‘I don’t remember any woods there,’ Brunetti said.
‘Well, there’s a plantation where trees are grown to be harvested, and there are paths between the trees,’ she said, drawing the trees and the paths with her hands. ‘Besides, we’re not doing anything fancy, just trotting along and getting to know one another.’
‘Like a marriage?’ he asked.
‘A little bit, yes,’ Griffoni laughed, but before she could say anything else, Lieutenant Scarpa approached and stopped at the head of the stairs. Brunetti moved so that Scarpa would not have to pass between them.
‘Good afternoon, Commissari,’ he said, raising his hand and giving Brunetti an uncharacteristic smile.
‘Lieutenant,’ they both acknowledged and remained silent until his footsteps had disappeared below them. Griffoni said, ‘I’ll get back to work,’ and turned towards her office, while Brunetti continued towards his own.
That same night the temperature plummeted and it rained: buckets, torrents, floods, cascades. The next morning people waited to leave their homes until they could see that the streets had rejected the thin coating of ice that the rain had left behind. The air had been washed clean, and for the first time in months Brunetti could see the Dolomites from the window of the kitchen.
Brunetti put on his thickest-soled shoes, more suitable for the mountains than for the city, and walked to the corner, where he decided to take the vaporetto, conscious that, for the first time in his life, the idea of falling on the street had influenced his behaviour.
When he arrived at the Questura, the officer at the door told him that Signorina Elettra had asked him to go to her office. No, he replied in response to Brunetti’s question, the Vice-Questore had not yet arrived.
He could tell, when he entered her office, that she had something unpleasant to tell him. They exchanged greetings, and Brunetti stepped back to lean against the windowsill. No sun to warm his back today. It was Tuesday, and she had been to the flower market, so her office was ablaze, today with tulips: three, no, four different vases of them and no doubt a few more in Dottor Patta’s office.
In a bow to autumn, Signorina Elettra was wearing a deep orange woollen dress, with a dark chrysanthemum-red scarf wrapped closely around her neck. Her hair, usually gleaming chestnut, appeared to have more red highlights today. ‘You’re not going to like this,’ she said, not at all to his surprise.
‘What?’
‘There are two things, Commissario. It’s been a week and Giorgio still hasn’t been in touch, and he’s the only one I can ask to find the calls made with those cards.’ She forestalled his question by saying, ‘Yes, I sent an official request, but it’ll be at least another week before we get any sort of response.’
Brunetti had the feeling that this news was the lesser evil and said, ‘Let’s hope Giorgio can find the information sooner.’ He smiled to show he was neither angry nor impatient.
She gave an uncharacteristic ‘Um’ before she said, ‘And Dottor Gottardi has looked at all the files concerning Manuela and thinks there’s nothing to pursue.’ She raised both hands in a sign of surrender.
‘And?’ Brunetti asked, refusing to permit himself to remark that Dottor Gottardi was not proving to be a compliant magistrate.
‘He’s read your report about the possible link to Cavanis’ murder, and he sees no reason to believe the two cases are related. It’s not his case, but he says there’s not been much progress.’
‘And so?’ he asked politely. She hadn’t yet said anything he particularly disliked, so the surprise no doubt lay in whatever order the magistrate might have for him.
‘And so he’s suggested you be put in charge of everything that’s emerged after that boy fell from the altana.’
‘I beg your pardon,’ Brunetti said. ‘I thought the Guardia di Finanza had taken it over.’
‘That case, yes,’ she said. ‘But he thinks there should be a separate investigation into the private hotels and bed and breakfast places.’ She looked at the keyboard of her computer as she told him this.
Suddenly he remembered a picture from a book he’d read to the kids when they were young: a cat on a branch in a tree, slowly disappearing and leaving behind only his menacing smile. And that thought led him to Scarpa’s almost cordial smile as he was coming up the stairs.
‘It’s Scarpa, isn’t it?’ he asked.
She looked at the screen of her computer and nodded. ‘I’d say so. Probably.’
‘How did he manage that?’ Brunetti asked, sure she would know.
‘Do you know Dottor Gottardi?’ she asked.
Brunetti had spoken to the magistrate, who had been there only a few months, but had never worked with him on a case before Manuela’s.
‘He’s from Trento, isn’t he?’ Brunetti asked.
‘Yes.’
‘And?’