Viale Canova.
‘At first, I thought he was police. He had that look.’ Brunetti thought it better not to ask, but Canale explained, anyway. ‘You know, ties and suits and very eager that no one misunderstand what he was doing. He asked me, and I told him that I was. I still thought he was police. In fact, he never told me he wasn’t, let me go on thinking that he was.’
‘What else did he want to know, Signor Canale?’
‘He asked me about the apartment.’
‘The apartment?’
‘Yes, he wanted to know who paid the rent. I told him I did, and then he asked me how I paid it. I told him I deposited the rent in an account in the owner’s name at the bank, but then he told me not to lie, that he knew what was going on, so I had to tell him.’
‘What do you mean, “knew what was going on”?’
‘How I pay the rent.’
‘And how is that?’
‘I meet a man in a bar and I give him the money.’
‘How much?’
‘A million and a half. In cash.’
‘Who is he, this man?’
‘That’s exactly what he asked me. I told him he was just a man that I met every month, met at a bar. He calls me during the last week of the month and tells me where to meet him, and I do, and I give him a million and a half, and that’s that.’
‘No receipt?’ Brunetti asked.
Canale laughed outright at this. ‘Of course not. It’s all cash.’ And, consequently, they both knew it went unreported as income. And untaxed. It was a common enough dodge: enormous numbers of tenants probably did something similar to this.
‘But I do pay another rent,’ Canale added.
‘Yes?’ Brunetti asked.
‘One hundred and ten thousand lire.’
‘And where do you pay it?’
‘I deposit it in a bank account, but the receipt I get doesn’t have a name on it, so I don’t know whose account it is.’ ‘What bank?’ Brunetti asked, though he thought he knew.
‘Banca di Verona. It’s in-’
Brunetti cut him short. ‘I know where it is.’ Then he asked, ‘How big is your apartment?’
‘Four rooms.’
‘A million and a half seems a lot to pay.’
‘Yes, it is, but it includes other things,’ Canale said, then shifted about in his chair.
‘Such as?’
‘Well, I won’t be bothered.’
‘Bothered while you work?’ Brunetti asked.
‘Yes. And it’s hard for us to find a place to live. Once people know who we are and what we do, they want us out of the building. I was told that this wouldn’t happen while I lived there. And it hasn’t. Everyone in the building thinks I work on the railways: that’s why I work nights.’
‘Why do they think this?’
‘I don’t know. They just sort of all knew it when I moved in.’
‘How long have you lived there?’
‘Two years.’
‘And you’ve always paid your rent like this?’
‘Yes, since the beginning.’
‘How did you find this apartment?’
‘One of the girls on the street told me.’
Brunetti permitted himself a small smile. ‘Someone you’d call a girl or someone I’d call a girl, Signor Canale?’
‘Someone I’d call a girl.’
‘What’s his name?’ Brunetti asked.
‘No use my telling you. He died a year ago. Overdose.’
‘Do your other friends – colleagues – have similar arrangements?’
‘A few of us, but we’re the lucky ones.’
Brunetti considered this fact and its possible consequences for a minute. ‘Where do you change, Signor Canale?’
‘Change?’
‘Into your…’ Brunetti began and then paused, wondering what to call them. ‘Into your working clothes? If people think you work on the railways, that is.’
‘Oh, in a car, or behind the bushes. After a while, you get to be very fast at it; doesn’t take a minute.’
‘Did you tell all of this to Signor Mascari?’ Brunetti asked.
‘Well, some of it. He wanted to know about the rent. And he wanted to know the addresses of some of the others.’
‘Did you give them to him?’
‘Yes, I did. I told you, I thought he was police, so I told him.’
‘Did he ask you anything else?’
‘No, only about the addresses.’ Canale paused for a moment and then added, ‘Yes, he asked one more thing, but I think it was just sort of, you know, to show that he was interested in me. As a person, that is.’
‘What did he ask?’
‘He asked if my parents were alive.’
‘And what did you tell him?’
‘I told him the truth. They’re both dead. They died years ago.’
‘Where?’
‘In Sardinia. That’s where I’m from.’
‘Did he ask you anything else?’
‘No, nothing.’
‘What sort of reaction did he have to what you told him?’
‘I don’t understand what you mean,’ Canale said.
‘Did he seem surprised by anything you said? Upset? Were these the answers he was expecting to get?’
Canale thought for a moment and then answered, ‘At first, he seemed a little surprised, but then he kept asking me questions, as if he didn’t even have to think about them. As if he had a whole list of them ready.’
‘Did he say anything to you?’
‘No, he thanked me for the information I gave him. That was strange, you know, because I thought he was a cop, and usually cops aren’t very…’ He paused, hunting for the proper expression. ‘They don’t treat us very well.’
‘When did you remember who he was?’
‘I told you: when I saw his picture in the paper. A banker. He was a banker. Do you think that’s why he was so interested in the rents?’
‘I suppose it could be, Signor Canale. It’s certainly a possibility we will check.’
‘Good. I hope you can find the man who did it. He didn’t deserve to die. He was a very nice man. He treated me well, decently. The way you did.’
‘Thank you, Signor Canale. I wish only that my colleagues would do the same.’
‘That would be nice, wouldn’t it?’ Canale said with a winsome smile.
‘Signor Canale, could you give me a list of the same names and addresses you gave him? And, if you know it, when your friends moved into their apartments.’
‘Certainly,’ the young man said, and Brunetti passed a piece of paper and a pen across the desk to him. He bent
