Free Doctored Evidence by Donna Leon

opposition. He came up with no convincing explanation.
    It was far easier to speculate about Scarpa’s motives. To accept her story was to accept that the police had acted with unwonted haste in accepting a convenient solution to the crime. It was also to require an explanation of the whereabouts of the money that had disappeared while in police custody. Both matters had been in the hands of Lieutenant Scarpa. More importantly, to accept her story would demand a re-examination of the case, or rather, it would demand that, more than three weeks after the murder, the case finally be examined for the first time.
    Brunetti had been on vacation when Signora Battestini’s body was discovered and had returned to Venice only after the case had been set aside, when he had continued with the investigation of the baggage handlers at the airport. Since the accused had been repeatedly filmed rifling through and stealing from passengers’ luggage and since some of them were willing to testify against the others in the hope of receiving lighter sentences, there was very little for Brunetti to do save to keep the papers and files straight and interview those who had not yet confessed but who might perhaps be persuaded to do so. He had read about the murder while he had been away and, foolishly lulled into believing what he read in the papers, had been convinced that the Romanian woman was guilty. Why else should she try to leave the country? Why else that panicked attempt to flee from the police?
    Signora Gismondi had just provided him with alternative answers to these questions: Florinda Ghiorghiu left the country because her job was gone, and she tried to escape the police because she was a citizen of a country where the police were believed to be as corrupt as they were violent and where the thought of falling into their hands was enough to drive a person to flee in maddened panic.
    When Brunetti had seen Scarpa in Signorina Elettra’s office an hour before, the lieutenant was stiff with anger at what he insisted were a witness’s lies. Sensing his rage, Signorina Elettra suggested to the lieutenant, ‘Perhaps someone else could get the truth out of her.’
    Brunetti was astonished by Signorina Elettra’s civility to the lieutenant and by her apparent willingness to believe him. Her craft became evident only when she turned to him and said, ‘Commissario, it seems the lieutenant has laid the groundwork by seeing through this woman’s story. Maybe someone else could try to find out what’s motivating her.’ Turning back to the lieutenant and raising her hands in a gesture rich with deferential uncertainty, she added, ‘If you think that might help, Lieutenant, of course.’ He noticed that she was wearing a simple white cotton blouse: perhaps it was the tightly buttoned collar that made her seem so innocent.
    Atavistic suspicion of Signorina Elettra flashed across Scarpa’s face, but before he could speak, Brunetti interrupted, saying toSignorina Elettra, ‘Don’t look at me. I’ve got the airport to worry about, so I don’t have time to be bothered with something like this.’ He turned to leave.
    Brunetti’s reluctance prompted Scarpa into saying, ‘She’s just going to keep telling me the same story. I’m sure of that.’
    It was a statement, not a request, and Brunetti held firm. ‘I’ve got the airport case.’ He continued towards the door.
    That was enough to provoke Scarpa. ‘If this woman’s lying about a murder, it’s more important than petty theft at the airport,’ he said.
    Brunetti stopped just short of the door. He turned towards Signorina Elettra, who said, with resignation, ‘I think the lieutenant’s right, sir.’
    Brunetti, a man of sorrows and afflicted with grief, said, with perhaps too much resignation, ‘All right, but I don’t want to get involved. Where is she?’
    Thus it