Drawing Conclusions - Donna Leon [65]
‘Until you find something interesting,’ he said, trying to sound as if he were joking but fearing he did not succeed.
After this, Brunetti repaired to his office. Once at his desk, he was suddenly assailed by hunger, looked at his watch, and was surprised to see that it was well past three. He called home but no one answered: he hung up before the machine kicked in. Paola refused to carry a telefonino, and the kids, both probably already back at school, were not likely to be of any help. He could try her on her office phone, but she seldom answered it: her students knew where to find her, and any colleague who wanted to speak to her, as far as she was concerned, could walk down the hall to her office.
He thought of calling home again and this time leaving a message, but nothing he could say would change the fact that he had once again failed to show up for lunch and had not thought to call. The kids would hear about something like this for days had either tried it.
His phone rang, and he answered with his name.
‘This is Maddalena Orsoni,’ she said. ‘It turns out that I came back sooner than planned.’
In most circumstances, Brunetti would offer some cliché about hoping this did not mean she had encountered any sort of difficulty, but she did not sound like the sort of woman to have much patience with cliché or sentiment, and so he said, ‘Would it be possible for us to meet now?’
Neither of them, he noticed, made any reference to the subject that concerned them. He was a public official in pursuit of information, yet he instinctively avoided asking any specific questions on the phone. How convenient Venice made it to have a conversation, to meet on the street, as if by accident, and go for a coffee; how easy to walk across town to have a drink and a chat.
‘Yes,’ she finally answered.
‘A bar?’
‘Fine.’
‘I don’t know where you are,’ he said, adding, ‘but I’m at San Lorenzo. So choose a place that’s convenient for you; I’ll meet you there.’
She took some time considering this and finally said, ‘There’s a bar just at the end of Barbaria delle Tole in Campo Santa Giustina, on the corner on the left as you come in from SS. Giovanni e Paolo. I can be there in ten minutes.’
‘I’ll see you there,’ he said and replaced the phone.
19
What an odd place to meet. Could any campo be more out of the way than Campo Santa Giustina? Only someone heading towards San Francesco della Vigna or to the Celestia boat stop would pass through it, or someone like Brunetti who often walked for the simple pleasure of seeing or re-seeing the city. He recalled coming here, years ago, in search of the person rumoured to be able to repair dolls. Chiara’s grandparents had given her a porcelain-headed girl in a hoop skirt for Christmas, but the doll had lost an eye. Brunetti no longer remembered whether he had managed to find the eye, but he did remember the taciturn grey-haired woman who ran the Doll Hospital, looking as much like a patient as did the dolls she kept in the window. He had passed through the campo since then but had never veered over to look in the window to check up on new patients.
It took him only a short time to get there. Across the campo he recognized the dreary window of the second-hand clothing store. Like most Italians of his age, Brunetti disliked the idea of buying used clothing; indeed, used anything, unless it were, say, a painting. But who would be tempted, save by abject misery, to want anything in that window? Brunetti had not been to Bulgaria when it was still a Communist country, but he imagined its shop windows must have looked like this: dusty, sober, earth-coloured pleas that people pass by without looking.
He went into the bar. A dark-haired woman was the only client, sitting at a table near the window. He approached and asked, ‘Signora Orsoni?’
She looked at him without smiling or extending her hand. ‘Good afternoon, Commissario,’ she said and nodded towards the seat opposite her.
He pulled the chair away from the table and sat. Before he could say anything, the barman