Through a glass, darkly

'Yes.'

'Why not the other one, what's his name?' he asked, looking down at the papers and shifting them around until he found it. 'De Cal?'

'He had no contact with Tassini’ Brunetti said, 'other than as his employer, and he barely knew who he was.'

'What else?' Patta asked.

'What would it cost him to be convicted of environmental pollution? A fine? A few thousand Euros? Besides, he's a sick man; no judge is going to send him to jail. He has nothing to lose.'

'Not like Fasano, eh?' Patta asked with what sounded to Brunetti like satisfaction.

Brunetti was uncertain whether Patta referred to the fact that Fasano had a lot to lose or that he was a healthy man. 'He does have everything to lose. He's President of the glassmakers on Murano, but I've been told that's just a stepping-stone’ Brunetti said.

Patta nodded. 'And where do you think he intends to go?'

'Who knows? First higher in the city, as mayor, and then Europe, as a deputy. It's the path they usually take. Or perhaps he'll do both, and continue to run the factory, as well.' Brunetti turned his thoughts away from the shoals of politicians who managed to hold two, three, even four full-time jobs. 'He's hitched himself to the environmental movement, but he's still a businessman interested in making a profit. What better combination for our times?' Brunetti asked, thinking it was unusual for him to speak so openly to Patta, of all people.

Patta looked at the papers again. 'You mentioned samples. Sent to Bocchese. Have you got his results yet?'

'I called when I got in, but the tests weren't finished’ Brunetti said.

Patta took his phone and asked Signorina Elettra to connect him with the laboratory. Almost at once Patta said, 'Good morning, Bocchese. Yes, it's me. I'm calling for Commissario Brunetti, about those samples he sent you.'

Patta looked over at Brunetti, his face as smooth as he tried to make his voice. After a moment, he said, 'Excuse me? Yes, he is.' Patta's eyes took on a stunned look, as though perhaps Bocchese had told him the samples contained plague or botulism. 'Yes’ he repeated, 'he is. One moment.' He held the phone across his desk, saying, 'He wants to talk to you.'

'Good morning, Bocchese’ Brunetti said.

'Is it all right if I tell him?'

'Yes.'

'Pass me back, then’ Bocchese said.

Expressionless, Brunetti handed the phone back to Patta.

Patta put it to his ear again, and said, 'Well?' making his voice brusque and authoritative. Brunetti could hear Bocchese's voice, but he couldn't make out what he was saying. Patta pulled a sheet of paper towards him and started to write. 'Say that again, please,' he said.

As Brunetti watched, the letters started to appear upside down: 'Manganese, arsenic, cadmium, potassium, lead.' More followed below, all sounding harmful, if not lethal.

Patta set the pen down and listened for some time. 'Above the limits?' Bocchese answered this at some length, and then Patta said, 'Thank you, Bocchese’ and hung up. He turned the paper so that Brunetti could more easily read it. 'Quite a cocktail’ he said.

'What was Bocchese's answer when you asked if they were above the limits?' Brunetti asked.

'He said he'd have to go out there to take a larger sample, but that, if this is an indication, then the place is dangerous.'

Brunetti knew that was a relative term. Dangerous to whom, to what sort of creature, and after how long an exposure? But he had no desire to jeopardize his truce with Patta, so he said only, 'He'll need a judge to authorize him to go out and take samples.'

'I know that’ Patta snapped.

Brunetti said nothing.

Patta reached over and tapped the newspaper again. 'Then this is all lies? There's no investigation?'

'No.'

He watched Patta weigh this information. Brunetti's answer had destroyed Patta's hopes of following in the wake of some other investigation, leaving the Vice-Questore no choice but to be a shark and not a scavenger. He looked at Brunetti, placed his open palm on the papers Brunetti had shown him, and asked, 'You think you've got enough to link him to this dumping?'

The dumping, Brunetti knew, could have served as a motive for Fasano to eliminate Tassini. Prove that it had been going on and that Tassini knew about it, and there was a chance that they would find some other link between Fasano and Tassini, perhaps some physical evidence—perhaps someone who remembered seeing Fasano near the factory on the night Tassini died? Brunetti no sooner considered this possibility than he asked himself what could be considered strange about an owner's presence near his own factory? He decided to answer the question as asked. 'Yes. If he's not personally responsible, his factory is. Someone used that pipe, and perhaps three other pipes, to get rid of the sediment from the molatura.'

'Just like in the good old days,' Patta said with no indication that he spoke ironically, then asked, 'How much would this save him?'

'I don't know.'

'Find out. Find out how much it costs for each pick-up.' Patta paused, gave Brunetti a long, evaluating look, then said, 'I know him from the Lions Club, and he's never been seen to pick up a bill. I wouldn't be surprised if the cheap bastard did it to save a couple of hundred Euros. Maybe less.'

Brunetti could have been no more startled had he heard an English lady-in-waiting call the Queen a slut. Fasano was both wealthy and powerful, and had he just heard Patta refer to him as a 'cheap bastard'?

'What else, sir?' Brunetti asked, stunned to monosyllables.

'Nothing for the moment. I'll take care of getting a judge to sign the order to send Bocchese out there to take more samples. In fact, you'd better tell him to get rid of the samples he has. This is a new investigation, and I don't want there to be any evidence that we looked into this before.'

'Yes, sir,' Brunetti said, getting to his feet.

'And I want you to talk to those plumbers again, but I want you to do it here, with a video camera running.' Brunetti nodded, and Patta said, 'Make sure he describes that pipe in the back, and if he knows, ask him what minerals are in the stuff he hauls away and how dangerous they are. And ask him again when he thinks that cover was put on the pipe.'

'Yes, sir,' Brunetti said.

'I'll have the order for you after lunch, and as soon as you have it, I want Bocchese out there,' said Patta with increasing urgency. Then he added, 'And I want him to take people from the Environmental Agency with him. I don't want there to be any question about those samples, that they've been contaminated in any way. In fact, maybe the environmental people can take their own samples and do their own tests, along with Bocchese.'

'All right’ Brunetti said.

'Good.' Patta gave a particularly eager smile. 'That should be enough.'

'To do what, sir? Show there was a reason why he murdered Tassini?'

Patta could not have been more astonished had Brunetti's hair suddenly burst into flames. 'Who said anything about murder, Brunetti?' He tilted his head and looked at Brunetti as though he had doubts as to whether they had been in the same room together all this time, talking about the same thing. 'I want him stopped. If he gets into office and brings a new junta into power with him, then what happens to the connections I've spent ten years building up?' Patta demanded aggressively. 'Have you thought about that?'

He saw Brunetti's expression and went on, And don't you for an instant believe he's using this environmental nonsense for political ends, Brunetti. He really believes it.' Patta threw up his hands at the very thought. 'I've listened to him talk: he's like all converts, all fanatics. It's all he cares about, so if he's elected mayor, you can say goodbye to the idea of the subway in from the airport or the dikes in the laguna or licences for more hotels. He'll turn this city back fifty years. And then where will we all be?'

Stunned beyond speech, Brunetti could do nothing more than say, 'I don't know, sir.'

Patta's phone rang, and he answered it. When he heard the voice on the other end, he waved a hand at