Acqua Alta
At the Questura, he went quickly up to his office and found it, surprisingly, neither tropical nor arctic. For a moment he entertained the fantasy that the heating system had finally been fixed, but then a shriek of escaping steam from the radiator under his window put an end to it. The explanation, he realized, lay in the thick sheaf of papers on his desk. Signorina Elettra must have put them there recently, opened the window for a moment, then closed it before she left.
He hung his overcoat behind the door and walked over to his desk. He sat, picked up the papers and began to read through them. The first was a copy of Semenzato’s bank statements, going back four years. Brunetti had no idea how much the museum director had been paid and made a note to find out, but he did know the bank statement of a rich man when he saw one. Large deposits had been made with no apparent regularity; just so, amounts of fifty million and more had been taken out, again, with no apparent pattern. At his death, Semenzato’s balance had been two hundred million lire, an enormous amount to keep in a savings account. The second page of the statement noted that he also had double that amount invested in government bonds. A wealthy wife? Good luck on the stock market? Or something else?
The next pages listed foreign calls made from his office number. There were scores of them, but, again, no pattern that Brunetti could discern.
The last three pages were copies of Semenzato’s credit card receipts for the last two years, and from them Brunetti got an idea of the airline tickets he had paid for. He ran his eye quickly down the list, amazed at the frequency and distance of the trips. The museum director, it seemed, would spend a weekend in Bangkok as casually as another man might go to his beach house, would go to Taipei for three days and stop in London for the night on his way back to Venice. A copy of the statements from his two charge cards accompanied the itinerary and gave proof that Semenzato did not stint himself in any way when he travelled.
Beneath these, he found a sheaf of fax papers, clipped together at the top. All of these related to Carmello La Capra. On the first sheet, Signorina Elettra had pencilled the observation, ‘Interesting man, this one.’ Salvatore’s father, it appeared, had no visible means of support; that is, he appeared to have no job or fixed employment. Instead, on his tax return for the last three years, he listed his profession as ‘consultant’, a term which, when added to the fact that he was from Palermo, sounded alarm bells in Brunetti’s mind. His bank statement showed that large transfers had been made to his various accounts in interesting, one might even say suspicious, currencies: Colombian pesos, Ecuadorean escudos, and Pakistani rupees. Brunetti found copies of the bill of sale of the palazzo La Capra had bought two years ago; he must have paid in cash, for there was no corresponding withdrawal from any of his accounts.
Not only had Signorina Elettra succeeded in getting copies of La Capra’s bank statements, but she had also managed to provide copies of his credit card receipts as complete as those she had obtained for Semenzato. Well aware of how long it took to obtain this information through legal channels, Brunetti had no choice but to accept the fact that she must be doing it unofficially, which probably meant illegally. He admitted this, and he read on. Sotheby’s and the Metropolitan Opera box office while in New York, Christie’s and Covent Garden in London, and the Sydney Opera House, apparently while on the way back from a weekend in Taipei. La Capra had stayed, of course, at the Oriental in Bangkok, where he had gone, it seemed, for a weekend. Seeing that, Brunetti shuffled back through the papers until he found the list of Semenzato’s travels and his credit card receipts. He put the papers side by side: La Capra and Semenzato had spent the same two nights at the Oriental. Brunetti separated the papers and laid the separate sheets in two vertical columns on his desk. On at least five occasions, Semenzato and La Capra had been in a foreign city on the same dates, often staying in the same hotel.
Did hunters feel this rush of excitement when they saw the first prints in the snow or when they heard a rustling in the trees behind them and turned to see the bright rush of wings? La Capra and his new palazzo, La Capra and his purchases at Sotheby’s, La Capra and his trips to the Orient and the Middle East. The trajectory of his life crossed repeatedly with that of Semenzato, and Brunetti suspected the reason lay in their shared interest in things of great beauty and even greater price. And Murino? How many objects had his shop provided for Signor La Capra’s new home?
He decided to go down and thank her in person, telling himself that he would make no inquiries about the source of her information. The door to her office was open, and she sat behind her desk, typing into her computer, head turned aside to watch the screen. He noticed that today’s flowers were red roses, at least two dozen of them, flowers which proclaimed love and longing.
She sensed his presence and glanced up at him, smiled, and stopped typing. ‘Buon giorno, Commissario,’ she said. ‘How can I help you?’
‘I’ve come to thank you, bravissima Elettra,’ he said. ‘For the papers you left on my desk.’
She smiled at the use of her first name, as if she saw it as a tribute, not a liberty. ‘Ah, you’re welcome. Interesting coincidences, aren’t they?’ she asked, making no attempt to disguise her satisfaction at having noticed them.
‘Yes. How about the phone records? Did you get them?’
‘They’re cross-checking them now to see if they called one another. They’ve got the records on Signor La Capra’s phone in Palermo as well as the phone and fax lines he had installed here. I told them to check for any that might have come from Semenzato’s home or office, but that will take a bit longer and probably won’t be ready until tomorrow.’
‘Do we owe all of this to your friend Giorgio?’ Brunetti asked.
‘No, he’s in Rome on some sort of training programme. So I called and said Vice-Questore Patta needed the information immediately.’
‘Did they ask you what it was for?’
‘Of course they did, sir. You wouldn’t want them to give this sort of information out without the proper authorization, would you?’
‘No, of course not. And what did you tell them?’
‘That it was classified. A government matter. That will make them work faster.’
‘And what if the Vice-Questore finds out about this? What if they mention this to him, say you used his name?’
Her smile grew even warmer. ‘Oh, I told them that he would have to deny all knowledge of it, so he wouldn’t like their mentioning it to him. Besides, I’m afraid they’re rather used to doing things like this, checking on private phones and keeping records of the calls that people make.’
‘Yes, so am I,’ Brunetti agreed. He was afraid that a record was also kept of what some people said during those phone calls, a flight of paranoia in which he was probably joined by a large part of the population, but he didn’t bother to mention this to Signorina Elettra. Instead, he asked, ‘Any chance we could get them today?’
‘I’ll give them a call. Perhaps this afternoon.’
‘Would you bring them up to me if they come in, signorina?’
‘Of course,’ she answered and turned back to her keyboard.
He went to the door but before reaching it, he turned, hoping to capitalize on the intimacy of the last minutes. ‘Signorina, excuse me if I ask, but I’ve always been curious about why you decided to come to work for us. Not everyone gives up a job at Banca d’Italia.’
She stopped typing but kept her fingers poised over the keys. ‘Oh, I wanted a change,’ she answered casually and turned her attention back to her typing.
And fish flew, Brunetti thought to himself as he left her office and went back up to his own. The heat had become tropical in his absence, so he opened the windows for a few minutes, holding them only partially open to prevent the rain from driving in, then closed them and went back to his desk.
La Capra and Semenzato, the mysterious man from the South and the museum director. The man with expensive taste and the money to indulge it, and the museum director with the cont
acts that might be necessary to indulge that taste to its fullest. They were an interesting pair. What other objects would Signor La Capra have in his possession, and were they to be found in his palazzo? Was the restoration completed, and, if so, what sort of changes had been made? That was easily discovered; all he had to do was go down to city hall and ask to see the plans. Of course, what was to be read in the plans and the work that had actually been done might not bear too close a resemblance to each other, but to discover the truth of that, all he had to do was learn which of the city inspectors had signed off on the final papers, and he would have a fairly good idea of how close the relationship was likely to be.
There remained the question of what objects might be contained in the newly restored palazzo, but that demanded a different sort of answer. The magistrate who would issue a search warrant on the basis of hotel receipts for the same dates didn’t exist in Venice, a city where palazzi such as La Capra’s sold for seven million lire per square metre.
He decided to try official means first, which meant a call to the other side of the city and the offices of the catasto, where all plans, projects and transfers of ownership had to be registered. It took him a long time to get through to the proper office, as his call was shunted back and forth between uninterested civil servants who were sure, even before Brunetti had a chance to explain what he wanted, that it was another office which could give him the information. A few times, he tried speaking in Veneziano, sure that the use of dialect would ease things by assuring the person on the other end of the line that he was not only a police official but, more importantly, a native Venetian. The first three people he spoke to answered his every question in Italian, apparently not themselves Venetian, and the fourth slipped into thoroughly incomprehensible Sardinian until Brunetti relented and spoke in Italian. That, however, didn’t get him what he wanted, but it did get him, finally, transferred to the correct office.
He felt a surge of joy when the woman who answered the phone spoke in purest veneziano – what’s more, with the strongest of Castello accents. Forget what Dante said about Tuscan being sweet in the mouth. No, this was the language to bring delight.
During the long wait for officialdom to make up its mind to speak to him, he had abandoned all hope of getting a copy of the plans and so asked, instead, for the name of the firm that had done the restorations. Brunetti recognized the name, Scattalon, and knew that they were among the best and most expensive companies in the city. In fact, it was they who had the more-or-less eternal contract to maintain his father-in-law’s palazzo against the equally eternal ravages of time and tide.
Arturo, the oldest Scattalon son, was in the office but was unwilling to discuss a client’s affairs with the police. ‘I’m sorry, Commissario, but that is privileged information.’
‘All I’d like is a general idea of how much the work cost, perhaps rounded out to the nearest ten million,’ Brunetti explained, failing to see how such information could be privileged or in any way private.
‘I’m sorry, but that’s absolutely impossible.’ The sound from the other end of the line disappeared, and Brunetti imagined Scattalon was covering the mouthpiece with his hand in order to speak to someone there with him. In a moment he was back. ‘You’d have to give us an official request from a judge before we would reveal information like that.’
‘Would it help if I had my father-in-law call and ask your father about this?’ Brunetti asked.
‘And who is your father-in-law?’ Scattalon asked.
‘Count Orazio Falier,’ Brunetti said, savouring, for the first time in his life, the rich sound of each syllable as it fell trippingly from his tongue.
Again, the sound at the other end grew muffled, but Brunetti could still make out the deep rumble of male voices. The phone was set down on a hard surface, he heard noises in the background, and then another voice spoke, ‘Buon giorno, Dottor Brunetti. You must excuse my son. He’s new to the business. A university graduate, so perhaps he isn’t familiar with the trade, not yet.’
‘Of course, Signor Scattalon. I understand completely.’
‘What information was it you said you needed, Dottor Brunetti?’ Scattalon asked.
‘I’d like a rough estimate of how much Signor La Capra has spent on the restoration of his palazzo.’
‘Of course, Dottore, of course. Let me just get the file.’ The phone was set down again, but Scattalon was quickly back. He said he didn’t know how much the original purchase price had been, but he estimated that, during the last year, his company had charged La Capra at least five hundred million, including both labour and materials. Brunetti assumed that this was the price ‘in bianco’, the official price that would be reported to the government as what had been spent and earned. He didn’t know Scattalon well enough to feel himself free to ask about this, but it was a safe conclusion that a great deal, perhaps the major part, of the work had been paid for ‘in nero’, unofficially and at a cheaper rate, the better for Scattalon to avoid having to declare it as income and hence be forced to pay taxes on it. Brunetti considered it a safe assumption that he could factor in another five hundred million lire, if not for Scattalon, then for other workers and expenses that would have been paid ‘in nero’.
As to what had actually been done in the palazzo, Scattalon was more than forthcoming. New roof and ceilings, structural reinforcement with steel beams (and the fine paid for that), all walls stripped down to the original brick and replastered, new plumbing and wiring, a complete heating system, central air conditioning, three new stairways, parquet floors in the central salons, and double-glazed windows throughout. No expert, Brunetti could still calculate that this work would cost enormously more than the sum Scattalon had quoted. Well, that was between Scattalon and the tax people.
‘I thought he was planning a room where he could put his collection,’ Brunetti fabricated. ‘Did you work on that, a room for paintings or,’ and here he hoped as he paused, ‘ceramics?’
After a brief hesitation during which Scattalon must have been weighing his obligation to La Capra against that to the Count, he said, ‘There was one room on the third floor that might have served as a kind of gallery. We put bullet-proof glass and iron gratings on all the windows,’ Scattalon continued. ‘It’s at the back of the palazzo, and the windows face north, so it gets indirect light, but the windows are large enough to allow a fair amount to come in.’
‘A gallery?’
‘Well, he never said that, but it would certainly seem that’s what it is. Only one door, reinforced with steel, and he had us cut a number of indentations in the wall. They would be perfect for showing statues, so long as they were small, or perhaps for ceramics.’
‘What about an alarm system? Did you install one?’
‘No, we didn’t, but that’s not work we’re prepared to do. If he had it done, he would have had to hire a different company.’
‘Do you know if he did?’
‘I’ve no idea.’
‘What sort of man did he seem to you, Signor Scattalon?’
‘A wonderful man to work for. Very reasonable. And very inventive. He has excellent taste.’
Brunetti understood this to mean that La Capra was extravagant, probably given to the sort of extravagance that did not quibble over bills or examine them too closely.
‘Do you know if Signor La Capra is living in the palazzo now?’
‘Yes, he is. In fact, he’s called us in a few times to take care of details that were overlooked in the last weeks of work.’ Ah, Brunetti thought, the ever-useful passive voice: the details had been ‘overlooked’; Scattalon’s workmen had not overlooked them. What a wondrous thing was language.
‘And do you know if any details were overlooked in the room you call the gallery?’
Scattalon’s answer was immediate. ‘I didn’t call it that, Dottor Brunetti. I said it might serve that function. And, no, there were no details overlooked there.’
‘Do you know if your workmen had reason to
go into that room when they went back to the palazzo for the last pieces of work?’
‘If there was no work to be done in the room, then there would be no reason for my men to enter it, so I’m sure they would not.’
‘Of course, of course, Signor Scattalon. I’m sure that’s true.’ His sense of the conversation suggested that Scattalon had patience for one more question, no more. ‘Is the door the only means of access to that room?’
‘Yes. That, and the air-conditioning duct.’
‘And do the gratings open?’
‘No.’ Simple, monosyllabic, and quite audibly terminal.
‘Thank you for your help, Signor Scattalon. I’ll be sure to mention it to my father-in-law.’ Brunetti concluded, giving no more explanation at the end of the conversation than he had at the beginning but reasonably certain that Scattalon, like most Italians, would be sufficiently suspicious of anything having to do with a police investigation not to mention it to anyone, most assuredly not to a client who might not yet have paid him in full.
Chapter Nineteen
WOULD SIGNOR La Capra, he wondered, turn out to be yet another of those well-protected men who were appearing on the scene with unsettling frequency? Rich, but with a wealth that had no roots, at least none that were traceable, they seemed to be moving north, coming up from Sicily and Calabria, immigrants in their own land. For years, people in Lombardy and the Veneto, the wealthiest parts of the country, had thought themselves free from la piovra, the many-tentacled octopus that the Mafia had become. It was all roba dal Sud, stuff from the South, those killings, the bombings of bars and restaurants whose owners refused to pay protection money, the shoot-outs in city centres. And, he had to admit, as long as it had remained, all that violence and blood, down in the South, no one had felt much concern with it; the government had shrugged it off as just another quaint custom of the meridione. But in the last few years, just like an agricultural blight that couldn’t be stopped, the violence had moved north: Florence, Bologna, and now the heartland of industrialized Italy found themselves infected and looked in vain for a way to contain the disease.