trial is taking place?'
'But the trial has been going on for ever,' Brunetti objected. The trial against the petrochemical complex for its pollution of the land, the air, and the laguna had been dragging on for years: everyone in the Veneto knew that, just as they knew it would drag on for many more, or at least until the statute of limitations ran out and its spirit was subsumed into that heaven where expired cases went.
"Then let me read you one thing, and you tell me if you think it's coincidental’ she said, flipping the supplement over and running her eyes down the back cover. 'At the end, the writers express their thanks to those who have helped in the preparation of this supplement—a document that is meant to inform the people of the Veneto of any environmental danger resulting from the existence of the industrial plant in their back yard.' She glanced at Brunetti to see that she had his full attention and then continued. 'And just who is it that they thank for this cooperation?' she asked, running her finger, he assumed quite unnecessarily, down the last page. "The authorities of the industrial zone.'
When Brunetti remained silent, she tossed the supplement onto her desk and said, 'Come on, Guido, you have to tell me that's wonderful. That's genius. They prepare a document about this percolating industrial complex that's three kilometres from us, probably filled with enough toxins and poisons to eliminate all of the northeast, and who do they ask for information about how dangerous those substances might be if not the very authorities who run the complex?' She laughed out loud, but Brunetti did not join her.
Like the presenter of a television quiz show, she paused and gave him a mock-serious look, as if hoping to provoke a response by a display of eager curiosity. When he remained silent, she said, 'Or think of it this way: the next time Patta wants some crime statistics,, he should ask the boss of the local Mafia, or the Chinese Mafia, to prepare them for him.' She raised the supplement above her head and said, 'We're all crazy, Guido.'
Brunetti sat on the sofa, silent but attentive. 'Let me read one more thing, just one’ she said, opening the booklet. She flipped forward a few pages, then back. 'Ah, here it is,' she said. 'Just listen to this: "How to behave in case of an emergency." ' She pushed up her glasses, pulled the supplement a bit closer, and continued to read aloud.' "Shut yourself in your house, close the windows, turn off the gas, don't use the phone, listen to the radio, don't go outside for any reason." ' She turned to him and added, 'The only thing they don't do is tell us not to breathe.' She let the supplement drop and said, 'We live less than three kilometres from that, Guido.'
'You've known about this for years,' Brunetti said, letting himself sink deeper into the sofa.
'Yes, I've known about it,' she agreed. 'But I didn't have this,' she said, picking up the booklet again and opening it to the last page. 'I didn't have the information that thirty-six million tons of "material" flow through there every year. I've no idea how much thirty-six million tons is, and God knows they don't tell us what it's thirty-six million tons of, but I suspect it would take considerably less than that, in the case of fire, to ...' Her voice drifted off.
'What makes you think something like that will happen?' he asked.
'Because I spent an hour and a half today trying to give the new expiry date of my credit card to the phone company’ she shot back.
'The connection?' he inquired with Olympian calm.
'They sent me a letter, telling me the card had expired and asking me to dial their free number. When I did, I got the usual menu of cheerful suggestions: press one for this and two for that and three if you want to sign up for new services. And then the line died. Six times.'
'Why did you try six times?'
'What other choice is there? Even if I want to tell them to cancel the service, I still have to speak to them and tell them to do so and send the final bill to the bank.'
'And when is it that you are going to explain the connection with Marghera?' he asked, aware suddenly of how tired he was and how much he longed not to be involved in this conversation.
She removed her glasses, the better to see him or the better to fix him with her basilisk eye. 'Because the same people work in both places, Guido. The same people set up the programs and work on the safety systems. At the end of all of this, I was told, by the human being I finally managed to talk to, that I had to send the expiry date of the card to a fax number because their system did not allow her to take the information over the phone.'
Brunetti rested his head against the back of the sofa and closed his eyes. 'I still don't get the connection,' he said.
'Because the person who failed to put the fax number on the letter they sent me could just as easily be the man whose job it is to turn a handle or a knob at one of the factories in Marghera and who, instead of turning it like this,' she said and waited for him to open his eyes. When he did, he saw her grab a giant, invisible wheel and turn it to the right. Turns it like this’ she continued, turning her hands to the left. 'And there goes Marghera, and there goes Venice, and there go all of us.'
'Oh come on,' he said, tired and irritated by her histrionics, 'you're being a catastrophist.'
'Just like Vianello?' she asked.
Brunetti no longer remembered how he had been dragged into this, but he no longer cared what he said. 'In his wilder moments, yes. You are.'
A tense silence had replaced the eager humour of her first remarks. Brunetti leaned down and fished up that week's Espresso. He flipped it open and found himself looking at the movie reviews. Doggedly he concentrated on reviews of films he would never, even in his wildest moments, think of seeing. Having finished reading these, he fanned through the pages and came to the lead story: the Marghera trial. He shut the magazine and let it drop to the floor.
'All right,' he said. 'All right.' He let some time pass and said, 'I've had a long day, Paola. And I don't want to spend what little is left of it arguing with you.'
His eyes closed, he heard her rather than saw her come close, and then he felt her weight on the sofa beside him. 'I'll go make dinner’ she said. Her weight shifted, and then he felt her lips on his forehead.
An hour later, as they sat down to dinner, Brunetti watched his children as the family ate and drank, and he listened to them complain about their teachers and the pressure of homework that seemed never to ease.
'If you want to go to the university,' he said, 'then homework's the price you have to pay.'
'And if I don't go,' Chiara asked, 'then what?' Brunetti failed to detect defiance in her words; he noticed that Paola had tuned into the question.
'Then I suppose you try to find a job,' Brunetti answered in a voice he attempted to make sound factual rather than critical. The choice seemed obvious enough to him.
'But everyone's always saying that there aren't any jobs’ Chiara complained.
'And that's what's always in the papers’ Raffi added, his fork poised over his swordfish steak. 'Look at Kati and Fulvio’ he said, naming the older brother and sister of his best friend. 'Both of them are dottori, and neither one of them has a job.
'
"That's not true’ Chiara said. 'Kati's working in a museum.'
'Kati is selling catalogues at the Correr, you mean’ Raffi said. "That's not a job, not after six years at the university. She'd make more money if she sold shoes at Prada.' Brunetti wondered if Raffi considered that a better job.
'Prada's not the smartest place in the world to work if you want to get a job as an art historian’ Chiara said.
'Neither is the bargain basement at the Correr Museum’ her brother shot back.
Brunetti, who had seen the last exhibition there and paid more than forty Euros for the catalogue, hardly saw the museum shop as a bargain basement, but he kept this thought to himself and, instead, asked, 'What about Fulvio?'
Raffi looked down at his fish, and Chiara reached out to take some more spinach, though her knife and fork had been neatly lined up on her plate before. Neither answered, and the atmosphere filled with a palpable awkwardness. Brunetti pretended he had noticed nothing and said, 'Well, he's sure to find something. He's a bright boy.' Then, to Paola, he said, 'Would you pass me the spinach? If Chiara decides to leave any, that is.'
As she passed the dish to him, Paola gave every indication she had registered the response to Fulvio's name by ignoring it and saying, 'It's the same with my students. They write their theses, get their degrees, begin to call themselves dottore, and then think they're lucky if they can find a job as a substitute teacher in some place like Burano or Dolo.'
'Plumbing’ Brunetti interrupted, holding up a hand to gather their attention. "That's what I tell my children to study: plumbing. There's always work to be had. Lots of interesting company and plenty of work. Nothing good can come of reading all those books, sitting in libraries, talking about ideas: it's bad for the brain. No, give me a real man's job: fresh air, good pay, honest hard work.'