This time a silent Brunetti nodded. He was about to ask Vianello if Signorina Elettra had told him about the attempt to hack into the Vice-Questore’s email, when the Inspector said, ‘But still, regardless of whether it goes directly to the immigrants or not, fifty euros a day is still being spent, isn’t it?’ He gave Brunetti a quick glance and asked, ‘Eighteen thousand euros a year?’
This time, it was Vianello’s turn to wait. When he had figured it out, Brunetti nodded.
‘That’s still more than I take home in a year.’ Vianello did some calculations and was forced to clarify. ‘After taxes, that is.’ Was that a grin he saw on Vianello’s face?
Brunetti decided it was time to go up to his office.
9
Brunetti met no one on the steps. He went into his office and, rejecting the temptation to close the door behind him, walked over to the window and looked across towards the fa?ade of San Lorenzo. The restoration team had long since disappeared, leaving no trace that they had been there. Worse, the cat condominium that had stood there for years had vanished, as had, unfortunately, the cats.
Over the years, most of the street cats had disappeared from the area, and now their last home, that multi-storey extravaganza, was gone. Brunetti realized he minded more for the humans than for the cats. They were wily and would find new safe places to hide in and go on living, but the people from the nursing home who took such pleasure in the cats’ presence and their survival in the face of terrible odds, what of them? And what of Vianello, to whom he had been so condescending with his talk of logic and all its wonders?
He heard a noise at the door, called ‘Avanti,’ and turned to greet his guest.
It was Signorina Elettra, today dressed in something that might have been mistaken for battle fatigues. The cloth of her jacket was mottled green and grey, with twin breast pockets buttoned closed. Things got a bit confused with her trousers, which were charcoal grey and very narrow – hardly the sort of thing to wear into battle. Her boots, however, slipped back into role: heavy-soled, thick black leather brushed to a mirror-like shine, tied halfway up her shins with elaborately choreographed white laces. In her hand she held a folder, not a weapon.
‘Are you planning to repel an invasion?’ he asked.
‘I’ve got some information about Contessa Lando-Continui’s granddaughter,’ she said by way of response. Perhaps he had only imagined speaking?
‘Please tell me,’ he said, waving a hand towards the chairs on the other side.
She sat and crossed her legs. She opened the folder.
‘Manuela,’ she began, ‘has been declared 80 per cent mentally handicapped, and her mother receives a monthly payment of six hundred and twelve euros to help care for her.’
Signorina Elettra glanced at Brunetti, who nodded, urging her to continue. ‘Her oxygen supply was cut off for a certain time. The official report gives this as the reason for her handicap and the resulting payment and further states that the damage manifests itself in permanent child-like behaviour. They estimate her mental age at seven, though for some things it is estimated that she has greater capacity.’ She looked at Brunetti, but he shook his head: that was more than enough to know.
‘I found the school she was attending and spoke to the preside, who’s been there only four years. Manuela’s file is online and states that she was absent from classes for a good portion of her last three months there. Only one of her teachers is still there: he taught Italian but doesn’t remember much about her save that she was beautiful.’
Brunetti realized that, although the facts kept rising around him like a tide, he had discovered little to suggest a crime of any sort. If he wanted to make any real progress, he could no longer continue without an official request.
Signorina Elettra saw his attention move away from her and asked, ‘What is it?’
‘The Vice-Questore doesn’t know anything about this. I’ve not had time to mention it to him.’ Hearing himself, Brunetti recognized how lame the excuse was.
‘Ah,’ she said, eyes moving away from his face, as though a solution were written on the far wall and she had only to study it to discover what it was. ‘It would be best,’ she began and paused to consult the wall again to read the rest of the message. ‘ . . . if he believed that this was an investigation that would somehow help his career.’
Brunetti turned his attention to the wall she had studied with such success. Their eye-beams threaded on one double string, the same their postures were, staring at the wall in hope of some revelation.
‘Have you met Dottor Patta’s wife?’ he broke the silence by asking.
‘Once. At a reception for the Praetore. She wanted his attention, not mine.’
Brunetti was struck by her last sentence and by the idea of a person who wanted attention. Finally he said, ‘That’s how to do it.’
‘How?’
‘By using the Contessa’s attention as bait to offer his wife.’