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being
paid, you understand. That’s not something we have any control over - but about
being beat up, well, no one wants to be sent to investigate it, even if we have
the name of the man who did it. Or if they do go to question him, usually
nothing happens.’
     
    ‘I got a taste of that, even
something stronger, from Sergeant Buffo,’ Brunetti said.
     
    At the name, Gallo compressed his
lips but said nothing.
     
    ‘What about the women?’ Brunetti
asked.
     
    ‘The whores?’
     
    ‘Yes. Is there much contact
between them and the transvestites?’
     
    ‘There’s never been any trouble,
not that I know of, but I don’t know how well they get on. I don’t think they’re
in competition over clients, if that’s what you mean.’
     
    Brunetti wasn’t sure what he
meant and realized that his questions would have no clear focus until he read
the files in the blue folder or until someone could identify the body of the
dead man. Until they had that, there could be no talk of motive and, until
that, there could be no understanding what had happened.
     
    He stood, glanced at his watch. ‘I’d
like your driver to pick me up at eight-thirty tomorrow morning. And I’d like
the artist to have the sketch ready by then. As soon as you have it, even if it’s
tonight, get at least two officers to start making the rounds of the other
transvestites, to see if any of them know who he is or if they’ve heard that
anyone from Pordenone or Padova is missing. I’d also like your men to ask the
whores - the women, that is, if the transvestites use the area where he was
found or if they know of any of them who ever has in the past.’ He picked up
the file. ‘I’ll read through this tonight.’
     
    Gallo had been taking notes of
what Brunetti said, but now he stood and walked with him to the door.
     
    ‘I’ll see you then tomorrow
morning, Commissario.’ He headed back towards his desk and reached for the
phone. ‘When you get downstairs, there’ll be a driver waiting to take you back
to Piazzale Roma.’
     
    As the police car sped back over
the causeway towards Venice, Brunetti looked out to the right, at the clouds of
grey, white, green, yellow smoke billowing up from the forest of smokestacks in
Marghera. As far as the eye could see, the pall of smoke enveloped the vast
industrial complex, and the rays from the declining sun turned it all into a
radiant vision of the next century. Saddened by the thought, he turned away and
looked off towards Murano and, beyond it, the distant tower of the basilica of
Torcello, where, some historians said, the whole idea of Venice had begun more
than a thousand years ago, when the people of the coast fled into the marshes
to avoid the invading Huns.
     
    The driver swerved wildly to
avoid an immense camper-van with German plates that suddenly cut in front of
them then swerved off to the parking island of Tronchetto, and Brunetti was
pulled back to the present. More Huns, and now no place to hide.
     
    He walked home from Piazzale
Roma, paying little attention to what or whom he passed, his mind hovering over
that bleak field, still seeing the flies that swarmed around the spot under the
grass where the body had been. Tomorrow, he would go and see the body, talk to
the pathologist, and see what secrets it might reveal.
     
    He got home just before eight,
still early enough for it to seem like he was returning from a normal day.
Paola was in the kitchen when he let himself into the apartment, but there were
none of the usual smells or sounds of cooking. Curious, he went down the
corridor and stuck his head into the kitchen; she was at the counter, slicing
tomatoes.
     
    ‘Ciao , Guido,’ she said, looking up
and smiling at him.
     
    He tossed the blue folder on the
kitchen counter, walked over to Paola, and kissed the back of her neck.
     
    ‘In this heat?’ she asked, but
she leaned back against him as she said it.
     
    He licked delicately at her skin.
     
    ‘Salt