Suffer the Little Children (3 page)

She stood, frozen in panic, unable to scream.

The tension was broken by the masked man on the floor, who moaned and then struggled, as if drunkenly, to his feet. He put one gloved hand over his nose, and when he pulled it away he seemed shocked by the sight of his own blood. ‘He broke my nose,' he said in a muffled voice, then pulled his mask over his face and let it fall to the floor. Blood continued to drip from his nose on to the front of his jacket. As he turned towards the man who appeared to be in charge, the woman saw the single word spelled out in iridescent letters on the back of his padded jacket.

‘“Carabinieri?”' she asked, her voice barely audible over the continued screams of the baby.

‘Yes, Signora. Carabinieri,' said the man who had spoken to her. ‘Didn't you know we'd come, Signora?' he asked, something close to sympathy in his voice.

GUIDO BRUNETTI LAY
just on the edge of the sleep of the just, curled round the back of his wife. He was in that cloudy space between sleeping and waking, reluctant to let go of the happiness of the day. His son had casually mentioned at dinner how stupid one of his classmates was to fool around with drugs and had failed to see the look of relief that passed between his parents. His daughter had apologized to her mother for an angry remark made the previous day, and the words ‘Mohammad' and ‘mountain' sounded just at the edge of Brunetti's consciousness. And his wife, his sweet wife of more than twenty years, had surprised him with an outburst of amorous need that had inflamed him as though those two decades had never passed.

He drifted, full of contentment and greedy to run each of the events through his mind again. Unsolicited repentance from a teenager: should he alert the press? What caused him to marvel even more was Paola's assurance that this was not an attempt on Chiara's part to achieve some quid pro quo in return for the seemly expression of sentiments proper to her age and station. Surely, Chiara was smart enough to realize how effective a ploy this would be, but Brunetti chose to believe his wife when she said that Chiara was fundamentally too honest to do that.

Was this the greatest delusion, he wondered, our belief in the honesty of our children? The question, unanswered, slipped away from him, and he drifted into sleep.

The phone rang.

It rang five times before Brunetti, in the thick voice of the drugged or mugged, answered it. ‘
Sì?
' he muttered, his mind flashing down the hall but instantly comforted by the memory of having wished both of his children goodnight as they went to bed.

‘It's Vianello,' the familiar voice said. ‘I'm at the hospital. We've got a mess.'

Brunetti sat up and turned on the light. The urgency in Vianello's voice, as much as the message, told him he would have no choice but to join the Inspector at the hospital. ‘What sort of mess?'

‘There's a doctor here, one of the paediatricians. He's in the emergency room, and the
doctors are talking about possible brain damage.' This made no sense to Brunetti, regardless of his fuddled state, but he knew Vianello would get to it quickly, so he said nothing.

‘He was attacked in his home,' the Inspector continued. Then, after a long pause, he added, ‘By the police.'

‘By us?' Brunetti asked, astonished.

‘No, the Carabinieri. They broke in and tried to arrest him. The captain who was in charge says he attacked one of them,' Vianello said. Brunetti's eyes narrowed as the Inspector added, ‘But he would say that, wouldn't he?'

‘How many of them were there?' Brunetti asked.

‘Five,' Vianello answered. ‘Three in the house and two outside as backup.'

Brunetti got to his feet. ‘I'll be there in twenty minutes.' Then he asked, ‘Do you know why they were there?'

Vianello hesitated but then answered, ‘They went to take his son. He's eighteen months old. They say he adopted the child illegally.'

‘Twenty minutes,' Brunetti repeated and put the phone down.

It was only as he was letting himself out of the house that he bothered to check the time. Two-fifteen. He had thought to put on a jacket and was glad of it now, in the first chill of autumn. At the end of the
calle
he turned right and headed towards Rialto. He probably should have asked for a launch, but he never
knew how long one would take, while he was sure to the minute how long it would take to walk.

He ignored the city around him. Five men to take an eighteen-month-old baby. Presumably, especially if the man was in the hospital with brain damage, they had not rung the doorbell and politely asked if they could come in. Brunetti himself had taken part in too many early morning raids to have any illusions about the panic they caused. He had seen hardened criminals whose bowels had loosened at the sound and sight of armed men bursting in upon them: imagine the reaction of a doctor, illegally adopted baby or no. And the Carabinieri – Brunetti had encountered too many of them who loved bursting in and imposing their sudden, terrifying authority, as if Mussolini were still in power and no one to say them nay.

At the top of the Rialto, he was too preoccupied with these thoughts to think of looking to either side but hurried down the bridge and into Calle de la Bissa. Why should they need five men and how would they get there? Surely they'd need a boat, and by whose authority were they carrying out an action like this in the city? Who had been informed, and if official notice had been given, why had nothing been said to him about it?

The
portiere
seemed to be asleep behind the window of his office: certainly he did not look up as Brunetti entered the hospital. Blind to the magnificence of the entrance hall though aware
of the sudden drop in temperature, Brunetti worked his way right and left and then left again until he arrived at the automatic doors of the emergency room. They slid aside to let him enter. Inside the second set of doors, he pulled out his warrant card and approached the white-jacketed attendant behind the glass partition.

The man, fat and jolly-faced and far more cheerful than either the time or the circumstances warranted, glanced at Brunetti's card, smiled at him and said, ‘Down to the left, Signore. Second door on the right. He's in there.'

Brunetti thanked him and followed the directions. At the door, he knocked once and went in. Though Brunetti did not recognize the man in battle fatigues who lay on the examining table, he recognized the uniform of the man standing at the window. A woman in a white lab coat sat beside the man on the table, smoothing a strip of plastic tape across his nose. As Brunetti watched, she cut a second strip and placed it parallel to the other. They anchored a thick cotton bandage to the man's nose; both nostrils were plugged with cotton. Brunetti noticed that there were already dark circles under his eyes.

The second man leaned comfortably against the wall, arms and legs crossed, observing. He wore the three stars of a captain and a pair of high black leather boots more appropriate for riding dressage than a Ducati.

‘Good morning, Dottoressa,' Brunetti said
when the woman looked up. ‘I'm Commissario Guido Brunetti, and I'd be very grateful if you could tell me what's going on.'

Brunetti expected the Captain to interrupt him here, but was both surprised and disappointed by the man's continued silence. The doctor turned back to her patient, pressing the ends of the tape a few times until they were secure on the man's face. ‘Keep this in place for at least two days. The cartilage has been pushed to one side, but it should reattach itself without any trouble. Just be careful with it. Take the cotton out tonight before you go to bed. If the bandage comes loose, or if it starts to bleed again, see a doctor or come back in here. All right?'

‘
Sì
,' the man agreed with rather more sibilance than might have been heard in his normal voice.

The doctor extended a hand, and the man took it. She held him steady as he lowered his feet to the ground and stood, his other hand propped on the examining table. He needed a moment to steady himself. The doctor crouched down and looked upwards, at the cotton wadding in the man's nose, but evidently it did not trouble her, so she stood up and stepped back. ‘Even if nothing happens, come back in three days, all right, and I'll take another look.' The man gave a very cautious nod, and looked as if he wanted to say something, but she cut him off and added, ‘And don't worry. It should be fine.'

The man glanced at the Captain, then turned
back to the doctor. ‘I'm from Verona, Dottoressa,' he said in a muffled voice.

‘In that case,' she said briskly, ‘see your own doctor after three days or if it starts to bleed again. All right?'

He nodded and then turned to the Captain. ‘And work, sir?'

‘I don't think you'd be much use to anyone with that,' the Captain said, pointing at the bandage, then added, ‘I'll call your sergeant and explain.' He turned to the doctor and said, ‘If you'd give him some sort of letter, Dottoressa, he can go on sick leave for a few days.'

Something, perhaps nothing more than a sense of theatre or the habit of suspicion, made Brunetti wonder if the Captain would have been so gracious had he not been there as witness and if he had not introduced himself as a police officer. The doctor walked to the desk and pulled a pad towards her. She wrote a few lines, tore off the paper, and handed it to the injured man, who thanked her, then saluted the Captain and left the room.

‘I was told that another man came in with them, Dottoressa,' Brunetti said. ‘Could you tell me where he is?'

She was young, he noticed now, far younger than a doctor had any right to be. She was not beautiful, but she had a pleasant face, the sort that would wear well through life, becoming more attractive as she grew older.

‘He's a colleague of mine, the assistant chief of
pediatria
,' she began, emphasizing the title as
though offering it as sufficient proof that the Carabinieri had no business being involved with him. ‘I didn't like the look of his injuries' – this with a glance towards the Captain – ‘so I sent him up to
neurologia
and called the assistant
primario
at home.' Brunetti was aware that she had the Captain's attention as well as his own. ‘His pupils wouldn't dilate, and he had trouble placing his left foot, so I thought someone from
neurologia
should take a look at him.'

At this, the Captain interrupted from his place against the wall. ‘Couldn't it have waited until later, Dottoressa? There's no need to get a doctor out of bed because a man's hit his head, is there?'

She turned her attention to the Captain, and the look she gave him made Brunetti prepare for a barrage. Instead, she said in an entirely neutral voice, ‘I thought it wiser, Captain, as he seems to have hit his head against the butt of a rifle.'

So much for you, Captain, Brunetti thought. He caught the look the officer gave her in response and was surprised to see that the young man actually looked embarrassed.

‘He said that, Dottoressa?' the Captain asked.

‘No. He didn't say anything. Your man did. I asked what had happened to his nose, and he told me.' Her voice remained neutral.

The Captain nodded and pushed himself away from the wall. He approached Brunetti and put out his hand. ‘Marvilli,' he said as they shook hands. Then he turned to the doctor and said, ‘For what it's worth, Dottoressa, he's not
my man. As he told you, he's from the command in Verona. All four of them are.' When neither Brunetti nor the doctor acknowledged this remark, the Captain revealed his youth and his uncertainty by explaining, ‘The officer who was supposed to come with them had to replace someone in Milano, so they assigned me to the operation because I'm stationed here.'

‘I see,' the doctor said. Brunetti, who had no idea of the extent – even the nature – of the operation, thought it wisest to remain silent.

Marvilli seemed to have run out of things to say, so after a pause, Brunetti said, ‘I'd like to see this man, if I may, Dottoressa. The one in
neurologia
.'

‘Do you know where it is?'

‘Next to
dermatologia
?' Brunetti asked.

‘Yes.'

‘Then I see no reason why you can't go up,' she said.

Wanting to thank her by name, Brunetti looked at the tag on her jacket. ‘Dottoressa Claudia Cardinale,' he read to himself. She'd had to live with that, he supposed, but had some parents no sense at all?

‘Thank you, Dottoressa Cardinale,' he said formally and held out his hand. She shook it, then surprised Brunetti by also shaking the Captain's. Then she left them alone in the room.

‘Captain,' Brunetti said in a neutral tone, ‘would it be possible for me to know what's going on here?'

Marvilli raised his hand in a gesture that was
curiously self-effacing. ‘I can tell you at least part of it, Commissario.' When Brunetti said nothing, Marvilli went on, ‘What happened tonight is part of an investigation that's been going on for some time: almost two years. Dottor Pedrolli,' he said, mentioning what Brunetti could only assume was the name of the man in
neurologia
, ‘illegally adopted a baby eighteen months ago. In separate operations, he and a number of other people have been arrested tonight.'

Though curious about the number of people, Brunetti made no rejoinder, and Marvilli obviously thought no further explanation necessary.

‘Is that what he's being accused of,' Brunetti asked, ‘the illegal adoption of a child?' and by so doing became involved in Gustavo Pedrolli's exposure to the might and majesty of the law.

Marvilli said, ‘I imagine he's also likely to be charged with the corruption of a public official, falsification of state documents, kidnapping of a minor, and illegal transfer of funds.' He watched Brunetti's face, and when he saw how sombre his expression grew, the Captain went on. ‘As the case continues, there will no doubt be further charges.' With the toe of one of his elegant boots, he prodded at a bloody piece of gauze that lay at his feet, then looked up at Brunetti. ‘And I wouldn't be at all surprised if resisting arrest and violence to a public official in performance of his duties were added.'