‘Perhaps if we might use the Maestro’s study,’ he said, but the widow was unrelenting and refused to turn back from the window. He went and stood at the door, gesturing for the maid to pass through before him. He followed her down the corridor to the now familiar study. Inside, he closed the door and motioned to a chair. She took her seat, and he went back to the chair he had sat in when he examined the papers.
She was in her mid-fifties, and she wore a dark dress that could be a sign of either her employment or her grief. The midcalf length was unfashionable, and the cut emphasized the angularity of her body, the narrowness of her shoulders, the flatness of her chest. Her face matched her body perfectly, the eyes a bit too narrow and the nose more than a little too long. She reminded him, as she sat upright on the edge of the chair, of one of the long- legged, long-necked sea birds that perched on the pilings of the canals.
‘I’d like to ask you a few questions, Signora Breddes.’
‘Signorina,’ she corrected automatically.
‘I hope there will be no trouble if we speak in Italian,’ he said.
‘Of course not. I’ve lived here for ten years.’ She said it in a way to suggest she was offended by his remark.
‘How long did you work for the Maestro, Signorina?’
‘Twenty years. Ten in Germany, and now ten years here. When the Maestro bought the apartment here, he asked me to come and take care of it. I agreed. I would have gone anywhere for the Maestro.’ From the way she spoke, Brunetti realized that she saw having to live in a ten-room apartment in Venice as a sort of suffering she would be willing to endure only because of her devotion to her employer.
‘Do you have charge of the house?’
‘Yes. I’ve been here since shortly after he bought it. He came down and gave instructions about the furniture and the painting. I was in charge of getting it organized and then of seeing that it was taken care of while he was away.’
‘And while he was here?’
‘Yes; that too.’
‘How often did he come to Venice?’
‘Two or three times a year. Seldom more than that.’
‘Did he come to work? To conduct?’
‘Sometimes. But he also came to visit friends, go to the Biennale.’ She managed to make all this sound like so much earthly vanity.
‘And while he was here, what were your responsibilities?’
‘I did the cooking, though there was an Italian cook who would come in for parties. I chose the flowers. I oversaw the work of the maids. They’re Italian.’ This, he assumed, explained the need for the overseeing.
‘Who did the shopping for the house? Food? Wine?’
‘While the Maestro was here, I planned the meals and sent the maids to Rialto every morning to get fresh vegetables.’
Brunetti thought she might be ready, now, to begin answering the real questions. ‘So the Maestro got married while you were working for him?’
‘Yes.’
‘Did this cause any changes? When he came to Venice, that is.’
‘I don’t know what you mean,’ she said, though it was clear she did.
‘In the running of the house. Were your duties any different after the Maestro was married?’
‘No. Sometimes the signora cooked, but not often.’
‘Anything else?’
‘No.’
‘Did the presence of the signora’s daughter cause you any problems?’
‘No. She ate a lot of fruit. But she was no trouble.’
‘I see, I see,’ Brunetti said, taking a piece of paper from his pocket and idly sketching some words on it. ‘Tell me, Signorina Breddes, during these last weeks that the Maestro was here, did you notice anything, well, anything different about his behavior, anything that struck you as peculiar?’
She remained silent, hands clasped on her lap. Finally, she said, ‘I don’t understand.’
‘Did he seem strange to you in any way?’ Silence. ‘Well, if not strange in any way’—and he smiled, asking her to understand how difficult this was for him—’unusual in any way, out of the ordinary.’ When she still said nothing, he added, ‘I’m sure you would have noticed anything out of the ordinary, since you had known the Maestro so long and were certainly more familiar with him than anyone else in the house.’ It was a blatant sop to her vanity, but that didn’t mean it might not work.
‘Do you mean with his work?’
‘Well,’ he began, and flashed her a smile of complicity, ‘it could have been with his work, but it could have been with anything, perhaps something personal, something that had nothing to do with his career or with his music. As I said, I’m sure your long familiarity with the Maestro would have made you particularly sensitive to anything like this.’
Watching as the bait floated toward her, he flicked at the line to bring it even closer. ‘Since you had known him for so long, you would have noticed things that others would have overlooked.’
