The Death of Faith

by Donna Leon

  ‘That was Signora Stocco. Her daughter Nicoletta is in Chiara’s class. R.E. class.’

  ‘Padre Luciano?’ Brunetti asked, wondering what new lightning bolt was to be hurled at him by the forces of religion.

  Paola nodded.

  ‘What happened?’

  ‘She didn’t say. Or she didn’t know. She was helping Nicoletta with her homework tonight — her husband’s in Rome for business all this week — and she said Nicoletta started to cry when she saw the religion book. When she asked her what was the matter, she wouldn’t say. But after a while, the girl said that Padre Luciano had said things to her in the confessional and then that he had touched her.’

  ‘Touched her where?’ Brunetti asked, a question he asked as much as a father as a policeman.

  ‘She wouldn’t say. Signora Stocco decided not to make too much of it, but I think she’s shaken. She was crying when she talked to me. She asked me to speak to you.’

  Brunetti was already far ahead, thinking of what would have to happen before he could separate parent from policeman and act. ‘The girl would have to tell us,’ he said.

  ‘I know. From what the mother said, I think that’s unlikely.’

  Brunetti nodded. ‘Unless she does, there’s nothing I can do.’

  ‘I know,’ Paola said. She was silent for a while and then added, ‘But I can.’

  ‘What do you mean?’ Brunetti asked, surprised by the strength and suddenness of his fear.

  ‘Don’t worry, Guido. I won’t touch him. I promise you that. But I will see that he’s punished.’

  ‘You don’t even know what he did,’ Brunetti said. ‘How can you talk of punishment?’

  She backed away a few paces and looked at him. She started to speak and then stopped. After a pause during which he saw her start to speak twice and stop, she stepped toward him and put her hand on his arm. ‘Don’t worry, Guido. I won’t do anything that is illegal. But I will punish him and, if necessary, I will destroy him.’ She watched his shock turn into acceptance that she meant what she’d said. ‘I’m sorry,’ she apologized, ‘I always forget how you hate melodrama.’ She looked at her watch and then up at him. ‘As I said before, it’s late and I have an early class.’

  Leaving him there, Paola went down the corridor toward their bedroom and their bed.

  * * * *

  Chapter Eighteen

  Usually a sound sleeper, that night Brunetti was kept awake by dreams, animal dreams. He saw lions, turtles, and a peculiarly grotesque beast with a long beard and a bald head. The bells of San Polo counted out the intermittent hours for him, keeping him company as he endured the long night. At five, the realization came to him that Maria Testa must recover and begin to speak, and as soon as he saw that, he slipped into a sleep so peaceful and dreamless that even Paola’s noisy departure failed to wake him.

  He woke a little before nine and spent twenty minutes lying in bed, planning it, attempting vainly to hide from himself the fact that it was she who would run all of the risks attendant upon her resurrection. The desire to put it into action grew so strong that he was finally driven up and into the shower, then out of the apartment and toward the Questura. From there, he called the chief of neurology at the Ospedale Civile and from him received his first setback, for the doctor insisted that Maria Testa could not, under any circumstances, be moved. Her condition was still too uncertain and precarious to allow her to be disturbed. A long history of battles with the health system suggested to Brunetti that a more realistic explanation lay in the fact that the staff simply didn’t want to be bothered by something they considered as inconsequential as this, but he knew it was useless to argue.

  He asked Vianello to come up to his office and began by explaining his plan. ‘All we do,’ he concluded, ‘is have a story put in the Gazzettino tomorrow morning, saying that she’s come out of the coma. You know how they love that sort of thing — Back from the Edge of the Grave. Then, whoever was in that car, once they believe she’s recovered and able to talk, they’ll have to try again.’

  Vianello studied Brunetti’s face, as if seeing new things in it, but said nothing.

  ‘Well?’ Brunetti prompted.

  ‘Is there time for the story to get in by tomorrow?’ the sergeant asked.

  Brunetti looked at his watch. ‘Of course there is.’ When Vianello looked no more content, Brunetti asked, ‘What’s wrong?’

  ‘I don’t like the idea of putting her at even greater risk,’ the sergeant finally answered. ‘Using her as bait.’

  ‘Someone will be in the room, I told you.’

  ‘Commissario,’ Vianello began, and Brunetti was immediately on his guard, as he was whenever Vianello addressed him by his title and in that patient tone. ‘Someone in the hospital will have to know what’s going on.’

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘Well?’

  ‘Well what?’ Brunetti snapped. He had thought of all of this and knew the dangers, so the force of his reaction to Vianello’s question was no more than a reflection of his own unease.

  ‘That’s a risk. People talk. All anyone has to do is go into the bar on the ground floor and start asking about her. Someone — an orderly, a nurse, a doctor even — is bound to say something about there being a guard in the room with her.’

  ‘Then we don’t tell them it’s a guard. We say the guard’s been removed. We can say they’re relatives.’

  ‘Or members of the order?’ Vianello suggested, voice so level that Brunetti couldn’t tell if he was being helpful or sarcastic.

  ‘No one in the hospital knows she’s a nun,’ Brunetti said, though he seriously doubted this.

  ‘I’d like to believe that.’

  ‘What does that mean, Sergeant?’

  ‘Hospitals are small places. It’s not easy to keep a secret for long. So I think we should take it as given that they know who she is.’

  After having heard Vianello use the word ‘bait’, Brunetti was unwilling to admit that was exactly what he wanted her to be. Tired of hearing Vianello give voice to all of the uncertainties and objections he had spent the morning attempting to deny or minimize, Brunetti asked, ‘Are you in charge of the duty roster this week?’

  ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘Good. Then continue with the shifts at the hospital, but I want them moved inside her room.’ Remembering Alvise and the comic book, he said, ‘Tell them they aren’t to leave the room, for any reason, unless they get a nurse to stay in there with her while they’re gone. And put me down for one of the shifts, starting tonight, from midnight until eight.’

  ‘Yes, sir,’ Vianello said and got to his feet. Brunetti looked down at the papers on his desk, but the sergeant made no attempt to leave. ‘One of the strange things about this exercise programme,’ he began, waiting for Brunetti to look up at him. When he did, Vianello continued, ‘is that I need a lot less sleep. So I can split that shift with you, if you’d like. Then, we just have to use two officers for the other two, and it will be a lot easier to juggle the hours:

  Brunetti smiled his thanks. ‘You want to begin the shift?’ he asked.

  ‘All right,’ Vianello agreed. ‘I just hope this doesn’t keep on long.’

  ‘I thought you said you needed less sleep.’

  ‘I do. But Nadia isn’t going to like it.’

  Nor, Brunetti realized, was Paola.

  Vianello got to his feet and made a waving motion with his right hand, whether a lazy salute or the sign one accomplice gives another was impossible to determine.

  After the sergeant went downstairs to make up the duty roster and tell Signorina Elettra to call the Gazzettino, Brunetti decided to stir the waters even more. He called the San Leonardo nursing home and left a message for the Mother Superior, saying that Maria Testa — he was insistent in using her name — was recovering well in the Civil Hospital and hoped to be able to receive a visit from the Mother Superior sometime in the future, perhaps as early as next week. Before he hung up, he asked the nun he sp
oke to if she’d also pass the message on to Dottor Messini. He found the number of the chapter house and, when he called, was surprised to have the call taken by an answering machine. He left much the same message for Padre Pio.

  He thought of calling both Contessa Crivoni and Signorina Lerini, but he decided to let them learn the news of Suor’Immacolata’s recovery from the newspaper.

  When Brunetti went into Signorina Elettra’s office, she looked up at him but didn’t give her usual smile. ‘What’s wrong, Signorina?’

  Instead of answering, she pointed to a manila folder on her desk. ‘Padre Pio Cavaletti is what’s wrong, Dottore.’

  ‘As bad as that?’ Brunetti asked, though he had no idea what he meant by ‘that’.

  ‘Read it, and you’ll see.’

  Brunetti picked up the slim folder and opened it with interest. It held photocopies of three documents. The first was a one-sentence letter from the Lugano Office of the Union Bank of Switzerland to ‘Signor Pio Cavaletti’; the second was a letter addressed to ‘Padre Pio’, written in a hand that trembled across the page with sickness or age, perhaps both; the third carried the by-now-familiar crest of the Patriarchate of Venice.

  He glanced again at Signorina Elettra, who sat quietly, hands neatly folded on the desk in front of her, waiting for him to finish reading. He turned back to the papers and read through them slowly.

  ‘Signor Cavaletti. We acknowledge your 29 January deposit of 27,000 Swiss francs to your account with this bank.’ The computer-generated bank form had no signature.

  ‘Sainted Father, you have turned my sinful eyes to God. His grace is not of this world. You were right — my family is not of God. They do not know Him or recognize His power. Only you, Father, you and the other holy saints. It is you and the saints we must thank with more than words. I go to God knowing I have done this.’ The signature was illegible.

  ‘Permission is herewith granted to the pious union Opus Dei to establish and maintain in this city a mission of study and holy works under the direction of Padre Pio Cavaletti.’ This one bore the signature and seal of the director of the office of religious foundations.

  Having finished the three pages, Brunetti looked up. ‘What do you make of these, Signorina?’

  ‘I make of them exactly what they are, Dottore.’

  ‘And that is?’

  ‘Spiritual blackmail. Not much different from what they’ve been doing for centuries, just a little shabbier and on a smaller scale.’

  ‘Where did they come from?’

  ‘The second and third are from files kept in the office of the Patriarch. Not from the same file.’

  ‘And the first?’

  ‘From a reliable source,’ was the only explanation she gave and, Brunetti saw, the only one she was going to give.

  ‘I’ll take your word for that, Signorina.’

  ‘Thank you,’ she said with simple grace.

  ‘I’ve been reading about them, Opus Dei,’ he volunteered. ‘Does your friend’s friend, the one at the Patriarchate, know if they’re very’ — Brunetti wanted to use the word ‘powerful’, but something akin to superstition prevented him — ‘if they’re very much of a presence in the city?’

  ‘He says it’s very difficult to be certain about them or about what they do. But he’s convinced that their power is very real.’

  ‘That’s just what people used to say about witches, Signorina.’

  ‘Witches didn’t own entire neighbourhoods in London, Dottore. Nor did they have a Pope who praised them for their “sacred mission”. Nor did witches,’ she began, pointing to the folder he still held, ‘have ecclesiastical sanction to set up centres for study and holy works.’

  ‘I never knew you had such strong feelings about religion,’ he said.

  ‘This has nothing to do with religion,’ she snapped out.

  ‘No?’ His surprise was real.

  ‘It has to do with power.’

  Brunetti considered this for a moment. ‘Yes, I suppose it does.’

  In a more relaxed voice, Signorina Elettra said, ‘Vice-Questore Patta asked me to tell you that the visit from the Swiss police chief has been postponed.’

  Brunetti hardly heard her. ‘It’s what my wife says.’ When he saw that she wasn’t following him, Brunetti added by way of explanation, ‘About power.’ And as soon as she understood, he asked, ‘Excuse me, what did you say about the Vice-Questore?’

  ‘The visit from the Swiss police chief has been postponed.’

  ‘Ah, I’d forgotten all about it. Thank you, Signorina.’ Saying nothing else, he placed the folder on her desk and went back to his office to get his coat.

  * * * *

  This time his ring was answered by a middle-aged man wearing something that was meant, Brunetti supposed, to look like a friar’s habit but which succeeded only in making him look like a man in a badly hemmed skirt. When Brunetti explained that he had come to speak to Padre Pio, the doorkeeper folded his hands together and bowed his head but said nothing. He led Brunetti across the courtyard, where there was no sign of the gardener, though the scent of lilac was even stronger. Inside, the sharp odours of disinfectant and wax lurked under the sweet pall of lilac. On the way they passed a younger man walking in their direction. The two demi-clerics nodded silently to one another, and Brunetti saw it as so much pious posturing.

  The man Brunetti had come to think of as the artful mute stopped outside the door to Padre Pio’s office and nodded to Brunetti that he might enter. When he did, without bothering to knock, he found the windows closed, but this time he noticed the crucifix that hung on the far wall. Since it was a religious image that Brunetti disliked, he gave it no more than a cursory glance, taking no interest in whatever aesthetic value it might have.

  A few minutes later, the door opened and Padre Pio came into the room. As Brunetti recalled, he wore the religious habit with ease, managing to look comfortable in it. Brunetti’s attention was again pulled to the full lips, but this time he realized how the centre of the man lay in his eyes, greyish green and bright with intelligence.

  ‘Welcome back, Commissario,’ the priest said. ‘Thank you for your message. Suor’Immacolata’s recovery is in response to our prayers, I’m sure.’

  Though tempted, Brunetti did not begin by asking that he be spared the rhetoric of religious hypocrisy and, instead, said, ‘I’d like you to answer a few more questions.’

  ‘Gladly. So long as — as I explained the last time — they do not require me to divulge information which is sealed.’ Though the priest continued to smile, Brunetti sensed that he had registered the difference in Brunetti’s mood.

  ‘No, I doubt that any of this information is in any way privileged.’

  ‘Good. But before you begin, there’s no reason to stand. Let’s at least be comfortable.’ He led Brunetti to the same two chairs and, flicking back his habit with practised grace, lowered himself into the chair. He reached under his scapular with his right hand and began to finger his rosary. ‘What is it you’d like to know, Commissario?’

  ‘I’d like you to tell me about your work at the nursing home.’

  Cavaletti gave a small laugh and said, ‘I’m not sure that’s what I’d call it, Dottore. I serve as chaplain to the patients and some of the staff. To bring people closer to their Maker is a joy; it is not work.’ He looked away toward the other side of the room, but not before he had seen Brunetti’s lack of response to these sentiments.

  ‘You hear their confessions?’

  ‘I’m not sure whether that’s a question or a statement, Commissario,’ Cavaletti replied with a smile, as if he wished to remove even the hint of sarcasm from his remark.

  ‘It’s a question.’

  ‘Then I’ll answer it.’ His smile was indulgent. ‘Yes, I hear the confessions of the patients, as well as of some of the staff. It’s a great responsibility, especially the confessions of the old people.’

  ‘And why is that, Father?’

  ‘Becau
se they are nearer to their time, to their earthly ending.’

  ‘I see,’ Brunetti said and then, as if it were the logical consequence of the previous answer, he asked, ‘Do you maintain an account at the Lugano branch of the Union Bank of Switzerland?’

  The lips remained curved in their peaceful smile, but Brunetti was watching his eyes, which tightened almost imperceptibly and just for an instant. ‘What a strange question,’ Cavaletti said, pulling his brows together in evident confusion. ‘How does it relate to the confessions of these old people?’

  ‘That’s exactly what I’m trying to find out, Father,’ Brunetti said.