Doctored Evidence

her?' Carlotti asked. Brunetti was surprised that anyone who had seen the woman's body could ask the question.

'He said it was trauma of the blows to her head.'

Again that nod, again a diagnosis confirmed.

Brunetti took out his notebook and opened it to the pages where he'd made some notes of what Signora Gismondi had told him.

'How long was she a patient of yours, Dottore?'

Carlotti's response was immediate. 'Five years, ever since the death of her son. She insisted that the doctor they both went to was responsible for his death, so she refused to go to him after the son died and asked to join my practice.' He said it with a hint of regret.

'And was there any basis to her claim that this other doctor was responsible?'

'It's nonsense. He died of AIDS.'

Suppressing his surprise, Brunetti asked, 'Did she know this?'

'Better to ask if she believed it, Commissario, because she didn't believe it. But she must have known it.' Neither found this difficult to make sense of.

'Was he gay?'

'Not publicly and not to the knowledge of my colleague, though that doesn't necessarily mean that he was not. Nor was he a haemophiliac, nor a drug user, and he'd never had a transfusion, at least not that he could remember or the hospital had any record of.'

'You tried to find out?'

'My colleague did. Signora Battestini accused him of criminal negligence, and he tried to protect himself by finding out the source of the infection. He also wanted to know if there was any chance of Paolo's having passed it on, but she refused to answer any questions about him, even when someone from the Public Health went to talk to her. When she became my patient, she said only that he had been murdered by the 'doctors'. I made it clear I would not listen to such things and suggested she find another doctor. So she stopped saying it, at least she stopped saying it to me.'

'And you never heard anything that suggested he might be gay?'

Carlotti shrugged. 'People talk. All the time. I've learned not to pay much attention to it. Some people seemed to believe he was, others not. I didn't care, so they stopped talking about him to me.' He glanced at Brunetti. 'So I don't know. My colleague believes he was, but that's because there seems no other way to explain his having the disease. But I repeat: I never met him, so I don't know.'

Brunetti left it there and asked, 'About Signora Battestini, then, Dottore. Is there anything you could tell me that might explain why someone would do this to her?'

The doctor pushed his chair back and stuck his legs out, unusually long legs in a man so much shorter than Brunetti. He crossed his ankles and scratched the back of his head with his left hand. 'No, not really. I've been thinking about this since you called, in fact, since I found her, but I can't think of anything. She was a person of a certain character…' the doctor began, but before he could continue with this platitude, Brunetti interrupted him.

'Please, Dottore. I've spent my life listening to people speak well of the dead or find ways to avoid speaking the truth about them. So I know about 'a certain character', and I know about 'difficult', and I know about 'wilful'. I'd like you to remember that this is a murder investigation, and because it is, Signora Battestini is far beyond any harm your words might do to her. So could you please forget politeness and tell me honestly about her and about why someone might want to kill her?'

Carlotti grinned at this, then glanced towards the door to the waiting room, from which the voices of the two women could be heard speaking in soft, nervous voices. ‘I suppose it's a habit we all have, doctors especially, always afraid we'll be caught saying something we ought not to say about a patient, caught telling the truth.'

At Brunetti's nod, he went on. 'She was a nasty old shrew, and I never heard a good word said about her.'

'Nasty in what way, Dottore?' Brunetti asked.

The doctor considered before answering, as though he'd never stopped to think about why this woman was nasty or in what particular ways she was. His hand moved to his head and went back to scratching at the same spot. Finally he looked at Brunetti and said, 'Maybe all I can do is give you examples. Like the women who worked for her. She never stopped complaining about them or telling me, or them, that the things they did weren't done the right way. They used too much coffee to make her coffee, or they left lights on, or they should wash the dishes in cold water, not hot. If they tried to defend themselves, she'd scream at them, telling them they could go back where they came from.'

There was a cry from one of the children in the waiting room, but it stopped. Carlotti went on. 'It doesn't sound like a lot, I realize now, when I hear myself saying it, but it was terrible for them. They were probably all illegal, the women, so they couldn't complain, and the last thing any of them wanted to do was go back to where they came from. And she knew it.'

'Did you know any of them, Dottore?'

'Know them how?' he asked.

'Speak to them about where they came from, about what they did before they came here.'

'No. She wouldn't let me, probably wouldn't let anyone. If the phone rang while I was there, she demanded to know who it was, made them hand over the phone. Even if their telefonini rang, she wanted to know who was calling them, told them they couldn't talk on the phone while she was paying them to work.'

'And the last one?'

'Flori?' the doctor asked.

'Yes.'

'Do you think she killed her?' Dottor Carlotti asked.

'Do you, Dottore?'

'I don't know. When I found her, the first thing I did was look for Flori's… for her body. It never occurred to me that she could have done it: the only possibility I could think of was that she might have been another victim.'

'And now, Dottore?'

The man seemed genuinely pained. ‘I read the papers, and I spoke to that other, officer, and everyone seems sure she did it.' Brunetti waited. 'But I still can't believe it.'

'Why is that?'

The doctor hesitated for a long time, glancing at Brunetti's face as if to see if this man who also spent his time with human weakness would understand. 'I've been a doctor for more than twenty years, Commissario, and it's part of my profession to notice things in people. It might seem as though all I need to pay attention to are physical things, but I've seen enough sick people to know that what's wrong with the soul is often also wrong with the body. And I'd say that there was nothing wrong with Flori's soul.' He looked away, looked back, and said, 'I'm afraid I can't be more precise or professional than that, Commissario.'

'And Signora Battestini? Do you think there was something wrong with her soul?'

'Nothing more than greed, Commissario,' Carlotti answered instantly. 'The ignorance and stupidity, they didn't come from the soul. But the greed did.'

'Many old people have to be careful with their money,' Brunetti suggested, playing devil's advocate.

'This wasn't being careful, Commissario. This was obsession.' Then he surprised Brunetti by slipping into Latin. ''Radix malorum est Cupiditas.' Not money, Commissario. That's not the root of all evil. It's the love of money. Cupiditas’

'Did she have much money to be greedy about?' Brunetti asked.

'I've no idea,' the doctor answered. One of the children in the outer room began to cry, that high-pitched wail that cannot be faked. Carlotti looked at his watch. 'If you have no more questions, Commissario, I'd like to get on with seeing my patients.'

'Certainly,' Brunetti said, getting to his feet and returning his notebook to his pocket. 'You've been more than generous with your time.'

As they walked towards the door, Brunetti asked, 'Did Signora Battestini ever receive visitors while you were