Wilful Behaviour (32 page)

Brunetti led her down to the cabin, uncertain whether to speak to her or wait for her to begin to speak on her own. His curiosity made silence more difficult, but he opted for that and, sitting across from one another, they rode silently back to the Questura.

Inside, he took her to one of the small rooms used for questioning and advised her that everything they said would be recorded. He led her to a chair on one side of the table, sat opposite her, gave their names and the date and asked if she would like to have a lawyer with her as she talked. She waved a hand at him in dismissal, but he repeated the question until she said, ‘No. No lawyer.’

She sat silent, looking down at the surface of the table in which people had, over the course of the years, carved initials and words and pictures. Her face was splotched with red, her eyes still swollen from crying. She traced some initials with the forefinger of her right hand then finally looked up at Brunetti.

‘Is it true that Claudia Leonardo worked at the library where you are one of the directors?’ He thought it best to avoid any reference to her husband until the interview had taken on its own momentum.

She nodded.

‘I’m sorry, Signora,’ he said with a softening of his face that was not quite a smile, ‘but you must say something. Because of the recording.’

She looked around, searching for the microphones, but as they were set into two wall sockets that looked like light switches, she failed to identify them.

‘Did Claudia Leonardo work at the Biblioteca della Patria?’ he asked again.

‘Yes.’

‘How long after she began to work there did you meet her?’

‘Not very long.’

‘Could you tell me how you first met her? The circumstances, I mean.’

She folded the fingers of her right hand into the palm and, using the nail of her thumb, began to dig idly at one of the letters on the table, freeing it of the greasy material that had accumulated over the years. As Brunetti watched, her nail pried free a tiny sliver of what looked like black wax. She brushed it to the floor. She looked at him. ‘I had to go down to the library to look for a book, and when I came in she asked me how she could help me. She didn’t know who I was.’

‘What was your first impression of her, Signora?’

She shrugged the question away, but before Brunetti could remind her of the microphones, she said, ‘I didn’t have much of an impres…’ Then, perhaps recalling where they were and why she was here, she sat up straighter in her chair, looked over at Brunetti and said, voice a bit firmer, ‘She
seemed
like a nice girl.’ She emphasized ‘seemed’. ‘She was very polite, and when I told her who I was she was very respectful.’

‘Do you think that was an accurate assessment of the girl’s character?’ Brunetti asked.

She paused not an instant over this question and said, ‘It can’t be, not after what she did to my husband.’

‘But what did you think at the beginning, when you first met her?’ he asked.

It was evident to Brunetti that she had to overcome her reluctance to answer this question, but when she did she said, ‘I was wrong. I saw the truth, but it took time.’

Abandoning the attempt to get her to describe her first impression of the girl, Brunetti asked, ‘What did you come to believe?’

‘I saw that she was, that she was, that she was…’ Stuck on that phrase, her voice died away. She looked down at the initial on the table, dug a bit more material out of it, and finally said, ‘That she was interested in my husband.’

‘Interested in an improper way?’ Brunetti suggested.

‘Yes.’

‘Was this something that had happened before, that women became interested in your husband?’ He thought it might be better to phrase it this way, placing the guilt on the women, at least for the moment, until she was more adjusted to accepting the so-obvious truth.

She nodded, then quickly said, voice too loud and nervous, ‘Yes.’

‘Did this happen often?’

‘I don’t know.’

‘Had it happened before with the employees of the Biblioteca?’

‘Yes. The last one.’

‘What happened?’

‘I found out. About them. He told me what happened, that she was… well, that she was immoral. I sent her away, back to Geneva, where she came from.’

‘And did you find out about Claudia, as well?’

‘Yes.’

‘Could you tell me how that happened?’

‘I heard him talking on the phone to her.’

‘Did you hear what he was saying?’ When she nodded, he asked, ‘Did you listen to the conversation or only to his part of it?’

‘Only his part. He was in his office, but the door wasn’t closed. So I could hear him talking.’

‘What did he say?’

‘That if she wanted to continue to work in the Biblioteca, nothing else would happen.’ He watched her going back in time and listening to her husband’s part of that conversation. ‘He told her that if she would just forget about it and not tell anyone, he promised not to do anything else.’

‘And you took that to mean that it was Claudia Leonardo who was bothering your husband?’ Brunetti asked, not voicing his scepticism but curious that she could have interpreted his words this way.

‘Of course.’

‘Do you still think that now?’

Her voice suddenly grew fierce, the linked initials on the table below her forgotten. ‘It had to be that way,’ she said with tight conviction. ‘She was his lover.’

‘Who told you that she was his lover?’ As he waited for her answer he studied this woman, the restrained frenzy in her hands, recalling the way she had hungrily leaned her breast into the accidental touch of her husband’s hand, and an entirely new possibility came to him. ‘Did your husband confess that they were lovers, Signora?’ he asked in a softer voice.

First came the tears, which surprised him by coming without any emotion registering on her face. ‘Yes,’ she said, turning her attention back to the table.

Hunting dogs, Brunetti knew, were divided into two general classes: sight hounds and scent hounds. Like one of the second, he was off, racing through the thick, wet grass of an autumn day, leaping over obstacles that had been placed in his path, catching traces of his prey that had previously been obscured by heavier scents. His mind circling, leaping, lurching after its prey, he found himself back again at the starting point, and he asked, ‘Whose idea was it to talk to the old woman, Signora, and offer her the chance to clear Guzzardi’s name? Was it your husband’s?’

She should have been surprised. She should have looked up at him, startled, and asked him what he was talking about. Had she done that, he would not have believed her, but he would have
realized
how far he still had to go before he hunted her to ground.

Instead, she surprised him by asking, ‘How did you know about that?’

‘It doesn’t matter. But I know. Which of them had the idea?’

‘Maxwell,’ she said. ‘One of the people who wrote a letter of recommendation for Claudia was Signora Jacobs. She’d been a patron of the Biblioteca for some time, always asking about Guzzardi and whether we had ever received any papers that would prove he didn’t take those drawings.’ She paused and Brunetti resisted the urge to prompt her. ‘My father knew him and he said there never would be any proof because he did take them. They’d be worth a fortune now, my father said, but no one knew where they were.’

‘No one knew that Signora Jacobs had them?’

‘No, of course not. No one ever went to her house, and everyone knew how poor she was.’ She paused, then corrected this, ‘Or thought she was.’

‘How did he find out?’ he asked, still careful not to refer directly to her husband.

‘Claudia. One day, talking about Signora Jacobs, she said something about the things that were in her house and what a pity it was that no one got to see them except her and the old woman. I think she was the only one who went there.’ And the cleaning woman, Brunetti wanted to tell her. And the Somali cleaning woman so honest she was trusted with the keys while the rest of the city was kept away, untrusted and ignorant.

‘How do you know about this, Signora?’

‘I heard them talking, my father and Maxwell. They were both so used to ignoring me,’ she began, and Brunetti marvelled that she could seem so casually accepting of this, ‘that they talked about everything in front of me.’

‘Was the idea of clearing Guzzardi’s name a way to get the drawings from her?’ Brunetti asked.

‘I think so. Maxwell told Claudia that someone had come to the Biblioteca with papers that showed that Guzzardi was innocent.’ He watched as she tried to recall what had been said in front of her.

‘Did he suggest that Signora Jacobs give the drawings in exchange?’

‘No, all he did was tell Claudia that there was proof that he was innocent and suggest she ask Signora Jacobs what she wanted to do.’

‘And?’

‘I don’t know what happened. I think Claudia talked to her about it, and I think my father had someone go and talk to the old woman.’ She sounded vague and uninterested in this, but then she glanced at him sharply and said, ‘Then I heard him talking to Claudia on the phone.’

‘And is that when he told you that they were lovers?’ Brunetti asked.

‘Yes. But he told me that it was over, that he’d ended it. In fact, he slammed the phone down on her that time, told her to be very careful what she told people about him. And he sounded so upset that I made a noise.’ She stopped again.

Brunetti waited.

‘He came out of his office and saw me, and he
asked
me what I’d heard. I told him, I told him that I couldn’t stand it any more, him and those girls, that I was afraid of what I’d do if he didn’t stop.’ She nodded her head, no doubt hearing the words again, replaying the jealous scene between her and her husband.

After some time, she went on, ‘That’s when he told me about the way she had tempted him and how he hadn’t wanted to do anything. But she’d thrown herself at him. Touched him.’ She pronounced the words, ‘tempted’ and ‘thrown’ with disgust, but when she said ‘touched’ she spoke with shock that approached horror. ‘And he told me then that he was afraid of what would happen if she came back, that he was a man, and he was weak. That it was me he loved but he didn’t know what would happen if this wicked girl tempted him again.’

Seeing how agitated she was becoming, Brunetti decided it would be best to lead her away from these memories for a moment. ‘Let me go back to one thing, Signora, to the conversation you heard when you came in. Your husband was telling her that, if she came back to the Biblioteca and didn’t tell anyone, he wouldn’t do anything else? Is that correct?’

She nodded.

‘I’m sorry to have to remind you, Signora, but you have to speak.’

‘Yes.’

‘That’s what he said?’

‘Yes.’

‘Is it possible that he might have been talking
about
something else? Have you thought about this?’ he asked.

Her look was utterly candid, and she said, ‘But that’s what he told me he meant. That he would allow her to come back, and if she behaved he wouldn’t do anything.’

‘Why would he want her to come back?’

She smiled here, having been quicker than he to ask this question and understand the reason. ‘He said he didn’t want there to be any talk, that he didn’t want me to be hurt by what people might say.’ She smiled at this proof of her husband’s consideration and, ineluctably, love.

‘I see,’ Brunetti said. ‘But then, when he told you how frightened he was of his weakness, that she could tempt him again, how did you react?’

‘I was proud of him, that he would be so honest with me and that I was worth so much to him. That he would confess to me.’

‘Of course,’ Brunetti muttered, understanding just what her husband’s confession really had meant to achieve and how successful he had been. ‘And did he ask you anything?’ Brunetti asked. When she seemed reluctant to answer, he changed the words a bit, ‘Did he ask for your help?’

That brought a smile. ‘Yes. He wanted me to go and talk to her and try to make her agree to stay away from him.’

‘Yes, I can see that that would be wise,’ Brunetti said, seeing only too well her husband’s wisdom in making the request. ‘And did you go?’

‘Not for a few more nights. I told him I trusted him to be strong. But then, a few days later, he
came
and told me that she had started again, had… had touched him again, and he didn’t know how long he would be strong.’ Again, her voice broke in horror at the girl’s behaviour.

‘And did he ask you again to go and talk to her?’

‘No,’ she said. ‘He didn’t have to. I knew it was what I had to do, to go and tell her to leave him alone and not tempt him.’

‘And?’

‘And I went that night,’ she said, folding her hands in front of her on the table, interlacing her fingers.

‘And?’ Brunetti asked.

‘You know what happened,’ she said with dismissive contempt for this charade.

‘I’m afraid I do, Signora, but you have to say it.’

‘I killed her,’ she said, voice tight. ‘She let me in and I started to talk to her. I have my pride, so I didn’t say that Maxwell had asked me. I told her she’d have to stay away from him.’

‘And what happened?’

‘She told me that I was wrong, that she had no interest in him, that I had it all backwards and it was Maxwell who was bothering her.’ She smiled confidently here. ‘But he’d warned me that she’d lie and tell me that, so I was ready for it.’

‘Then?’

‘Then she said things about him, terrible things that I couldn’t listen to.’

‘What things?’

‘That she knew that the idea of those papers about Guzzardi was just a way for Maxwell and my father to get money, that she’d told Maxwell
she
was going to tell Signora Jacobs about it.’ She stopped, and Brunetti heard a distinct hardening in her voice as she said, ‘And she made up lies about other girls and what people in the Biblioteca said about him.’

‘And then?’

‘And then she said the idea of sex with him made her sick.’ Her tone struck out, even to the edge of doom, and he knew, without her having to tell him, that it was this that had driven her over the edge to violence.