Transient Desires (Commissario Brunetti #30)(46)

‘That’s when Marcello began to feel the pain.’ Duso grew thoughtful and added, ‘I think we were both so frightened we didn’t notice much until then, when it looked like it was all over, and we were safe.’ Perhaps it was that last word that stopped him short: for a long time Duso did no more than repeat the word: ‘Safe’.

Now that Duso had begun talking, Brunetti knew it was necessary to keep him from stopping. Screwing his face up in confusion, Brunetti said, ‘Since you were both safe, why is he afraid?’

Duso threw his hands up in the air. ‘I don’t know. Marcello loves his uncle because he took him in when his father died. Pietro has only the two daughters,’ Duso said and closed his eyes. ‘Maybe Marcello is some sort of substitute for the son he didn’t have. I don’t know.’

But still his nephew was not to be his heir, Brunetti thought. Of course, that didn’t mean he loved Marcello any less, only that he had weighed his nephew in the balance and found him wanting.

Duso shook his head wildly. ‘I don’t know what to do. I don’t know. All Marcello said was that his uncle had found out that we’d been questioned at the Questura.’ Bracing his elbows on the table, Duso put his face in his hands and shook his head.

‘Did he see his uncle?’

‘No. His cousin who lives here came to visit him in the hospital, and she said her father was angry with Marcello because he’d talked to the police, really angry. Her father’s worried it could get him into trouble.’

‘Who?’ Brunetti asked, ‘Marcello or his uncle?’

Duso at first seemed confused by the question, but closed his eyes as if listening again to what his friend had told him. ‘His uncle,’ he said, surprised to hear himself say it.

A long pause radiated from that and lasted until Brunetti asked, ‘Do you know the uncle?’

Duso’s manner changed. He pushed his chair back from the table, as though wanting to establish a greater distance between Brunetti and himself. His face moved, but he said nothing. Brunetti thought he was trying to find the right way to answer the question.

Finally Duso said, ‘I met him once.’

‘When?’ Brunetti asked.

‘Ten years ago.’

‘And not since then?’

‘No.’

‘If I might speak as a father,’ Brunetti said with an easy smile, ‘that sounds very strange.’

Duso’s voice was nervous as he asked, ‘Why?’

‘Because my son has a lot of friends. I don’t know all of them, but I know his closest friend very well: he’s even come on vacation with us a few times.’

Duso stared across at Brunetti, as though assembling a new way of examining human relationships. ‘How long have they been friends?’

‘Since they began school. They sat in the same row then, and they still sit near one another at university,’ Brunetti said, as if ignorant of any other way for best friends to sit during the same class.

Duso looked down at his hands again, then pushed his chair even farther back to allow him to look at his shoes. Head still bowed, he asked, in a very low voice, ‘They’re only friends?’

Pieces of the puzzle slipped into place in Brunetti’s mind and he said, ‘They’re both heterosexual, if that’s what you mean.’ Then, after a pause, Brunetti added, ‘Not that I see it would make any difference.’

‘To you?’ Duso asked.

‘To me. To Raffi. To Giorgio,’ he said and watched Duso try to contain his surprise. ‘They love one another. Well, they’re friends, so they should, don’t you think?’

Duso opened his mouth to speak, but no words emerged. Finally he managed to ask, ‘And if it was more?’ unable to say what that ‘more’ would be but leaving no doubt about what he meant, ‘you wouldn’t mind?’

Brunetti thought about it for a moment, never having questioned his son’s preference but thinking of the other possibility now. ‘No, I wouldn’t mind. Yet,’ he began and saw Duso grow suddenly more alert. ‘Yet I’d worry that it might complicate his life or make it difficult.’ He gave himself time to follow this idea, then finished by saying, ‘But not as difficult and painful as it would be if he pretended to be heterosexual and wasted his life with that.’ The thought ran along with itself until Brunetti said, with finality, ‘That would cause me limitless pain.’

‘I see,’ Duso said. ‘Thank you.’

‘Could this be the reason Marcello’s frightened?’ Brunetti asked.

‘Maybe,’ Duso answered. He glanced at Brunetti and added, ‘Everyone’s afraid of Pietro.’

‘Are you?’

‘Why do you think I haven’t seen him for ten years?’ Duso asked and gave a smile that transformed his face, the sort of easy smile a person gives when slipping off a pair of too-tight shoes. ‘He doesn’t believe Marcello and I are just friends. Like brothers.’

He looked at Brunetti, who said, ‘You’re both lucky to have that bond.’

‘You think it’s a good thing?’ Duso asked, his voice as neutral as he could make it.

‘One of the best things that can happen, I’d say,’ was Brunetti’s response. Seeing that Duso had trouble masking his relief at hearing this, Brunetti risked saying, ‘His uncle’s afraid you’ll . . . influence him?’