By Its Cover (16 page)

‘I suspect so,’ Brunetti agreed.

Brunetti’s phone rang. He pulled it out and looked at the number. ‘Excuse me,’ he said and got to his feet. With no explanation, he went to the door and stepped back into the room that held the books, pulling the door closed behind him.

‘Brunetti,’ he said.

‘It’s Dalla Lana, Commissario,’ he heard one of the new officers say.

‘Yes?’

‘There’s been a death, Signore,’ he said, paused, then added, ‘Violent.’

‘If you mean murder, Dalla Lana, just say it, all right?’

‘Yes, sir. I’m sorry, but this is my first one, and I didn’t know whether to use that word.’

‘Tell me what you know,’ he said.

‘A man called – it was about ten minutes ago – to say he’s at his brother’s apartment, and his brother’s been killed. He said there’s a lot of blood.’

‘Did he give his name?’ Brunetti asked, noting that it had taken Dalla Lana ten minutes to call him. Ten minutes.

‘Yes, sir. Enrico Franchini. He lives in Padova.’

Brunetti raised his eyes and looked at the rows and rows of books, survivors from former ages, witnesses to life. ‘Did he tell you his brother’s name?’ he asked in a very cool voice.

‘No, sir. All he said was that he was dead, and then he started to cry.’

‘In Castello?’ Brunetti asked, but it really wasn’t a question.

‘Yes, sir. Do you know him?’

‘No.’ Then, more practically, ‘Did you send someone?’

‘I’ve been trying to find you, sir. I called your office, but you weren’t there. No one could give me your
telefonino
number. But then …’

‘You have it now,’ Brunetti said. ‘Call Bocchese and tell him to get over there with a crew. Did the man who called give you his phone number?’

‘No, sir,’ Dalla Lana said, and then, in a much smaller voice, ‘I forgot to ask him for it.’

Brunetti realized his fingers were white around his phone. He relaxed his grip and said, ‘The phone there, in your office, lists the numbers that have called. Find the last one and call him back and tell him, if he’s still in the apartment, to leave it, go outside, and wait for the police. He doesn’t have to go outside the building, but I want him out of the apartment. Do you understand that?’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘Call Foa, either on his phone or on the radio, and tell him to stop whatever he’s doing and go to the end of La Punta della Dogana. I’ll meet him there in ten minutes.’

‘If he can’t come, sir?’

‘He’ll come.’ Brunetti broke the connection.

He opened the door and went back into the room. ‘I’m afraid I have to return to the Questura, Dottoressa,’ he said, voice striving for calm. She seemed not to find this unusual, but Vianello got to his feet and moved towards the door.

‘Thank you for your time,’ Brunetti said. Without waiting for her response, he turned and left the room and started down the steps, folding the papers she had given him and putting them into his pocket.

‘What’s wrong?’ Vianello asked, one step behind him.

Brunetti hurried down to the courtyard, then out on to the street, turning left on the
riva
and towards the Punta della Dogana. ‘Franchini’s dead,’ he said. Vianello stumbled but quickly regained his footing.

‘His brother called from the apartment and said he was dead. There’s a lot of blood.’

‘What else did he say?’

‘I didn’t talk to him. He called the Questura: they called me.’

Blind to everything around them, the two men walked, almost running. ‘Bocchese’s coming, with a team. I told Dalla Lana to call the brother and tell him to get out of the apartment.’

‘Where are we going?’ Vianello asked as he suddenly realized where they were walking. The
riva
ended at a point that led only to water, and there was no boat stop, no chance to do anything except circle back towards the vaporetto at La Salute or flag a passing taxi.

‘I told Foa to meet us up there,’ Brunetti said. They passed a woman out walking two dogs. One of the dogs chased after them, barking wildly, though from fun and not in menace, and how, Brunetti asked himself, did he know that?

‘
Bassi, smettila
,’ the woman called after the dog, which gave up the chase and doubled back towards her.

As they reached the open triangular space at the end of the island, Brunetti saw the police boat moored at the very point. ‘Foa,’ he called. The pilot came to the side of the boat and put out his hand. Brunetti, and then Vianello, jumped on board; Foa flipped the rope from the stanchion and revved the motor. He pulled away from the
riva
and to the left, doubling back towards Castello.

They stayed on deck with the pilot, almost as if they believed that being able to see the buildings streaming by would shorten the trip. Neither spoke, and Foa, sensing their mood, said nothing. He did not use the siren: noise was for novices. Instead, he put on the blue light and weaved in and out of what traffic there was until he turned into the canal of Sant’Elena. He slowed to a more moderate speed, snaking past moored boats as he moved
into the ever smaller canals of Castello. Ahead of them, a large flat-decked transport boat stuck its nose into the canal, but Foa blasted it into sudden reverse with one short bleat of his siren.

Foa slowed again when he entered Rio di S. Ana and told them to duck their heads as they went under a bridge; he turned left and glided up and stopped behind another police launch that was moored on the right side of the canal. He hadn’t even grabbed the rope before Brunetti and Vianello leaped up to the
riva
and started across the
campo
.

They saw a man on one of the benches who seemed unaware of anything around him. He sat slumped over, legs apart, looking at the ground between his feet. He held a white handkerchief in his left hand, and as they approached him, he wiped at his eyes and blew his nose, then looked down again, his forearms propped on his thighs. Brunetti saw his shoulders rise and fall and heard his choked sob. The man wiped his eyes again but didn’t look up at the sound of their approaching footsteps.

Brunetti heard a humming sound, and then the man sobbed again. His hands were coiled into tight fists, the handkerchief crushed between his fingers. Brunetti approached the bench and stopped a metre from the man. ‘Signor Franchini,’ he said in a normal voice. The humming noise continued, and the man wiped at his eyes again.

Brunetti squatted down, bringing his eyes level with the other man’s. ‘Signor Franchini,’ he said again, this time raising his voice a little.

The man gave a sudden start, looked at Brunetti, pulled himself upright, and pressed himself against the back of the bench. Brunetti held up a hand, palm towards him. ‘We’re police officers, Signore. Don’t be frightened.’

The man stared at him, silent. He appeared to be in his late fifties, dressed in a woollen suit, his tie neatly knotted,
as though he had come here from his office. His thin grey hair fell across a narrow forehead. His eyes were brown, swollen in the aftermath of tears, his nose long and slender.

‘Signor Franchini?’ Brunetti said again. His knees began to hurt, and he leaned forward and pressed one hand against the ground. He pushed himself to his feet, careful to rise very slowly, though he felt it in his knees as he did.

‘Can we help you in any way?’ he asked, turning to Vianello, who had stopped a few metres away, then motioning him to come closer. Vianello was careful to move very slowly as he came to stand near his superior, leaving a space big enough for a man to dash through between them.

‘Who are you?’ the man asked. He sniffled, blew his nose, let his hands fall to his lap.

‘I’m Commissario Guido Brunetti, and this is Ispettore Vianello. We just heard about your brother, so we came here.’ He half turned and indicated the two police boats moored one behind the other, as if that would prove he was telling the truth.

‘Have you seen him?’ the man asked.

Brunetti shook his head. ‘No. We’ve just got here.’

‘It’s very bad, you know,’ the man said.

‘You’re his brother?’ Brunetti asked.

The man nodded. ‘Yes, the baby brother.’

‘Me, too,’ Brunetti said.

‘It’s not easy,’ Franchini said.

‘No, it’s not,’ Brunetti agreed.

‘They’re never careful enough.’ Franchini stopped, surprised at what he had just said, and raised the handkerchief with both hands to press it against his eyes. He gave a single, short sob, before lowering his hands.

‘Do you mind if I sit?’ Brunetti asked. ‘My knees can’t do that any more.’

‘Please, please,’ Franchini said and moved to the left to make room for him.

Brunetti sat down with a sigh and stretched his legs in front of him. He made a motion with his head, and Vianello started walking towards the house. The other man paid no attention to him.

‘You came from Padova?’ Brunetti asked casually.

‘Yes. Aldo and I always speak to each other on Tuesday nights, and when he didn’t answer his phone last night, I decided I better come and see what was wrong.’

‘Why did you think something was wrong?’ Brunetti asked in an entirely conversational voice.

‘Because we’ve spoken to each other every Tuesday night, at nine o’clock, for sixteen years.’

‘I see,’ Brunetti said and nodded to confirm the good sense of Franchini’s decision to come. He turned to face the man, as in a normal conversation, and saw that, although he was a thin man, a double chin hung incongruously beneath his face. He had large ears.

‘And you came this afternoon?’

‘I had to work today. We don’t get out until three.’

‘Oh, what do you do?’

‘I’m a teacher. Latin and Greek. In Padova.’

‘I see,’ Brunetti said. ‘Those were my favourite classes.’

‘Really?’ Franchini turned to ask him, unable to contain his pleasure.

‘Yes,’ Brunetti said. ‘I liked the precision of them, especially of Greek. Everything had the right place.’

‘Did you keep it up?’ Franchini asked.

Brunetti shook his head, his regret real. ‘I got lazy, I’m afraid. I still read them, but in Italian.’

‘It’s not the same,’ Franchini said, then quickly added, as though afraid of hurting a student’s feelings, ‘But it’s good that you still read them.’

Brunetti let a long time pass and then asked, ‘Were you and your brother close?’

After an even longer time, Franchini said ‘Yes.’ Another pause, then he added, ‘And no.’

‘Like me and my brother,’ Brunetti offered, waited a few moments and asked, ‘How were you close?’

‘We studied the same things,’ Franchini said, glancing aside to look Brunetti in the face. ‘He preferred Latin, though.’

‘And you Greek?’

Franchini shrugged in assent.

‘How else?’

He could see Franchini start to fold his handkerchief into a neat square, as if the apparent normality of the conversation had eliminated the need for tears. ‘We were raised as believers. Our parents were very religious.’

His father having been a savage atheist, Brunetti nodded to suggest a common experience.

‘Aldo was more interested than I.’ Franchini looked away. ‘He answered his vocation and became a priest.’ He was still folding the handkerchief, which was now reduced to the size of a packet of cigarettes.

‘But then he lost it. He told me once that he woke up one morning and it was gone, as if he’d put it somewhere before he went to bed and couldn’t find it when he woke up.’

‘What did he do?’ Brunetti asked.

‘He left. He stopped being a priest, so they fired him from his teaching job. They couldn’t do that, not legally, so they had to make it seem like he retired early, and they gave him a pension.’

‘How did he manage to live here?’ Brunetti asked, knowing Franchini would understand he was asking about money.

‘The apartment belonged to my parents, and they left it to us. So he moved here, and I stayed in Padova.’

‘Is your family there?’ Brunetti asked.

‘Yes,’ he said but did not elaborate.

‘And you called him every Tuesday?’

Franchini nodded. ‘Aldo changed when he lost his job: it was like he’d lost everything that was important to him. Except for Latin. He spent his time reading.’

‘In Latin?’

‘I helped find him a place here where he could read. He said he wanted to read the Fathers of the Church,’ Franchini said.

‘To find his faith again?’ Brunetti asked.

He heard the cloth of the other man’s jacket rub against the back of the bench as he shrugged. ‘He didn’t say.’ Then, before Brunetti could speak, he added, ‘And I never asked.’

‘So he spent his time reading the Fathers of the Church,’ Brunetti said, half statement, half question.

‘Yes,’ Franchini said. ‘And then this,’ he added, raising the hand that was not holding the handkerchief and waving it vaguely at the building behind them.

13

From that same building, as if in response to the waving of Franchini’s hand, came the sound of a window being opened, and then a voice called down, ‘Commissario.’

Brunetti stood and turned to face the voice, angry that his peaceful colloquy with Franchini had been interrupted so sharply. A uniformed officer stood at the window, leaning out and waving, as if he thought Brunetti did not know they were in the apartment. Brunetti raised his hand and made a rolling gesture, hoping the man would understand he was on his way, or would be soon.

When he looked back at Franchini, he saw that he had bent forward again and was staring at the pavement, hands together, forearms resting on his thighs. He seemed unaware of Brunetti, who took out his phone and dialled Vianello’s number. When the Inspector answered, Brunetti said, ‘Can you send someone down to stay with Signor Franchini?’ and hung up before Vianello could speak.

A few minutes later, Brunetti was relieved to see Pucetti emerge from the front door of the building.

When Pucetti reached the bench, Brunetti bent down to Franchini and said, ‘Signore, Officer Pucetti will stay here with you until I get back.’ Franchini looked at him, then at Pucetti. The officer gave a small bow. Franchini returned his gaze to Brunetti, then to the pavement. Brunetti patted the younger man’s arm but said nothing.