‘Not my guys,’ said Sandro, putting up some resistance. He set his jaw. ‘All right, so it doesn’t get us much further. But we have a name.’
The sun was now low on the horizon, the sky glowing apricot through the arches of the Ponte Vecchio. It would soon be sinking, out in the silver sea off Viareggio. Where was he hiding, this Josef Cynaricz, whose blood had been on Brunello’s dead body, and from whom or from what was he hiding?
And then he felt it, the first pulse of adrenaline, as unmistakable as love. They were on to him, at last. They had a name, a profile.
‘I know she’s your friend,’ he said. ‘I know. He’s alive. He’s alive, and Brunello’s dead; that’s not necessarily good news, is it? Just think about it. It might be better for her if — if he doesn’t come back. That might turn out to be our job, to keep him away from her.’
‘To turn him in?’ said Giuli, fierce but not pulling away. Sandro could feel the waiter’s eyes on them, and let go. ‘Are you going to tell Pietro that he’s been seen? That he’s alive? And scared?’
‘His blood was on Brunello’s body,’ he said slowly. Was he going to tell Pietro? Whose side was he on, exactly?
‘She said that,’ said Giuli, half turning her head away from him to hide her expression.
‘Who said what?’ said Sandro, his head thick with it all. Like a swarm of bees, like a caffeine hangover, too much adrenaline combined with too much new information.
‘The Russian girl,’ Giuli spoke slowly. ‘When she said Anna was better off without him — she said he had a dirty job.’
‘Did she say what kind?’ He didn’t ask how the Russian girl knew: girls like that, living on the margins, they knew more than most about dirty jobs.
Giuli shook her head.
‘The kind that involves violence? Intimidation?’
Sandro was beginning to get that sick feeling in his stomach, the churning that arrived at the stage in any case when you began to wonder about how much you’d been fooling yourself. He really had begun to believe in Anna’s version of her guy: he’d convinced himself she’d know if he was — capable of doing what had been done to Claudio Brunello. But he’d seen sentimental drug dealers showing around pictures of their kids, known hitmen who were kind to animals, men whose wives knew nothing — or chose to know nothing — about what they did. But why would he have chosen Anna, if he was that kind of guy?
It could be as simple as the fact that she was easy to fool. He could feel Giuli’s eyes on him, taking in his expression. Then she looked past him.
‘Does this place have a bathroom?’
She sounded tired. Sandro looked around helplessly. The bar was no more than a wooden counter made out of wine boxes. Bathroom?
‘Of course it doesn’t,’ Giuli answered for him. ‘Let’s go home, shall we?’
‘OK,’ he said. Giuli needed a bathroom, and he needed Luisa.
But when they got there, the flat was dark, and neither Luisa nor Anna was there.
CHAPTER NINETEEN
‘She said what?’
‘Marisa asked me if I’d come out to her apartment,’ said Roxana. ‘To — um, pay my respects. To Irene Brunello.’ She was almost enjoying Val’s disbelief.
‘It’s on my way home,’ she went on, shrugging. ‘I don’t mind.’ Pursed her lips, thinking. ‘It’s got to be tough,’ she said. ‘Having her there.’
She got out her mobile. She’d called Ma to tell her she’d be a bit late home. Told her not to worry, for the umpteenth time: the handyman would keep her company, fixing the gate. Infuriatingly, Ma had reacted almost with amusement, as if it was all Roxana’s invention, her panic attack.
‘Oh, you enjoy yourself, dear,’ she’d said. Enjoy myself?
The mobile was almost out of battery. Roxana reached up into the overhead cupboard where she kept a charger.
They were in the tiny bright kitchenette at the back of the bank, and no one could hear them, but Val and Roxana were whispering anyway. It was half an hour from closing time and the Guardia and Giorgio Viola had just left for the day. They often came here in the dosing hours of a working day when there were no customers. Each took it in turns to take a breather from the dusty gloom of the bank, a shot of natural light. It had been easier when there was no Marisa, mind.
Val shook his head, watching her fiddle to get the charger into the phone. Gently he took it from her and with a single deft movement plugged it in. ‘Better not let Madam catch you,’ he said, sliding it out of sight behind the coffee machine. ‘That’s company electricity you’re consuming.’
She watched him, thinking about Irene Brunello and Marisa. ‘It’s just — it’s not like Marisa. I mean, it almost counts as asking for help, doesn’t it?’ Val pulled a long face. ‘With her. With Signora Brunello.’ Still shaking his head slowly, chastened. It was almost endearing to see him strain to understand.
He was right: it wasn’t like Marisa. She’d called Roxana into her office, about halfway through the afternoon. Roxana had thought it would be to do with the private detective — her private detective, was how she thought of him, Sandro Cellini. But Marisa hadn’t mentioned him.
Nothing to stop me calling him. The thought had barely had time to settle, then Marisa had said, ‘It’s Irene.’
The conversation had been stilted and odd, and Marisa had not been herself: stumbling, hesitant, awkward. Had it been something the private detective had said? Or was it the weirdness of the situation generally? Marisa having to be a shoulder for anyone to cry on was crazy.
‘I — um — well, I know you don’t know her. But I’m at my wits’ end, really.’ Marisa hadn’t seemed able to hold eye contact. ‘I don’t know when she’s planning to go, you see. Last night — well. The — the crying was awful. I didn’t know whether to go in.’
Roxana had just stood there, hands clasped tight, not even daring to sit down. Not knowing what to say.
‘I’ve got to get home before too late,’ she had begun, hedging. ‘My mother’s — well, there’s someone coming round. There was — some damage to our fence, a man’s coming to fix it.’
Marisa had made a gesture, almost impatient. ‘Your mother,’ she had said, irritably. Then frowned. ‘Did you say there was an intruder?’
‘Not exactly,’ Roxana had said, hesitating, finding herself reluctant to give out any more detail. ‘Look, it doesn’t matter, he’s not coming till seven-thirty or something.’
‘Anyway,’ Marisa had said. ‘She can’t stay forever, can she?’
Roxana had looked at her blankly. ‘Ma?’ she had said.
‘No,’ Marisa had replied, clicking her tongue. ‘Irene Brunello.’
Roxana had contemplated Marisa’s expression, and pitied Claudio Brunello’s widow even more than she had when she heard the news. ‘She’ll have to go home and tell her children some time,’ she had ventured, faltering at the thought.
And then Marisa’s head had swivelled, and for a second her eyes had met Roxana’s. ‘Yes,’ she had said. ‘That’s it, she will, won’t she?’
There was guilt somewhere deep down in Marisa, Roxana could have sworn there was, but a ferocious instinct for self-preservation had been wrestling it into silence. ‘She did say that’s why she couldn’t face going back. Something about holidays, not wanting to ruin the holidays.’
‘No.’
Looking into Marisa’s face, Roxana had seen she was not interested in thinking about Claudio Brunello’s children; it would be too complicated or too unpleasant, or too pointless, that was what she’d been telling herself.
‘I’ll come,’ she had said quietly. ‘I’d like to give her my — my best wishes, anyway. He was a — a nice man. A good guy.’ And Marisa’s eyes had swivelled away.
Now in the little back room with Val, there was a silence. Roxana frowned and rubbed at the circular mark left by a coffee cup. How many afternoons had she come in here, desperate for a quick shot of caffeine to get her to the end of the day?
‘What’s she got to feel guilty about?’ she said, hardly even aware of saying it out loud.