Drawing Conclusions - Donna Leon [16]
He got out at San Zaccaria and walked along the water, spirits whisked up and about by the sight of the motion of the wind on the waves. He turned into the front door of the Questura a few minutes before ten and went directly up to Patta’s office. His superior’s secretary, Signorina Elettra Zorzi, was behind her computer; she was bedecked, like unto the lilies of the field, in a blouse that had to be silk, for the pattern in gold and white would have been wasted on any lesser fabric.
‘Good morning, Commissario,’ she said formally as he came in. ‘The Vice-Questore is quite eager to have a word with you.’
‘No less so than I, Signorina,’ Brunetti answered and went over to knock on the door.
A bellowed ‘Avanti!’ caused Brunetti to raise his eyebrows, Signorina Elettra her hands from the keys.
‘Oh my, oh my, oh my,’ she said by way of warning.
‘I am just going inside and may be some time,’ Brunetti said in English, to her consternation.
Inside, he found Patta in his no nonsense commander-of-armed-men mode, one with which Brunetti was amply familiar. He adjusted his posture accordingly and walked to the seat Patta indicated in front of his desk.
‘Why wasn’t I called last night? Why was I kept in the dark about this?’ Patta’s voice was irate, but calm, as suited an official with a hard job to do and no help from the people around him, certainly not from the one in front of him.
‘I informed you about the death when I left our dinner, Dottore,’ Brunetti said. ‘By the time we finished our initial investigation, it was after three in the morning, and I didn’t want to disturb you at that hour.’ Before Patta could say, as he usually did at this point, that there was no time, night or day, when he was not prepared to assume the responsibilities of his office, Brunetti said, ‘I knew I should have done it, sir, but I thought a few hours would make no difference and we’d both be better able to deal with things if we had a decent night’s sleep.’
‘You certainly seem to have done so,’ Patta was unable to stop himself from saying. Brunetti ignored the remark or at least allowed no response to it to show on the bland face he raised to his superior.
‘You seem to have no idea of who the dead woman is,’ Patta said.
‘The woman upstairs said her name was Costanza Altavilla, Dottore,’ Brunetti said in what he tried to make sound like a helpful voice.
Barely managing to suppress his exasperation, Patta said, ‘She’s the mother of my son’s former veterinarian; that’s who she is.’ Patta paused to allow the significance of this to register on Brunetti, then added, ‘I met her once.’
It was seldom that Patta left Brunetti utterly without words, but Brunetti had, over the years, developed a defensive response even to that rare event. He put his most serious expression on his face, nodded sagely a few times, and let out a long, and very thoughtful, ‘Hmmmm.’ He did not understand why, time after time, Patta was deceived by this, as he was again. Perhaps his superior had no coherent memory, or perhaps he was incapable of responding to outward manifestations of extreme deference in any other way, as an alpha dog is incapable of attacking a dog that flips over and shows its soft underbelly and throat.
Brunetti knew that there was nothing he could say. He could not risk saying ‘I didn’t realize that,’ without Patta’s hearing sarcasm, nor could he ask Patta to explain a relationship the importance of which he must obviously think self-evident. And, to the degree that he valued his job, he could not express curiosity about the fact that Patta’s son had a veterinarian rather than a doctor. He waited, head tilted to one side in the manner of a very attentive dog.
‘Salvo used to have