Under his breath, Brunetti muttered, 'Vianello dissed me’ He gave a quick guffaw, and he went out on to the deck, his good spirits renewed.
The launch pulled up to the riva, and they were quickly in front of the building. Brunetti glanced up and saw that both the shutters and the windows of Signora Battestini's apartment were open, though ho televised sound poured out. He rang the bell and saw that her name had been replaced by Van Cleve.
A blonde head appeared at the window above him, and then a man's head appeared beside the woman's. Brunetti stepped back from the building and was about to call up to them to open the door, but -apparently the sight of Pucetti's uniform sufficed, for a moment later both heads disappeared, and the door to the building clicked open.
The man and the woman, equally blonde and equally pale skinned and eyed, stood at the door to the apartment. Looking at them, Brunetti could not stop himself from thinking of milk and cheese and pale skies perpetually rilled with clouds. Their Italian was halting, but he managed to make it clear to them who he was and where he wanted to go.
'No chiave’ the man said, smiling, and showing his empty hands to reinforce the message. The woman imitated his gesture of helplessness.
'Va bene. Non importa’ Brunetti said, turning from them and starting up the stairs to the attic.
Pucetti followed close behind. At the first turning, Brunetti looked back and saw the two of them still standing outside the door to what was now apparently their apartment, staring up at him, as curious as owls.
When he reached the top of the steps, Brunetti pulled out a twenty-centesemi coin, sure he could use it to unthread the already-loosened screws in the flange. But as he reached the door, he found that the flange was hanging at an angle, loose from the jamb. The two screws he had so carefully turned back in place were also loose, and the door stood open a few centimetres.
Brunetti put out a cautionary hand towards Pucetti, but he had already noticed and had moved to the right of the door, his hand reaching for his pistol. Both men froze, waiting for some sound from inside. They stood that way for minutes. Brunetti put his left foot in front of the bottom of the door and rested his full weight on it, thus blocking any attempt that might be made to push it open from the inside.
After another few minutes, Brunetti nodded at Pucetti, moved his foot, reached forward and pulled the door open. He went in first, calling out, 'Police’ and feeling just the least bit ridiculous as he heard himself say it.
The attic was empty, but even in the dim light they could see signs of the passage of the person who had been there before them. A trail of scattered objects told of curiosity turning to frustration and that in its turn transformed into anger, and then rage. The first boxes stood neatly unstacked near where Brunetti had left them, their flaps pulled open, contents set on the ground next to them. The next lay on their sides, their flaps ripped open. The third pile, where Brunetti had found the papers, had been pillaged: one box had been ripped in half, and a wide semicircle of papers arched over to the next pile. The last boxes, which had held her collection of religious kitsch, had suffered martyrdom: the bodies and limbs of saints lay strewed about in positions of impossible and ungodly promiscuity; one Jesus had lost his cross and stretched for it with open arms; a blue Madonna had lost her head in crashing against the back wall; another had lost her infant son.
Brunetti took it all in, turned to Pucetti, and said, 'Call them and tell them to send the crime team. I want fingerprints taken of everything’ He placed his right hand on Pucetti's arm and pushed him towards the door: 'Go down and wait for them,' he said. Then, in violation of everything he had ever learned or taught about the need to preserve a crime scene from contamination, he added, 'I want to have a look before they get here.'
Pucetti's confusion was so strong as almost to be audible as well as visible, but he did as he was told, slipping past the attic door, careful not to touch it, and went downstairs.
Brunetti stood, studying the scene and considering the consequences of the discovery of his fingerprints on so many of the papers, boxes and documents that lay in front of him. He could, if he chose, explain their presence by maintaining that he had used this time to examine the evidence. He could, just as easily, say that he had come up to the attic and examined the contents of some of the boxes during a previous, unauthorized, visit to the apartment.
Brunetti took a step towards the boxes. In the gloom, he set his right foot on the glass ball containing the Nativity scene, slipped, and lost his footing. He landed on his other knee, landed on something that crumbled under his weight, pushing sharp fragments through the cloth of his trousers and into his skin. Stunned by the fall and the sudden pain, it took him a moment to raise himself to his feet. He looked first at his knee, where the first faint traces of blood were beginning to seep through the cloth, and then to the floor, to see what he had fallen on.
It was a third Madonna. His knee had caught her in the stomach, crushing all life out of her but sparing her head and legs. She looked up at him with a calm smile and all-forgiving eyes. Instinctively, he bent to help her, at least to put the top and bottom parts somewhere safe. He went down on his good knee, wincing at the pain this motion caused the other, and reached with both hands to pick up the fragments. Amidst the pieces of crushed plaster was a flattened roll of paper. Puzzled, Brunetti looked at the bottom of the Madonna's feet and saw that there was a small oval opening closed with a cork, just like the bottom of a salt shaker. The paper had been rolled up into a tight cylinder and stuffed inside her.
He dropped the head and legs into the pocket of his jacket and stepped out into the hallway. He moved to the window at the end and, grasping the top left corner of the paper with the tips of his fingers, used the back of the fingernails of his right to unroll it, hoping to leave no fingerprints. But the paper kept rolling up, preventing him from seeing what was written on it.
He heard Pucetti on the stairs below him, calling out, They're on the way, sir’ When Brunetti saw him appear at the head of the steps, he called the young officer over. Kneeling again, he spread the paper open with the tips of the fingers of both hands and told Pucetti to put the very edge of his foot sideways on the top. When it was anchored to the ground, Brunetti used the tips of his little fingers to scroll it open again, anchoring the open sheet with his forefingers once it was done.
The single sheet of paper bore the letterhead of the Department of Economics at the University of Padova and was dated twelve years previously. It was addressed to the Department of Personnel of the School Board of the City of Venice and stated, after a polite greeting, that, 'Unfortunately, there is no mention in the records of our department of a student named Mauro Rossi as having been awarded the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Economics; nor, in fact, do we have any record of a student of that name and with that birth date ever having enrolled in this faculty’ The signature was illegible, although there was no mistaking the seal of the university.
Brunetti stared down at it, refusing to believe what it told him. He tried to recall the documents on the wall of Rossi's office, among them the large, framed parchment which proclaimed him as a Doctor of Philosophy – Brunetti had not bothered to read the name of the faculty granting the degree.
The letter was addressed to the Director of the Personnel Department, but certainly directors did not open their own maiclass="underline" that's what clerks and assistants were for. They opened, read, and made official note of the letters which certified that the claims made in a curriculum vitae were true. They filed the letters of recommendation, the marks gained on competitive exams, made note of all the pieces of the paper puzzle that, when put together, gave a picture of someone worthy of professional rank and promotion in the civil service.