birds. In the autumn, whenthe air changed and the hunting season began, a wild restiveness came over Diana, who knew no peace until the day his uncle could finally take down his shotgun and open the door that led to the woods behind his home.
Looking at Signorina Elettra poised on the edge of her chair, Brunetti was struck by how much she resembled Diana: there were the same liquid dark eyes, the flared nostrils, and the badly restrained nervousness at the thought of prey that was to be seized and brought back. ‘Can you find everything with that thing?’ he asked, not needing to name her computer.
She turned towards him and she sat up straighter. ‘Perhaps not everything, sir. But many things.’
‘Don Alvise Perale?’ he asked. He sensed, rather than saw, Vianello’s start of astonishment, but when he turned to look at him, Brunetti saw that the inspector had managed not to display his surprise. Brunetti permitted himself a half-smile, and after a moment Vianello was forced to shake his head in rueful appreciation of Brunetti’s inability to trust anyone fully.
He remembered that Diana needed no encouragement or explanation: a flutter of motion and she was off, like the wind. Signorina Elettra wasted no time with questions or clarifications. ‘The ex-priest, sir?’
‘Yes.’
She rose to her feet in a single graceful motion. ‘I’ll go and see what I can find.’
‘It’s almost eight, Signorina,’ he reminded her.
‘Just a quick look,’ she said and was gone.
When the door closed behind her, Vianello said, ‘Don’t worry, sir. She doesn’t have a bed here. So she’ll go home eventually.’
10
Brunetti found a seat at the back of the cabin, on the left-hand side of the vaporetto, so his view was of San Giorgio and the façades on the Dorsoduro side of the canal. He studied them as he headed up towards San Silvestro, but his attention was far removed from Venice, even from Europe. He considered the mess that was Africa, and he considered the endless historical argument of whether it was caused by what had been done to the Africans or by what they had done to themselves. It was not a subject upon which he believed himself sufficiently expert to comment, nor one where he thought there was much hope that people would arrive at the kind of consensus that passes for historical truth.
His memory filled with images: JosephConrad’s battleship, firing round after futile round into the jungle in an attempt to force it to submit to peace; shoals of bodies washed up on the shores of Lake Victoria; the shimmering surface of a Benin bronze; the yawning pits where so many of the earth’s riches were mined. No one of these things was Africa, he knew, any more than the bridge under which the boat was passing was Europe. Each was a piece in a puzzle no one could understand. He remembered the Latin words he had once seen on a sixteenth-century map to mark the limit of Western exploration of Africa: Hic scientia finit : Knowledge Stops Here. How arrogant we were, he thought, and how arrogant we remain.
At home he found peace, or perhaps it is more accurate to say that he found a truce that seemed to be holding. Chiara and Paola talked as usual at dinner, and if the way Chiara packed away two helpings of pasta with broccoli and capers and then two baked pears was any indication, her appetite had returned to normal. Taking this as a good sign, he allowed himself to stretch out on the sofa in the living room after dinner, the smallest of small glasses of grappa on the table beside him, his current book propped on his stomach. For the last week, he had been rereading Ammianus Marcellinus’ history of the later Roman Empire, a book which Brunetti enjoyed chiefly for its portrait of one of his greatest heroes, the Emperor Julian. But even here he found himself drawn into Africa, with the account of the siege of the town of Leptis inTripolis and of the perfidy and duplicity of both attackers and defenders. Hostages
Looking at Signorina Elettra poised on the edge of her chair, Brunetti was struck by how much she resembled Diana: there were the same liquid dark eyes, the flared nostrils, and the badly restrained nervousness at the thought of prey that was to be seized and brought back. ‘Can you find everything with that thing?’ he asked, not needing to name her computer.
She turned towards him and she sat up straighter. ‘Perhaps not everything, sir. But many things.’
‘Don Alvise Perale?’ he asked. He sensed, rather than saw, Vianello’s start of astonishment, but when he turned to look at him, Brunetti saw that the inspector had managed not to display his surprise. Brunetti permitted himself a half-smile, and after a moment Vianello was forced to shake his head in rueful appreciation of Brunetti’s inability to trust anyone fully.
He remembered that Diana needed no encouragement or explanation: a flutter of motion and she was off, like the wind. Signorina Elettra wasted no time with questions or clarifications. ‘The ex-priest, sir?’
‘Yes.’
She rose to her feet in a single graceful motion. ‘I’ll go and see what I can find.’
‘It’s almost eight, Signorina,’ he reminded her.
‘Just a quick look,’ she said and was gone.
When the door closed behind her, Vianello said, ‘Don’t worry, sir. She doesn’t have a bed here. So she’ll go home eventually.’
10
Brunetti found a seat at the back of the cabin, on the left-hand side of the vaporetto, so his view was of San Giorgio and the façades on the Dorsoduro side of the canal. He studied them as he headed up towards San Silvestro, but his attention was far removed from Venice, even from Europe. He considered the mess that was Africa, and he considered the endless historical argument of whether it was caused by what had been done to the Africans or by what they had done to themselves. It was not a subject upon which he believed himself sufficiently expert to comment, nor one where he thought there was much hope that people would arrive at the kind of consensus that passes for historical truth.
His memory filled with images: JosephConrad’s battleship, firing round after futile round into the jungle in an attempt to force it to submit to peace; shoals of bodies washed up on the shores of Lake Victoria; the shimmering surface of a Benin bronze; the yawning pits where so many of the earth’s riches were mined. No one of these things was Africa, he knew, any more than the bridge under which the boat was passing was Europe. Each was a piece in a puzzle no one could understand. He remembered the Latin words he had once seen on a sixteenth-century map to mark the limit of Western exploration of Africa: Hic scientia finit : Knowledge Stops Here. How arrogant we were, he thought, and how arrogant we remain.
At home he found peace, or perhaps it is more accurate to say that he found a truce that seemed to be holding. Chiara and Paola talked as usual at dinner, and if the way Chiara packed away two helpings of pasta with broccoli and capers and then two baked pears was any indication, her appetite had returned to normal. Taking this as a good sign, he allowed himself to stretch out on the sofa in the living room after dinner, the smallest of small glasses of grappa on the table beside him, his current book propped on his stomach. For the last week, he had been rereading Ammianus Marcellinus’ history of the later Roman Empire, a book which Brunetti enjoyed chiefly for its portrait of one of his greatest heroes, the Emperor Julian. But even here he found himself drawn into Africa, with the account of the siege of the town of Leptis inTripolis and of the perfidy and duplicity of both attackers and defenders. Hostages
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