The Girl of his Dreams - Brunetti 17 Read Online Free Page A

two chairs. He waited for the priest to sit and then did the same.
    'Thank you for coming to give the blessing,' Brunetti said.
    'Not the best way to see old friends again for the first time ’ the priest answered with a smile.
    Was that meant as a reproach that neither he nor Sergio had made any attempt to contact him in the years since his return to Venice?
    'I visited your mother in the nursing home ’ Antonin continued. 'A number of the people I knew when they were first in the hospital went out there ’ he added, meaning the private nursing home outside the city where Brunetti's mo ther had spent her last years. ‘I know it was very good; the sisters there are very kind.' Brunetti smiled and nodded. 'I'm sorry I was never there when you and Sergio were ’ Abruptly the priest got to his feet, but it was only to pull his long skirt out from under him and flick it to one side; then he sat down again and went on. 'The sisters told me you went often, both of you.'
    'Not as often as we should have, I suppose ’ Brunetti said.
    ‘I don't think there's any "should" in these circumstances, Guido. You go when you can and you go with love ’
    'Did she know that we went?' Brunetti found himself asking.
    Antonin studied his hands, folded together in his lap. ‘I think she might have. Sometimes. I never know what they think or what's going on inside them, these old people.' He raised his hands in an arc of confusion. ‘I think that what they do know is feelings. Or that they register them. I think they sense if the person with them is kind and is there because they love them or like them.' He looked at Brunetti and then again at his hands. 'Or pity them.'
    Brunetti noticed that Antonin's fingernails covered only half of the bed of the nail, and at first he thought they must have been bitten down, a strange habit in a man of his age. But then he noticed that the nails were brittle and broken off in irregular layers, faintly concave and spotted, and he realized it must be some sort of disease, perhaps brought back from Africa. If so, why did he still have it?
    'Do they register all those things the same way?' Brunetti asked.
    'You mean the pity?' Antonin asked.
    'Yes. It's different from love or liking, isn't it?'
    'I suppose so,' the priest said and smiled. 'But the ones I saw were happy to get it: after all, it's much more than most old people get.' Absently, Antonin pinched up the cloth of his robe and ran the fold between the fingers of his other hand to make a long crease. He let it drop , looked at Brunetti and said, ‘Y our mother was lucky that she still had so many people who came to her with love and liking.'
    Brunetti shrugged that away. His mother's luck had run out years ago.
    'Why is it you've come?' Brunetti asked, then added 'Antonin' when he heard how harsh his question sounded.
    'It's for one of my parishioners ’ the priest said, then immediately corrected himself, 'well, if I had a parish, that is. She would be, then. But as it is she's the daughter of one of the men I visit in the hospital: he's been there for months. That's how I've come to know her, you see.'
    Brunetti nodded but remained silent, his usual tactic when he wanted to encourage someone to continue speaking.
    'It's about her son, actually, you see ’ the priest said, looking back down at his skirt.
    Because Brunetti had no idea of the ages of the man in the hospital or his daughter, he could have no idea of the age of the woman's son, which meant he could not anticipate the nature of the problem, though the fact that Antonin wanted to speak to him about it suggested it was something at variance with the law.
    'His mother is very worried about him ’ Antonin continued.
    There were many reasons a mother could worry about her son, Brunetti knew: his own mother had worried about him and Sergio, and Paola worried about Raffi, though he knew that Paola had little reason to worry about what most mothers today feared for their children: drugs. How