The Golden Egg - By Donna Leon Page 0,1

child, Clorinda.”’

For a moment, no one spoke as they all ran their way backwards through the dialogue and accompanying narrative to see if they fulfilled the family requirement for a story filled with cheap melodrama, cliché and outrageous characterization. When it was clear that no one had anything to add to the beginning of the story, Paola got to her feet, saying, ‘There’s ricotta-lemon cake for dessert.’

Later, as they sat in the living room, having coffee, Paola asked Brunetti, ‘Do you remember the first time Raffi brought Sara here, and she thought we were all mad?’

‘Clever girl,’ Brunetti said. ‘Good judge of people.’

‘Oh, come on, Guido; you know she was shocked.’

‘She’s had years to get used to us,’ Brunetti said.

‘Yes, she has,’ Paola said, leaning back in the sofa.

Brunetti took her empty cup and set it on the table in front of them. ‘Is this grandmotherhood calling?’ he inquired.

Without thinking, she reached aside and poked him in the arm. ‘Don’t even joke about it.’

‘You don’t want to be a grandmother?’ he asked with feigned innocence.

‘I want to be the grandmother of a baby whose parents have university degrees and jobs,’ she answered, suddenly serious.

‘Are those so important?’ he asked, just as serious

as she.

‘We both have them, don’t we?’ she asked by way of answer.

‘It is the usual custom to answer questions with answers, not with more questions,’ he observed, then got up and went into the kitchen, remembering to take the two cups with him.

He came back a few minutes later, carrying two glasses and a bottle of Calvados. He sat beside her, and poured them each a glass. He handed her one and took a sip of his own.

‘If they have degrees and jobs, it means they’ll be older when they have children. Perhaps wiser,’ Paola said.

‘Were we?’ Brunetti asked.

Ignoring his question, she went on. ‘And, if they get a decent education, they’ll know more, and that might help.’

‘And the jobs?’

‘They’re not so important, I think. Raffi’s bright, so he shouldn’t have trouble finding one.’

‘Bright and well-connected,’ Brunetti clarified, not thinking it polite to refer directly to the wealth and power of Paola’s family.

‘Of course,’ she said, able to admit to these things with him. ‘But bright’s more important.’

Brunetti, who agreed, confined himself to a nod and another sip of the Calvados. ‘The last thing he told me was that he wanted to study microbiology.’

Paola considered this, then said, ‘I don’t even know what it is they do.’ She turned to him and smiled. ‘Do you ever think about that, Guido, about all those disciplines we name every day: microbiology, physics, astrophysics, mechanical engineering. We mention them, we even know people who work at them, but I wouldn’t be able to tell you what it is they actually do. Would you?’

He shook his head. ‘It’s so different from the old

ones – literature, philosophy, history, astronomy, mathematics – where it’s clear what they do or at least what the material is they’re working in. Historians try to figure out what happened in the past, and then they try to figure

out why it happened.’ He put his glass between his palms and rubbed it like a lazy Indian making fire. ‘All I can figure out about microbiology is that they look at little growing things. Cells.’

‘And after that?’

‘God knows,’ Brunetti said.

‘What would you study if you had it to do all over? Law again?’

‘For fun or to get a job?’ he asked.

‘Did you study law because you wanted to get a job?’

This time, Brunetti ignored the fact that she had answered a question with a question and said, ‘No. I studied it because it interested me, and then I realized

I wanted to be a policeman.’

‘And if you could study just for fun?’

‘Classics,’ he answered without a moment’s hesitation.

‘And if Raffi chose that?’ she asked.

Brunetti reflected on this for some time. ‘I’d be happy if that’s what he wanted to study. Most of our friends’ kids are unemployed, no matter what degrees they have, so he might as well do it for love as for any job it might get him.’

‘Where would he study?’ she asked, more a mother’s concern than a father’s.

‘Not here.’

‘Here Venice or here Italy?’

‘Here Italy,’ he said, not liking to have to say it, just as she didn’t like to hear it.

They turned and looked at one another, forced to confront this inevitability: kids grow up and kids leave home. If the phone rang after midnight, it would no longer be possible to take it down the hall