Friends in High Places (36 page)

Knowing she had no responsibility for the last but still wild with the desire that she be made to pay, he continued, ‘The newspapers will put it all together: Rossi’s death, a suspect with bite marks made by the murdered girl ruled out because he’s been declared mentally incompetent by the court, and the possible involvement of dal Carlo’s secretary, an older woman,
una zitella,’
he said, surprising himself with the force of the contempt he put into the word ‘spinster’.
‘Una zitella nobile’
- he all but spat that last word - ‘who was pathetically besotted with her boss - a younger, married, man,’ he thundered down on the shaming adjectives - ‘and who just happens to have a brother who has been declared mentally incompetent by the courts and who hence might be the person suspected of killing Rossi.’ He paused and watched as she shrank away from him in real horror. ‘And they will assume that dal Carlo was neck deep in these murders, and he will never be free of that suspicion. And you,’ he said, pointing across the desk at her, ‘you will have done that to him. It will be your last gift to Ingeniere dal Carlo.’

‘You can’t do that,’ she said, voice rising up beyond her control.

‘I’m not going to do a thing, Signorina,’ he said, appalled at the pleasure he took in saying all of this. ‘The papers will say it, or suggest it, but no matter where the words come from, you can be sure that the people who read it will put it all together and believe it. And the part they will like best is the spectacle of the ageing
zitella nobile
with her pathetic obsession with a younger man.’ He leaned across the desk and all but shouted at her: ‘And they will ask for more.’

She shook her head, mouth agape: if he had slapped her, she would have borne it better. ‘But you can’t. I’m a Dolfin.’

Brunetti was so stunned that all he could do was laugh. He put his head back against the top of his chair and allowed himself the sudden release of mad laughter. ‘I know, I know,’ he said, voice difficult to control as new waves of wild mirth swept through him, ‘You’re a Dolfin, and the Dolfins never do anything for money.’

She stood, her face so red and tormented it sobered him instantly. Clutching her purse in fingers that creaked with the strain, she said, ‘I did it for love.’

‘Then God help you,’ Brunetti said and reached for the phone.