those shoes, Signor Gravi?’
‘Yes, I sold a pair of them, about a month ago. To a man.’ He paused here, waiting for the policemen to remark on how strange it was that a man would buy those shoes.
‘A man?’ Brunetti asked obligingly.
‘Yes, he said he wanted them for Carnevale. But Carnevale isn’t until next year. I thought it strange at the time, but I wanted to sell the shoes because the satin was torn away from the heel on one of them. The left one, I think. Anyway, they were on sale, and he bought them. Fifty-nine thousand lire, reduced from a hundred twenty. Really a bargain.’
‘I’m sure it was, Signor Gravi,’ Brunetti agreed. ‘Do you think you’d recognize the shoes if you saw them again?’
‘I think so. I wrote the sale price on the sole of one of them. It might be there.’
Turning to Vianello, Brunetti said, ‘Sergeant, could you go and get those shoes back from the lab for me? I’d like Signor Gravi to take a look at them.’
Vianello nodded and left the room. While he was gone, Gravi talked about his vacation, describing how clean the water in the Adriatic was, so long as you went far enough south. Brunetti listened, smiling when he thought it required, keeping himself from asking Gravi to describe the man who bought the shoes until Gravi had identified them.
A few minutes later, Vianello was back, carrying the shoes in their clear plastic evidence bag. He handed the bag to Gravi, who made no attempt to open it. He moved the shoes around inside the bag, turning first one and then the other upside-down and peering at the sole. He held them closer, smiled, and held the bag out to Brunetti. ‘See, there it is. The sale price. I wrote it in pencil so whoever bought it could erase it if they wanted to. But you can still see it, right there.’ He pointed to faint pencil markings on the sole.
At last Brunetti permitted himself the question. ‘Could you describe the man who bought these shoes, Signor Gravi?’
Gravi paused for only a moment and then asked, voice respectful in the face of authority, ‘Commissario, could you tell me why you’re interested in this man?’
‘We believe he can provide us with important information about an on-going investigation,’ Brunetti answered, telling him nothing.
‘Yes, I see,’ Gravi answered. Like all Italians, he was accustomed not to understand what he was told by the authorities. ‘Younger than you, I’d say, but not all that much. Dark hair. No moustache.’ Perhaps it was hearing himself say it that made Gravi realize how vague his description was. ‘I’d say he looked pretty much like anyone else, a man in a suit. Not very tall and not short, either.’
‘Would you be willing to look at some photos, Signor Gravi?’ Brunetti asked. ‘Perhaps that would help you recognize the man?’
Gravi smiled broadly, relieved to find it all so much like television. ‘Of course.’
Brunetti nodded to Vianello, who went downstairs and was quickly back with two folders of police photos, among which, Brunetti knew, was Malfatti’s.
Gravi accepted the first folder from Vianello and laid it on top of Brunetti’s desk. One by one, he leafed through the photos, placing them face down on a separate pile after he looked at them. As Vianello and Brunetti watched, he placed Malfatti’s picture face down with the others and continued until he reached the bottom of the pile. He looked up. ‘He’s not here, not even someone who looks vaguely like him.’
‘Perhaps you could give us a clearer idea of what he looked like, Signore.’
‘I told you, Commissario, a man in a suit. All these men,’ he said, pointing to the pile of photos that lay before him, ‘well, they all look like criminals.’ Vianello stole a look at Brunetti. There had been three photos of police officers mixed in with the others, one of them of Officer Alvise. ‘I told you, he wore a suit,’ Gravi repeated. ‘He looked like one of us. You know, someone who goes to work every day. In an office. And he spoke like an educated man, not a criminal.’
The political naivety of that remark caused Brunetti to wonder, for a moment, if Signor Gravi was really an Italian. He nodded to Vianello, who picked up the second folder from where he had set it on the desk and handed it to Gravi.
As the two policemen watched, Gravi leafed through a smaller stack of photos. When he got to Ravanello’s, he paused and looked up at Brunetti. ‘That’s the banker who was killed yesterday, isn’t it?’ he asked, pointing down at the photo.
‘He’s not the man who bought the shoes, Signor Gravi?’ he asked.
‘No, of course not,’ Gravi answered. ‘If it had been, I would have told you when I came in.’ He looked at the photo again, a studio portrait that had appeared in a brochure which carried photos of all of the officers of the bank. ‘It’s not the man, but it’s the type.’
‘The type, Signor Gravi?’
‘You know, suit and tie and polished shoes. Clean white shirt, good haircut. A real banker.’
For an instant, Brunetti was seven years old, kneeling beside his mother in front of the main altar of Santa Maria Formosa, their parish church. His mother looked up at the altar, crossed herself, and said, voice palpitant with pleading and belief, ‘Maria, Mother of God, for the love of your Son who gave His life for all of us unworthy sinners, grant me this one request, and I will never ask a special grace of you in prayer for as long as I may live.’ It was a promise he was to hear repeated countless times in his youth, for, like all Venetians, Signora Brunetti always placed her trust in the influence of friends in high places. Not for the first time in his life, Brunetti regretted his own lack of faith, but still he prayed.
He returned his attention to Gravi. ‘Unfortunately, I don’t have a photo of the other man who might have bought these shoes from you, but if you could come with me, perhaps you could help us by taking a look at him in the place where he works.’
‘You mean literally take part in the investigation?’ Gravi’s enthusiasm was childlike.
‘Yes, if you’d be willing.’
‘Certainly, Commissario. I’d be glad to help you in any way I can.’
Brunetti stood, and Gravi jumped to his feet. As they walked towards the centre of the city, Brunetti explained to Gravi what he wanted him to do. Gravi asked no questions, content only to do as told, a good citizen helping the police in their investigation of a serious crime.
When they got to Campo San Luca, Brunetti pointed out the doorway that led up to Santomauro’s office and suggested to Signor Gravi that he have a drink in Rosa Salva and allow Brunetti five minutes before he came upstairs.
Brunetti went up the now familiar stairway and knocked on the door to the office. ’
When she looked up from her computer and saw who it was, she couldn’t resist the impulse that brought her half-way out of her chair. ‘I’m sorry, Signorina,’ Brunetti said, putting both hands up in what he hoped was an innocent gesture. ‘I’d like to speak to Avvocato Santomauro. It’s official police business.’
She seemed not to hear him, looked at him with her mouth open in a widening O, either of surprise or fear, Brunetti had no idea which. Very slowly, she reached forward and pressed a button on her desk, keeping her finger on it and getting to her feet but staying safely behind her desk. She stood there, finger still on the button, staring at Brunetti, silent.
A few seconds later, the door was pulled open from inside, and Santomauro came into the outer office. He saw his secretary, silent and still as Lot’s wife, then saw Brunetti by the door.
His rage was immediate and fulminant. ‘What are you doing here? I called the Vice-Questore and told him to keep you away from me. Get out, get out of my office.’ At the sound of his voice, the secretary backed away from her desk and stood against the wall. ‘Get out,’ Santomauro said again, almost shouting now. ‘I will not be subjected to this sort of persecution. I’ll have you…’ he began but stopped as another man came into the office behind Brunetti, a man he didn’t recognize, a short man in a cheap cotton suit.
‘The two of you, get back to the Questura where you came from,’ Santomauro shouted.
‘Do you recognize this man, Signor Gravi?’ Brunetti asked.
‘Yes, I do.’
Santomauro stopped at this, though he still didn’t recognize the little man in the cheap suit.
‘Could you tell me who he is, Signor Gravi?’
