The Golden Egg

15

At the bottom of the flight of steps that would take him to his office, Brunetti glanced at his watch and saw that it was after two. It was likely to be one of the last temperate days of the year, and he felt himself entitled, after what he chose to think of as his morning’s work, to lunch with his wife. Paola had told him that the kids would not be there, so he could be as late as he pleased, and he decided to take her at her word.

As he made his way towards Rialto, he played at something he told himself resembled that three-dimensional oriental chess game he had read about but not understood and that might be called Go. He had no idea of the rules and so invented his own: he assumed that the people he shifted to another office on another floor would go without complaint and without rancour, emulating the man in the Bible who picked up his bed and walked away.

Scarpa to Signorina Elettra’s, Signorina Elettra to Claudia Griffoni’s. The large cabinets to the archive, where their high shelves would save some papers from the effects of mildew and time. And where was Griffoni supposed to go? Into the converted cupboard which had been Lieutenant Scarpa’s office for years?

He said nothing about the problem of Signorina Elettra’s office during the meal, finding the calamaretti con piselli more interesting than the territorial disputes of his colleagues. He waited until he was standing beside Paola, drying the dishes and putting them back in the cabinet, but drying them very slowly and not paying attention to what he was doing. He continued to dry a wine glass until she reached out with a wet hand, took the glass from him and set it on the counter. ‘What’s bothering you?’ she asked.

‘Women.’

It was seldom that Brunetti managed to stop Paola in her tracks, so her expression gave him a certain satisfaction. ‘In general? Or specifically?’ she asked. She rinsed her hands and took the towel from him to dry them.

‘Specifically,’ Brunetti answered.

Appearing to ignore him, she said, ‘How nice it would be to live on the first floor.’

‘With damp and no light?’ Brunetti asked, thinking of the ground-floor offices in the Questura; he had not even dared to consider moving any of the players in his game to them.

‘With only one flight of steps if we want to go out to get a coffee in a bar,’ she corrected. She reached up for the caffetiera, added water, put in the coffee, screwed the top on tightly, and set it on the stove. Paola was certain to return to the subject of women, so he went back into the living room and stood at the window. The clouds had grown heavier during lunch, and a light rain was falling.

She came in with two cups, sugar already added. She handed him one, stood stirring hers, and asked, ‘Which ones, specifically?’

‘Signorina Elettra and Claudia Griffoni,’ he answered.

‘They’ve come to blows?’ she asked.

He sipped at his coffee, finished it, and set the cup on a table. ‘You always talk about feminine jealousy.’

‘When I’m not speaking about male jealousy,’ she reminded him. She went and sat on the edge of the sofa, waiting.

‘It’s about an office,’ he began. ‘But that’s just a pretext. Elettra has never taken to her. It’s evident every time I mention her.’

‘And Griffoni’s feelings?’

Brunetti had never considered this. ‘I’m not sure that she’s noticed.’

She waved a hand in the air. ‘Earth to Guido, Planet Earth to Guido. Are you there?’

‘What’s that mean?’

‘It means that if Elettra doesn’t like someone, there is no way that the person would not notice it.’

He thought of Signorina Elettra’s perpetual, and public, goading of Lieutenant Scarpa, so different from the gentle, almost affectionate, pokes she took at Vice-Questore Patta. One man disgusted her, the other caused only irritation. With Griffoni, however, she had been assiduously polite, as she was with no one else at the Questura.

When he explained this to Paola, she said, ‘How does Griffoni behave?’

‘The same way. It’s as if she’s addressing a head of state.’

‘Well, she is, isn’t she?’

‘What?’

‘Signorina Elettra, at least from what you’ve told me, runs the place. Or she certainly runs Patta, which comes to the same thing.’

‘And so?’

‘So Griffoni’s formality could be nothing more than deference to her position.’ Before Brunetti could object, she said, ‘Remember, she’s a Sicilian, and they’re far more hierarchical in their thinking than we are. If they come of good families, the impulse towards politeness is even stronger.’

‘It’s been three years.’

‘They’ll work things out. It sounds to me as if each is simply waiting for the other one to show some sign of informality.’

Brunetti, refusing to believe this, asked, ‘What do I do? Stay out of it and break it up when they’re rolling around on the floor with their hands on each other’s throat?’

‘You said something about an office,’ Paola reminded him. ‘Is it about who gets one?’

‘Yes.’

‘Who makes that decision?’

‘Patta.’

‘Is there some way you can blackmail him into averting hostilities?’

Of course, after decades at the university, she would think of the most underhand way to deal with a problem. He had so far forgotten to tell Patta that there was no risk to the mayor’s son because of the bribes being paid to the Polizia Municipale. Patta, however, need not be told how easy it had been to discover that. Let him think that Brunetti had had to call in favours from the forces of order, ask old friends to turn a blind eye, risk his own reputation in defence of the mayor’s son and his re-election campaign, his political future.

If he made his efforts sound sufficiently Herculean, he might also add a request that Foa be temporarily assigned to the Guardia Costiera.

He bent down and kissed her. ‘I tremble to think of what you’ve been learning all these years from those novels you read,’ he said and went back to the Questura.

The rain grew heavier while he was still on the way as a serious shower turned into the first full pounding-down of the autumn. Glad that he had worn his light raincoat, Brunetti did not try to stop and wait it out; although he quickened his pace for the last ten minutes, he still arrived at the Questura with his head and shoulders soaked.

He rubbed his hair with both hands, wiped them on his handkerchief, then used it to swipe at his hair. Upstairs, he hung his coat on the door of the cupboard and decided to go down to speak to Signorina Elettra.

Once again, when he entered she was not at her desk. The door to Patta’s office was again ajar, and he could hear his superior’s voice from behind it, though he

could not make out what he was saying. He went and stood by the window, removing himself from temptation, but when he looked down at the riva he saw Signorina Elettra stepping into a police launch, Foa holding her hand to steady her on the slippery deck.

Brunetti moved closer to the door.

‘I realize the seriousness of the situation, Signore,’ Patta said in a placatory voice. ‘I’ve got one of my best men looking into it, you can be sure.’ There followed a long pause. ‘Yes, he’s Venetian, sir.’

Brunetti, one of Patta’s best men, moved silently across the office and went back upstairs to his own.

His phone started to ring when he was still a few metres from the room. Quickening his steps, he picked it up on the seventh ring. ‘Brunetti,’ he said.

‘Guido, it’s Ettore,’ he heard Rizzardi say.

‘What is it?’

‘A strange thing’s happened, and I thought I should

tell you.’

‘What?’

‘You sent one of your men over here with the mother of that man who died, didn’t you?’

‘Yes. What happened?’

‘Oh, she identified him. The young man couldn’t have been kinder to her.’

‘Is that why you’re calling?’

‘No, she’s back: that’s why.’

‘Back where?’

‘Back in the hospital.’

‘With you?’

‘No. In the Emergency Room.’

‘How do you know that?’

‘Favaro,’ he said, naming one of his assistants. ‘He

saw her when she came to identify her son, and

he recognized her when she was brought in by the ambulance, so he came to tell me.’

‘What happened?’

‘I don’t know. I haven’t seen her.’

‘Did he say anything about her?’

‘Yes. He said it looked like someone beat her up.’