Through a glass, darkly

took a deep breath, amazed at his own blindness. He had had the book and Tassini's numbers in his hands at the same time and he had not seen it.

He took the copy he had made of Tassini's numbers, found the first, and opened Dante to Canto VII, line 103. 'L'acqua era buia assai piu che persa', 'The water was much darker than persa’ he repeated. 'What the devil is persa?' He looked at his watch, saw that Paola was likely still to be home, and dialled their number.

'Pronto,' she answered on the fifth ring.

'Paola,' he said, 'what's persa?'

'In what context?' she asked, displaying no curiosity as to the reason for his question.

'In Dante’ he said.

'I think it's a colour’ she said, 'but let me get the concordance.' In less than a minute she was back, and he heard her mumbling as she searched for the word, a habit Chiara had picked up from her. Finally she said,' 'a colour between purple and black, but black predominates'.' She waited for his response, and when he made none, she asked, 'Anything else?'

'Not yet. I'll call.'

Paola hung up.

Brunetti went back to the book. The stream that Dante was following eventually flowed into the Styx, but Tassini's reference was only to line 103, to the black water.

The next was no less grim: 'no green leaves but dark colours, no smooth branches, but gnarled and warped.'

He continued with Tassini's references: 'the banks were crusted over with a mould from the vapour below that sticks on them and fights with the eyes and nose.'

And the last: 'do not set your feet upon the burning sand.'

This was hardly the stuff of a major environmental scandal, but if Signorina Elettra was right and Tassini had the faith of a true believer, he would have interpreted these Dantean descriptions as he pleased and found whatever signs and portents he chose to find.

Brunetti decided to go down and talk to Patta, if only for the perverse desire to prove himself correct in his assessment of the man. Celestine V had renounced the papacy in order to avoid the power of office, had he not? How unlike Patta, who renounced every aspect of his work save for the power and perks of office. Having Patta run naked through a field of worms and maggots, weeping tears and blood, would perhaps be an excessive punishment for his negligence of office, but the contemplation of this image kept Brunetti occupied as he made his way to his superior's office.

Signorina Elettra glanced up from, some papers as he came in, and she smiled a peculiar kind of smile. 'I have some information about Signor Fasano, who would appear to be what he claims to be.'

'Good,' he had the presence of mind to say, and, 'thank you.' Then he asked, 'Is the Vice-Questore in?'

'Yes, he is. Would you like to speak to him?' she asked, as if Brunetti might have had some other reason to have come down two flights of stairs to ask if Patta were in. He tried to remember how absent of respect he had been when discussing Fasano with her the previous time: might this be the reason for her formality?

She picked up her phone and pressed a button, asked Dottor Patta if he would see Commis-sario Brunetti, replaced the phone, and nodded towards the door. Brunetti thanked her and went in without bothering to knock.

'Ah, Brunetti,' Patta said as he entered, 'I was just going to call you.'

'Yes, sir?' Brunetti said, making his way towards Patta's desk.

'Yes, sit down, sit down,' Patta said with a broad wave of his hand.

Brunetti did as he was told, all systems on high alert as they registered Patta's affability.

'I wanted to talk to you about this thing out on Murano,' Patta said.

Brunetti did his best to look mildly interested.

'Yes,' Patta said, 'I wanted to talk to you about this case you seem to be creating.'

'A man died there, sir’ Brunetti said, hoping to surprise Patta into a reconsideration of his own words.

Patta gave him a long look. 'Of a heart attack, Brunetti. The man died of a heart attack.' The affability had disappeared from his voice. When Brunetti said nothing, Patta added, 'I assumed you would have spoken to your friend Rizzardi by now, Commissario.' In the face of Brunetti's refusal to answer him, Patta repeated, 'He died of a heart attack.'

Brunetti sat silently. Apparently Patta had not finished. The Vice-Questore went on, 'I don't know if you've had time to formulate some theory of foul play here, Brunetti, but if you have, I want you to unformulate it. The man collapsed and died of a heart attack while he was at work.'

'He was a watchman, not a glass-blower’ Brunetti said. 'There was no reason for him to be working near the furnace.'

'On the contrary,' Patta said with an equanimity that Brunetti found as puzzling as it was infuriating, 'it's just because he was a watchman that there are any number of reasons he could have been there. There could have been something wrong with the furnace, a sudden rise in temperature that he went to investigate. Someone could have left that rod there for him to trip over, or he could have been doing what a lot of them do out there at night: working a piece of glass for himself.' Patta's smile registered the plausibility of these things, and Brunetti wondered just where the Vice-Questore, a Sicilian, had learned so much about the art of making Murano glass. Scarpa was a possible choice, Scarpa who shared his superior's desire that the city be viewed as free of crime, and what better crime to keep from the records than murder? But Scarpa was no more Venetian than his master. Fasano, then?

Even before he spoke, Brunetti knew it was hopeless, with Patta so contentedly persuaded that the investigation—whatever pale, weak thing that might have been—was over. But still he said, 'I came to speak to you, sir, because of some papers that were in Tassini's possession.'

'How in his possession?'

'They were in his home.'

'And how is it that they happen to be in your possession, Commissario?'

'Because I took them away with me when I went to speak to his widow.'

'Have you made a formal report of this?'

'Yes’ Brunetti lied, knowing that Signorina Elettra could easily backdate his report, when he got around to writing it.

Patta did not question this. Instead he asked, 'And what are these papers?'

'Lists of numbers.'

'What sort of numbers?'

'There are references to specific laws and to specific geographic locations. And there are repeated references to Inferno. There was a copy of the poem in his room at the factory.'

'And is this book another item in your possession?' Patta asked.

'Yes.'

'Is that all there was, Brunetti? Or was there something other than—' Patta began, using the long-drawn-out enunciation one employs with a wilful or disobedient child—'references to laws and geographic locations and to Inferno?' Patta was unable or unwilling to resist the temptation to repeat Brunetti's words.

As though this had been a request for information rather than an insult, Brunetti said, 'There has to be a reason he was keeping those numbers, sir.'

Patta made a business of shaking his head in feigned confusion. 'Specific laws and specific locations, is it, Brunetti? And what comes next, the winning lottery number for Venice? Or the geographic coordinates of where the extraterrestrials are going to land?' He got up from his chair and took two steps, muttering, 'Dante', as if to calm his troubled spirit. He persuaded himself to return and sit down again. 'Though it might come as a surprise to you, Brunetti, this is a Questura,' he said, leaning across his desk and pointing a finger at the Commissario, 'and we are police officers. It is not a tent in the middle of the desert where people come to you so that you can hold seances and read tarot cards.'

Brunetti glanced at Patta, then shifted his eyes to a spot on the desk between them. 'Do you understand me,