The Discordant Note

by Claudio Ruggeri

“When I see you again?”.

  “I’ll be back tomorrow, it was much easier than expected, I’m not saying I’ve found Master Brandenburg’s murderer but at least I know something more about his life and contacts”.

  “It’s not there that we have to look for it, eh?”.

  “I don’t think so, but I found out that Corinna was not actually one of his possible lovers, she’s his own daughter”.

  “You had already anticipated, Vincent, that the surprises were far from finished ...”.

  “Yeah”.

  “How did you get there?”.

  “It was the girl's mother to tell me the whole story, that Helena Singer who had phoned a couple of times to the Master; she told me that she met the Master almost thirty five years ago and had a long love story with him, love story that led to the birth of this child”.

  “There's something that doesn’t make sense to me, Vincent...”.

  “If you let me finish... it happened that the Master, at the end, did not want that responsibility; according to the lady, indeed, he was very poor, and that’s why he came to Italy”.

  “What do you think about it?”.

  “In my opinion, Brandenburg was led to understand how his presence was not welcome within that family of industrialists; then, in order to avoid years of discussions and hypocrisies, he packed up and left. The scandal was finally covered up with a marriage of interests, promptly put in place by the Singer family”.

  “What about the lady?”.

  “Very talkative, Angelo ... just that I had the impression that the Master was for her only one kind of whim, a distraction, something special, light years away from hypocrisy, fake smiles and monotony of a typical upper middle class family”.

  “Damn ... have you also talked with Brandenburg’s daughter?”.

  “Of course, born Corinna Adler”.

  “What about her, instead?”.

  “Very different story ... she tried not to show her true feelings; indeed, during our brief conversation she was almost daring me, but in the end she couldn’t resist to show up her affection to the Master. I personally believe she really suffered about learning the news of her real father’s death”.

  “I think so, Vincent, if you remember some of the phrases Corinna wrote to the Master, the few that the interpreter was able to translate yesterday, well ... you can say that they are the proof of her affection”.

  “Yeah ...”.

  “What time will your plane arrive here, tomorrow?”.

  “It should land at Fiumicino around five in the afternoon, give or take a minute or two; I think I’ll take a scheduled flight but if I change my mind, I’ll let you know”.

  “Okay, I guess now you want to know if there are news from Italy as well, right?”.

  “I already know that there aren’t, unfortunately ... otherwise my phone would have started to ring here and instead he did not ...”.

  “In our defence there is the fact that you left only one day ago ...”.

  “That's true ...”.

  “There's something I need to do before you come?”.

  “Actually, yes, Angelo, you should call the Fossi & Sons, the company that deals with the surveillance service of the area; ask them if they can provide us last week records. Corinna told me that she had been to see her father and that she had stayed in his house until Tuesday, a few days ago, so I'm really curious to see what happened around the place during this very period”.

  “Alright Vincent, the number is on your desk, right?”.

  “Yes, there should be a hand-written piece of paper by that guy who showed up yesterday on behalf of the company, you’ll see that you’ll find there the numbers of those who can give us a hand ... one more thing, you should take all those letters the Master received, again, and ...”.

  “We are already doing, actually”.

  “Yes, but this time you’ll have to focus only on the names of those who sent them to him, not on the content of the letters, and then you’ll have to compare them with those written in his personal agenda, as for instance, in those rare occasions when Brandenburg wrote not only the initial but something more about the names of his students”.

  “Um ... do you want to know if any of them went to the Master not only to take piano lessons, don’t you?”.

  “Let’s say yes ... anyway, to let you know, I’ve also found out that Brandenburg offered violin lessons as well”.

  “Okay, so if there won’t be last-minute changes we'll see you tomorrow at five o'clock, right Vincent?”.

  “Yes, give or take a minute or two... please, just be there,

  Angelo ...”.

  “Sure I’ll be there, do you think that I would let you walk?”.

  “You can never tell”.

  “Um ... tomorrow, Vincent”.

  “See you tomorrow”.

  Sunday, July 7th

  Aided by the fact that it was a festive day, the commissioner allowed himself a few more hours of sleep; it was a little after ten o'clock of that summer morning when he opened his eyes in his hotel room.

  Germano forced himself to get out of bed and start getting ready for breakfast that was waiting for him in the lobby of the small hotel.

  It took about twenty minutes to have a wash, shave and wear something decent to go out of his room.

  He had breakfast alone and appreciated the fact that the Germans had not forgotten that in the world there are people who still like to start the day with a croissant and a coffee.

  The appointment with Theodor Kaiser, who would kindly escorted him to the airport, was set for twelve thirty, right outside the same hotel in which Germano was staying; the Commissioner spent then the rest of that morning sightseeing at least a little bit of Monaco of Bavaria, strolling the streets and buying some souvenirs.

  As it was easy to expect, the sedan carrying Theodor Kaiser settled in front of the hotel that housed the Italian commissioner at twelve twenty five; Germano, seeing the silhouette of the car through the windows of the hall, picked up his little hand luggage and headed to the exit.

  The two cops exchanged a few phrases along the way to the international airport of Monaco, but this time they did not talk of unsolved cases, homicide or persons to be examined; their conversation, indeed, mostly focused on different aspects of German life and the Italian one as well, two peoples, as it is often said by many, that pretend to hate each other in public, while in private they do not hate at all.

  Germano got out of the car, near the large window from which you access the international departures, but before going away, he wanted to say one more thing to his German colleague.

  “Your English is so good, Mr. Kaiser”.

  “Why do you think they chose me to take you around the city, Germano?”.

  “Yeah, of course, but ...”.

  “My superiors knew about the fact that you were born in America and ... let's say that they did not want to make a bad impression”.

  “But ... this is not typical of your people, Theodor, am I wrong?”.

  “No, no mistake, Vincent, however, it is perhaps a little bit as you say in Italian ... the world is the same wherever you go”.

  At these last words, the two commissioners smiled each other, before each one took his own way.

  The trip back to Italy, was a good chance for Germano to sit a little bit alone and reflect, but this time he did about the investigation he was dealing with; at that point, indeed, he still had no track to follow, no clue that could somehow give a turn to the case, the only thing which the commissioner was certain of, however, was the fact that he had never met the murderer so far, not in Italy nor in Germany.

  The smiling face of Angelo Parisi was there waiting, as he had promised; the inspector took the luggage out of Germano’s hands and led him towards the service car parked just outside the arrivals area of the Fiumicino Airport.

  The commissioner, since it was Sunday and then little could have been done as part of the investigation, he aske
d his friend and colleague to take him straight home, but not before having a good coffee together, at one of the many bars open on the seafront near the airport.

  Angelo Parisi immediately understood, both from his words and gestures, that there was something behind that strange laxity.

  “At the end, did you find what you were looking for?”.

  “Yes ... and no, Angelo”.

  “Then why didn’t you stay a few more days?”.

  “Because it’s not there that we need to look for the murderer; I got the impression that everything is extremely handy but I must have missed something, Angelo ... I need to find out what”.

  “Anyway, tomorrow morning we will have everything you asked me yesterday, both the videos and Piazza and Di Girolamo ready to re-examine every single letter”.

  “Well, I will be there, but this time I’ll be fresh and rested”.

  “That’s better, Vincent ... I'll take you home now?”.

  “Let’s go”.

  Monday, July 8th

  The commissioner spent a nice night that allowed him to rest for several hours, continuously, thing that he hadn’t been able to do for more than a week.

  At seven thirty, he was already in his car ready to head to the station and resume the investigation.

  Waiting for him, he found none of his colleagues, none but the agents of the night shift; the first to join him was Angelo Parisi, who reached the station around eight thirty and then, one by one, they all finally arrived.

  At this time, Germano called everyone into his office to make the point of the situation.

  “So guys ... here it is the point ...”, he couldn’t finish his sentence because of a man insistently knocking on the office door.

  “Come in”.

  “Hi, we met a few days ago, I ...”.

  “Do you have the recordings with you?”.

  “Sure, Commissioner, here they are, take the DVD, you will find everything about the last week”.

  “Very good, thank you, then”.

  “You’re welcome”.

  Angelo Parisi immediately prepared the monitor and the player, in order to give a look at what had been moving around the house of Master Brandenburg during the last days.

  The only camera they could refer to, was the one placed at the entrance of the street, from which they could see both the gate and part of the garden of the house in which the crime was committed.

  The images of the previous Saturday went on pretty quickly until, when they had reached the late afternoon, the policemen gathered in Germano’s office saw the silhouette of a woman entering the frame, going up to Brandenburg’s house and buzz the intercom.

  After a few seconds, the girl in the video began to greet the landlord, who in the meantime had probably opened the door or was at one of the windows; the way she greeted the man was so warm and with sweeping gestures of the arms, that they immediately understood that she had to be quite intimate with Brandenburg.

  To avoid any possible distraction, Germano promptly intervened.

  “That’s the daughter, when I talked to her, she told me she came to visit her father last Saturday, now we know she didn’t lie”.

  Piazza asked more.

  “The daughter, Commissioner? The Corinna we were looking for?”.

  “Yeah... Brandeburg had a secret child, Corinna Adler, I was going to tell you when I called you here in my office, but then the guy with the video interrupted me and ...”.

  “Damn, Commissioner ...”.

  “Yeah, the story is quite strange; anyway, let’s go on with the video”.

  They spent the next two hours reviewing the days of Sunday and Monday, as well, in which, with the exception of some sporadic going out and subsequent return of the two, nothing seemed to disturb the secluded and seemingly monotonous existence of the German Master.

  Regarding the next day, Tuesday, the images passed quickly on the screen until the hour of dinner, when Corinna Adler reappeared in the video, at the time when she, presumably, greeted his father to go back to Germany; to confirm that, the policemen also managed to catch the shape of the cab going away with the girl on board.

  When they set the video images at a higher speed again, Germano noticed something almost imperceptible, first appearing and then vanishing again.

  “Excuse me Angelo, send back the tape up to the moment in which Corinna leaves the house, then send it forward very slowly”.

  “Okay, Vincent”.

  At that point, all those present reviewed the scene of the girl who first came out of the house, and then went away in the cab; it was at that moment that the commissioner suddenly asked him to stop the footage.

  “What's that, Angelo?”.

  “It looks like the silhouette of a scooter, wait a minute ...”.

  In the upper right corner of the screen, they saw what seemed to be the shape of a scooter doing a U-turn to take the main road again; although it was almost completely hidden by some plants, they could still make out the back during the maneuver.

  “Maybe, Vincent, it simply took the wrong way ...”.

  “It may be, Angelo, but it seems to me that it departs immediately after the taxi ... look closer ... the car disappears from the video, then the person on the scooter goes out for only one moment and then turn back”.

  “Um ... when you talked to Corinna, were you told she had the feeling of being followed, or if someone robbed her taxi during the ride?”.

  “I was not told any of this, Angelo ... anyway, go back to the exact moment when the girl comes out of the gate”.

  “Okay, Vincent”.

  This time, the eyes of the cops were all focused on the top right corner of the monitor, on those weeds more than two meters high.

  The scooter seemed to arrive just a few moments before Corinna Adler came out from his father's house, the front wheel was visible leaning out of that urban vegetation on its arrival; they also managed to catch the shape of someone putting his own hands on the helmet as if to take it off, but then he did not do that.

  When the German girl went out of the building, indeed, they could see the scooter slightly reverse as to deliberately hide behind the brush, probably to make sure that its driver was able to observe without being seen.

  The images then continued until the scene they had already seen, the taxi that goes away and the scooter that starts right behind it; at that point, Germano asked to stop the video.

  “I want this to be sent to the experts, we need to know the model of the scooter, at first glance it may seem an Aprilia of few years ago, but I want to know exactly; and, tell them to try to enlarge the image to the maximum, at the moment when it makes the U-turn, I have the impression that with a little bit of luck we will be able to know even the plate number, can you take care of it, Piazza?”.

  “Sure, Commissioner; we’ll make a copy of this DVD, right now, so while you continue to watch it, I will be able to bring to the experts the sequence that we are interested in”.

  “Okay, Piazza, let’s get it immediately started”.

  The inspector did not need to be told twice and immediately pulled the copy in their possession out of the player to create an identical one; he didn’t need more than a quarter of an hour, time during which Germano and others had enough time for a coffee before returning to work.

  With the exception of that suspect U-turn, the surveillance camera, however, did not shoot anything relevant throughout the day of Tuesday; they passed to following days, but even in this case the cops did not notice anything significant to the investigation.

  They didn’t need to watch the video further, because they had been already given the footage about Friday a few days earlier, and they had already widely analyzed the events of that day.

  While waiting for Inspector Piazza to be back to the room, Germano told the others to seriously begin to work on the the victim’s students.

  Angelo Parisi took out his notebook and, trying to sound slightly annoyed, showed to the
commissioner a list of persons he had compiled himself.

  The name that appeared on the list were eight, all from the Brandenburg’s agenda and making reference to hypothetical lessons that the German musician had the habit of writing down.

  At that time, Inspector Di Girolamo pointed out that it was still hard to be so sure of the type of meetings that the murdered man had; Germano, then, asked Parisi to tell everybody any information that emerged from lenders or INPS.

  “Everything in order, Vincent, the Master lived thanks to the copyright of his works, every month he received two credits, one from Italy and one from Germany, from companies that manage the economic exploitation of musical works, including the Master’s, as indeed I was able to verify myself; I learnt all about it and I also found out that almost every time a film goes on TV with the soundtrack, or you hear a song on the radio, its artist and who manages its rights, draw benefit from it, economically speaking ...”.

  “Good, Angelo, is there anything else that you can add regarding the Master’s banking?”.

  “Not that much, the only strange thing is that Brandenburg never picked up huge sums, he always paid by credit card and picked up only a maximum of two hundred euro a month in cash. I doubt, for this reason, he may have paid for such a long time for some sort of sexual encounters, because that is what Di Girolamo suggested, without his finances being dissipated, unless ...”.

  “Go on, Angelo”.

  “Unless he had other sources, maybe not traceable income... and he used that money for his vices, but frankly I have strong doubts about it”.

  “Me, too ... let’s take for granted the authenticity of those meetings, as they really were referring to music lessons, and go on ... it seems to me that we were talking about a list of students or something ...”.

  “It’s over there, Vincent, on your desk”.

  “Yeah”.

  The list had two male names, Giacomo and Luca, and six women's names, Barbara, Giulia, Paola, Stefania and two women called Valentina; the Master used to write down, along with the names of those last two women, the initial of their last name, an F for the first and a C for the second one.

  At that point, Inspector Parisi went out for a moment and then returned with a big transparent plastic bag in his hands, through which they were able to see the hundreds of letters that the policemen would now have to re-examine one by one, in an attempt to combine some of them to the names on that list.