‘For the Banca d’ltalia,’ she said, as much to the screen as to Brunetti.
He raised his eyebrows. She glanced up and, seeing his expression, explained. ‘I was an assistant to the president.’
One didn’t have to be a banker or a mathematician to work out the drop in salary that a change like this meant. Further, for most Italians, a job in a bank represented absolute security; people waited years to be accepted on the staff of a bank, any bank, and Banca d’ltalia was certainly the most desirable. And she was now working as a secretary for the police? Even with flowers twice a week from Fantin, it made no sense. Given the fact that she would work, not just for the police, but for Patta, it seemed an act of sovereign madness.
‘I see,’ he said, though he didn’t. ‘I hope you’ll be happy with us.’
‘I’m sure I will be, Commissario,’ Signorina Elettra said. ‘Is there any other information you’d like me to find?’
‘No, not at the moment, thank you,’ Brunetti said and left her to go back to his office. Using the outside line, he dialled the number of the hotel in Bolzano and asked to speak to Signora Brunetti.
Signora Brunetti, he was told, had gone for a walk and was not expected to be back at the hotel before dinner. He left no message, merely identified himself and hung up.
The phone rang almost immediately. It was Padovani, calling from Rome, apologetic about the fact that he had succeeded in learning nothing further about Santomauro. He had called friends, both in Rome and in Venice, but everyone seemed to be away on vacation, and he had done no more than leave a series of messages on answering machines, requesting that his friends call him but not explaining why he wanted to speak to them. Brunetti thanked him and asked him to call if he did learn anything further.
After he hung up, Brunetti pushed the papers on his desk around until he found the one he wanted, the autopsy report on Mascari, and read through it carefully again. On the fourth page he found what he was looking for. ‘Some scratches and cuts on the legs, no sign of epidermal bleeding. Scratches no doubt caused by the sharp edges on – ‘ and here the pathologist had done a bit of showing off by giving the Latin name of the grass in which Mascari’s body had been hidden.
Dead people can’t bleed; there is no pressure to carry the blood to the surface. This was one of the simple truths of pathology that Brunetti had learned. If those scratches had been caused by, and here he repeated out loud the orotund syllables of the Latin name, then they would not have bled, for Mascari was dead when his body was shoved under those leaves. But if his legs had been shaved by someone else, after he was dead, then they would not have bled, either.
Brunetti had never shaved any part of his body except his face, but he had, for years, been witness to this process as performed by Paola, as she attempted to run a razor over calf, ankle, knee. He had lost count of the times that he had heard muttered curses from the bathroom, only to see Paola emerge with a piece of toilet paper sticking to some segment of her limb. Paola had been shaving her legs regularly since he knew her; she still cut herself when she did it. It seemed unlikely that a middle-aged man could achieve this feat with greater success than Paola and shave his legs without cutting them. He tended to believe that, to a certain degree, most marriages were pretty similar. Hence, if Brunetti were suddenly to begin to shave his legs, Paola would know it immediately. It seemed to Brunetti unlikely that Mascari could have shaved his legs and not have his wife notice, even if he didn’t call her while away on business trips.
He glanced at the autopsy report again: ‘No evidence of bleeding on any of the cuts on victim’s legs or traces of wax.’ No, Signor Mascari, regardless of the red dress and the red shoes, regardless of the make-up and the underwear, had not shaved or waxed his own legs before he died. And so that must mean that someone had done it for him after he was dead.
Chapter Nineteen
He sat in his office, hoping that a late afternoon breeze would spring up and bring some relief, but the hope proved to be as futile as his hope that he would begin to see some connection between all the random factors of the case. It was clear to him that the whole business of the transvestism was an elaborate posthumous charade, designed to pull attention away from whatever the real motive had been for Mascari’s death. That meant that Ravanello, the only person to have heard Mascari’s ‘confession’, was lying and probably knew something about the murder. But, though Brunetti found no difficulty in believing that bankers did, in fact, kill people, he couldn’t bring himself to believe that they would do it merely as a short cut to promotion.
Ravanello had been in no way reluctant to admit to having been in the bank’s office that weekend; in fact, he had volunteered the information. And with Mascari just identified, his reason made sense – what any good friend would do. Moreover, what any loyal employee would do.
Still, why hadn’t he identified himself on the phone on Saturday, why kept secret, even from some unknown caller, that he was in the bank that afternoon?
His phone rang and, still musing on this, still dulled with the heat, he gave his name. ‘Brunetti.’
‘I need to talk to you,’ a man’s voice said. ‘In person.’
‘Who is this?’ Brunetti asked calmly.
‘I’d rather not say over the phone,’ answered the voice.
‘Then I’d rather not talk to you,’ Brunetti said and hung up.
This response usually stunned callers so much that they felt they had no option but to call back. Within minutes, the phone rang again, and Brunetti answered in the same way.
‘It’s very important,’ the same voice said.
‘So is it that I know who I’m talking to,’ Brunetti said quite conversationally.
‘We talked last week.’
‘I talked to a lot of people last week, Signor Crespo, but very few of them have called me and said they wanted to see me.’
Crespo was silent for a long time, and Brunetti feared for a moment that it might be his turn to be hung up on, but instead, the young man said, ‘I want to meet you and talk to you.’
‘We are talking, Signor Crespo.’
‘No, I have some things I want to give you, some photos and some papers.’
‘What sort of papers and what sort of photos?’
‘You’ll know when you see them.’
‘What does this have to do with, Signor Crespo?’
‘With Mascari. The police got it all wrong about him.’
Brunetti was of the opinion that Crespo was correct about this, but he thought he’d keep that opinion to himself.
‘What have we got wrong?’
‘I’ll tell you when I see you.’
Brunetti could tell from Crespo’s voice that he was running out of courage or whatever other emotion had led him to make the call. ‘Where do you want to meet me?’
‘How well do you know Mestre?’
‘Well enough.’ Besides, he could always ask Gallo or Vianello.
‘Do you know the parking lot at the other side of the tunnel to the train station?’
It was one of the few places where someone could park for free in the vicinity of Venice. All anyone had to do was park in the lot or along the tree-lined street that led to the tunnel and then duck into the entrance and up on to the platforms for the trains to Venice. Ten minutes by train, no parking fee, and no waiting in line to park or pay at Tronchetto.
‘Yes, I know it.’
I’ll meet you there, tonight.’
‘What time?’
‘Not until late. I’ve got something to do first, and I don’t know when I’ll be finished.’
‘What time?’
‘I’ll be there by one this morning.’
‘Where will you be?’
‘When you come up out of the tunnel, go down to the first street and turn left. I’ll be parked on the right side in a light blue Panda.’