Donna Leon - The Golden Egg

‘Someone broke in here a few months ago and took them.’

Brunetti pulled his notebook from the inside pocket of his jacket, flipped it open, and took out his pen.

‘That won’t help,’ she said brusquely.

‘Excuse me?’

‘Writing down the date. It won’t help. I never told the police.’

Brunetti let his hands fall to his lap and asked, ‘Why is that, Signora?’

‘No one trusts them,’ she said, unaware or unconcerned that he was a member of the police.

That, Brunetti was willing to admit, was probably the truth, but he didn’t want to admit it to this woman. Instead, he picked up the notebook and asked, ‘What was taken?’

‘Everything.’

‘I see,’ Brunetti said and then, rather than asking her to supply a list, asked: ‘ Carta d’identità ?’

‘Yes.’

‘Birth certificate and baptismal certificate?’

Here she moved back in her chair and crossed her legs. She was wearing a dark dress, and the motion pulled the hem to mid-calf; Brunetti could not help noticing that they were shapely and long. ‘Oh, I lost those a long time ago. When we moved.’ In response to his glance, she said, ‘You know how it is.’

Brunetti, who did not know how it was, said, ‘Of course,’ and made a note of it.

‘Where was your son born?’ he inquired mildly. ‘And when?’

Even though it might have been obvious that his questions had been leading to this one, she seemed surprised. ‘In France,’ she said. ‘I was working there. We were, my husband and I.’

‘I see. And the name of the town?’

‘I don’t know,’ she said, her voice calm, even in the face of Brunetti’s quizzical stare.

‘How is that, Signora?’ he asked, lowering the notebook, the better to attend to her answer.

‘We were working in a small village near Poitiers, and the doctor told us there were complications with the pregnancy and I should try to have the baby there, in the hospital. Because it was so much better equipped. So when the pains began, my husband and I started to go there. By car. A friend had loaned us his car. But my husband didn’t know the way, and we ended up in a small town and the best he could do was find a doctor’s office, and I had the baby there.’

‘Then the name of that place should have been on the birth certificate, no?’ Brunetti asked with an easy smile.

She nodded. ‘Yes, but things didn’t go well, and I was very sick and in the hospital in Poitiers for a month, and when they let me out, we decided we had had enough of France, so we took Davide and came back to Italy. And that’s when we lost the papers.’

‘Did you move to Venice?’

She hesitated a long time before she answered. ‘No, we went to stay with his family.’

Picking up the notebook again, Brunetti asked, ‘And where was that, Signora?’

Voice suddenly obstinate, she demanded, ‘Why do you want to know all this?’

‘Because it’s what they need, Signora. It’s not that I’m particularly interested,’ he said easily, making it sound as though he actually meant it, ‘but the people at the hospital are going to need this information for their system to be able to function.’ He smiled and shook his head, as if to suggest that he found this quite as absurd as she must.

‘Then I’ll tell them,’ she said with the same note of truculence he had heard the first time she spoke to him.

As though the words could not remain unspoken, Pucetti said, ‘I think the Signora should have to give this information only once, sir.’ The tone was meekness itself, yet one sensed the steely resolve that animated him: leave this poor creature alone with her grief. There was nothing of insubordination in what he said, but his manner made it clear that he had declared himself the paladin of this unfortunate mother in her loss and would do his best to protect her from the cold insensitivity of his superior.

‘All right,’ Brunetti said, pocketed his notebook and got to his feet. ‘Then we’ll leave the Signora in peace,’ he said, managing to suggest that this was not the end of the matter for his inferior officer. He nodded to Signora Cavanella and gave Pucetti a hard look not absent of reprimand and warning.

At the door, he turned to Pucetti and said, voice rich with sarcasm, ‘If you’d like to see that the Signora isn’t persecuted by the officials at the hospital, as well, perhaps you’d go along to keep an eye on her?’

Pucetti opened his mouth to defend himself but glanced at Signora Cavanella, as if to ask her what she wanted. Then he lowered his head and allowed the moment to pass.

‘It would be very kind if he could come with me,’ Signora Cavanella said, and Brunetti made no attempt to prevent a look of raw anger from flashing across his face. But he was trapped, and his face showed that he knew it. ‘All right, then. If that’s what you want.’ He turned towards the door, saying, ‘I’ll leave it to you two to decide what time is best for you,’ and left the apartment, not bothering to close the door quietly.

11

Brunetti turned into the first calle on the right, irritated that the scene had got beyond his control and he had not thought to ask her about the pills that had killed her son. As he approached the bar on the first corner, Vianello materialized from the doorway. ‘Would you like a drink?’ he asked.

Brunetti walked up to him, saying, ‘Pucetti made a serious mistake joining the police: he could have had

a career on the stage.’

Vianello turned back into the bar and went over to a table near the window that provided a clear view down the calle , thus explaining his sudden appearance at the door. A glass of white wine stood to the left of that day’s Gazzettino ; Brunetti waved to the barman and pointed to the glass.

As Brunetti pulled out a chair, Vianello closed the paper and set it aside. ‘Tell me,’ Vianello said.

‘When we were still outside,’ Brunetti began, ‘and you were pulling your disappearing act, Pucetti – completely out of the blue – asked her if her son used to play soccer in Campo San Polo.’ Hearing this, Vianello grimaced and picked up his glass.

The barman arrived and set a second glass of wine in front of Brunetti; he picked it up and took a drink. ‘He said he and his friends used to play soccer there and her son was goalie for them sometimes.’ Even before Vianello could comment, Brunetti went on, ‘I know: he lives down in Castello, so why he’d be playing soccer in San Polo is beyond me.’

‘He hates sports,’ Vianello said. In response to Brunetti’s surprise, Vianello explained. ‘One day, I was reading La Gazzetta dello Sport in the squad room, and when he saw it he said he hated soccer, was sick of reading about it, hearing people talk about it.’ He finished his wine and set the glass on the table. ‘So you can forget the idea that he was playing anything – especially soccer – in Campo San Polo.’

Brunetti swirled his wine around for a moment and said, ‘Then he’s even more clever than I thought he was.’

‘And the woman?’ Vianello asked.

‘A liar. She invented a break-in to explain the lack of papers: apparently, she has nothing, or he had nothing. And the birth and baptismal certificates were lost when they moved back from France. Which is where she said he was born.’ He finished his wine and set his glass beside Vianello’s.

‘Why would she lie about something like that?’ Vianello asked. It was not that he thought Brunetti had the answer hidden in his back pocket, but an invitation to joint speculation.

‘Maybe she stole him from outside a supermarket because she wanted a baby,’ Brunetti said.

‘Or raised the baby of a relative,’ countered Vianello, adding, ‘It’s not as if anyone much cares whether women who have children are married or not.’