CB18 About Face (2009) Read Free

spoke into the general silence to explain, ‘I prefer not to eat beef; my daughter Chiara won’t eat meat or fish – at least not this week; Raffi won’t eat anything green and doesn’t like cheese; and Guido,’ she said, leaning towards him and placing a hand on his arm, ‘won’t eat anything unless he gets a large portion.’
    Everyone at the table obliged with gentle laughter, and Brunetti kissed Paola’s cheek as a sign of good humour and sportsmanship, vowing at the same time to refuse any offer that might be made of a second helping. He turned to her and, still smiling, asked, ‘What was that all about?’
    ‘I’ll tell you later,’ she said and turned away to ask a polite question of her father.
    Apparently having decided not to comment on the Contessa’s remarks, Franca Marinello said, when Brunetti’s attention returned to her, ‘The snow on the street’s a terrible problem.’ Brunetti smiled, quite as if he had neither noticed her shoes nor been listening to that same remark for the last two days.
    According to the rules of polite conversation, it was now his turn to make some meaningless remark, so he did his part and offered, ‘But it’s good for the skiers.’
    ‘And the farmers,’ she added.
    ‘I beg your pardon?’
    ‘Where I come from,’ she said, in an Italian that displayed no trace of local accent, ‘we have a saying, “Under the snow is bread. Under the rain is hunger.”’ Her voice was pleasantly low: had she sung, she would have been a contralto.
    Brunetti, urban to the core, smiled apologetically and said, ‘I’m not sure I understand.’
    Her lips moved upward in what he was coming to recognize as her smile, and the expression in her eyes softened. ‘It’s supposed to mean that the rain simply runs away, doing only temporary good, but the snow lies on the mountains and melts away slowly all summer long.’
    ‘And thus the bread?’ Brunetti asked.
    ‘Yes. Or so the old people believed.’ Before Brunetti could comment, she went on, ‘But this snowfall was a freak storm here in the city, only enough to close the airport for a few hours; no more than a few centimetres. In Alto Adige, where I come from, it hasn’t snowed at all this year.’
    ‘So it is bad for the skiers?’ Brunetti asked with a smile, picturing her in a long cashmere sweater and ski pants, posed in front of a fireplace in some five-star ski resort.
    ‘I don’t care about them, only the farmers,’ she said with a vehemence that surprised him. She studied his face for a moment, and then added, ‘“Oh, farmers: if only they recognized their blessings.”’
    Brunetti all but gasped, ‘That’s Virgil, isn’t it?’
    ‘ The Georgics ,’ she answered, politely ignoring his surprise and everything it implied. ‘You’ve read it?’
    ‘At school,’ Brunetti answered. ‘And then again a few years ago.’
    ‘Why?’ she inquired politely, then turned her head aside to thank the waiter placing a dish of risotto ai funghi in front of her.
    ‘Why what?’
    ‘Why did you reread it?’
    ‘Because my son was reading it in school and said he liked it, so I thought I should have another look.’ He smiled and added, ‘It was so long since I read it at school that I no longer had any memory of it.’
    ‘And?’
    Brunetti had to think before he answered her, so rarely was he presented with the opportunity to talk about the books he read. ‘I have to confess,’ he said as the waiter set his risotto in front of him, ‘all that talk about the duties of a good landowner didn’t much interest me.’
    ‘Then what subjects do interest you?’ she asked.
    ‘I’m interested in what the Classics say about politics,’ Brunetti answered and prepared himself for the inevitable dimming of interest on the part of his listener.
    She picked up her wine, took a small sip, and tipped the glass in Brunetti’s direction, swirling the contents gently and saying, ‘Without the good landowner, we wouldn’t have