'Nadia says she doesn't like the feel of him or at least the feel of the way people talk about him. She thinks it's strange that so many people knew him for so long, lived near him, watched him grow up, and still had almost nothing to say about him.'
Brunetti, who was of much the same opinion, asked, 'Did she say what she thought this might mean?'
Vianello shook his head. 'No, just that it wasn't normal that no one wanted to talk about him.'
Brunetti saw the expression on Vianello's face, a low-level satisfaction, and interpreted it to mean that the inspector had learned something that confirmed his wife's analysis. In order to urge him towards the pleasure of revelation, Brunetti asked, 'What happened at the school board offices?'
'Same old thing’ Vianello said.
'Same old what?' Brunetti inquired.
'Same old office of a city bureaucracy. I phoned and explained that I wanted to speak to the Director in connection with a criminal investigation. I thought it would be better not to explain which. But he was in Treviso for a meeting, as was his assistant, and the person I eventually spoke to had been there only three weeks and said he couldn't be of any help.' Vianello grimaced and added, 'Probably won't be of any help after three years.'
Brunetti waited, familiar with the inspector's style. Vianello flicked away another invisibility from his trousers and went on, 'So I finally agreed to speak to the head of personnel and went to their offices to see her. They've modernized everything and now they've all got new computers and desks.
'The woman I spoke to is the head of a department that is now called Human Resources’ Vianello began. Brunetti was struck by how cannibalistic the term sounded but said nothing. ‘I asked her if she could provide records of the employment of Paolo Battestini, and she asked when he worked there. When I told her, she said it would be difficult to find records for certain periods because they were now in the midst of the process of transferring some employment information on to their computer system.' Seeing Brunetti's expression, Vianello said, 'No, I didn't even bother to ask how long it would take, but I did ask her which years were affected.' He looked up in search of Brunetti's approval, and when he saw it, he went on. 'She looked him up on the computer and said that the last five years he was there were already in the system, so she printed out a copy for me.'
'What sort of information was it?'
'Reports from his superiors on his work performance, dates of his holidays, sick-days, things like that.'
'And did you get it?'
'Yes. I gave it to Signorina Elettra when I came in.' Brunetti registered that she had finally arrived as Vianello said, 'There were long periods of sick-leave towards the end, and she's checking the hospital records to see if he was there and, if so, why.'
. 'I'll save her the trouble,' Brunetti said. 'He died of AIDS.' When he saw Vianello's surprise, he summarized his conversation with Dottor Carlotti the previous afternoon and half apologized for not having called Vianello to tell him this before he went to the school board offices. But he made no mention of his conversation with the postino.
'Better to have it confirmed by two sources,' Vianello said.
Brunetti felt a flash of anger at the suggestion that what he had discovered needed confirmation but controlled the feeling and asked, 'Did you manage to talk to anyone who worked with him?'
'Yes. After I got the print-out, I hung around in the corridor until about ten, when two of the men who worked there – I figured they might have worked with him – said they were going to the bar across the street for a coffee. I folded the papers so that their letterhead showed and followed them over’
Brunetti marvelled at how this man, taller and larger than he, so easily rendered himself invisible once he started to talk to people. 'And?' he prompted.
‘I said I was from the Mestre office, and they believed me, had no reason not to. They'd seen me there in their office, and they'd seen the woman give me the print-out, so they'd figure I had some reason to be there.
'I'd had a look over the woman's shoulder when she called up the personnel files and seen the names of a few people who still worked there, so I ordered a coffee and asked these two guys about one of them, said how long it was since I'd seen him. And then I asked about Battestini, if it was his mother who had been killed, and how he'd taken it because he'd always seemed so devoted to her.'
No wonder Vianello had seemed proud of what he had done. 'The cunning of the snake, Vianello,' Brunetti said in open praise.
'That's when things changed, though. It was very strange, sir. It was as if I'd taken that same cunning snake and tossed it on the floor at their feet. One of them even stepped back and put his money on the counter and left. There was a long silence, then the other one finally said he thought it was, but that Battestini didn't work there any more. Didn't even mention that he was dead. And then he just sort of disappeared. That is, I asked to pay for our coffees, and when I turned back, the guy wasn't there – not where he'd been beside me and not in the bar.' He shook his head at the memory.
'Did you get a sense of what it was about him, about Battestini?' Brunetti asked.
'Twenty years ago, it would have been because he was gay, but no one really cares about that now,' Vianello said. 'And most people feel pity for anyone who dies of AIDS, so I'd say it was something else, and the something else would probably have to do with the office. But whichever it was, they didn't like it that someone they didn't know was asking questions about him.' He smiled and added, 'At least that's the way it looked to me.'
'He subscribed to a magazine with photos of boys’ Brunetti said and watched this information register on Vianello's face. Then, for clarity's sake, he added, 'Adolescents, not little boys.'
After a moment, the inspector said, 'I'm not sure that's the sort of information people at his office would have had.'
Brunetti had to admit that this was true. 'Then it probably was something to do with his job at the school board.'
'Looks like’ Vianello said.
16
Brunetti and Vianello were on their way down to Signorina Elettra's office to save her the effort of – Brunetti didn't know whether to say 'accessing' or 'breaking into' the hospital patient files – when he realized he no longer cared how she got the information she gave him. That in its turn provoked a flash of shame at the moment's rage he'd felt at her absence. Like Otello, he had a lieutenant who could corrupt his best feelings.
As though forewarned that today she was to play Desdemona, Signorina Elettra wore a long dress of gossamer white linen, her hair hanging loose down her back. She greeted their arrival with a smile, but before she could say anything, Vianello asked, 'Any luck yet?'
'No,' she apologized. ‘I had a phone call from the Vice-Questore.' As if that were not sufficient justification, she explained, 'He wanted me to write a letter for him, and he was very particular about the wording.' She paused, waiting to see which one of them would be the first to ask.
It was Vianello. 'Are you at liberty to reveal the nature of the letter?'
'Good heavens, no. If I did, people here would know that he's applying for a job with Interpol.'
Brunetti recovered first and said, 'Of course, of course. It had to be.' Vianello failed to find words with which to do justice to his feelings. 'Are you at liberty, perhaps, to tell us to whom the letter is addressed?' Brunetti asked.
'My loyalty to the Vice-Questore would not permit that, sir,' she said, voice rich with the sort of pious sincerity Brunetti associated with politicians and priests. Then, thrusting her forefinger towards a sheet of paper which lay on her desk, she asked idly, 'Do you think a request to the Mayor for a letter of recommendation should go through the internal post?'