‘I’m invited to dinner tonight, so I have to save a little room,’ Griffoni explained, apparently to Manuela’s satisfaction. Then, glancing at her watch, she said, ‘Come on, Manuela; it’s stopped raining and it’s time to go home.’
Brunetti got to his feet, leaving half his whisky in the glass, folded the sweater over the arm of his chair, and put on his jacket. As though summoned by telepathy, Gala appeared at the door with their damp coats over her arm. There were kisses and handshakes, and soon they were walking back towards Campo Santa Maria Mater Domini. The rain had stopped, yet the day seemed colder, although that might have been the result of their damp clothing.
Manuela broke free of Griffoni’s arm and hurried from side to side in the calli, looking into windows or avoiding puddles, always only a few steps ahead of them.
‘Did she say anything about what happened?’ Brunetti asked in a low voice.
Griffoni shook her head. ‘By the time we got to the Contessa’s, she’d quietened down. She was happy – you saw her – when we had cake, and she was perfectly natural in the kitchen with Gala.’ Manuela came back and took Griffoni’s arm for a few steps, and then detached herself and walked ahead again.
‘You think he was the man who attacked her?’ Griffoni asked.
Brunetti raised his eyebrows in an expression that could have meant just about anything. ‘I think he worked at the stables, perhaps when she was there. There’s a picture on the wall in the office of a man who looks like him. When I first met him, he had a beard, so I didn’t recognise him from the photograph. But now he’s shaved off his beard I’m sure it’s he.’ Brunetti slowed his steps and turned to face her when he added, ‘You’ve seen him.’
Griffoni stopped walking. ‘What? When?’
‘He was in one of those programmes we watched on television, talking about a project he’s working on, something about plaques on buildings, historic things.’
When he saw that she understood, he added, ‘Cavanis had only one channel working on his television; that’s the channel he appeared on.’
Before he could say anything further, Griffoni cut him short. ‘That’s the Belle Arti.’ She grabbed his arm for emphasis. ‘They’d be in charge of anything like that.’
‘Belle Arti,’ Brunetti whispered, thinking of the phone number on the scrap of paper in Cavanis’ apartment and that he’d told Griffoni about it.
‘What’s his name?’ she asked in a voice she struggled to keep calm.
‘Alessandro Vittori-Ricciardi.’
She shook her head to show she did not recognize it. Then the two of them stood silent, working it out. Manuela came back, and on seeing them still as statues, thought it was a game, and so raised one arm in the air and put the other hand on her hip. She stood motionless like that for a moment until she tired of it and went back to look in another shop window.
‘Cavanis recognized him,’ Brunetti said slowly, his mind already far ahead of his words.
‘And tried to call them because he was drunk and didn’t know what time it was,’ Griffoni added, a Christe to his Kyrie.
‘And then finally did call him,’ Brunetti said, closing the litany.
Griffoni’s voice suddenly changed and grew sombre. ‘It’s all circumstantial, Guido. A good defence attorney would hang us out to dry in fifteen minutes.’
‘That was his umbrella I picked up,’ Brunetti said. ‘Bocchese’s got it now.’
She said nothing. Manuela hurried back to ask if they were close to home and seemed pleased to be told they were. When she was off again, Griffoni asked, ‘Until he’s done with it and has or doesn’t have a match, what are you going to do?’
Brunetti took out his phone and said, ‘Call Enrichetta degli Specchi and see if she has a list of the people who worked at the stables fifteen years ago.’
26
Sandro Vittori, yet to become Vittori-Ricciardi, had indeed worked at the stables during the time Manuela had kept her horse there. His job had been to clean the stables and hold the bridles of the horses ridden by the youngest students as they circled the ring. Enrichetta degli Specchi managed to find his letter of application and the records of his salary for the six months he was there. Then she called Brunetti back to tell him she had also found a copy of a letter her late husband had sent to Vittori, firing him and forbidding him to return to the stables. At Brunetti’s request, she promised to fax it to the Questura but read him a few phrases over the phone. ‘ “ . . . will not have a student of mine treated in such a disrespectful manner . . . young girls placed in my trust . . . actions not to be tolerated”.’
After reading this to Brunetti, she said, ‘My husband was a . . . a private person. That is, he was very good at keeping secrets. If he knew which girl this man was bothering, he wouldn’t have told anyone.’