By Its Cover by Donna Leon Read Free Book Online Page B

façades of the palazzi on the other side of the Grand Canal.
    Patta, fatuous but not a fool, backed away from this by saying, ‘I’ll leave it to you, then, Brunetti. See what the Americans can tell you.’
    ‘Yes, sir,’ Brunetti said, pushing himself back from the chair.
    Signorina Elettra had returned to her desk, which now held a large vase. In this she was adjusting dozens of bright red tulips. The windowsill held the same excess of daffodils, the two colours in competition for the viewer’s attention. Brunetti turned his, instead, to the creator of this floral exuberance. Given that she was today wearing an orange woollen dress and shoes so narrow with heels so high that either they or the toe could have delivered a mortal wound, this was not hard to do.
    ‘And what was it the Vice-Questore had to say to you, Commissario?’ she asked amiably.
    Brunetti waited until she was seated before leaning against the windowsill that had no vase. ‘He asked where the flowers came from,’ he answered, straight-faced.
    It was rare that Brunetti had the pleasure of surprising her, but this time he obviously had, and so he decided to continue with it. ‘It’s Monday, so there’s no market at Rialto, and that means you bought them in a florist’s.’ He put on a stern face and said, ‘I hope the office expenses can cover the cost.’

    She smiled, a glow to match that of the flowers. ‘Ah, but I’d never abuse that account, Dottore.’ She let three beats pass and added, ‘They were sent to me.’ The glucose level of her smile soared and she asked, ‘And what was it the Vice-Questore had to say?’
    Brunetti waited for a few seconds to acknowledge his defeat and then smiled to show her he appreciated it. ‘I told him about a robbery – quite a few of them – at the Biblioteca Merula.’
    ‘Books?’ she inquired.
    ‘Yes, and a lot of maps and title pages cut from others.’
    ‘Might as well steal them, then,’ she said.
    ‘Because they’re ruined?’ he asked, surprised to hear her repeat what he now thought of as Dottoressa Fabbiani’s opinion.
    ‘If you break the nose off a portrait bust, you’ve still got most of the face, haven’t you?’ she asked.
    ‘If you cut a map out of a book,’ he said right back, ‘you’ve still got all of the text.’
    ‘But it’s ruined as an object,’ she insisted.
    ‘You sound like the librarian,’ Brunetti said.
    ‘I hope so,’ was her response. ‘They spend their lives working with books.’
    ‘So do readers,’ Brunetti said.
    This time she laughed in return. ‘Do you really mean that?’
    ‘That the missing page doesn’t change the book?’
    ‘Yes.’
    He lifted himself up by his hands until he was sitting on the windowsill, legs dangling down. He studied his feet, waved one and then the other. ‘Depends on how you define “book”, doesn’t it?’
    ‘Partly, yes.’
    ‘If its purpose is to present a text, then it doesn’t matter if you pull out the maps.’

    ‘But?’ she asked.
    He wanted to show her that he could see the other side of the argument, so he said, ‘But if it’s an object that captures information about a particular time – the way the maps are drawn, for example – and representative of …’
    Patta’s door opened and the man appeared. He shot a glance at Brunetti, sitting as casually as a schoolboy on a flowery bank, and then at his secretary, seen consorting with the enemy. The three people in the room froze.
    Finally Patta said, ‘Could I see you for a moment, Signorina?’
    ‘Of course, Vice-Questore,’ she answered, getting smoothly to her feet and sliding her chair back in place.
    Wasting no words on Brunetti, Patta turned back to his office and disappeared. Signorina Elettra did not look at Brunetti as she followed him into the room. The door closed.
    Brunetti hopped down and, looking at his watch, saw that it was justifiably time to go home.

5
    The children were interested in the story of the theft and tried