‘What I don’t understand,’ the Count said, ‘is the attempt to sell the diamonds privately. These things are generally taken care of beforehand.’
‘I beg your pardon,’ Brunetti said.
‘Usually, the deal is arranged before the diamonds are brought here, to Europe, and often at the governmental level. Very often it’s a simple barter arrangement: stones for guns, so the complication of moving large amounts of money is avoided,’ the Count said, increasing Brunetti’s uneasiness by saying, ‘and the transport can usually be arranged by the addition of a percentage charge.’
Brunetti wondered what the phrase ‘governmental level’ might mean, but before he could ask, he felt the slowing of the engine as the boat approached the narrow channel leading to the airport dock. He looked at his watch. ‘What time does your plane leave?’ he asked.
‘Don’t worry,’ the Count said. ‘It will wait.’ The boat pulled up to a dock and Massimo glanced into the cabin, but when he saw that the Count did not get to his feet, he backed out into the channel and set the motor to idling. Brunetti glanced outside, at the abandoned airport terminal, and saw that it had stopped raining.
‘The question you haven’t asked, Guido, is why someone would kill him.’
‘To steal the diamonds?’
‘Possibly,’ the Count answered. ‘But I doubt that either one of us believes that.’
‘Then to prevent their sale,’ Brunetti countered.
‘Their sale or the purchases that would be made with the money?’
‘That, I think,’ Brunetti agreed.
‘And that’s why you want to know who the likely arms seller would be? To lead you to your dead black man?’ the Count asked, bringing the conversation back to its point of origin.
‘Yes. It’s the only place I can think of to start at.’
‘If I might comment on this, Guido,’ the Count said deferentially, ‘it sounds as if the arms dealer would be the least likely to kill him. It would stop the sale, and the people who sell weapons aren’t usually in the business of killing.’
Brunetti let that one lie.
‘It is the involvement of those two agencies of our government,’ the Count said, ‘that puzzles me.’ He looked down and flicked a speck of dust from his trousers, then back at Brunetti. ‘It is not unusual for sales of weapons — after all, they are one of our most successful industries — to be, well, to be accommodated by the government. But they usually do that when the purchaser is known to them.’
‘You mean another government?’ Brunetti asked.
‘Yes. Or, just as easily, some group eager to replace an existing government.’ His smile was wolfish. ‘The Americans are not the only people who welcome the removal of inconvenient politicians and their replacement by those better disposed towards their business methods.’ Again, that smile. ‘Even better, at least from an economic point of view, is to see that hostilities continue more or less indefinitely so that the process of replacement can be prolonged for as long as there are natural resources that can be sold to pay for new weapons. Ideally, by both sides.’
The Count gave Brunetti a long look, raised a hand as if to reach across and touch his shoulder, but did not; he pressed his palm back on the seat beside him. ‘It is the involvement of either one of these ministries that makes me think — I might even say fear — that this could be a very dangerous situation.’
Before Brunetti could answer, the Count went on, ‘No, don’t tell me that it has already been shown to be dangerous because that man is dead. I mean for you, Guido, for you and for anyone they perceive as being in their way.’
A taxi passed them going faster than it should and slammed its motor into reverse just metres from the dock. Its wake caught them broadside, flinging Brunetti forward so that he had to brace himself on the edge of the seat opposite him.
‘Come, it’s impossible to stay here,’ the Count said. He went forward, stooping, and tapped on the glass of the door. Massimo engaged the motor and slid the boat alongside the dock, grabbed a rope and jumped ashore. He held the boat tight to the side while the Count stepped up on to the dock. Leaning back down, he said, ‘No, Guido, don’t bother. Massimo will take you back.’
As Brunetti waited, the Count said, ‘I’ll make some calls and let you know whatever I can.’
A sudden wave slapped the side of the boat, and Brunetti looked down to check where he had placed his feet. When he looked back up at the Count, a man in a chauffeur’s uniform was standing next to him, and at the kerb stood a dark grey Lancia, its back door open and its motor running.
Massimo jumped back into the boat and backed quickly away from the dock. ‘Shall I take you to the Questura, Dottore, or would you like to go home?’
‘Take me home, please, Massimo,’ he said. When he looked back at the land, the car was pulling slowly away from the kerb to take the Count the three minutes to the terminal.
As Massimo took him back towards the city, Brunetti recalled the Count’s precise words. He had not said that he would make calls and tell Brunetti whatever he learned, but that he would tell him whatever he could. Brunetti felt suddenly uneasy and wondered if, like Claudio, he was a man who put too much trust in his friends.
23
The next morning, as Brunetti stood alone in the living room, drinking his second coffee, the brightness of the day lured him out on to the terrace. Though it was hardly springlike, it was easily warm enough to allow him to stand there for a few minutes and watch the light reflected on the wet tiles of the roofs around and below him. There was no sign of a cloud; in fact, the light hurt his eyes, even at this hour. Much as he had welcomed the rain, he prayed that this brilliant day would last and give them all a chance to shake off the gloom of the previous days.
When he felt the cold begin to penetrate his jacket, he went back inside, set his cup and saucer on the table in the living room, then thought better of it and took it into the kitchen and put it in the sink. He considered taking scarf and gloves, but he decided to invest in hope for the day and so left them and put on only his overcoat before he let himself out of the apartment.
The weather seemed to have infected people on the street; even the newsagent, whose face was usually as grim as the headlines, managed a gruff ‘grazie’ as he gave Brunetti his change. Brunetti decided to walk: if this was the global warming that Vianello was always banging on about, then surely there were worse things facing the world.
He turned right along the Canale di San Lorenzo and paused to study the scaffolding on the old men’s home, searching for signs of progress. It appeared that the windows were finally in place on the third floor: Brunetti could not remember having seen them before. A workman climbed down the scaffolding and walked across the campo and Brunetti, his mind idling, followed him with his eyes. As the workman let himself into a wooden shack, Brunetti noticed two men sitting on one of the benches in the campo, two black men. The bench was set parallel to the canal and thus permitted the men to look across at the façade of the Questura.
It was too far for him to be sure, but he thought the men were the one he had defined as the leader and the very thin young man who had raised his hand to Brunetti. Brunetti continued towards the bridge. He stopped there and gazed across the canal. He was sure the two men recognized him. Their heads moved closer together, and he watched them talk, saw their hands move as first one, then the other, gestured across the canal, either at him or at the Questura. The young man used his left hand to point; his right hand sat useless in his lap. No sound of voices came across the canal, and so it was rather like watching a television with the volume turned down. The older man turned away from the other and raised a hand in Brunetti’s direction, then waved his fingers quickly down towards the ground and then again, signalling Brunetti to come and join them. The man then turned back to the other, placed his hand on his knee, and spoke to him.
The younger man nodded, either in agreement or resignation.
A noise to his right caught Brunetti’s attention and he turned towards it. Beyond the other bridge, a police launch was turning into the canal, its blue light flashing. Heedless of the waves it created on either side, it came towards him, shot under the first bridge, and pulled noisily up to the Questura.
The pilot, the one who had taken him home for lunch, jumped on to the dock and secured the rope to a hawser, then stood back and saluted. First to step up on to the dock were two guards, both wearing bulletproof vests, machine-guns held across their chests. Then in quick succession came the Questore and then Vice-Questore Giuseppe Patta. A moment later a man in a business suit whose face was vaguely familiar to Brunetti emerged from the cabin and followed the others. The guards seemed to pay scant attention to the men alighting from the boat, their eyes busy roaming up and down the calle and then across to the campo on the other side of the canal. Brunetti allowed his eyes to follow theirs and was not at all surprised to see that the two black men had disappeared.
He did not recognize either of the guards with the machine-guns and so remained where he was, making no attempt to approach the door of the Questura. The two guards went to the building, and one of them held open the door. When the three civilians were inside, the guards followed them. The door closed.
Brunetti went over to the pilot, who was securing the stern of the boat with a second rope. He noticed Brunetti approaching and saluted.
‘What’s that all about, Foa?’ Brunetti asked, hands in his pockets, tilting his head back towards the Questura.
‘I’m not sure, sir. I had to pick up the Vice-Questore at home at eight-thirty, and then we went to the home of the Questore and got him.’
‘And the guys with the guns?’ Brunetti asked.
‘They were with the one who gave me the order, sir, the civilian. He showed up here at about eight and handed me a letter.’
‘You still have it?’ Brunetti asked.
‘No, he took it back right after I read it.’
‘Who was it from?’
‘I didn’t recognize the signature, or even the title: it was some sort of under-secretary to a secretary of a committee. But I certainly understood the letterhead: it was from the Ministry of the Interior.’
‘Ah,’ Brunetti sighed, but softly, more to himself than to Foa. ‘What did it tell you to do?’
‘To follow the orders of the person who gave me the letter. And he told me who to pick up, and in what order.’
‘I see,’ Brunetti said, doing his best to make it sound as though the news Foa gave him was of no particular interest to him. He thanked the young man and went back to the Questura and, once inside, up to Signorina Elettra’s office. When he went in, she looked up and asked, ‘You weren’t invited to the party?’
‘Hardly. Only the grown-ups.’ Then, after a pause, ‘You got any idea?’
‘None. The Vice-Questore called me from the launch and told me he’d be in a meeting with the Questore for a good part of the morning and to explain that to anyone who phoned for him.’
‘Did he mention anyone else?’ Brunetti asked, sure that Patta would not have missed the opportunity to drop the name, or at least the title, of any important person he had a meeting with.
‘No, sir, he didn’t.’
Brunetti thought for a moment, then asked, ‘Will you call me when it finishes?’
‘Do you want to see him?’
‘No. But I’d like to know how long their meeting lasts.’
‘I’ll call,’ she said, and Brunetti went up to his office.
He spent the next hour alternately reading the paper, which he opened across his desk, making no attempt to hide it, and walking to the window to stare for long minutes down into Campo San Lorenzo. The black men reappeared in neither place. Restless, he opened first one drawer of his desk and then the others and pulled out any object or paper he could justify throwing away. Within half an hour, his wastepaper basket was full and the open newspaper was covered with an assortment of objects he either could not identify or lacked the will to throw away.
His phone rang. Thinking it was Signorina Elettra, he answered by saying, ‘Are they gone?’
‘It’s Bocchese, sir,’ the technician said. ‘I think you better come down here,’ he added, and hung up.
Brunetti picked up the newspaper by its corners and dumped the objects back into his bottom drawer, kicked it shut, and went downstairs.
When Brunetti entered the laboratory, Bocchese was sitting at his desk, a place where Brunetti seldom saw him. The technician was always so caught up in cleaning, measuring, weighing things that it had never occurred to Brunetti that there might come a time when he simply sat and did nothing. ‘What is it?’ Brunetti asked. ‘Those fingerprints?’
‘Yes,’ Bocchese said. ‘There’s no match in the Interpol files for the dead man. Nowhere — neither in personnel files nor among people with a criminal record.’ He waited for Brunetti to digest this and then added, ‘But. .’ When he saw Brunetti’s eyes flash towards him, he continued, ‘a flag went up when his prints were submitted, saying all requests for information should immediately be forwarded to our Ministry of the Interior.’
‘Did that happen?’ Brunetti asked, worried about the consequences.
Bocchese gave a small cough of audibly false modesty. ‘My friend thought it kinder not to burden them with his request.’
‘Ah, I see,’ Brunetti said, and he did.
‘He did say, though, that he had one other place he would try to look, but it might take some time.’ Before Brunetti could speak, the technician said, ‘No, I didn’t ask.’
Bocchese waved a hand in what might have been a comment on the reliability of friends and then said, ‘He also gave me a very strange answer about the print that was found at that house.’
‘What did your friend say?’ Brunetti asked, coming closer to the desk but not sitting.
‘The print is a match for one that belonged to Michele Paci, who was an officer with the DIGOS until three years ago.’
‘Belonged?’ Brunetti asked.
‘Yes. He died.’
Bocchese gave this time to sink in and then said, ‘When he told me, I asked him if it was possible that there had been a mix-up. But he told me he’d had the same reaction, so he’d checked it again. It’s a perfect match, probably because the DIGOS are so careful about taking prints when they set up files on their employees.’
‘Died how?’
‘The record doesn’t say. The entry says’ — and here Bocchese looked down at some papers on his desk — ‘“killed in the course of duty”.’
‘Then what’s his fingerprint doing on the door? And on that bag?’
‘Then what’s his fingerprint doing on the door? And on that bag?’
The best Bocchese could do was shrug. ‘I checked it myself when his answer came in. The match is perfect. If the one in the Ministry files is his real print, then so are the other two.’
‘And that means he’s not dead?’
With not much of a smile, Bocchese said, ‘Unless he really did lend his hand to someone.’
‘You ever come across something like this?’ Brunetti asked.
‘No.’
‘Would it be possible for someone to have left it there deliberately? Someone else, that is?’ Brunetti asked, though it made no sense.
Bocchese dismissed the possibility.
‘So he’s alive?’ Brunetti asked.
‘I’d say so.’
‘And Interpol? Any results from them?’
‘They have no match for the print.’
‘Don’t they have the prints of other member police forces on file?’
‘I’d always thought so,’ Bocchese said. ‘But perhaps not DIGOS because they’re not exactly police.’
After a long silence, Brunetti asked, ‘You trust your friend?’
‘Not to tell anyone?’
‘Yes.’
‘As much as I trust anyone,’ Bocchese answered, adding, ‘which isn’t very much.’ When he saw Brunetti’s pained response to this, he added, ‘He won’t tell anyone. Besides, it’s illegal, what he did.’
Brunetti walked slowly back to his office, trying to make some sense of what Bocchese had told him. If the fingerprints had indeed been left there by an agent of the Italian Secret Service, Brunetti was into an investigation that could lead anywhere. He considered this for a moment, and then quickly realized how much more likely it was that the investigation would lead nowhere. Recent history was filled with examples of insabbiatura, the burying of an inconvenient case in the sand. He had worked on some in the past, and they always forced him to confront the extent of his own cowardice. Or his despair.
It nagged at Brunetti: if the man was not dead, then who had faked his death, his employer or himself? Or both? In any case, what sort of retirement had the man gone to? He’d been in the apartment of the dead man, perhaps both before and after his death. Brunetti forced himself to stop speculating about what else the man might have done.
On an impulse, ignoring the fact that he had asked Signorina Elettra to phone him, he left the Questura and walked down towards Castello. Perhaps the black men had gone to earth in their apartment. He tried to concentrate on what he saw as he walked, intentionally chose an indirect route in the hope that it would divert him from the thought of the dead man and the man who was not dead.
As he knew was likely to be the case, the shutters were closed on the windows of the house, and a padlock hung from the door. He had nothing to lose, so he went down to the bar on the corner and asked for a coffee. The same card game was in progress, though the players had shifted it to a table nearer the back of the bar.
‘You were in here before,’ the barman said, ‘Filippo’s friend.’ He said it with a certain amusement.
Brunetti thanked him for the coffee. ‘I really am, you know,’ he said. ‘But I’m also with the police.’
‘I thought so,’ the barman said, obviously pleased with himself. ‘We all did.’
Brunetti grinned and shrugged, downed his coffee and put a five-Euro note on the bar.
As the other man looked for change, he said, ‘You wanted to know about the Africans, didn’t you?’
‘Yes. I’m trying to find out who killed that man last week.’
‘That poor devil in Santo Stefano?’ the barman asked, as though he had Venice confused with some more wildly violent place, where it was necessary to specify the location of a recent murder.
‘Yes.’
‘Lot of people want to know about them, it seems,’ the barman said, making himself sound like someone in a film who expected the detective to do a double-take.
Much as he would have liked to please him, Brunetti said only, ‘Such as?’
‘There was a man in here asking about them a couple of days before he was killed.’
‘But you didn’t tell me about this then.’
‘You didn’t ask,’ the barman said, ‘and you didn’t say you were a cop.’
Brunetti nodded to acknowledge the man’s point. ‘Would you tell me about him?’ he asked in a perfectly conversational voice.
‘He wasn’t from here,’ the barman began. ‘Let me ask,’ he said and turned to the card players. ‘Luca, that guy who asked about the vu cumprà? Where was he from, do you think?’ Then, before the other man answered, the barman added, nodding towards Brunetti, ‘No, not this one. The other one.’
‘Romano,’ the man named Luca called back, laying a card on the table.
Brunetti had forgotten to ask Bocchese if the report said where Paci was from. ‘What did he want to know?’
‘If any of them lived around here.’
‘What did you tell him?’
‘When I heard he wasn’t from here, I told him that none of them did and they wouldn’t try to, not if they knew what was good for them.’ In answer to Brunetti’s unspoken question, he added, ‘I figured that would convince him we didn’t want them here. Besides, the ones who came in here were always polite and quiet, paid for their coffee, said thank you. No reason to tell some stranger where they were.’
‘But you’re telling me.’
‘You’re not a stranger.’
‘Because I’m Venetian?’
‘No, because I asked Filippo about you, and he said you’re all right.’
‘Can you describe this man?’
‘Big. Little taller than you, but bigger, probably ten kilos heavier. Big head.’ He stopped.
‘Anything else you remember about him?’ Brunetti asked, wondering if there were some way Signorina Elettra could get into the personnel file of a deceased employee of the DIGOS.
‘No, just that he was big.’
From the card players, a voice called out, ‘Tell him about the guy’s hands, Giorgio.’
‘Yes, I forgot. Strange. The guy had hands just like a monkey’s, all covered with hair.’
24
And then it was Christmas. As it happened every year, most people added Christmas Eve and the day after Santo Stefano to their holiday, to make a long bridge of the weekend, so there was a period of five days when nothing much got done, not only at the Questura, but in most of the country. The only activity, it seemed, was in the shops, which were open longer than usual, attempting to lure customers into that year-end buying frenzy which statisticians employed to make the economy look better than it was.
Brunetti got through it all: the last purchases of gifts, the visits and the toasts, the endless dinners, gift-giving and receiving, more dinners. He had with Paola’s family, and when he managed to have a word alone with his father-in-law, the Count told him that he had asked certain friends to let him know if they came to learn of anything relating to the death of the African in Venice or perhaps of any connection there might be between his death and an attempt to buy arms. After five days, all Brunetti had to show was a new green sweater from Paola, a lifetime membership in a badger protection society from Chiara, from Raffi a parallel text edition of Pliny’s letters, and the conviction that he would be more comfortable if he had the shoemaker cut another hole in his belt.
When he returned to the Questura, he found the general mood oppressive, as if everyone there were suffering the after-effects, both physical and moral, of prolonged overeating. Further, someone appeared to have forgotten to turn the heating down while the offices were closed, and the rising temperature had sunk into the walls, which were warm to the touch. The first day back was bright and unseasonably warm, so opening the windows helped very little: the heat seeped from the walls, and people had no choice but to work in their shirtsleeves.
There were the usual reports of break-ins and burglaries from people returning from vacations; these kept the crime squads in and out all day. It soon began to appear that there had been two gangs at work: professionals who went after only the most expensive pieces, and what must have been drug addicts, who took only the quickly resaleable. The rich suffered most at the hands of the first gang; the less wealthy suffered at the hands of the other. Two bizarre reports at least relieved Brunetti’s mood: the professionals had offended an ageing film star who lived on the Giudecca by going through her house and scorning her paste jewellery, leaving her home without taking anything, while the addicts had walked past a de Chirico and a Klimt as they left an apartment carrying a five-year-old laptop and a portable CD player.
Because it was soon to be a new year, time for resolute behaviour, Brunetti went downstairs after lunch and, seeing that Signorina Elettra was not at her desk, knocked at Patta’s door.
‘Avanti,’ Patta called out, and Brunetti entered.
‘Ah, Brunetti,’ he said, ‘I hope you had a happy Christmas and that it will be a successful new year.’
‘Thank you, sir,’ Brunetti answered, not a little taken aback, ‘and the same to you.’
‘Yes, let’s hope it will be,’ Patta said. He waved Brunetti to a chair and pushed himself back in his own. Brunetti, as he seated himself, glanced at his superior and was surprised to see that he had not brought his usual vacation tan back with him this year. Nor, he noticed, the usual supplement to his embonpoint. In fact, the collar of Patta’s shirt looked a bit loose, or else he had not knotted his tie tightly enough.
‘Did you have a pleasant vacation?’ Brunetti asked, hoping to get Patta to talk and thus provide him with more opportunity to observe his superior’s state of being.
‘No, we decided not to go away this season,’ Patta said, then hastened to explain, as though such dereliction of consumption needed an excuse, ‘Both of the boys were home, so we decided to enjoy the time with them.’
‘I see,’ Brunetti said. Having met Patta’s sons, Brunetti was doubtful as to the joy to be had from their company, but still he added, ‘That must have made your wife happy.’
‘Yes, yes,’ Patta said and adjusted one of his cufflinks. ‘What can I do for you, Brunetti?’
‘I’d like to know if we should think about clearing up some of last year’s cases, sir,’ he began. As a ruse, it was pathetically transparent, but Brunetti was dulled by the heat and could think of nothing better.
Patta looked at him for a long time before saying, ‘It’s not like you to think so much like a bookkeeper, Brunetti. Cases sometimes do run over from year to year.’
Brunetti stopped himself from saying that most criminal cases ran over far longer than that and contented himself with answering, ‘I’d still like to see if we could get some of the outstanding cases settled.’
‘That’s not going to be so easy,’ Patta said, ‘not now, while we’re short-staffed.’
‘Are we, sir?’ Brunetti asked. This was news to him.
‘Lieutenant Scarpa,’ Patta explained. ‘He’ll be away until the end of January, and there’s no one to cover his workload while he’s away.’
‘I see, sir,’ Brunetti said, thinking it better not to ask. ‘But we should still try to settle some things,’ he insisted.
‘For instance?’ Patta answered, leaning the least bit forward.
There was no sense in flirting with it or flirting with Patta. ‘The murder in Campo Santo Stefano. It’s the only outstanding murder case we have.’
‘It’s not,’ Patta said instantly.
‘What?’ Brunetti asked shortly, then thought to add, ‘sir.’
‘It’s not our case, Brunetti, as I made clear to you. The case has been handed over to the Ministry of the Interior for investigation.’
‘With no explanation?’
‘I am not in the habit of questioning the decisions of my superiors,’ Patta said. Only with difficulty did Brunetti prevent himself from gasping outright or from making a sarcastic response.
Forcing himself to remain calm, he said, ‘I’m hardly questioning their decisions, sir. But I would like to know if the case has been solved. If so, we can close it here.’
‘That’s already been done, Commissario,’ Patta said calmly.
‘Closed?’
‘Closed. All copies of documents have been forwarded to the Ministry of the Interior.’
‘And the records on the computer?’ Brunetti asked, immediately regretting it.
‘They have been forwarded, as well.’
‘Vice-Questore,’ Brunetti said with a voice he forced to remain amiable and calm, ‘I don’t know much about computers, but I do know that working with them is different from working with actual pieces of paper. When something like an email is forwarded, the original remains on the computer.’
Patta smiled, as if to compliment and applaud this very bright student. ‘That corresponds with my own understanding of the process, Commissario.’
‘But is it the case here?’
‘I beg your pardon?’
‘Are the originals of the documents still on our computer?’
‘Ah, I don’t think I can answer that for you, Commissario.’
‘Who could?’
‘The computer people from the Ministry who were in here during the holidays. They came here on the order of the Minister.’ The heat. The heat. He should have known.
Brunetti could think of nothing to say. He got to his feet, asked if he should start interviewing the people whose homes had been robbed, and when Patta said he thought that would be an excellent use of his time, Brunetti excused himself and left the office.
Signorina Elettra was at her desk. She looked up at Brunetti, saw his expression, and stopped herself from saying whatever it was she was about to say.
Speaking in a conspiratorially low voice, Brunetti said, ‘The Vice-Questore just told me that some people, computer people, from the Ministry of the Interior were in here during the vacation. He said that they were,’ he continued, emphasis on the next word, ‘forwarding the files about the murder of the man in Campo Santo Stefano to their office, which is now in charge of the case.’ As he said the last phrase, he realized how close he was to losing control even of this soft voice he was using. He forced himself to relax and said, ‘Could you have a look?’
She pulled her lips tight, something she did when stressed or angry. ‘I’ve already done that, sir. In fact, that’s what I wanted to tell you, just now. It’s all gone.’ He had to lean forward to hear her.
‘All? Aren’t there things like backup and. . other things?’ he asked.
‘There are. And they’re all gone from there, too. It’s been wiped clean.’
‘Is that possible? I thought you were. .’ He didn’t know the words to express what he thought she was.