The Discordant Note Read Free Page A

never, and never will receive a love letter, and others, even if they are no longer so young as this Ralf Brandenburg, who instead receives many of them every month”.
    “What can I say ... I would not put myself in the philosopher’s shoes ... but I think we should not be surprised if someone like the Master Brandenburg, despite having nearly sixty years, receives these letters; you see, Giulio ... we are compelled, for the work we do, having to be in contact every day with sadness and meanness of the human being, but it does not happen only to us; others, in everyday life, indeed, encounter and are forced to see the superficiality, cunning, hypocrisy and even worse, so then when you meet a person like Brandenburg, you can’t help to be fascinated, this holds true especially for women”.
    “Maybe, Commissioner, it happens only because of the fame that surrounds characters like him ...”.
    “I can’t be sure but ... I do not think that this kind of people, commonly known as artists , are able to move thousands of people only with their music, their movies or because of what they write; I think instead that they are able to do it in everyday life as well, which is, perhaps, the reason why it is so hard to forget them ... however ... we should go back to work, now ... you Venditti? Have you found anything relevant?”.
    “No, Commissioner, just some letters of the same kind of those found by Di Girolamo; however, I’ll keep trying”.
    “Good”.
    The research of the four men went on for another thirty minutes until, glancing at his watch, Germano realized that the lunch hour was long past; he instantly suspended the work and walked into the kitchen to see if there was still something left of his meal the night before.
    The search was, unfortunately,  in vain. With the thirty-five degrees in the shade, in that early afternoon of July, having a batch of fried vegetable for lunch was not exactly the best thing; the commissioner, however, resigned to the fact and convinced himself that in the end that was better than nothing. The four, then, began to fill their mouth with stuffed olives and rice balls without protesting too much.
    Inspector Parisi’s eye fell on a 20x15 white envelope, and he decided to show it immediately to Germano.
    “What's wrong with it, Angelo?”.
    “Take a good look inside this envelope, Vincent ... I found only two letters in it, but if you look carefully just the way it is   warped ...”.
    “Yeah ... it seems that it contained more than the two letters you found, are you sure you haven’t drop anything in the carry from the Master’s home to my table?”.
    “One hundred per cent sure, Vincent; I even had to remove a paper clip that held it tightly sealed, to see its content, two minutes ago”.
    “I see ... you've already prepared the paper clip to be sent to the scientific department, right?”.
    “Of course, Vincent”.
    “Well, I was leafing through what appeared to be Brandenburg Ralf’s agenda, you see ... he used to write down the things he had to do during the day and the time of the lessons, but nothing more; however, let’s take this to the station as well, without sending it to the scientific department though”.
    “It will be done, Vincent”.
    The verification work ended shortly before five in the afternoon; Germano and his men gathered everything that was useful to the investigation, small thing to be honest, and headed back to the police station, where another series of already planned activities were waiting for them.
    Upon their arrival, they found Inspector Gianni Piazza already  dealing with the analysis of the Master’s printout and correspondence by e-mail; the shrug with which he received them meant that, at least for the moment, there was nothing so important for the investigation to be shared with others.
    In addition to Piazza, they found Marco Farina, the gardener who did the call to the police station and now, as asked by Germano, was there to make