the table, then went back to the counter and got himself a bottle of red wine and a glass. He popped an olive into his mouth, poured a glass of wine, then spat the pit into his cupped hand. He looked around for a place to put it while he ate another. And another. Finally, he tossed them into the garbage bag under the sink.
He cut two slices of bread, put some salami between them, and poured a glass of wine. On the table was that week’s issue of
Chewing, he walked slowly into the living room, hoping that the ringing would stop before he got there. On the seventh ring, he picked it up and said his name.
‘Hello. This is Brett,’ she said quickly. ‘I’m sorry to call you at home, but I’d like to talk to you. If that’s possible.’
‘Is it something important?’ he asked, knowing it had to be for her to call but hoping, nevertheless, that it was not.
‘Yes. It’s Flavia.’ He knew that too. ‘She’s had a letter from his lawyer.’ There was no need to ask her whose lawyer. ‘And we talked about the argument she had with him.’ This would have to be Wellauer. Brunetti knew he should volunteer to meet her, but he lacked the will to do it.
‘Guido, are you there?’ He heard the tension in her voice, even as he heard her struggle to keep it calm.
‘Yes. Where are you?’
‘I’m at home. But I can’t see you here.’ Her voice caught at that, and he suddenly wanted to talk to her.
‘Brett, listen to me. Do you know the Giro bar, the one just near Santa Marina?’
‘Yes.’
‘I’ll meet you there in fifteen minutes.’
‘Thank you, Guido.’
‘Fifteen minutes,’ he repeated, and hung up. He scribbled a note for Paola, saying he had to go out, and ate the rest of his sandwich as he went down the steps.
Giro’s was a smoky, dismal place, one of the few bars in the city that stayed open after ten at night. The management had changed hands a few months before, and the new owners had done their best to tart the place up, adding white curtains and slick music. But it had failed to become a hip pub, while ceasing to be a local bar where friends met for a coffee or a drink. It had neither class nor charm, only overpriced wine and too much smoke.
He saw her when he walked in, sitting at a table in the rear, looking at the door and being looked at in her turn by the three or four young men who stood at the bar, drinking small glasses of red wine and talking in voices that were meant to float back and impress her. He felt their eyes on him as he made his way to her table. The warmth of her smile made him glad he had come.
‘Thank you,’ she said simply.
‘Tell me about the letter.’
She looked at the table, where her hands lay, palms down, and she kept them there while she spoke to him. ‘It’s from a lawyer in Milan, the same one who fought the divorce. He says that he has received information that Flavia is leading “an immoral and unnatural life”—those were the words. She showed me the letter. “An immoral and unnatural life.”‘ She looked up at him and tried to smile. ‘I guess that’s me, eh?’ She brought one hand up, embracing emptiness. ‘I don’t believe it,’ she said, shaking her head from side to side. ‘He said that they were going to file a suit against her and ask . . . they would demand that the children be returned to the custody of their father. This was an official notice of their intention.’ She stopped and covered her eyes with one hand. ‘They’re officially giving us notice.’ She moved her hand to her mouth and covered it, as though keeping the words inside. ‘No, not us, just Flavia. Only her—that they’re going to reinstitute proceedings.’
Brunetti sensed the arrival of a waiter and waved him back with an angry hand. When the man had retreated out of hearing, he asked, ‘What else?’ She tried; he could see that she tried to push the words out, but she couldn’t do it. She looked up and gave him a nervous grin, just the sort Chiara produced when she had done something wrong and had to tell him about it.
She muttered something, lowered her head.
‘What, Brett? I didn’t hear.’
She looked at the top of the table. ‘Had to tell someone. No one else.’
‘No one else?’ She had spent much of her life in this city, and there was no one she could tell this to, only the policeman whose job it was to find out if she loved a murderess?
‘No one?’
‘I’ve told no one about Flavia,’ she said, meeting his glance this time. ‘She said she wanted no gossip, that it could damage her career. I’ve never told anyone about her. About us.’ He remembered, in that instant, Padovani’s telling the tale of Paola’s first blush of love for him, of the way she carried on, telling all her friends, talking of nothing else. The world had permitted her not only joy but public joy. And this woman had been in love, there was no question of that, for three years and had told no one. Except him. The policeman.
‘Was your name mentioned in the letter?’
She shook her head.
‘What about Flavia? What did she say?’
Biting her lips, she lifted one hand and pointed it at her heart.
‘She blames you?’
Just like Chiara, she nodded and then dragged the back of her hand under her nose. It came away wet and gleaming. He pulled out his handkerchief and handed it to her. She took it, but seeming not to have any idea what she was supposed to do with it, she sat with it in her hand, tears running down her face, nose dripping. Feeling not a little foolish but remembering that, after all, he was someone’s father, he took the handkerchief and patted at her
