Fatal Remedies (29 page)

He asked the driver to find a bar and offered him coffee. Though he’d slept deeply, Brunetti had not slept enough, and he felt dull and irritable. A second cup seemed to help; either the caffeine or the sugar would keep him going for the next few hours.

He entered the Interfar office a little after ten and asked if he could speak to Signor Bonaventura. On request, he gave his name and stood by the desk while the secretary called to inquire. Whatever answer she received was immediate and, as soon as she heard it, she set down the phone, got to her feet and led Brunetti through a door and down a corridor covered with light-grey industrial carpeting.

She stopped at the second door on the right, knocked, and opened it, and stood back to allow him to enter. Bonaventura sat behind a desk covered with papers, pamphlets and brochures. He stood when Brunetti came in but remained behind his desk, smiling as he approached, then leaned across it to shake Brunetti’s hand. Both sat.

‘You’re far from home,’ Bonaventura said amiably.

‘Yes. I came up here on business.’

‘Police business, I take it.’

‘Yes.’

‘Am I part of that police business?’ Bonaventura asked.

‘I think so.’

‘If so, it’s the most miraculous thing I’ve ever known to happen.’

‘I’m not sure I understand you,’ Brunetti said.

‘I spoke to my foreman a few minutes ago and was just about to call the
Carabinieri.’
Bonaventura glanced down at his watch. ‘No more than five minutes ago and here you are, a policeman, already on my doorstep, as if you’d read my mind.’

‘And may I ask why you were going to call them?’

‘To report a theft.’

‘Of what?’ Brunetti asked, though he was pretty certain he knew.

‘One of our trucks is gone, and the driver hasn’t reported for work.’

‘Is that all?’

‘No. My foreman tells me it looks as if a good deal of merchandise is missing, too.’

‘About a truckload, would you say?’ Brunetti asked in a neutral voice.

‘If the truck and the driver are both missing, that would make sense, wouldn’t it?’ He wasn’t angry yet, but Brunetti had plenty of time to push him there.

‘Who is this driver?’

‘Michele de Luca.’

‘How long has he worked for you?’

‘I don’t know, half a year or so. I don’t concern myself with things like that. All I know is that I’ve seen him around here for months. This morning, the foreman told me his truck wasn’t in the lot where it’s supposed to be and that he hadn’t shown up.’

‘And the missing merchandise?’

‘De Luca left here yesterday afternoon with a full shipment and was supposed to bring the truck back here before he went home, then be here at seven this morning to pick up another shipment. But he never turned up and the truck wasn’t parked where it was supposed to be. The foreman phoned him, but there was no answer on his
telefonino,
so I decided to call the
Carabinieri.’

It seemed to Brunetti an excessive response to what could well have been no more than an employee being late for work, but then he reflected that Bonaventura actually hadn’t made the call, so he kept his surprise to himself, waiting to see how the scene would be played. ‘Yes, I can see that you would,’ he said. ‘What was in the shipment?’

‘Pharmaceuticals, of course. That’s what we make here.’

‘And where were they going?’

‘I don’t know.’ Bonaventura looked down at the papers cluttering his desk. ‘I’ve got the shipping invoices here somewhere.’

‘Could you find them?’ Brunetti asked, nodding towards the documents.

‘What difference does it make where they were going?’ Bonaventura demanded. ‘The important thing is to find this man and get the shipment back.’

‘You don’t have to worry about him,’ Brunetti said, though he suspected that Bonaventura was also lying about wanting the shipment back.

‘What does that mean?’

‘He was shot and killed by the police last night.’

‘Killed?’ Bonaventura repeated, sounding genuinely amazed.

‘The police went to question him, and he opened fire on them. He was killed when they entered his apartment.’ Then, quickly changing the subject, Brunetti asked, ‘Where was he taking this shipment?’

Disconcerted by the sudden switch of topic, Bonaventura hesitated before finally answering, ‘To the airport.’

‘The airport was closed yesterday. The air-traffic controllers were on strike,’ Brunetti told him, but from his expression he could tell Bonaventura already knew. ‘What instructions did he have if he couldn’t deliver?’

‘It’s the same for all the drivers: bring the truck back here and put it in the garage.’

‘Could he have put it in his own garage?’

‘How do I know what he could have done?’ Bonaventura exploded. ‘The truck’s gone and, from what you tell me, the driver’s dead.’

‘The truck’s not gone,’ Brunetti said softly and watched Bonaventura’s face as he heard the statement. He saw him attempt to hide his shock, then as quickly try to change his expression, but all he achieved was a grotesque parody of relief.

‘Where is it?’ Bonaventura asked.

‘By now, in the police garage.’ He waited to see what Bonaventura would ask and, when he remained silent, added,

‘The boxes were in the back.’

Bonaventura tried to disguise his shock, tried and failed.

‘Not sent to Sri Lanka, either,’ Brunetti said, then added, ‘Do you think you could help me find those shipping invoices now, Signor Bonaventura?’

‘Certainly.’ Bonaventura bowed his head to the task. Idly, aimlessly, he moved papers from one side of his desk to the other, then stacked them all in a pile and went through them one by one. ‘That’s strange,’ he said, looking up at Brunetti after he had gone through the lot, ‘I can’t find them here,’ He got to his feet. If you’ll wait, I’ll ask my secretary to get them for me.’

Before he could take his first step towards the door, Brunetti got to his feet. ‘Perhaps you could call her,’ he suggested.

Bonaventura turned his mouth up in a smile. ‘It’s really the foreman who has them, and he’s back at the loading dock.’

He started to move past Brunetti, who put out a hand and placed it on his arm. ‘I’ll come with you, Signor Bonaventura.’

‘That’s really not necessary,’ he said with another motion of his mouth.

‘I think it is,’ was all Brunetti answered. He had no idea what his legal rights were here, how much authority he had to detain or follow Bonaventura. He was outside Venice, even beyond the borders of the province of Venezia, and no charges had been contemplated, much less brought, against Bonaventura. But none of that mattered to him. He stepped aside and let Bonaventura open the door of his office, then followed him down the corridor, away from the front of the building.

At the back, a door opened out on to a long cement loading dock. Two large trucks were backed up to it, rear doors open, and four men were wheeling dollies filled with cartons from doors further down the dock into the open backs of the trucks. They looked up when they saw the two men emerge from the door but then went back to their work. Below them, between the trucks, two men stood and talked, hands in the pockets of their jackets.

Bonaventura walked over to the edge of the loading dock. When they looked up at him, he called down to one of them, ‘De Luca’s truck’s been found. The shipment’s still in it. This policeman wants to see the shipping invoices.’

He had barely finished the word ‘policeman’, when the taller of the two men sprang away from the other and reached inside his jacket. His hand came out carrying a pistol, but the instant Brunetti saw him move, he ducked back inside the still-open door and pulled his own pistol from its holster.

Nothing happened. There was no noise, no shot, no shouting. He heard footsteps, the slamming of what sounded like a car door and another; then a large motor spring into life. Instead of going out on to the dock again to see what was happening, Brunetti ran back through the corridor and out of the front door of the building, where his driver was waiting, motor running to keep the car warm, while he read
Il Gazzettino dello Sport.

Brunetti pulled open the passenger door and leaped into the car, seeing the driver’s panic disappear when he recognized him. ‘A truck, going out of the far gate. Swing round and follow it.’ Even before Brunetti’s hand reached the car phone, the driver had tossed his paper into the back seat and had the car in gear and spinning round towards the back of the building. As they rounded the corner, the driver pulled the wheel sharply to the left, trying not to hit one of the boxes that had fallen from the open doors of the truck. But he couldn’t avoid the next one and their left wheels passed over it, splattering it open and spewing small bottles in a wide wake behind them. Just beyond the gates Brunetti could see the truck moving off down the highway in the direction of Padova, its rear doors flapping open.

The rest was as predictable as it was tragic. Just beyond Resana, two
Carabinieri
vehicles were drawn up across the road, blocking traffic. In an attempt to get past them, the driver of the truck swerved to the right and on to the high shoulder of the road. Just as he did, a small Fiat, driven by a woman on the way to pick up her daughter at the local
asilo,
slowed at the sight of the police block. The truck, as it came back on to the road, swung into the other lane and slammed into her car broadside, killing her instantly. Both men, Bonaventura and the driver, had been wearing their seat-belts, so neither was hurt, though they were severely shaken by the crash.

Before they could free themselves from their seat-belts, they were surrounded by
Carabinieri,
who pulled them down from the truck and flung them face forward against its doors. They were quickly surrounded by four
Carabinieri
carrying machine-guns. Two others ran to the Fiat but saw there was nothing to be done.

Brunetti’s car pulled up and he got out. The scene was absolutely silent, unnaturally so. He heard his own footsteps approaching the two men, both of whom were breathing heavily. Something metal clanged to the ground from the direction of the truck.

He turned to the sergeant. ‘Put them in the car,’ was all he said.

* * * *

24

There was some discussion about where the men should be taken for questioning, whether back to Castelfranco, which had territorial jurisdiction over the scene of their capture, or back to Venice, from which city the investigation had begun. Brunetti listened to the police discuss this for a few moments, then cut into the conversation with a voice of iron: ‘I said put them in the car. We’re taking them back to Castelfranco.’ The other policemen exchanged glances, but no one contradicted him and it was done.

Standing in Bonino’s office, Bonaventura was told he could call his lawyer, and when the other identified himself as Roberto Sandi, the foreman of the factory, he was told the same. Bonaventura named a lawyer in Venice with a large criminal practice and asked that he be allowed to call him. He ignored Sandi.

‘And what about me?’ Sandi asked, turning to Bonaventura.

Bonaventura refused to answer him.

‘What about me?’ Sandi said again.

Still, Bonaventura remained silent.

Sandi, who spoke with a pronounced Piedmontese accent, turned to the uniformed officer next to him and demanded, ‘Where’s your boss? I want to talk to your boss.’

Before the officer could respond, Brunetti stepped forward and said, I’ll be in charge of this,’ even though he wasn’t sure of that at all.