his rank and demanded to be connected to the ward where Signora Moro
was being treated. There was some delay in transferring the call, and
when the nurse on duty spoke to him, she was helpful and cooperative
and told him that the doctor had advised that Signora Moro be kept
until the next day, when she could go home. No, there was no serious
injury: she was being kept an extra day in consideration of her age
rather than her condition.
Braced by this comforting sign of humanity, Brunetti thanked her, ended
the call, and immediately called the police in Mogliano. The officer
in charge of the investigation told him that a woman had come into the
Questura that morning and admitted she had been driving the car that
struck Signora Moro. Panicking, she had driven away, but after a
sleepless night in which she had been the victim of both fear and
remorse, she had come to the police to confess.
When Brunetti asked the other officer if he believed the woman, he
received an astonished, 'Of course', before the man said he had to get
back to work and hung up.
So Moro was right when he insisted that 'they' had had nothing to do
with the attack on his mother. Even that word, 'attack', Brunetti
realized, was entirely his own invention.
Why, then, Moro's rage at Brunetti for having suggested it? More
importantly, why his state of anguished despair last night, far out of
proportion for a man who had been told that his mother was not
seriously injured?
Awareness that he had done something else to merit Lieutenant Scarpa's
enmity should have troubled Brunetti, but he could not bring himself to
care: there were no degrees to implacable antipathy. He regretted only
that Pucetti might have to bear the brunt of Scarpa's anger, for the
lieutenant was not a man likely to aim a blow, at least not an open
one, at people above him. He wondered whether other people behaved
like this, deaf and blind to the real demands of their professions in
their heedless pursuit of success and personal power, though Paola had
long assured him that the various struggles that absorbed the
Department of English Literature at the university were far more savage
than anything described in Beowulf or the bloodier Shakespearean
tragedies. He knew that ambition was accepted as a natural human
trait, had for decades observed others striving to achieve what they
determined to be success. Much as he knew these desires were judged to
be perfectly normal, he remained puzzled by the passion and energy of
their endeavours. Paola had once observed that he had been born with
some
essential piece missing, for he seemed incapable of desiring anything
other than happiness. Her remark had troubled him until she explained
that it was one of the reasons she had married him.
Musing on this, he entered Signorina Elettra's office. When she looked
up, he said without introduction, 'I'd like to learn about the people
at the Academy.'
'What, precisely, would you like to know?'
He considered this, then finally said, 'I think what I'd really like to
know is whether any of them is capable of killing that boy and, if so,
for what reason.'
There could be many reasons,' she answered, then added, 'If, that is,
you want to believe that he was murdered.'
'No, I don't want to believe that. But if he was, then I want to know
why.'
'Are you curious about the boys or the teachers?'
'Either. Both.'
'I doubt it could have been both.'
'Why?' he asked.
'Because they'd probably have different motives.'
'Such as?'
'I haven't explained myself well,' she began, shaking her head. 'I
think the teachers would do it for serious reasons, adult reasons.'
'For instance?'
'Danger to their careers. Or to the school.'
'And the boys?'
'Because he was a pain in the ass.'
'Seems a pretty trivial reason to kill someone.'
'Viewed from a different perspective, most reasons for killing people
are pretty trivial.'
He was forced to agree. After a while he asked, 'In what way could he
have been a pain in the ass?'
'God knows. I don't have any idea what bothers boys that age. Someone
