‘No. Nothing. It was as though it had never happened, and after a time it felt that way, too. I’d say hello to her – Costanza – on the steps, or she’d ask me in for a cup of tea, or she’d come up here if I suggested it. But neither of us ever said anything about it.’ She looked back and forth between them, as if asking them to understand. ‘You know how it is. After a time, something that’s happened, even if it isn’t very nice, if you just don’t talk about it, it sort of goes away. Not that you forget about it, not really, but it isn’t there any more.’
Brunetti recognized the familiarity of this, and Vianello said, ‘It’s the only way life can go on, really, if you think about it.’
At this, Brunetti glanced at Signora Giusti and their eyes met. She nodded, and Brunetti found himself nodding in return. Yes, it was the only way life could go on.
12
‘Did you ever find out what she was doing?’ Brunetti finally asked.
‘It doesn’t take much to understand, does it?’
‘What do you mean?’ Brunetti asked.
‘I think she was using her apartment as some sort of safe house for… well, for women at risk.’ Then, before he could ask, she explained, ‘From their boyfriends or their husbands, or in the case of these women from the East, for all I know, from the men who own them.’
‘Own?’ Vianello asked.
‘You’re a policeman. You should be able to figure it out,’ she said, surprising them both with the blunt challenge. Then she went on in a calmer voice, ‘What else could they be, if not prostitutes? That woman, Alessandra or Alexandra, she wasn’t Italian, she barely spoke the language. I doubt she was anyone’s wife. But I know she was frightened, terrified that whoever broke her nose would come back and finish the job. That’s probably why she disappeared.’
‘Can you remember,’ Brunetti began, ‘anything that your neighbour said in all this time – since you noticed the women coming into the house – that would suggest she felt in danger?’
In a voice that strove for patience, she said, ‘I told you, Commissario, Costanza was a very private person. She wouldn’t say anything like that. It wasn’t her way, her style.’
‘Even as a joke?’ Vianello interrupted to ask.
‘People don’t joke about things like this,’ she said sharply.
Brunetti was of a different mind entirely, having had plenty of evidence of the human capacity to joke at anything, no matter how terrible. It seemed to him an entirely legitimate defence against the looming horror that could afflict us. In this, he was a great admirer of the British; well, of the British who were, with their wry humour in the face of death, their gallows humour – they even had a word for it – defiant to the point of madness.
‘Signora,’ Brunetti said in a voice meant to restore tranquillity, ‘did you draw conclusions on your own?’ Before she could ask, he said, ‘Here I’m asking for your general feeling or impression of what might have been going on.’
For some reason, his question calmed her visibly. Her shoulders grew less stiff. ‘She was doing what she thought was right and trying to help these poor women.’ She raised a hand, then turned and left the room and was quickly back, carrying a small piece of paper, the familiar receipt for a bill paid in the post office. She handed it to Brunetti and sat again in her place on the sofa.
‘Alba Libera,’ he read, wondering what Free Dawn she was involved with.
‘Yes,’ she said, raising a hand as if to wave away the banality of the title. ‘They probably wanted to have a title that would not call attention to itself.’
‘And who are they?’ Brunetti enquired: it was not the organization Signorina Elettra had found.
‘It’s a society for women. You can see it’s a non-profit,’ she said, pointing to the letters that followed its name.
Brunetti restrained his impulse to say that those letters were no guarantee of fiscal probity and, instead, asked, ‘What do they do?’
‘What Costanza did. Help women who run away, or who try to run away. They have a helpline, and they take it in turn to answer. And if they think there’s real danger, then they find a place for them to stay.’
‘And then what?’ asked the ever-practical Vianello.
Signora Giusti failed to control the coolness of the glance with which she greeted his question. ‘Taking them in’s a start, wouldn’t you say?’ she asked. Then she added, ‘They try to find them a place to live in a different city. And a job.’ She started to say something, stopped, then continued, ‘And sometimes they help them change their names. Legally.’
Brunetti nodded. ‘How do people give them money?’ he asked. ‘That is, how did you learn about them?’
She lowered her head and looked attentively at her hands. ‘I opened a piece of Costanza’s mail,’ she said in a low voice. ‘It was a mistake. Over the years, we’ve fallen into the habit of collecting the post from the box downstairs. There’s only one for all four apartments. She and I take one another’s so it doesn’t get confused with the mail for the people on the other floors. Or picked up by their kids. That’s happened a few times. So whichever of us comes in first,’ she explained, and Brunetti noted how easily she had fallen back into the present tense, ‘collects the mail. I put hers on the mat in front of her door, and she puts mine on the table beside her door. But one time – it must have been a year or two ago – I brought one of her envelopes up here by mistake and opened it while I was opening my own. There was a leaflet inside, and I read it through. Pretty terrible stuff. At the end there was one of these payment slips,’ she said, leaning over and touching the receipt. ‘And when I looked at it, I saw that her name was on it.’ She stopped and looked down at her hands, the very picture of a guilty schoolgirl. ‘And then I saw that her name was on the envelope.’
‘What did you do?’ Vianello asked.
‘I waited for her to come in, and when I heard her, I went downstairs and gave her the envelope and explained what had happened. She gave me a strange look: I’m not sure she believed me, not really. But she pulled the leaflet out of the envelope – I’d put it back in so it looked as if I hadn’t read it – and said I might like to have a look at it.’
She looked back and forth at their faces. ‘So I took it, and then I sent them some money, and now I do it every six months or so. They need it, God knows.’
‘I see,’ Brunetti said. Suddenly his stomach growled. As happens in that situation, everyone pretended they had not heard it. He leaned forward and took out his wallet. He removed one of his visiting cards and wrote his telefonino number on the back. ‘Signora,’ he said, ‘this is my own number. If you remember anything or anything happens that you think I should know, please call me.’
Without glancing at the card, she set it on the arm of the sofa and got to her feet. She led them to the door and shook hands with them, wished them good day and closed the door as soon as they were outside the apartment.
‘Well?’ Vianello asked, as they started down the steps.
‘More proof that people don’t trust us,’ Brunetti said.
‘You and me or the police in general?’ Vianello asked as they reached the last flight.
‘The police,’ Brunetti answered and pulled open the door of the building, letting them out into the light of the day. ‘I think she did trust you and me. Or else she wouldn’t have told us about this Alba Libera thing.’ Then, after a pause, Brunetti asked, ‘Silly name, isn’t it?’
Vianello shrugged. ‘You mean because it’s boastful?’
Brunetti nodded, adding, ‘No more so than Opus Dei, I suppose.’
Vianello laughed and ran both hands through his hair, as if ridding himself of the events of the morning. ‘I’ll take the 51,’ the Inspector said. ‘It’s faster.’