unlikely that they had been killed soon before the sinking of the boat.
Brunetti had just finished reading the autopsy report when Vianello knocked and came in. ‘I called Chioggia, sir,' the sergeant said, not bothering to sit down, 'but they had no details whatsoever.'
Brunetti set the papers aside. 'As you said, they don't seem to be the sort of people who expect the police to solve their problems for them.'
He half expected Vianello to ask if anyone did, any more, but the sergeant made no reply. Brunetti took this opportunity to tell Vianello about his plan to send Pucetti to Pellestrina.
'What about recommendations?' Vianello asked.
'Pucetti said he worked in his brother-in-law's pizzeria. He can call the place in Pellestrina and say he's heard they're looking for a waiter, then recommend Pucetti. All in the family.'
'What if someone recognizes him?' Vianello asked, echoing Brunetti's own fear.
'Not likely to happen, is it?' Brunetti asked by way of response, conscious as he did of how much he sounded like Signorina Elettra.
Reading the signs of Brunetti's reluctance, Vianello didn't object; excusing himself without asking for new orders, he went downstairs.
Brunetti returned to the papers Signorina Elettra had given him. If the Alessandro Scarpa Brunetti was curious about was in his thirties -which distinguished him from the other Alessandro Scarpa who lived on Pellestrina, who was eighty-seven - then he had been arrested three years before for threatening a man with a knife. The other man had, the next day, changed his story and retracted the accusation, so there was nothing in the police files against Scarpa, though the Maresciallo of Carabinieri on the Lido said that Scarpa was known to cause trouble when he drank.
No information could be gathered about anyone with the surname Giacomini.
Signora Follini, it turned out, was a horse of a different colour. Follini was not her married name, for Signora Follini, though she had often enjoyed the company of men, had yet to do so under benefit of clergy. Her given name was Luisa, and she had been born on Pellestrina fifty-two years before.
Her familiarity with the police, or perhaps it would be more exact to say theirs with her, began when she was nineteen, when she was arrested for soliciting. A first offender, she had been reprimanded and released, only to be arrested for the same offence at least three times during the next year. There was a long gap then, suggesting either that Luisa Follini had come to some accommodation with the local police or had moved from the area. She did not reappear in Pellestrina until twelve years ago, when she had been arrested under the still-stringent drug laws for possession, use and attempted sale of heroin as well as for prostitution.
Luckily for her, she had been accepted at a drug rehabilitation centre near Bologna, where she had spent three years, returning to Pellestrina, it seemed, cured of both her addiction to heroin and her occupation. Her parents had died during her absence, and she had taken over the small store they owned in the village, where she had remained until the present time.
Reading the report, Brunetti remembered that her dress had had long sleeves, and he wondered where the money for her surgery had come from and when she had had the operations done. Who had paid for them? The small store he had seen could in no way provide for the work evident in her face; nor, for that fact, could casual prostitution or the sale of heroin in a place as small as Pellestrina.
He thought back to the two occasions he had spoken with her. The first time, she had been flirtatious and wryly theatrical about the limitations of living in a place like Pellestrina. With the history she trailed behind her, she would surely know the full cost of that, he reflected. But she had given no sign of the nervous energy of the addict. Nor had her nervousness the second time seemed related to drugs: it had been the nervousness of fear, and it had peaked with the entrance of those two men.
He had no idea how late she would keep her store open. He pulled out the phone book and checked the listings for Pellestrina. Follini, Luisa was given. He dialled the number, and the phone was picked up on the third ring. She answered, giving her name.
'Signora,' he began, 'this is Commissario Brunetti. I spoke to you earlier.' He heard a soft click as the receiver was replaced.
He put the phone book back in the drawer, put the file to the left of his desk, and went downstairs to talk to Pucetti.
13
Pucetti could barely contain his delight at the assignment. At the mention of Signorina Elettra's name he smiled, and at Brunetti's explanation that it would be his chief duty to protect her, he seemed almost to glow. When the young officer asked whose idea it was to send her there, Brunetti hedged and answered, instead, that he hoped Pucetti's girlfriend would have no objection to the special assignment, that is, Ancillary Duty.
That night after dinner he told Paola about Pucetti, hoping she would agree that this would, if not assure, then at least increase Signorina Elettra's safety.
'What an odd couple they are,' Paola said.
'Who?'
'Signorina Elettra and Pucetti.'
'They're hardly a couple’ Brunetti protested.
'No, I know that. But I mean, as people; it's so odd that people like that, so bright, should be working for the police.'
Not a little indignant, Brunetti said, ‘I work for the police, as well. I hope you haven't forgotten that.'
'Oh, don't be such a thin-skinned baby, Guido’ she said, putting her hand on his arm. 'You know exactly what I mean. You're a professional, with a law degree, and you joined the police when things were different, when it was a respectable thing to do with your life.'
'Does that mean it isn't any more?'
'No, I suppose it's still respectable’ she began, then, seeing his expression, hastily said, ‘I mean of course it's a respectable choice; you know I mean that. But it's just that the best people, people like you, aren't joining it any more. In ten years, it will be filled with Pattas and Alvises, the ambition-maddened and the hopelessly stupid.'
'Which is which?' Brunetti asked.
She laughed at that. 'Well might you ask.' They were drinking verbena tisane out on the terrace, the children safely returned to their books. Four very plump clouds, pink with the reflected light of evening, formed a distant backdrop to the campanile of San Polo; the rest of the sky was clear and promised another day of glory.
She returned to the subject. 'Why do you think it is that so few really worthwhile people join now?'
Instead of answering, he asked a question. 'It's the same for you, isn't it? What sort of new colleagues are you getting at the university?'
'God, we sound like Pliny the Elder, don't we, sitting around and grumbling about how disrespectful youth is and how everything is going to hell?'
'People have always said that. It's one of the few constants in the histories I read: every age sees the one before it as the golden age when men were virtuous, women pure, and children obedient.'
'Don't forget 'respectful',' Paola suggested. 'The children or the women?' 'Both, I suppose.'
Neither of them spoke for a long time, not until the clouds had drifted to the south and served to frame the campanile of San Marco.
Brunetti broke the silence by asking, 'Who'd join now?' He let the question lie, and when Paola didn't bother to answer, he went on, 'It happens too often: we work to arrest them, then when we do, the lawyers get their hands on the case, or the judges, and they end up getting off. I've seen it happen dozens of times, and I'm seeing it happen more and more often. There's that woman who got married in Bologna last week. Two years ago she stabbed and killed her husband. Sentenced to nine years. But she's out on appeal after three months in jail, and now she's married again.'
Ordinarily, Paola would have made some ironic comment on the bravery of the new husband, but she waited to see if he was finished. When he went on, what he said shocked her. ‘I could retire, you know.' Still she didn't say anything. 'I've got the years in service. Well, almost. I suppose what I mean is I could retire in two years.'
Paola asked, 'Is that what you want to do?'
He sipped at his tisane and found it had grown cold. He tipped the cold tea out into the large terracotta tub that held the oleander, poured a fresh cup, added honey, and said, 'Probably not. Not really. But it costs so much at times to watch what happens and not be able to do anything to stop it.' Brunetti leaned back in his chair and
