‘Business.’
‘Can you be more specific than that, Signora? What business?’
She shook her head a few times, insistent on displaying her ignorance. Finally she said, ‘My husband never told me anything about his businesses. He said I didn’t need to know.’
Again, Brunetti asked himself how many times he had heard this, and how many times it had been an answer structured to turn away guilt. But he believed this heavy-set woman was telling him the truth, found it entirely credible that her husband had not seen fit to share his professional life with her. He recalled the man he’d met in Patta’s office: elegant, well-spoken, one might even say sleek. How odd to pair him with this little woman with her dyed hair and tight-fitting suit. He glanced down at her feet and saw that she was wearing a pair of stout-heeled pumps, their toes narrowed to a painful point. On her left foot, a large bunion had pushed its way into the leather and sat there like a section of an egg, the leather stretched tight across it. Was marriage the ultimate mystery?
‘When did they fight, Signora?’
‘All the time. Especially during the last month. I think something happened that made Paolo angry. They’d never got on well, not really, but because of the family and because of business, well, they rubbed along somehow.’
‘Did anything particular happen during the last month?’ he asked.
‘I think there was an argument,’ she said, her voice so soft that Brunetti again thought of future listeners to the tape.
‘An argument between them, between your husband and your brother?’
‘Yes.’ She nodded repeatedly as she spoke.
‘Why do you think that, Signora?’
‘Paolo and he had a meeting at our apartment. It was two nights before it happened.’
‘Before what happened, Signora?’
‘Before my husband was… before he was killed.’
‘I see. And why do you think there was an argument? Did you hear them?’
‘Oh, no,’ she answered quickly, looking up at him as if surprised at the suggestion that there could ever be raised voices in the house of Mitri. ‘I could tell it from the way Paolo behaved when he came upstairs after they had talked.’
‘Did he say anything?’
‘Only that he was incompetent.’
‘Was he talking about your brother?’
‘Yes.’
‘Anything else?’
‘He said that Sandro was ruining the factory, ruining the business.’
‘Do you know what factory he was talking about, Signora?’
‘I thought he was talking about the one up here, in Castelfranco.’
‘And why would your husband be interested in that?’
‘There was money invested in it.’
‘His money?’
She shook her head. ‘No.’
‘Whose money, Signora?’
She paused, considering how best to answer this. ‘It was my money,’ she finally said.
‘Yours, Signora?’
‘Yes. I brought a lot of money to the marriage. But it remained in my name, you see. Our father’s will,’ she added, gesturing vaguely with her right hand. ‘Paolo always helped me decide what to do with it. And when Sandro said he wanted to buy the factory, they both suggested I invest in it. This was a year ago. Or perhaps two.’ She broke off when she saw Brunetti’s response to her vagueness. ‘I’m sorry, but I don’t pay much attention to these things. Paolo asked me to sign papers and the man at the bank told me what was happening. But I don’t think I ever understood, not really, what the money was for.’ She stopped and brushed at her skirt. ‘It went to Sandro’s factory, but because it was mine, Paolo always thought it belonged to him as well.’
‘Do you have any idea of how much you invested in this factory, Signora?’ She looked to Brunetti like a schoolgirl about to burst into tears because she couldn’t remember the capital of Canada, so he added, ‘If you have an idea, that is. We really don’t need to know the exact amount.’ This was true; it would all be found out later.
‘I think it was three or four hundred million lire,’ she answered.
‘I see. Thank you,’ Brunetti said, then asked, ‘Did your husband say anything else that night, after he spoke to your brother?’
‘Well.’ She paused and, Brunetti thought, tried to remember. ‘He said the factory was losing money. From the way he spoke, I think Paolo might have had money invested in it privately.’
‘Aside from yours?’
‘Yes. With just a note from Paolo. Nothing official.’ When Brunetti was silent, she continued, ‘I think Paolo wanted to have more control over the way they did things.’
‘Did your husband give you any idea of what he was going to do?’
‘Oh, no.’ She was clearly surprised by the question. ‘He never told me about things like that.’ Brunetti wondered what sort of things he did tell her about but thought it best not to ask. ‘Afterwards he went to his room and the next day he didn’t mention it, so I thought, or I hoped, that he and Sandro had settled things.’
Brunetti responded instantly to her reference to ‘his room’, surely not the stuff of happy marriages. He worked his voice into a lower tone: ‘Please forgive me for asking you this, Signora, but could you tell me what sort of terms you and your husband were on?’
‘Terms?’
‘You said he went to “his room”, Signora,’ Brunetti replied in a soft voice.
‘Ah.’ The quiet sound escaped her entirely involuntarily.
Brunetti waited. Finally he said, ‘He’s gone now, Signora, so I think you can tell me.’
She looked across at him and he saw the tears form in her eyes. ‘There were other women,’ she whispered. ‘For years, other women. Once I followed him and waited outside her house, in the rain, for him to come out.’ Tears flowed down her face, but she ignored them. They began to drop on to the front of her blouse, leaving long oval marks on the fabric. ‘Once I had him followed by a detective. And I started to listen to his phone calls. Sometimes I’d play them back, hear him talking to other women. The same things he used to say to me.’ Tears cut her off and she paused a long time, but Brunetti forced himself not to speak. Finally she went on, ‘I loved him with my whole heart. From the first day I saw him. If Sandro did this…’ Her eyes filled with tears again, but she brushed them away with both palms. ‘Then I want you to know it and I want him to be punished. That’s why I want to talk to Sandro.’ She stopped, looking down.
‘Will you come and tell me what he says?’ she asked, eyes still on her hands, which lay quite still in her lap.
‘I don’t think I can do that until it’s all over, Signora. But then I will.’
‘Thank you,’ she said, looking up, then down again. Suddenly she got to her feet and walked towards the door. Brunetti was there before her and opened it. He stepped back to allow her to pass through ahead of him. ‘I’ll go home, then,’ she said and, before he could say anything, she walked out of the door, down the corridor and towards the entrance hall of the police station.
26
He went back to the desk of the officer whose phone he had used and, without bothering to ask permission, called Signorina Elettra again. As soon as she heard his voice, she told him the technician was already on the way to the Castelfranco morgue to take tissue samples, then asked him to give her a fax number. He put down the phone and went to the front desk, where he had the sergeant in charge write down the number. After giving it to Signorina Elettra, he remembered he had not called Paola that morning, so he dialled his home number. When no one answered, he left a message, saying that he was delayed in Castelfranco, but would be back later in the afternoon.
He sat down after that and lowered his head into his hands. A few minutes later he heard someone say, ‘Excuse me, Commissario, but these just came in for you.’
He looked up and saw a young officer standing in front of the desk he had requisitioned. In his left hand he held the distinctive curling papers of a fax, quite a few of them.