Zen paused.
‘I take it I may speak openly?’
‘Oh, please! You take me for a fool? That’s why I am calling you. Our tracer identified the number from which you rang earlier. I’m speaking from a secure line. But I haven’t got all day, Zen. For the second time, what do you want?’
The square was still deserted, but Zen brought the receiver close to his mouth and lowered his voice.
‘It’s question of access to a police file, onorevole.’
There was a brief silence.
‘I’d have thought that was one of the few areas in which you were better qualified to act than I.’
‘This particular file has been sealed.’
‘Why?’
‘That’s one of the things I want to find out. It concerns the disappearance of an American called Ivan Durridge.’
There was a long silence. Zen eyed the circling flock of plastic flakes and said nothing.
‘I seem to recall the affair vaguely,’ l’onorevole said at last. ‘What is your interest in it?’
Zen knew better than to try and conceal the truth from this man.
‘Private enterprise,’ he replied promptly. ‘I’ve been retained by the family to look into it, but first of all I need to know why the case was closed. I can’t afford to step on anyone’s toes.’
There was a dry laugh the other end.
‘Neither can I.’
Another silence.
‘I’ll have to see what other interests are involved,’ the voice replied at length. ‘I’ll ask around. Assuming I get a nihil obstat from my sources, how do you want the material delivered?’
Zen caught a glimpse of movement out of the corner of his eye. He looked round. A young man in overalls passed by carrying four wooden chairs, their legs interlocked, on his shoulders.
‘I’ll get in touch later today and leave details with your staff. Thank you very much for granting me this much of your valuable time, onorevole. I can’t tell you how I appreciate it.’
At the other end there was nothing but the static-corroded silence, but it was some time before Zen replaced the receiver and turned away.
Back in the osteria, Tommaso was sitting alone at a table facing the door. He stood up and waved as Zen came in, then called to the barman to bring a flask of wine.
‘I was beginning to think I’d imagined the whole thing,’ he exclaimed, clasping Zen’s shoulder and arm as though to prove that it was not in fact an apparition. ‘How long has it been now? And then not even to let me know you’re here! Honestly, Aurelio, I’m offended.’
‘I only arrived this morning, Tommaso. And I was just about to contact you, as it happens.’
He pinched his friend’s cheek and gave one of his rare unconstrained smiles. Tommaso Saoner looked exactly the same as he had for as long as Zen could remember: the perpetual dark stubble, the stolid, graceless features, the glasses with rectangular lenses and thick black rims through which he peered out at the world as though through a television set.
‘Your health, Aurelio!’ cried Tommaso, pouring their wine.
‘And yours.’
They drained off their glasses.
‘Where’s your companion?’ asked Zen.
Tommaso’s expression grew serious.
‘Ferdinando? He had to go.’
‘Ferdinando Dal Maschio?’
Tommaso beamed in delight.
‘You’ve heard of him? The movement is growing in numbers and importance every day, of course, but I had no idea that they were talking about us in Rome already!’
Zen produced his cigarettes, then looked round guiltily.
‘Is it all right to smoke here?’
Tommaso frowned.
‘Why ever not?’
‘I was told this morning that the council had set aside non-smoking areas in all public places.’
Tommaso burst out laughing.
‘Oh, for heaven’s sake! That’s just for the tourists. There’s no such nonsense in genuine Venetian bars like this, where real Venetians go to drink good Veneto wine. Anyway, that bunch of crooks and incompetents on the council will be out on their collective ears in a couple of weeks, once the people get a chance to express their contempt for them. And as soon as we get in we’ll repeal all their stupid by-laws.’
Zen offered his friend a cigarette.
‘“We”?’ he queried.
Tommaso declined the cigarette with a waggle of his finger.
‘I mean the movement. Nuova Repubblica Veneta. What are they saying about us in Rome?’
Zen lit his cigarette, gazing at Saoner.
‘I have no idea.’
‘But you said…’
‘I’ve heard about Dal Maschio, but not in Rome. It was here. From his wife, Cristiana Morosini. Her mother is a neighbour of ours.’
Tommaso’s elation vanished as quickly as it had appeared.
‘Don’t take any notice of what she told you,’ he retorted. ‘It’s all a load of scurrilous nonsense. Believe me, the things Ferdinando has had to put up from that whore, she’s lucky he didn’t leave long ago — and give her a damn good thrashing first!’
Zen considered his friend through a cloud of smoke.
‘No doubt he deemed that such a course would have been politically inadvisable.’
Missing the irony in Zen’s voice, Tommaso merely nodded earnestly.
‘But she deserved it, believe you me. Most women would be proud to have a husband who has single- handedly transformed politics in the Veneto, broken the mould and offered a new and inspiring vision of a twenty- first century Venice, independent and revitalized!’
Tommaso’s eyes were shining with enthusiasm. Zen poured them both more of the light, prickly wine.
‘But not Cristiana,’ Saoner went on bitterly. ‘Instead, she did everything possible to undermine him, first ridiculing him to his face and in public, and then cuckolding him with a reporter from the mainland. Is it any wonder he sought solace in the arms of some of his admirers?’
He tossed off his wine and made a visible effort to change the subject.
‘Anyway, that’s enough politics. What happy wind brings you home, Aurelio?’
Zen emitted a self-pitying sigh.
‘Mamma heard from Rosalba that Ada Zulian had been complaining about some sort of harassment. It’s all in her head, of course, but to my mother Ada is still la contessa and nothing would do but I had to put in for a temporary transfer and come up to look into it personally.’
As he retailed this latest pack of lies, Zen marvelled at the way his cover story was changing and developing, growing ever more detailed and plausible with every telling. If he wasn’t careful, he would start believing it himself pretty soon.
Tommaso nodded seriously.
‘Funnily enough, we were discussing the Zulian family at a meeting just the other day. The contessa has been under a lot of pressure to sell that old factory they own, but like a true Venetian she’s refused. “Chi vende, scende.” The question we were discussing is what use to put such sites to when we come to power. Ferdinando used the Zulian case as an example. An international consortium has reportedly offered a fortune to turn the Sant’Alvise site into a hotel complex. That’s out of the question, of course, but the problem we face is whether to develop such vacant land for housing or for light industry. Ferdinando’s view is that…’
As Tommaso Saoner launched into a detailed analysis of the issue, Zen nodded and tried not to yawn. He
