room to ask Pucetti to come up. When the young man arrived, Brunetti gestured to the chair in front of his desk.
Before sitting, Pucetti gave a look he could not disguise at Brunetti’s computer. His eyes shot to his superior and then back to the computer, as if he had difficulty pairing the one with the other. Brunetti resisted the impulse to smile and tell the young officer that, if he did his homework and kept his room clean, he’d let him take it for a ride. Instead, he said, ‘Tell me.’
Pucetti did not bother pretending not to understand. ‘The one we’ve arrested three times – Buffaldi – has gone on two first-class cruises in the last two years. He has a new car parked in the garage at Piazzale Roma. And his wife bought a new apartment last year: declared price was 250,000 Euros, but the real price was 350,000.’ Pucetti held up a finger with each fact, then folded his hands and put them in his lap to signify that he had nothing else to say.
‘How did you get this information?’ Brunetti asked.
The younger man looked down at his folded hands. ‘I had a look at his financial records.’
‘I think I could have figured that much out, Pucetti,’ Brunetti said in a calm voice. ‘How did you gain access to that information?’
‘I did it on my own, sir,’ Pucetti said in a firm voice. ‘She didn’t help me. Not at all.’
Brunetti sighed. If a safe-cracker files off a layer of skin to sensitize his pupil’s fingertips or teaches him how to blow a lock, who’s responsible for opening the safe? Each time Brunetti himself used his burglar tools to open a door, how much responsibility fell to the thief who had taught him how to use them? And, given that Brunetti had passed this skill on to Vianello, who bore the guilt for every door the Inspector managed to open?
‘Your defence of Signorina Elettra is admirable, Pucetti, and your skill is a credit to her pedagogical capabilities.’ He refused to smile. ‘I had something more practical in mind with my question, however: what did you open and what information did you steal?’
Brunetti watched Pucetti fight down his pride and his confusion at his superior’s apparent displeasure. ‘His credit card records, sir.’
‘And the apartment?’ Brunetti asked, forbearing to remark that most people did not buy apartments with credit cards.
‘I found out who the notary was who handled the sale.’
Brunetti waited, irony carefully placed aside.
‘And I know someone who works in his office,’ Pucetti added.
‘Who?’
‘I’d rather not say, sir,’ Pucetti answered, his eyes in his lap.
‘Admirable sentiment,’ Brunetti said. ‘This person confirmed the difference in price?’
Pucetti looked up at this. ‘She wasn’t sure, sir, but she said that when they discussed the sale with the notary, they made no secret that the difference in price would be at least a hundred thousand.’
‘I see.’ Brunetti allowed some time to pass, during which Pucetti twice glanced at the computer, as if memorizing the name and dimensions. ‘And where does this lead us?’
Pucetti looked up eagerly. ‘Isn’t it enough to reopen the investigation? He makes about fifteen hundred Euros a month at that job. Where else does this money come from? He’s been filmed opening suitcases and taking things from them: jewels, cameras, computers.’ He paused, as though he were not the one who should be answering questions.
‘The filming was dismissed as evidence during the last trial, as you know, Pucetti, and we are not yet at a place where the mere possession of large amounts of money is proof that it was stolen.’ Brunetti kept calm, imitating the voice of the defence attorney the last time the baggage handlers had been accused of theft. ‘He could have won the lottery, or his wife could have. He could have borrowed the money from members of his family. He could have found it in the street.’
‘But you know he didn’t, sir,’ Pucetti pleaded. ‘You know what he’s doing, what the lot of them are doing.’
‘What I know and what a prosecutor can prove in a court of law are entirely different matters, Pucetti,’ Brunetti said, not without a note of reprimand in his voice. ‘And I suggest very strongly that you consider this fact.’ He saw the young man open his mouth to protest and raised his voice to stop him. ‘Further, I want you to go back and very carefully cancel any traces you might have left during your investigation of Signor Buffaldi’s finances.’ Before Pucetti could object, he added, ‘If you managed to find them, then someone else will be able to find that you have been there, and that information would render Signor Buffaldi untouchable for the rest of his career.’
‘He’s pretty much untouchable now, isn’t he?’ Pucetti said, voice just short of anger.
That was enough to spark Brunetti’s own. Impetuous boy, thinking he could change things: so much the way Brunetti had been decades ago, just sworn into the force and keen to work for justice. The memory calmed Brunetti, who said, ‘Pucetti, the system we have is the one we have to use. To criticize it is as useless as to praise it. You know and I know how limited our powers are.’
As if giving in to a force stronger than his power to resist it, Pucetti said, ‘But what about her? She finds out things, and you use them.’ Brunetti was again conscious of Pucetti’s zeal.
‘Pucetti, I saw your face when I told you to cancel your traces: you know you left some. If you can’t eliminate them, then ask Signorina Elettra to help you do so. I don’t want this case made more difficult than it is.’
‘But unless you use this…’ Pucetti said in a high voice.
Staring him down, Brunetti continued in a tight voice. ‘I have the information, Pucetti. I’ve had it since they booked the tickets for the cruises and bought the car, and bought the house. So go back and remove your traces, and don’t ever think of doing something like this without my knowledge, without my authorization.’
‘What’s the difference?’ Pucetti asked, in a voice that sought information, not sarcastic revenge. ‘About how you got it?’
How much to trust him? How to stop Pucetti from dragging them into a legal swamp while still encouraging him to take chances? ‘She doesn’t leave traces and you do.’
Then Brunetti picked up his phone and dialled Signorina Elettra’s number. When she answered, he said, ‘Signorina. I’m just going out for a coffee. Do you think you could step up to my office while I’m gone? Pucetti has some changes he has to make to research he’s been doing, and I wonder if you could help him.’ He paused for a moment while she answered, then said, ‘Of course I’ll wait until you come up.’ He replaced the phone and went to stand by the window until she arrived.
4
BRUNETTI, WHO HAD already had three coffees that morning and did not want another, went down to the lab in search of Bocchese and whatever information he might have about the man who had been found that morning. When he went in, he saw two technicians at a long table at the back, one pulling objects from a cardboard box with plastic-gloved hands while the other appeared to check something on a list each time he removed a new object. The gloved one took a step to his left as Brunetti entered, cutting off his ability to distinguish the objects.
Bocchese sat at his desk in the corner, his head bent over a sheet of paper on which he appeared to be making a drawing. The lab chief did not raise his head at the sound of approaching footsteps, and Brunetti saw that the bald spot on the top of his head had expanded in recent months. Draped in a shapeless white workman’s tunic, Bocchese could easily have been a monk in some medieval monastery. Brunetti abandoned this idea as he grew near and saw that the man was drawing a thin blade and not illuminating the initial letter in some biblical text.
‘Is that what killed him?’ Brunetti asked.
Bocchese changed his grip on the pencil and used the side of the point to shade in the underside of the blade. ‘It’s what Rizzardi’s report described,’ he said, holding the paper up so that he and Brunetti could examine it. ‘It’s almost twenty centimetres long and widens to four near the handle.’ Then, with gruff expertise, ‘So it was a regular knife, not one he could fold closed and put in his pocket. Find it in any kitchen, I’d say.’
‘The point?’ Brunetti asked.
‘Very narrow. But that’s normal with knives, isn’t it? Most of it is about two centimetres wide.’ He tapped the eraser end of the pencil against the point of the blade in the drawing. Then he added a few lines, curving the cutting edge of the blade upward to the tip. ‘The report says tissue at the top of the cuts showed evidence of being
