Con el agua al cuello

From the residence where she spends her last days bedridden, Benedetta Toso, a cancer patient at just thirty-eight, wants to talk to Brunetti about something she doesn't want to take with her to her grave. Weak and on the verge of death, the woman barely manages to have any lucid moment and sketch a few loose sentences that implicate her husband, Vittorio Fadalto, recently died in a traffic accident, with money obtained illegally and which, in Consequently, his death was actually murder. "They killed him," he tells the commissioner. Unfortunately, before she can learn more about it, the woman breathes her last. What illegal money were you referring to? Who are those "they" whom Toso accuses of having murdered her husband? The fine thread of investigation will lead the curator to the man's workplace, Spattuto Acqua, a private company tasked with monitoring water quality in Venice. There, Brunetti will face not only the truth about whether Fadalto was killed or not, but a bribery case among employees with the aim of hiding polluting spills in the water, which could have catastrophic consequences on the health of Venetians.