A Noble Radiance (23 page)
Authors: Donna Leon
'I've told them that,'
Patta said, but when he caught Brunetti's look of sharp surprise, added, ‘I
knew you wouldn't want to be taken away from this Lorenzoni thing, not after
having just reopened it.'
'And so?' Brunetti
asked. 'And so I suggested that they choose someone else.'
'Someone with broader
experience?' 'Yes.'
'Who?' Brunetti asked
bluntly.
'Myself, of course,'
Patta said, tone level and in the instructional mode, as if giving the boiling
point of water.
Brunetti, though it
was true that he wanted no part of a television programme, found himself
unaccountably enraged by Patta's blithe assumption that he could take it for
himself, just like that.
'It was TelePadova,
wasn't it?' Brunetti asked.
'Yes. Whaf s that got
to do with anything?' Patta asked. Television was television to the
Vice-Questore.
Caught in the grip of
sheer perversity, Brunetti answered, Then perhaps they'll be aiming the programme
at an audience in the Veneto, and they might like someone local. You know, sir,
someone who speaks dialect or at least sounds like he's from the Veneto’
All warmth
disappeared from Patta's voice or manner. 'I don't see what difference that
makes. Crime is a national problem and one that must be treated nationally, not
divided up province by province, as you seem to think it should be’ His eyes
narrowed and he asked, 'You aren't a member of this Lega Nord, are you?'
Brunetti, who wasn't,
didn't believe that Patta had any right either to ask the question or get an
answer to it. 'I didn't realize you'd called me in to have a political
discussion, sir’
It was with evident
difficulty that Patta, the bright prize of a television appearance dancing
before his eyes, reined in his anger. 'No, but I mention it to you to point
out the dangers of that sort of thinking.' He straightened a folder on the top
of his desk and asked, voice as calm as if the subject was just being
introduced, 'Now, what are we going to do about this television thing?'
Brunetti, ever open
to the seduction of language, was enchanted with Patta's use of the plural, as
well as with his dismissal of the programme as a 'television thing'. He must
want it desperately, Brunetti realized.
'When they call you,
just tell them that I'm not interested’
'And then what?'
Patta asked, waiting to see what Brunetti was going to ask in exchange for
this.
"Then make any
suggestion you please, sir.' Patta's expression made it clear that he didn't
believe a word of what Brunetti was saying. In the past, he'd had ample proof
of his subordinate's instability: he'd once referred to a Canaletto his wife
had hanging in the kitchen; Brunetti had himself turned down a promotion to
work directly for the Minister of the interior in Rome, and now this, proof of
sovereign madness if ever Patta had seen it: the flat rejection of a chance to
appear on television.
'Very well. If that's
the way you feel about it, Brunetti, I'll tell them.' As was his habit, Patta
moved some papers around on the surface of his desk, thus giving evidence of
his labours. 'Now, what's happening with the Lorenzonis?'
'I've spoken to the
nephew and to some people who know him’
'Why?' Patta asked
with real surprise.
'Because he's become
the heir’ Brunetti didn't know this to be true, but in the absence of any other
male Lorenzoni, he believed it a safe assumption.
'Are you suggesting
he's responsible for his own cousin's murder?' Patta asked.
'No, sir. I'm
suggesting he's the one person who appears to have profited the most from his
cousin's death, and so I think he bears examination.'
Patta said nothing to
this, and Brunetti wondered if he were busy contemplating the interesting new
theory that personal profit might serve as a motive for crime to see if it
might be helpful in police work.
'What else?'
'Very little,'
Brunetti answered. 'There are a few other people I want to talk to, and then
I'd like to speak to his parents again’
'Roberto's?' Patta
asked.
Brunetti bit back the
temptation to answer that Maurizio's parents, one dead and one absent, would be
difficult to speak to. 'Yes.'
‘You realize who he
is, of course?' Patta asked.
'Lorenzoni?'
'Count Lorenzoni,'
Patta corrected automatically. Though the Italian government had done away
with titles of nobility decades ago, Patta was among those who would always
love a lord.
Brunetti let it pass.
‘I’d like to speak to him again. And to his wife.'
Patta started to
object, but then perhaps remembered TelePadova and so said only. Treat them
well.'
'Yes, sir,' Brunetti
said. He toyed for a moment with the idea of again bringing up Bonsuan's promotion
but said nothing and got to his feet. Patta returned his attention to the
papers on his desk and ignored Brunetti's departure.
Signorina Elettra was
still not at her desk, so Brunetti went down to the officers' room, looking for
Vianello. When he found the sergeant at his desk, Brunetti said, ‘I think it’s
time we talked to those boys who stole Roberto's car.'
Vianello smiled and
nodded towards some papers on his desk. Seeing the rigorously clear type of the
laser printer, Brunetti asked, 'Elettra?'
'No, sir. I thought
to call that girl who was going out with him - she complained about police
harassment and said she'd already given them to you, but I still asked -1 got
their names and then found the addresses.'
Brunetti pointed to
the paper, so different from the usual crabbed scrawl of Vianello's reports.
'She's teaching me
how to use the computer’ Vianello said with pride he made no attempt to disguise.
Brunetti picked up
the paper, holding it at arm's length to read the small print. 'Vianello, this
is two names and addresses. You need a computer to get this?'
'Sir, if you'll look
at the addresses, you'll see that one of them is in Genoa, doing his military
service. The computer got me that.'
'Oh’ Brunetti said
and looked more closely at the paper. 'And the other one?'
'He's here in Venice,
and I've already spoken to him’ Vianello said sulkily.
'Good work’ Brunetti
said, the only way he could think of to soothe Vianello's injured feelings.
'What did he say about the car? And about Roberto?'
Vianello looked up at
Brunetti; the sulks disappeared. 'Just what everyone's been saying. That he
was
unfiglio di papa
with too much money and too little to do. I asked him about
the car, and at first he denied it. But I told him there'd be no consequences,
that we just wanted to know about it. So he told me that Roberto asked them to
do it to get his father's attention. Well, Roberto didn't say that; it's what
the boy said. In fact, he sounded sort of sorry for him, for Roberto.'
When he saw Brunetti
start to speak, he clarified his remark. 'No, not that he's dead, or not only
that he's dead. It seemed to me like he was sorry that Roberto had to go to.
such lengths to get his father's attention, that he could be so lonely, so
lost.'
Brunetti grunted in
assent, and Vianello went on.
'They drove the car
to Verona and left it in a parking garage, then took the train home. Roberto
gave them the money for it all, even took them to dinner afterwards’
‘They were still
friends when he disappeared, weren't they?'
‘It seems so, though
this one - Niccolo Pertusi -1 know his uncle, who says he's a good boy - but
Niccolo said Roberto seemed like a different person the last few weeks before
it happened. Tired, no more jokes, always talking about how bad he felt, and
about the doctors he saw.'
'He was only
twenty-one,' Brunetti said.
'I know. Strange,
isn't it? I wonder if he was really sick.' Vianello laughed. 'My Aunt Lucia
would say it was a warning. Only she'd say it was’ and here Vianello added
creepy emphasis, '"A Warning"‘
'No,' Brunetti said.
'It sounds to me like he really was sick.'
Neither of them had
to say it Brunetti nodded and went up to his office to make the call-—
As usual, he lost ten
minutes in explaining to various secretaries and nurses just who he was and
what he wanted, then another five in assuring the specialist in Padova,
Doctor
Giovanni
Montini, that the information about Roberto Lorenzoni was necessary. More time
passed as the doctor had a nurse look for Roberto's file.
When he finally had
it, the doctor told Brunetti what he'd already heard so often he was beginning
to feel the same symptoms: lassitude, headache, and general malaise.
'And did you ever
determine what the cause was, ‘
Doctor?' Brunetti
asked. 'After all,
it’
s surely unusual for a man in the prime of youth to have
these symptoms?'
It could have been
depression’ the doctor suggested.
'Roberto Lorenzoni
didn't sound like a depressive type to me. Doctor,' Brunetti said.
'No, perhaps not’ the
doctor agreed. Brunetti could hear pages being turned. 'No, I've no idea what
might have been wrong,' the doctor finally said. 'The lab results might have
said.'
'Lab results?'
Brunetti asked.
‘Yes, he was a
private patient and could pay for them himself. I ordered a whole battery of
tests.' Brunetti could have asked if a patient with the same symptoms who was
on the public health rolls would have been left untested. Instead, he asked,
'"Might have said". Doctor?'
'Yes, I don't have
them here in the file’
'And why might that
be?' Brunetti asked.
'Since he never
called to make a follow-up
appointment,.
I suppose we never requested the
results from the lab.'
'Would it be possible
to do that now, Doctor?'
The doctor's
reluctance was audible. 'It’s quite irregular.'
'But do you think you
could get the results, Doctor?'
1 don't see any way
that could help.'
'Doctor, at this
point, any Information we have about the boy might help us find the people who
murdered him’ It had long been Brunetti's experience that, no matter how inured
people might have become to the word ‘death', all of them responded the same
way to the word 'murder'.
After a long pause,
the doctor asked, 'Isn't there some official way you can request them?'
'Yes, there is, but
it's a slow and complicated process. Doctor, you could save us a lot of time
and paperwork if you'd request them.'
'Well, I suppose so,'
Doctor Montini said, reluctance again audible.
Thank you, Doctor,'
Brunetti said and gave him the fax number of the Questura.
Having been finessed
into sending the fax, the doctor took the only revenge he could. 'By the end of
the week, then’ and hung up before Brunetti could say anything.
20
Remembering Patta's
admonition to treat the Lorenzonis well - whatever that meant - Brunetti called
the number of Maurizio's cellular and asked if he could speak to the family
that evening.
‘I don't know if my
aunt is able to see anyone’ Maurizio said, speaking over the noise of what
sounded like street traffic.
'Then I need to speak
to you and your uncle’ Brunetti said.
'We've already spoken
to you, spoken to all kinds of police, for about two years, and what’s it got
us?' the young man asked. The words, Brunetti realized, Came from the text of
sarcasm, but they were spoken in the tones of grief .
