Vittori sat up straighter in his chair, glanced at Griffoni as though she were a person who’d come to sit next to him on the vaporetto when the rest of the boat was empty, and said, ‘I seldom have reason to go to Santa Croce.’
By force of will, Brunetti prevented himself from glancing at Griffoni. He didn’t know if she would pounce on Vittori now for admitting he knew where this person he didn’t know lived, or would wait until later in the interview.
‘My concern here,’ Brunetti began, talking man to man, ‘is that she might make some sort of official complaint against you. Say something to her mother or her grandmother, either of whom would be sure to ask us what we know about the incident. In that case, I’d be obliged to repeat what I saw and heard her say.’
Vittori threw his hands in the air as a sign of his exasperation. ‘How can that be possible, if she’s a half-wit? Who’d believe her?’
Brunetti dismissed the possibility. ‘I’m thinking about the effect on your reputation. As you said, her grandmother is your employer. I have no way of knowing what her reaction would be.’
‘But she wouldn’t believe her, would she?’ asked a scandalized Vittori.
‘Manuela’s her granddaughter,’ Brunetti said, suggesting that there was no way of calculating the extent to which people would be carried, once the idea of family was involved. Besides, women were so hopelessly sentimental, weren’t they?
‘All the more reason for her grandmother not to believe her,’ Vittori said. ‘If the Contessa’s been with her all these years, she knows what her granddaughter is.’ Vittori sat quietly for a few moments and then said angrily, ‘It’s not only my reputation, it’s my honour that’s at stake here.’ He took two quick breaths and then burst out, ‘The very idea that I’d assault . . . Why, it’s ridiculous.’
I will not look at Claudia. I will not look at Claudia. I will not look at Claudia, Brunetti told himself, forcing his eyes to remain fixed on Vittori.
The other man had risen to the role and now demanded, ‘How dare she make an accusation like that? How dare she?’
Brunetti allowed time for sweet reason to come to his aid and said, ‘The difficult thing here is that people today tend to believe the woman.’
‘But she’s not a woman. She’s just a child,’ Vittori said, with no attempt to disguise his anger. ‘No one will believe her.’
Brunetti was about to respond when his phone rang. He saw that it was Signorina Elettra’s number, so he picked it up with a curt ‘Sì.’
‘Giorgio just called me. The last call on one of those cards in Cavanis’ garbage was made the morning of the day he was killed to the home number of the man who’s with you now. Eight forty-three: it lasted six minutes. It came from a public phone two bridges from Cavanis’ home.’ And then she was gone.
28
Brunetti folded his hands just in front of him on his desk, the way he could remember the first Questore he worked for doing when he summoned Brunetti for the yearly evaluation of his performance. He allowed himself a quick glance at Griffoni, who sat with her hands folded in her lap. He noticed a small bulge in the sleeve of her sweater, just at the cuff: Vittori’s handkerchief, he assumed. Here were traces that would not be compromised by the rain.
‘Signor Vittori,’ he began in a serious and not particularly friendly voice, ‘I’d like to turn your attention away from the vague accusation made on the street yesterday to events in the past.’
‘Not when she went into the water, I hope,’ Vittori said, trying for irony but coming just short of belligerence.
‘No, far closer in time,’ Brunetti said easily. ‘I refer to the morning on which you received a phone call from Pietro Cavanis.’ He looked at Vittori, whose face had been wiped clean of all expression. ‘Could you tell me if you remember that, Signor Vittori?’
Vittori tried to look uninterested in the question, but he was no good at it. His head moved backwards a few millimetres, and his mouth contracted in what, in other circumstances, might have been pique or irritation. Had he not shaved his beard, the tiny moue might not have been noticed by either Brunetti or Griffoni.
Brunetti, imitating his Questore, lowered his head and stared at his hands for a moment. When he glanced at Vittori again, he saw that the man was staring at his own hands, clasped in his lap. Brunetti looked at Griffoni, who nodded, face rigid, then indicated to Brunetti that he was in charge and she’d follow his lead.
‘That was a Thursday, wasn’t it?’ Vittori asked in a calm voice, head still lowered.
‘No, it was a Sunday,’ Brunetti said and gave him the precise date.
‘A Sunday . . . I’d probably have been at home.’
‘Don’t you remember?’ Brunetti asked.
After pausing for further reflection, Vittori said, ‘I believe I didn’t go out that day,’ and Brunetti did not call Vittori’s attention to the fact that he did not bother to ask who Pietro Cavanis was.