‘Are you all right, Doctor?’ he asked, voice low, careful not to touch her or approach her in any way.
She nodded, and the look of whatever it was passed from her eyes. Abruptly she turned and headed back towards the door of the mortuary. A few feet from it, she stopped suddenly, looked around her as It’surprised to find herself where she was, and ran towards a sink that stood against the far wall. She was violently sick into it, retched repeatedly until she stood at the sink, arms braced to support herself, leaning down above it, panting.
The attendant suddenly appeared beside her and handed her a white cotton towel. She took it with a nod and wiped at her face with it. With strange gentleness, the man took her arm and led her to another sink a few metres down the same wall. He turned on the hot-water tap, then the cold, and placed his hand under the water until it reached a temperature suitable for him. When it did, he reached out and held the towel white Doctor Peters washed her face and rinsed her mouth with a handful of water, and then another. When she was done, he handed her the towel again, shut off both laps, and left the room by the door on the other side.
She folded the towel and draped it over the edge of the sink. Making her way back to Brunetti, she avoided looking to her left, where the body still lay on me gurney, covered now.
When she got near, he turned and led the way to the door, held it open for her as they passed into the warmer evening air. As they walked down under the long arcade, she said, ‘I’m sorry. I don’t know why that happened. I’ve certainly seen autopsies. I’ve even
If only to complete the formality, he asked, ‘Is that Sergeant Foster?’
‘Yes, it is,’ she answered with no hesitation, but he sensed that she was struggling to keep her voice calm and level. Even her walk was more rigid than it had been when they went in, as It’she had let the uniform take over and direct her motions.
When they passed through the gate of the cemetery, Brunetti led her over to where Monetti had moored the boat. He sat inside the cabin, reading his newspaper. When he saw them approach, he folded it and moved to the stern, where he pulled on the mooring rope to bring the boat close enough for them to be able to climb on board easily.
This time she stepped onto the boat and went immediately down the stairs into the cabin. Pausing only long enough to whisper to Monetti, ‘Take as much time as you can going back,’ he followed her down into the cabin.
She sat farther forward this time, turned to face out of the front windows. The sun had already set, and the afterglow provided very little light by which to see the skyline of the city, off to their left. He took his place opposite her, noticing how straight and stiff she sat.
‘There will be a lot of formalities, but I imagine we can release the body tomorrow.’
She nodded to acknowledge that she heard him.
‘What will the Army do?’
‘Excuse me?’ she said.
‘What will the Army do in a case like this?’ he repeated.
‘Well send the body home, to his family.’
‘No, I don’t mean about the body. I mean about the investigation.’
At that, she turned and looked him in the eyes. Her confusion, he believed, was feigned. ‘I don’t understand. What investigation?’
‘To find out why he was killed.’
‘But I thought it was robbery,’ She said, asking for confirmation of that belief.
‘It might have been,’ he said, ‘bat I doubt it.’
She looked away from him when he said that and stared out of the window, but the panorama of Venice had been swallowed by the night, and all she saw there was her own reflection.
‘I don’t know anything about that,’ she said, voice insistent.
To Brunetti, it sounded as It’she believed she could make this be true, if only she repeated it often and insistently enough. ‘What kind of man was he?’ he asked.
For a moment, she didn’t answer, but when she did, Brunetti found her answer strange, ‘Honest. He was an honest man.’ It was a strange thing to say about a man so young.
He waited to see It’she would say anything more. When she didn’t, he asked, ‘How well did you know him?’
He watched, not her face, but its reflection in the window of the boat. She was no longer crying, but a fixed sadness had settled on her features. She took a deep breath and answered, ‘I knew him very well.’ But then her voice changed, grew more casual and offhand. ‘We worked together for seven months.’ And that was all she said.
‘What sort of work did he do? Captain Duncan said he was the Public Health Inspector, but I’m not sure I have any idea what that means.’
She noticed that their eyes met in the window, so she turned to face him directly. ‘He had to inspect the apartments where we live. We Americans, that is. Or if there were any complaints about tenants by their landlords, he had to go and investigate them.’
‘Anything else?’
‘He had to go to the embassies serviced by our hospital. In Egypt, Poland, Yugoslavia, and inspect the kitchens, see that they were clean.’
‘So he travelled a lot?’
‘A fair amount, yes.’
‘Did he like his work?’
Without hesitation and with great emphasis, she said, ‘Yes, he did. He thought it was very important.’
‘And you were his superior officer?’
Her smile was very small. ‘You could say that, I suppose. I’m really a paediatrician; they just gave me the job in public health so that they’d have an officer’s signature, and a doctor’s, in the right places. Mike ran the office almost completely by himself. Occasionally, he’d give me something to sign, or he’d ask me to write a request for supplies. Things get done faster if an officer asks for them.’
‘Did you ever go on any of these trips, these trips to the embassies, together?’
It’she found that a strange question, he had no way of telling, for she turned away from him and again stared out of the window. ‘No, Mike always went alone.’ Without warning, she stood and went towards the steps at the back of the cabin. ‘Does your driver, or whatever he is, know the way? It seems like it’s taking us an awful long time to get back.’ She pushed open one of the doors and looked carefully to either side of them, but the buildings that lined the canal were anonymous to her.
‘Yes, it takes longer to get back,’ Brunetti lied easily. ‘Many of the canals are one way, so we have to go all the way around the station to get to Piazzale Roma.’ He saw that they were just entering the Canale di Cannaregio. In five minutes, perhaps less, they would be there.
She pushed her way outside and stood on deck. A sudden gust of wind pulled at her cap, and she crushed it to her head with one hand, then removed it and held it at her side. With its stiffness removed, she was revealed as more than pretty.
He came up the steps and stood beside her. They made the right turn into the Grand Canal. ‘It’s very beautiful,’ she said. Then, changing her tone, she asked, ‘Why do you speak English so well?’
‘I studied it in school, and at the university, and I spent some time in the States.’
‘You speak it very well.’
‘Thank you. Do you speak Italian?’
Ahead of them he saw the moorings of Piazzale Roma. He stepped in front of her and grabbed the mooring rope to hold it ready while Monetti pulled up next to the piling. He flipped it over the top of the pole and tied it in an expert knot. Monetti cut the engine and Brunetti jumped to the dock. She took his hand with easy familiarity and followed him from the boat. Together, they went towards the car that was still parked in front of the Carabinieri station.
The driver, when he saw her approaching, scrambled out of the front seat, saluted, and opened the back door of the car. She pulled the skirt of her uniform under her and slipped into the back seat. Brunetti put out a restraining
