room, hesitated beside a large desk, then pulled out the chair behind it and sat in it: her shoulders barely topped the desk, and Brunetti could not stop himself from smiling.
The woman saw his smile, looked across at the child, then back at Brunetti, and he watched her assess the scene and his response. ‘I really do have a daughter, Signora,’ he said and walked over to take one of the chairs in front of the desk. Vianello took the other one.
The woman came into the room but remained standing, halfway between the desk and the open door, a position that offered her the opportunity to try to snatch the child to safety, should that become necessary.
‘Where’s your Mummy?’ Vianello asked.
‘She works. That’s why we have Zinka. She stays with me. We were supposed to go to the beach today – we have a cabina at the Excelsior – but Mamma says it’s too hot today, so we stayed home. Zinka was going to let me help make lunch.’
‘Good for you,’ Vianello said. ‘What are you going to make?’
‘Minestra di verdura. Zinka says if I’m good, I can peel the potatoes.’
Brunetti turned his attention to the woman, who appeared to be following the conversation with no difficulty. ‘Signora,’ he said with real warmth. ‘If I hadn’t promised to ask only about Signora Fontana, I’d ask you to teach me how I could convince my daughter that I might let her clean her room.’ He smiled to show her the joke; her face softened, and then she smiled in return.
The illegality of what he was doing suddenly descended on Brunetti, but heavier was the weight of the seaminess of it. She was just a child, for heaven’s sake: how great was his need to know, if he would sink to this?
He turned to the woman. ‘It’s not right to ask Lucia any more questions, I think. So perhaps we should let you both get back to your minestra.’ Vianello gave him a surprised glance, but he ignored it and said to the girl, ‘I hope it cools down enough for you to go to the beach tomorrow.’
‘Thank you, Signore,’ she said with learned politeness, then added, ‘Maybe it’s not so bad if we can’t go. Zinka hates the beach.’ Then, turning to her, she asked, ‘Don’t you?’
The woman’s smile reappeared, broader now. ‘The beach doesn’t like me, either, Lucia.’
Brunetti and Vianello stood. ‘Could you tell me when I might find the Marsanos at home? We’ll come back then.’
She looked at the little girl and said, ‘Lucia, go down to kitchen see if I left glasses there, please?’
Happy to obey, the girl jumped down from the chair and left the room.
‘Signor Marsano won’t tell you things. Signora no, also.’
‘Tell me what, Signora?’ Brunetti asked.
‘Fontana was good man. Fight with Signor Marsano, fight with upstairs people.’
She used the word for battle, so Brunetti asked, ‘Word fight or hand fight, Signora?’
‘Word fight, only word fight,’ she said, as though the other possibility frightened her.
‘What happened?’
‘They call names: Signor Fontana say Signor Marsano not honest, same with man upstairs. Then Signor Marsano say he is bad man, go with men.’
‘But you think he was a good man?’ Brunetti asked.
‘I know,’ she said with sudden force. ‘He found me lawyer. Good man at Tribunale. He help me with papers, for staying.’
‘For staying in Italy?’ Brunetti asked.
‘They aren’t there, Zinka,’ the girl shouted from the end of the corridor, then, as she approached, she asked, in that long-drawn-out voice of the impatient child, ‘Can we go back to work now?’
Zinka smiled as the girl appeared at the door and said, ‘One minute, then we work again.’
‘Could you give me the name of the lawyer, Signora?’ Brunetti asked.
‘Penzo. Renato Penzo. Friend of Signor Fontana. He is good man, too.’
‘And Signora Fontana,’ Brunetti asked, sensitive to the child’s impatience and the woman’s growing uneasiness, ‘is she a good woman, too?’
The woman looked at him, then down at the child. ‘Our guests go now, Lucia. You open the door for them, no?’
The child, sensing the possibility of getting back to work on the potatoes, all but ran to the front door. She pulled it open and went out on the landing, where she leaned over the railing, looking down into the stairwell. Brunetti saw how nervous it made the woman to see her there and started towards the door.
He stopped just inside it. ‘And Signora Fontana?’ he asked.
She shook her head, saw that Brunetti accepted her reluctance to talk, and