Transient Desires (Commissario Brunetti #30)(19)
Brunetti pulled his arm free from Griffoni’s grip and walked over to Duso. He reached down to the young man, who took his hand and pulled himself to his feet.
Brunetti saw the tears on the young man’s cheeks before he succeeded in wiping them away. Voice choked, Duso asked, ‘What happened?’
‘He fainted when we were talking to him,’ Brunetti explained. ‘The doctor who came thinks he broke a rib, and it’s punctured his lung.’
Before Duso could speak, Brunetti went on, making up the story he thought the young man needed to hear. ‘She didn’t seem very worried about him, but they need to take X-rays to be sure.’ He saw that Duso was responding as much to his calm tone as to the story he was telling.
Brunetti gestured to the door of the Questura and said, ‘Would you come this way? It won’t take long.’ Once inside, he stayed close to Duso’s side as Griffoni led them both towards the back of the building, to the interrogation room next to the one where Vio had collapsed.
There, everything was orderly: two desk lamps on the long table, chairs on both sides, even a carafe of water and four glasses.
Brunetti waved to a seat on the opposite side of the table, farther from the door, and waited while Duso pulled out the chair and sat: the chair was directly opposite a double electrical socket, half of which was in fact the lens of a camera that projected the top half of the person being questioned on to a television screen in the next room. The larger desk lamp took care of the audio.
Brunetti and Griffoni sat on the other side of the table, Brunetti directly opposite Duso. Brunetti found comfort in the certainty that Vianello was observing Duso: his friend’s bat-like sensitivity to voices doubled his ability to understand what was meant, not only what was said: where some heard defiance, Vianello sensed fear. Where others heard submission Vianello sensed deceit.
Brunetti turned his attention to the young lawyer.
Questioning a lawyer was never easy, both Brunetti and Griffoni knew. Believing themselves the only true interpreters of the law, lawyers often further assume that the police have little knowledge of the law’s many twists and turns, its seeming contradictions, nor of the multiplicity of interpretation it offered to its followers. This lawyer at the start of his career, and thus less experienced than his older colleagues, might not pause to consider that the two people with whom he was soon to speak had studied law and could have been, had they chosen to be, lawyers. It might also have surprised him to learn that their joint years of experience of the law probably exceeded that of his father or any of the lawyers in his office.
Youth often thinks in images, rather than words, so it was also possible that Avvocato Duso sometimes saw himself as a slayer of dragons, capable of charging through the defences of any who stood in his way. He worked but a moment’s walk from the Gallerie dell’ Accademia, where, had he visited the collection with any regularity, surely he would have seen Mantegna’s small wooden panel of San Giorgio in full armour, the saint glancing to his left and thus drawing the viewer’s gaze away from what lay behind his feet. There lay the dragon, head thrust in front of the frame in a triumph of trompe-l’oeil, just as the sliver of spear protruding from its jaw was proof of the saint’s triumph.
Griffoni’s touch on his arm interrupted Brunetti’s reverie; he turned his attention to the young lawyer. ‘Avvocato Duso,’ he said formally, ‘let me introduce myself: Brunetti, Commissario di Polizia.’ He turned towards Griffoni, who nodded. ‘This is my colleague, Commissario Claudia Griffoni.’
That done, Brunetti continued with the legal formalities. ‘We’ve asked you to come to speak to us about certain matters. I inform you that this conversation is being recorded.’ He glanced across at Duso, and asked, ‘Is that clear?’
Filiberto Duso was a handsome young man in a country where this is the norm; thus, he seemed not at all aware of it. His cheekbones were high and well defined, his nose thin and straight. His summer tan lingered, setting in contrast his blue eyes. He was clean-shaven and had two dimples on either side of his mouth: they creased when he smiled. His hair was in need of cutting.
‘Filiberto Duso,’ he finally said, making no attempt to extend his hand across the table.
‘Signor Duso, thank you for coming to speak to us,’ Brunetti began by saying, curious how Duso would deal with a remark that cried out for a sarcastic response.
The young man had obviously had time to recover at least a bit from the shock of seeing his friend being carried to an ambulance. His smile was easy and assured, but not warm, when he said, ‘Because I’m a lawyer, it is my obligation, as well as my pleasure, to be of help to the police.’
‘Thank you,’ Brunetti said simply and turned aside to Griffoni. Perhaps she could succeed in provoking him?
‘It’s about the events of Saturday night that we’d like to speak to you, Signor Duso,’ she said.
‘Which events?’ Duso asked.
As if he’d not spoken, Griffoni went on. ‘We’re curious about your movements that night. We’d like to learn if your memory is similar to that of Signor Vio.’
If either Brunetti or Griffoni had thought the mention of Vio’s name would affect Duso, they were mistaken, for he answered calmly, ‘I had dinner with my parents at eight, and I was with them until at least ten.’
‘And then?’ she asked mildly.