After leaving her office, Brunetti wondered if he should go up to his own to take a look around for anything he might need in the next weeks: reports from an ongoing investigation, his pistol, a light raincoat he’d left in the closet sometime in the spring? But no, he’d leave all thought of work behind. What did a man of determination and muscle need with police reports, with a pistol, with a raincoat, for heaven’s sake? If he got wet, then he’d be wet; if imperilled by some unknown terror from the sea, he’d beat it back with his single oar and then return to his bachelor home and cook the fish he’d caught that morning, eat it with a glass of local wine, then sit in the dimming light with a small glass of grappa while he listened to the chatter of marsh birds as they prepared themselves for sleep, and then go and do the same himself, the dreamless sleep that comes of sunlight, simplicity, and long hours rowing under the sun.
That night he packed, determined to make everything fit into a small wheeled suitcase, the one he used when they went away for a weekend or he travelled on police business for a few days. He packed a pair of tennis shoes that had soles good for rowing, a pair of leather sandals, and decided he’d wear an old pair of brown leather loafers he’d had re-soled and heeled more times than he could remember. Four T-shirts; uncertain whether there would be a washing machine in the house and embarrassed to ask Paola, he threw in two more. Underwear, two white cotton shirts and then a third, a button-down Brooks Brothers Oxford cloth he’d bought in New York and that had now matured to the perfect softness. An old beige cotton jacket he could no longer remember buying, a worn cashmere sweater he’d refused for years to part with, bathing trunks, a pair of light blue jeans, and a pair of navy blue Bermudas he’d bought but never worn. He paused as he picked up his razor, uncertain about putting it into the leather case Paola had given him for his fortieth birthday. Did rustic men shave every day? he asked himself. Paola’s voice somehow channelled itself into the room, saying, ‘Yes, they do,’ and he put in the razor. Toothbrush, comb, toothpaste, and that was that.
Now the hard part. Presumably, he’d have no guests; not unless Paola decided to come out and visit, with or without the kids. He would be by himself for two weeks, in a house that might or might not possess books. It would be light until after nine, when he’d eat, then go to bed. But the mornings: he’d be free to make coffee and go back to bed to read, what bliss. And if it rained? Faced with this prospect, Brunetti’s sense of heroism diminished, allowing him to admit he’d probably prefer days alone, undisturbed, with a book, to days spent rowing a boat aimlessly around the laguna in the rain.
He went into the bedroom, where his books were kept, exiled here a decade ago by the encroachment of Paola’s books on the shelves of her study, where space had once been promised to his. He stood and stared at their spines for five minutes, running his eyes across them, counting the days he’d be on the island. How long since he’d read the Odyssey? His hand reached towards it but came back empty: his memory was too clear; besides, his days would provide enough travel on the wine-dark sea. He went and took the Pliny from the sofa, came back, and placed it on the foot of the bed. Then Herodotus, a new translation which he’d had for three years and not once opened. He returned to studying the books, and when his eyes fell upon Suetonius, whom he had not read for ages, he took him and tossed him on the pile: what would be better than gossip for a rainy day?
He hesitated then, anticipating the panic that came when there was nothing left to read. Real men busied themselves, he had always been told: hunting, chopping firewood, defending their territory and women from marauding hordes, buying low and selling high. Faced with two weeks on the outer edges of a city that had always needed brave men to defend it, Brunetti stood and looked at his books, pulled down a copy of Euripides, to have as many Greeks as Romans, put the four books into his suitcase and closed it.
6
After a consciously non-dramatic farewell from Paola, Brunetti took the Number One from San Silvestro to Ca’ d’Oro and walked back towards Fondamente Nove, arriving on time for the 10.25. Because it was midweek, there were not many people on the enormous Number 13, and, even though it was July, he identified few people as tourists. He wore a pair of faded cotton trousers and one of the white cotton shirts, which was clinging damply to him by the time he got to Fondamente Nove. He had called the number Paola gave him for Davide, whose surname was Casati, and told him he’d be arriving at the Capannone stop on Sant’Erasmo at 10.53. He assumed that the grunt of acknowledgement he’d received had included the promise that Davide would meet him there. The idea of walking any distance on the island, pulling his suitcase behind him, in no way appealed.
The first stop was Murano Faro, where he watched idly as people got off and on. One woman caught his attention: tall, white-haired, more than robust, wheeling an enormous shopping cart while at the same time holding the hands of two little blonde girls, perhaps three and five. The taller one broke loose and started towards the door at the back of the vaporetto that led to the outside seats. ‘Regina!’ the woman called, and Brunetti heard the fear in her voice. The swinging doors led to seats, but they also led to a railing and then the drop into the water.
Just as the child passed him, Brunetti leaned closer and swept her up, saying, ‘Ciao, Reginetta. You don’t want to run away from your nonna, do you?’ Speaking automatically in Veneziano, Brunetti said it loud enough for the woman to hear and was careful to hold the child under the arms and at a good distance from himself, familiar as he was with the fears – groundless or not – of parents and grandparents.
He set Regina back on her feet and released her, hunched down in his seat to bring his eyes on a line with hers. She looked at him, startled, and Brunetti crossed his eyes and moved his ears up and down, a trick that used to drive his daughter Chiara to a delirium of giggles. Regina laughed aloud and clapped her hands in delight. Turning to the woman, she cried out in that piercing voice of child-joy, ‘Nonna, Nonna, come and look at the funny man.’ She, too, spoke in dialect rather than in Italian.
He stood and turned to the woman, who called out, ‘Guido Brunetti, is that you?’
His surprise left him without words, but he used the time it took him to recover to darken her hair, let it grow longer, take away fifteen kilos, and smooth the lines from her forehead and around her eyes. And yes, it was Lucia Zanotto, who had sat in the seat in front of him for four years of elementary school.
‘Lucia,’ he said, delighted. He had seen her only once – no, twice – in more than thirty years, and yet he knew her in an instant. Sweet-tempered, funny, generous Lucia, who had married her Giuliano Sandi while still in her teens and had three children, and here she was, on the boat to Sant’Erasmo.
They hugged one another, stepped back to have a better look, then hugged again. Then two kisses on the cheek and unconditional delight at having found an old friend. ‘I’d know you anywhere. You look just the same,’ they said simultaneously. It was the truth for them, although the years had changed them.