Brunetti reached the Questura before nine the next morning, shaky and cranky from having slept too little, and that badly. He went directly to Bocchese’s office and found the chief technician at his desk, a few papers in his hands. When the technician saw Brunetti, he said, ‘Here’s the report. I had them do it when they got back last night because I knew you’d give me no peace until you had it.’
Brunetti smiled in thanks. ‘Handbag and telefonino ?’ he asked.
‘Handbag, yes; telefonino, no,’ Bocchese answered. Then, before Brunetti could ask, he continued, ‘Which suggests that whatever kind of phone she had was more interesting than a wallet with …’ he paused to look at the paper … ‘one hundred and fifteen pounds, three hundred and twenty Euros, and three credit cards.’
‘I spoke to her husband last night,’ Brunetti said, ‘but I forgot to ask if she wore or brought any good jewellery with her.’
‘Men usually don’t know that sort of thing,’ Bocchese said. ‘She was wearing her wedding ring and one large solitaire diamond.’ He looked at Brunetti and added, ‘Worth more than the telefonino, I’d guess.’
‘No doubt,’ Brunetti agreed. ‘Did it look like anyone had gone through her things?’
‘Her suitcase was unopened and still neatly packed. Her coat was in the closet.’ Brunetti was about to speak when Bocchese said, ‘But.’
‘But?’
‘But there are scratches on her side of the connecting door. We took samples from her hands last night, and there were fibres under her fingernails. We took them there, in the room, and put bags on her hands so the nature of the material can be confirmed.’
Brunetti came over and sat in the chair beside Bocchese’s desk. The technician said, ‘We’re finished there, so there’s no need to keep the rooms sealed now.’
Brunetti nodded, telling himself that, even though Bocchese needed a lot of deference, he was a reliable colleague.
As Bocchese started to say something, Brunetti said, ‘Oddio ,’ slapping his hand to his mouth.
‘What’s wrong?’ Bocchese asked with real concern.
‘I forgot about Alvise and Pucetti. I put them on duty in front of the doors to the rooms, figured they could keep one another awake all night.’ Brunetti stood and said, ‘I’ll go and see they’re sent home.’
As he was leaving the office he heard Bocchese say, ‘How easy, to forget about Alvise,’ but chose to ignore the remark.
He went up to the officers’ squad room, found Vianello, and explained what had happened: the Inspector laughed at first but then said he’d call the hotel and have the men sent home.
‘Come up when you can,’ Brunetti said and went to speak to Signorina Elettra. When he entered her office, Signorina Elettra said, by way of greeting, ‘He’s heard, and he wants to see you.’
Brunetti nodded his thanks and knocked at Vice-Questore Patta’s door.
‘Avanti ,’ the deep voice called out, and Brunetti entered.
He had expected to find himself confronted with Patta Furioso: the Vice-Questore’s response to attention-getting crime was usually anger, as if the criminals had offended him personally. Part of his wrath was always directed at those in the Questura who had failed to apprehend criminals before or while they were committing their crimes.
And so it proved to be. ‘What was this woman doing in Venice?’ Patta demanded as soon as Brunetti had closed the door. ‘Why did she let a stranger into her room?’
‘Why a stranger, Vice-Questore?’ Brunetti inquired as he crossed the room.
‘She certainly didn’t come here to let a friend kill her, did she?’ Before Brunetti could answer, Patta pointed to a chair and said, ‘Sit down, Brunetti. Tell me about it.’
Brunetti did as he was told. ‘I went to the hotel last night, just before one. Tomasini took the call, and Pucetti and Alvise were there when I arrived; so were Bocchese and his crew.’
‘Why did it take you so long to get there?’ Patta asked.
‘I was there twelve minutes after I got the call, sir,’ he answered, inventing the number.
‘And?’
‘The woman was staying there with a friend, a German who lives in London. They’d come to the city for a few days.’ Thus Brunetti avoided mentioning that Rudy was also a friend of his and that the victim had come as the result of the death of another person she knew. Patta would have fallen upon these details as a beast upon prey and torn into them in an attempt to find nourishment.
‘Someone got into her room, or she invited someone into the room, and that person choked her to death, probably with a scarf, either hers or his own.’
‘Why are you so sure it was a man?’ Patta asked, as if he’d caught Brunetti in a lie.
‘It might have been a woman, Vice-Questore. Of course. But the statistics are against it.’ He wanted to ask Patta if he had ever worked on a case where a woman had strangled another woman but decided to let statistics do the arguing for him.
‘All right,’ Patta agreed, but grudgingly, ‘a man.’ And then, ‘Did anyone see her? Or him?’
‘The men at the desk in the hotel told me there was a dinner for forty last night, so there would have been a lot of people moving around, aside from the guests booked into the hotel.’ Before Patta could ask, Brunetti explained, ‘I didn’t have time to study the disposition of the rooms or the restaurant, but it might have been possible for someone to walk up the stairs or get into the elevator.’
‘I suppose so,’ Patta agreed, then asked, ‘Signs of theft?’
‘There was no telefonino ,’ Brunetti said. ‘She was still wearing a large diamond, and her wallet hadn’t been touched.’
‘Why would anyone steal a telefonino ?’ Patta asked. ‘Everyone has one already.’
Experience, patience, good sense, and the love of survival kept Brunetti from suggesting that perhaps the killer had wanted to have a pair. Instead, he said, ‘There might have been a record of calls, or photos, or searches for websites. Any of those is possible, Signore.’
Patta interrupted him, sounding disgruntled. ‘I’ve already had a vice-president of the chain of hotels that owns that one on the phone this morning, asking when this is going to be settled. It’s terrible publicity for them.’ Brunetti was convinced that the sincerity of Patta’s words was in direct correlation to the size of the multinational company that owned the hotel where the murder had been committed.
‘I’ll keep that in mind, Dottore,’ Brunetti said, getting to his feet. ‘I’ve got some things I’d like to ask Signorina Elettra to look into, so if you have no objection, I’ll go and speak to her.’ Then, with faint, but audible hesitation, he added, ‘If that’s acceptable to you, Signore,’ and left without hearing Patta’s response.
He approached Signorina Elettra’s desk, saying, ‘The Vice-Questore’s given me permission to ask you to do a few things for me.’ He permitted himself a smile and added, ‘He also tells me you can do anything.’
‘How very complimentary of him,’ she said with unaccustomed warmth.
Surprised, Brunetti failed to prevent himself from saying, ‘I think you’re the only person here he respects.’
She looked up and smiled modestly. ‘I think it’s more accurate to say I’m the only person here he fears.’
Oh so young and so untender, Brunetti thought. He had long been enamoured of the idea that Signorina Elettra had discovered where Patta had buried some of the Questura’s bodies, but now he began to suspect that Patta might have slipped a few into their graves with the help of his secretary. Much to his astonishment, Brunetti felt betrayed, as though she had no right to be loyal to the Vice-Questore or to preserve his secrets. And why had this not occurred to him before now?
Caught by surprise, he could say only, ‘I certainly hope you’re right,’ before he turned to the things he had to ask her to do. ‘I’ll try to get the dead woman’s telefonino number for you this morning. When you have it, please get a record of her calls as well as any sites she might have looked at.’
‘Going back how far, Signore?’ she asked, pencil in hand.
Gonzalo had died on the last day of her vacation, he remembered, and named a date three weeks earlier. ‘If she called anyone here, I’d like to know who it was and how long the calls lasted. In fact, could you go back even further than that for calls made to any Italian numbers?’ He thought about how small was his understanding of the cyber-reality in which he lived and said, ‘I don’t know if you can find out where a telefonino actually was when someone called it or used it.’ It was a statement, but both of them knew it was a question.
‘That can be done, Signore,’ she answered mildly, then, ‘Anything else, Signore?’
‘No, not for the moment,’ Brunetti said. ‘I’ll have a word with Dottoressa Griffoni, and then I’ll be back in my office.’
Signorina Elettra nodded, then returned her attention to the papers on her desk.
Upstairs, he found Griffoni at her own small desk in her very small office.
‘Yes, Guido?’ she looked up and asked as he stopped in front of her door.
‘I’d like you to make a phone call for me, Claudia.’
‘About the woman who was murdered?’
‘Yes.’ Brunetti wondered if this would have been easier if they’d just had a coffee together.
‘To whom?’
‘The husband.’ Before she could question this, Brunetti said, ‘It’s easier to speak to a woman.’ She stared but said nothing.
‘I spoke to him this morning, about two o’clock our time. And told him what had happened.’ She remained silent. ‘He was very English,’ Brunetti limited himself to saying. ‘He told me, though, that he can’t come. I think the reason is sickness, though he didn’t say that outright.’
‘If he’s English, he wouldn’t,’ Griffoni said.
Griffoni moved her knees to the side to allow Brunetti enough room to come into the office and take a seat on the other chair. ‘All right,’ she said. ‘What do you want me to tell him?’
‘Ask him, really,’ Brunetti said. ‘Only two things: the number of his wife’s telefonino and whether she was carrying anything valuable with her.’
‘Can’t Signorina Elettra get the number?’ she asked.
‘I don’t know if she used her own name or her husband’s, and it might take Signorina Elettra some time to get into the English phone system to look for it.’
‘I see.’ She extended a hand to Brunetti, who set his notebook on her desk, opened to the page with Dodson’s phone number.
Griffoni picked up her phone and waved away Brunetti’s when he offered it to her. She put in the numbers and pushed her chair halfway into the doorway to cross her legs.
Brunetti heard the double-buzz and then a male voice saying something he could not understand. ‘Good morning, sir,’ Griffoni said, speaking English with an accent mild enough not to interfere with understanding. ‘This is Commissario Claudia Griffoni. From the Venice police. My colleague Dottor Brunetti has given me your number.’
She listened for a short time and said, ‘No, nothing, sir. It’s still early, and we’re trying to find information that will help us in our work.’
Again, Brunetti heard the low sound of the man’s voice.
‘Only two things, sir: the number of your wife’s telefonino, and whether she brought anything of value with her.’ She paused as he answered and then said, ‘No, that’s all, sir.’
This time the man spoke for a longer time. Griffoni leaned towards her desk and slid Brunetti’s notebook towards her. She wrote some numbers, set down the pen and looked off towards the windowless wall behind Brunetti’s head.
As the man continued to speak, Griffoni closed her eyes and, occasionally, nodded. Finally she said, ‘No, sir, I’m not. It’s Commissario Brunetti who will be in charge.’ He spoke, this time for a shorter period, and then apparently stopped.
‘Yes, I’ll tell him, sir. And please accept my … sympathies for your loss.’
There were some low sounds, and then he seemed to be gone. Griffoni whispered, ‘Goodbye,’ and set her phone on the desk.
She opened her eyes and looked at Brunetti. ‘He gave me her number,’ she said, sliding his notebook back towards him. ‘And he said she had no jewellery. Not that she didn’t bring it: she never wore any except for the two rings.’
Brunetti could ask this of a woman. ‘How did he sound?’
‘Like a dying man,’ was all Griffoni said. Brunetti asked for no explanation.