A Venetian Reckoning Part 5

The entrance hall was lined on both sides with mirrors and gave the illusion that the small area was crowded with many duplicates of Brunetti and Signora Trevisan's brother. The floor was patterned with gleaming squares of alternating black and white marble, inducing in Brunetti the feeling that he and his reflection were moving about on a chess board and thus forcing him to view the other man as an opponent.

'I appreciate Signora Trevisan's agreeing to see me,' Brunetti said.

'I told her not to,' her brother said brusquely. 'She shouldn't see anyone. This is terrible.' The look he gave Brunetti made him wonder if the man was referring to Trevisan's murder or Brunetti's presence in the house of mourning.

Cutting in front of Brunetti, the other man led him down another corridor and into a small room off to the left. It was difficult to tell what purpose the room was meant to serve: there were no books, no television, and the only chairs in the room were straight-backed and stood in the four corners. Two windows on one wall were covered with dark green drapes. In the centre stood a round table and on it a vase of dried flowers. Nothing more and no clue as to purpose or function.

'You can wait here,' Lotto said and left the room. Brunetti stood still for a moment, then walked over to one of the windows and pulled back the drape. Beyond him lay the Grand Ca.n.a.l, sunlight playing on its surface, and off to the left Palazzo Dario, the golden tiles of the mosaic that covered its facade catching the light that shot up from the water below, only to shatter it into fragments and sprinkle it back on the waters of the ca.n.a.l. Boats floated by; minutes went with them.

He heard the door behind him open, and he turned to greet the widow Trevisan. Instead, a young girl with dark hair that fell to her shoulders came into the room, saw Brunetti standing by the window, pulled back, and left as quickly as she had entered, pulling the door closed behind her. A few minutes after this, the door was opened again, but this time it was a woman in her early forties who came into the room. She wore a simple black woollen dress and shoes with heels that raised her almost to Brunetti's height. Her face was the same shape as the girl's, her hair also shoulder length and the same dark brown, though the woman's colour showed signs of a.s.sistance. Her eyes, wide-s.p.a.ced like her brother's, were bright with intelligence and what Brunetti thought was curiosity rather than unshed tears.

She came across the room to Brunetti and extended her hand. 'Commissario Brunetti?'

'Yes, signora. I'm sorry we have to meet in circ.u.mstances such as these. I'm very grateful you consented to speak to me.'

'I want to do anything that will help you find Carlo's murderer.' Her voice was soft, the accent slightly brushed with the swallowed aspirants of Florence.

She looked around her, as if noticing the room for the first time. 'Why did Ubaldo put you in here?' she asked, then added, turning towards the door, 'Come with me.'

Brunetti followed her out into the corridor, where she turned right and opened another door. He followed her into a much larger room, this one with three windows that looked back up towards Campo San Maurizio and which appeared to be an office or a library. She led him towards two deep armchairs and took her place in one, indicating the second with her hand.

Brunetti sat, started to cross his legs, but realized the chair was too low to make that comfortable. He propped both elbows on the arms of the chair and joined his hands across his stomach.

'What is it you'd like me to tell you, commissario?' Signora Trevisan asked.

'I'd like you to tell me if, during the last few weeks, months perhaps, your husband seemed in any way uncomfortable or nervous or if his behaviour had changed in any way that seemed peculiar to you.'

She waited to see if there was anything else to the question, and when there seemed not to be, she paused for a moment, considering. Finally, she answered, 'No, I can't think of anything. Carlo was always very much caught up in his work. What with the political changes of the last few years, the opening up of new markets, he's been especially busy. But, no, during the last few months he hasn't been nervous in any special way, not more than his work would normally warrant'

'Did he ever speak to you about any case he was working on, or perhaps a client, which gave him particular trouble or caused him undue concern?'

'No, not really'

Brunetti waited.

'He had one new client,' she finally said. 'A Dane who was trying to open an import business - cheese and b.u.t.ter, I think - who found himself caught up in the new EC regulations. Carlo was trying to find a way for him to transport his products through France, rather than through Germany. Or perhaps it was the other way. He was very busy with this, but I can't say that he was upset about it.'

'And at work? What were his relations with his employees like? Peaceful? Friendly?'

She joined her hands together in her lap and looked down at them. 'I think so. He certainly never mentioned having trouble with any of his staff'. If he had, I'm sure he would have told me.'

'Is it true that the firm was entirely his, that the other lawyers were all salaried employees?'

'Excuse me?' she asked, giving him a puzzled glance. 'I'm afraid I don't understand the question.'

'Did your husband share the proceeds of his law practice with the other lawyers or did they work for him, as salaried employees?'

She looked up from her hands and glanced across at Brunetti. 'I'm afraid I can't answer that question, Dottor Brunetti. I know almost nothing about Carlo's business. You'd have to speak to his accountant'

' And who is that signora?'

'Ubaldo.'

'Your brother?'

'Yes.'

'I see,' Brunetti replied. After a short pause, he continued, 'I'd like to ask you some questions about your personal life, signora.'

'Our personal life?' she repeated, as though she had never heard of such a thing. When he didn't answer this, she nodded, signalling him to begin.

'Could you tell me how long you and your husband were married?'

'Nineteen years.'

'How many children do you have, signora?' 'Two. Claudio is seventeen, and Francesca is fifteen.' 'Are they in school in Venice, signora?' 'She looked up at him sharply when he asked this. 'Why do you want to know that?'

'My own daughter, Chiara, is fourteen, so perhaps they know one another,' he answered and smiled to show what an innocent question it had been.

'Claudio is in school in Switzerland, but Francesca is here. With us. I mean,' she corrected, rubbing a hand across her forehead, 'with me.'

'Would you say yours was a happy marriage, signora?' 'Yes,' she answered immediately, far faster than Brunetti would have answered the same question, though he would have given the same response. She did not however, elaborate.

'Could you tell me if your husband had any particularly close friends or business a.s.sociates?'

She looked up at this question, then as quickly down again at her hands. 'Our closest friends are the Nogares, Mirto and Graziella. He's an architect who lives in Campo Sant' Angelo. They're Francesca's G.o.dparents. I don't know about his business a.s.sociates: you'll have to ask Ubaldo.'

'Other friends, signora?'

'Why do you need to know all this?' she said, voice rising sharply.

'I'd like to learn more about your husband, signora.'

'Why?' The question leaped from her, almost as if beyond her volition.

'Until I understand what sort of man he was, I can't understand why this happened.' . 4 4A robbery?' she asked, voice just short of sarcasm.

'It wasn't robbery, signora. Whoever killed him intended to do it.'

'No one could have a reason to want to kill Carlo,' she insisted - Brunetti, having heard this same thing more times than he cared to remember, said nothing.

Suddenly Signora Trevisan got to her feet. 'Do you have any more questions? If not, I would like to be with my daughter.'

Brunetti got up from the chair and put out his hand. 'Again, signora, I appreciate your having spoken to me. I realize what a painful time this must be for you and your family, and I hope you find the courage that will help you through it.' Even as he spoke the words, they sounded formulaic in his ears, the sort of thing that got said in the absence of perceived grief, which was the case here.

'Thank you, commissario,' she said, giving his hand a quick shake and walking towards the door. She held it open for him, then walked along the corridor with him towards the front door of the apartment. There was no sign of the other members of the family.

At the door, Brunetti nodded to the widow as he left the apartment and heard the door close softly behind him as he started down the steps. It seemed strange to him that a woman could be married to a man for almost twenty years and know nothing about his business dealings. Stranger still, when her own brother was his accountant. What did they discuss at family dinners - soccer? Everyone Brunetti knew hated lawyers. Brunetti hated lawyers. He could not, consequently, believe that a lawyer, let alone a famous and successful one, had no enemies. Tomorrow he could discuss this with Lotto and see if he proved to be any more forthcoming than his sister.

10.

While Brunetti had been inside the Trevisan apartment, the sky had clouded over, and the shimmering warmth ' of the day had fled. He glanced at his watch and saw that it was not yet six, and so, if he chose, he could still go back to the Questura. Instead, he turned back towards the Accademia Bridge, crossed it, and headed up towards home. Halfway there, he stopped in a bar and asked for a small gla.s.s of white wine. He picked up one of the small pretzels on the bar, took a bite, but tossed the rest into an ashtray. The wine was as bad as the pretzel, so he left that, too, and continued towards home.

He tried to recall the expression on Francesca Trevisan's face when she had so suddenly appeared at the door, but he could remember no more than eyes flashing wide at the sight of him there. The eyes had been dry and had registered nothing more than surprise; she resembled her mother in absence of grief, as well as in feature. Had she been expecting someone else?

How would Chiara respond if he were to be killed? And Paola, would she be so easily capable of answering questions, were a policeman to come to ask about their personal life? Surely, Paola would not be able to say, as had Signora Trevisan, that she knew nothing about her husband's, her late husband's, professional fife. It snagged in Brunetti's mind, this protestation of ignorance, and he couldn't let it go, nor could he believe it.

When he let himself into the apartment, the radar of years told him that it was empty. He went down to the kitchen, where he found the table littered with newspapers and what seemed to be Chiara's homework, papers covered with numbers and mathematical signs that made no sense at all to Brunetti. He picked up a sheet of paper and studied it, saw the neat, right-slanting hand of his younger child in a long series of numbers and signs that he thought might be, if memory served, a quadratic equation. Was this calculus? Trigonometry? It had been so long ago, and Brunetti had been so unsuited to mathematics that he could recall almost nothing of it, though surely he had gone through four years of it He put the papers aside and turned his attention to the newspapers, where Trevisan's murder competed for attention with yet another senator and yet another bribe. Years had pa.s.sed since Judge Di Pietro handed down the first formal accusation, and still villains ruled the land. All, or what seemed like all, of the major political figures who had ruled the country since Brunetti was a child had been named in accusation, named again on different charges, and had even begun to name one another, and yet not one of them had been tried and sentenced, though the coffers of the state had been sucked dry. They'd had their snouts in the public trough for decades, yet nothing seemed strong enough - not public rage, not an upwelling of national disgust - to sweep them from power. He turned a page and saw photos of the two worst, the hunchback and the balding pig, and he nipped the paper closed with tired loathing. Nothing would change. Brunetti knew not a little about these scandals, knew where a lot of money had gone and who was likely next to be named, and me one thing he knew with absolute certainty was that nothing would change. Lampedusa had it right - things had to seem to change so that things could remain the same. There'd be elections; there'd be new faces and new promises, but all that would happen would be that different trotters would go into the trough, and new accounts would be opened in those discreet private banks across the border in Switzerland.

Brunetti knew this mood and almost feared it, this recurring certainty of the futility of everything he did. Why bother to put the boy who broke into a house in gaol when the man who stole billions from the health system was named amba.s.sador to the country to which he had been sending the money for years? And what justice imposed a fine on the person who failed to pay the tax on the radio in his car when the manufacturer of that same car could admit to having paid billions of lire to the leaders of trade unions to see that they would prevent their members asking for pay rises, could admit it and remain free? Why arrest anyone for murder, or why bother to look for the person who murdered Trevisan, when the man who had for decades been the highest politician in the country stood accused of having ordered the murders of the few honest judges who had the courage to investigate the Mafia?

This bleak reverie was interrupted by Chiara's arrival. She slammed the apartment door and came in with a great deal of noise and a large pile of books. Brunetti watched as she went down to her room and emerged a few moments later without the books.

'h.e.l.lo, angel,' he called down the hall. 'Would you like something to eat?' When wouldn't she, he asked himself.

'Ciao, Papa' she called out and came down the hall, struggling to extricate herself from the sleeves of her coat and managing, instead, only to pull one of them completely inside out and trap her hand in it. As he watched, she tore her other hand free and reached to pull at the sleeve. He glanced away and, when he looked back, the coat lay in a heap on the floor, and Chiara was bending to pick it up.

She came into the kitchen and tilted her face up to him, expecting a kiss, which he gave her.

She went over and opened the refrigerator, stooped down to see into it, reached into the back and pulled out a paper-wrapped wedge of cheese. She stood, took a knife from a drawer, and cut herself a thick slice.

'Want some bread?' he asked, pulling a bag of rolls down from the top of the refrigerator. She nodded, and they did a trade, he getting a thick wedge of cheese in exchange for two of the rolls.

'Papa,' she began, 'how much do policemen get paid an hour?'

'I don't know exactly, Chiara. They get a salary, but sometimes they have to work more hours a week than people who work in offices do.'

'You mean if there's a lot of crime, or they have to follow someone?'

'Si.' He nodded toward the cheese, and she cut him another piece, handing it to him silently.

'Or if they spend time questioning people, suspects and things like that?' she asked, clearly not going to give this up.

'Si,' he repeated, wondering what she was getting at.

She finished her second roll and put her hand into the bag for another.

'Mamma's going to kill you if you eat all the bread,' he said, a threat rendered almost sweet by years of repet.i.tion.

'But how much do you think it would work out to an hour, Papa?' she asked, ignoring him, as she sliced the roll in two.

He decided to invent, knowing that, whatever sum he named, he was going to end up being asked for it 'I'd say it isn't more than about 20,000 lire an hour.' Then, because he knew he was meant to, he asked, 'Why?'

'Well, I knew you'd be interested to know about Francesca's father, so I asked some questions about him today, and I thought that, since I was doing the police's work, they should pay me for my time.' It was only when he saw signs of venality in his children that Brunetti regretted Venice's thousand-year-old trading heritage.

He didn't answer her, so Chiara was forced to stop eating and look at him. 'Well, what do you think?'

He gave it some thought and then answered, 'I think it would depend on what you found out, Chiara. It's not as if we'd be paying you a salary, regardless of what you did, as we do with the real police. You'd be a sort of private contractor, working freelance, and we'd pay you in relation to the value of what you brought us.'

She considered this for a moment and appeared to see the sense of it. 'All right I'll tell you what I found out, and then you tell me how much you think it's worth.'

Not without admiration, Brunetti noted the skill with which she had evaded the critical question of whether he would be willing to pay for the information in the first place and had simply arrived at the point where the deal was already cut and only details remained to be worked out. Well, all right.

'Tell me.'

All business now, Chiara finished the last of the third roll, wiped her hands on a kitchen towel, and sat at the table, hands folded in front of her. 'I had to talk to four different people before I really learned anything,' she began, as serious as if she were giving testimony in court. Or on television.

'Who were they?'

'One was a girl at the school where Francesca is now; one was a teacher at my school, and a girl there, too, and the other was one of the girls we used to go to grammar school with.'

'You managed all of this today, Chiara?'

'Oh, sure. I had to take the afternoon off, to go see Luciana, and then go over to Francesca's school to talk to that girl, but I talked to the teacher and the girl at my school before I left.'

'You took the afternoon off?' Brunetti asked, but merely out of curiosity.

'Sure, the kids do it all the time. All you have to do is give them a note from one of your parents, saying you're sick or have to go somewhere, and no one ever asks questions.'

'Do you do this often, Chiara?'

'Oh, no, Papa, only when I have to.'

'Who wrote the note?'

'Oh, it was Mamma's turn. Besides, her signature's much easier to do than yours.' As she spoke, she picked up the pieces of homework lying on the table and arranged them into a neat stack, then placed them to the side and glanced up at him, eager to continue with important things.

He pulled out a chair and sat racing her. 'And what did these people tell you, Chiara?'

'The first thing I learned was that Francesca had told this other girl the kidnapping story, too, and I think I remember that she told a bunch of us the same story when we were in grammar school, but that was five years ago.'

'How many years did you go to school with her, Chiara?'

'We did all of elementary school together. But then her family moved, and she went to the Vivaldi middle school I see her occasionally; but we weren't friends or anything like that'

'was this girl she told the story to a good friend of hers?'

He watched Chiara draw her lips together at the question, and he said, 'Perhaps you'd better tell me all this in your own way.' She smiled.

"This girl I spoke to at my school knew her from middle school, and she said that Francesca told her that her parents had warned her always to be very careful who she spoke to and never to go anywhere with someone she didn't know. That's pretty much the same thing she told us about when we were at school with her.'