A Sea of Troubles

Vianello broke in to ask, 'Why is that worse than a storm?'

'Insurance,' Bonsuan answered. 'Nothing can insure you against those bastards from the Finanza.'

'How much was it worth?' Brunetti asked, again made aware of just how little he knew about this world of boats and the men who went to sea in them.

'They wanted five hundred million. That was fines and what they calculated he owed them, but no one has that much cash, so he had to sell the boat.'

'My God, are they worth that much?' Brunetti asked.

Bonsuan gave him a puzzled glance. 'If they're as big as his was, they're worth much more; they can cost a billion.'

Vianello broke in. 'If they wanted five hundred million for three years, that probably means he cheated them out of twice that, three times.'

'Easily,' Bonsuan agreed, not without a hint of pride at the cleverness of the men who fished the laguna. 'Ezio told me Spadini thought he'd win. His lawyer told him to fight the case, but he probably did that just to make his own bill bigger. In the end, Spadini had no choice: they came and took it. If he had come up with enough cash to pay the fine, too many questions would have been asked,' he said, leaving the others to assume that the money was there, hidden in secret investments or accounts, like so much of the wealth of Italy. He glanced at Vianello and added, 'Someone told me that the judge was one of the Greens.'

Vianello shot him a glance but said nothing.

Bonsuan went on, 'That he had a grudge against all of the vongolari because of what they do to the laguna.'

At this, Vianello finally said, his voice dangerously tight, 'Danilo, cases like this, about taxes, don't come up before judges.' Before Bonsuan could answer, he added, 'Whether they belong to the Greens or not.' Then, turning to Brunetti but obviously aiming his remarks at Bonsuan, Vianello added, 'Next we're probably going to be told about the way the Greens take vipers up in helicopters and drop them in the mountains to repopulate the species.' Then to Bonsuan he said, his voice more aggressive than Brunetti could ever remember it, 'Come on, Danilo, aren't you going to tell us how friends of yours have found dead vipers in bottles up in the mountains or how they've seen people tossing them out of helicopters?'

Bonsuan looked at the sergeant but didn't bother to answer, his silence resonant with his conviction of the futility of attempting to reason with fanatics. Brunetti had, over the course of the years, heard many people speak of these mysterious, malevolent helicopters, piloted by mad ecologists bent on restoring some perverted idea of 'nature', but it had never occurred to him that anyone could actually believe in them.

They had reached, not just an impasse, but the boat. Bonsuan turned away from them and busied himself with the mooring ropes. Vianello, perhaps in an attempt to soften the effect of his remarks, went to the back and began to untie the second rope. Brunetti left them to it, busy with calculations of the surprising sums that had just been referred to. When Bonsuan had the rope coiled, Brunetti followed him aboard and called to him as the pilot went up the steps towards the wheel, 'You'd have to catch a lot of fish to afford a boat like that.'.

'Clams,' Bonsuan instantly corrected him. 'That's where the money is. No one's going to take a shot at you over fish, but if they catch you digging up their clams and ruining their beds, then there's no telling what they'll do.'

'Is that what he did, ruin the beds?' Brunetti asked.

‘I told you it's what they all do,' Bonsuan answered. 'They'll dig anywhere, and every year there are fewer clams. So the price goes up.' He looked from Brunetti to Vianello, who was standing on the dock, listening. With a brusque beckoning gesture, the pilot waved towards the sergeant and said, 'Come on, Lorenzo.' Vianello tossed his end of the rope around one of the stanchions on the side of the boat and jumped on board.

'But if he's lost his boat’ Brunetti said, pretending to ignore the successful conclusion of peace negotiations, and bringing the conversation back from the general to the particular, 'what does he do now?'

'Fidele said he's working for one of his sons, runs one of his boats for him’ Bonsuan said, pulling out dials on the panel in front of him. 'It's a much smaller boat, and there's only two of them on it.'

'Must be difficult for him’ Vianello interrupted, 'not being the owner any more.'

Bonsuan shrugged. 'Depends on the son, I suppose.'

'And Signora Follini?' Brunetti asked, again bringing the conversation back to his immediate concern.

'It had been going on for about two years,' Bonsuan said. 'Ever since he lost the boat' Feeling that this wasn't sufficient explanation, Bonsuan went on. 'He doesn't have to get to sea so early any more, only when he wants to.'

'And the wife?' Vianello asked.

All of Italy and all of its history and culture went into the shrug with which Bonsuan dismissed this question. 'She's got a home, and he pays the rent. They've got three children, all married and on their own. What has she got to complain about?'Anything else he might have said was lost in the sound of the engine, which sprang to life at his command.

Not wanting to discuss this, Brunetti was content that they should return to the city, to their own homes and to their own children.

19

Brunetti had been in his office for less than an hour the following morning when he answered the phone to hear Signorina Elettra's voice.

'Where are you?' he asked brusquely, then moderated his tone and added, ‘I mean how are you?'

Her long silence suggested how she felt about being questioned in this manner. When she did answer, however, there was no sign of resentment in her voice. 'I'm on the beach. And I'm fine.'

The far-off cries of the gulls spoke to the truth of the first, the lightness in her voice to the second.

'Signorina,' he began with little preparation and less thought, 'you've been there more than a week now. I think it's time you began to think about coming back.'

'Oh, no, sir, I don't think that's a good idea at all.'

'But I do,' he insisted. ‘I think you should say your farewells to your family and report for work tomorrow.'

'It's the beginning of the week, sir. I'd planned to stay until at least the weekend.'

'Well, I think it would be better if you came back. There's a lot of work that's piled up since you left.'

'Please, sir. I'm sure it's nothing one of the other secretaries couldn't handle.'

'I need to get some information,' Brunetti said, realizing how close his voice came to pleading. 'Things I don't want the secretaries to know about.'

'Vianello can handle the computer well enough now to get you what you want.'

'It's the Guardia di Finanza,' Brunetti said, playing what he thought would be a trump card. ‘I need information from them and I doubt that Vianello would be able to get it.'

'What sort of information, sir?' He heard noises in the background: gulls, a horn of some sort, a car engine starting, and he remembered how narrow the beach of Pellestrina was and how close to the road.

‘I need to know about tax evasion.'

'Read the newspaper, sir,' she said, laughing at her own joke. When there was no response, she said, the laughter gone and her voice less rich for that, 'You can call their main office and ask. There's a maresciallo there, Resto, who can tell you everything you need to know. Just tell him I told you to call.'

He had known her long enough to recognize the polite inflexibility he was dealing with. ‘I think it would be better if you handled it, Signorina.'

All pleasantness dropped from her voice as she said, 'If you keep this up, sir, I'll be forced to take a week of real vacation, and I'd rather not do that because it would take a lot of time to adjust the timetables.'

He wanted to cut it short and simply ask her who the man was he had seen her with yesterday, but their relationship had ill prepared him for such a question, especially in the tone he knew he would be incapable of preventing himself from using. He was her superior, but that hardly gave him the authority to act in loco parentis. Because the difference in their positions precluded the intimacy of friendship, he could not ask her to tell him what was going on between her and the handsome young man he had seen her with. He could not think of a way to express concern that would not sound like jealousy, and he could not explain, even to himself, which it was he actually felt.