The Alchemists pursuit aa-3 Page 3

  She stifled a sob. "Amen! So you kept her jewelry to identify her?"

  The captain shook his head regretfully. "His Excellency took them and gave us a receipt. You will have to ask him for them."

  "They have already been returned to the lady's estate," I said. "Could your comrades tell how she had died?"

  He looked at me as if he had forgotten I was there, his pupils contracting sharply. In his opinion, I was exceedingly redundant. "It was very gruesome, because the crabs and the fish had been busy. But, just between us, Captain di Comin is a very clever man, and he noticed that the gristle of the dead woman's windpipe had been crushed. Some of the remaining flesh around her throat-"

  Violetta cried out and faked a dizzy spell, so I could whisk her out into the fresh sea breeze. I had assumed she was pretending, but even out on the fondamenta she was unusually subdued. That was Niobe showing; as Medea she could have torn the captain apart with a smile on her face.

  "You want to know any more?" I asked.

  She shivered. "No. It's too horrible to think about. You?"

  "No. Now we know how her jewels survived, and that's progress. Let's go and call on the noble gentleman."

  "Where to?" Giorgio asked as we boarded.

  "We need to locate a Senator Marco Avonal."

  "Rio di San Nicolo," Violetta said. "I'll direct you when we get there."

  Aha! When we had made ourselves comfortable in the felze, I said, "You are acquainted with His Excellency?"

  She bit her lip and nodded.

  If Avonal was rich enough to be a friend of Violetta's he might also have known an ex-courtesan who had been worth 1,470 ducats. I decided to wait a while before asking questions. We were passing through the Basino di San Marco, but I lowered the curtains, sacrificing the view of the fleet at anchor in the hope of a cuddle with Helen. Alas, my companion was currently Minerva.

  "Discovering a body is easier if you know where you left it?"

  Minerva is the clever one, but even I had seen that much.

  I said, "I always find it so."

  "But why would a murderer turn in the body himself, whether he found it by chance or simply fetched it from where he put it?"

  "I don't know." I was fairly sure I could think of a reason or two when I did not have to meet the withering gaze of those brilliant gray eyes. "Will you come in with me to see Avonal, if he's home?"

  "No."

  Chilly silence.

  "Dearest, if you want the Maestro's help, or even mine, you will have to be open with us."

  She pouted. Aspasia or Medea would still have refused, but Minerva could understand. "Very well. We met when a patron took me to a musical soiree at Avonal's house. I was asked to play the lute, and did. Evidently I impressed him, because a couple of days later he sent a note, asking me for an evening… oh, it must be about two years ago. He was not a senator then, just an official in the Salt Office. He took me to a dance in the Palazzo Corner Spinelli. He left early and took me home."

  "And stayed the night."

  "Of course. He was a skilled and considerate lover. He asked me again, about a month later… That time he just wanted sex. I agreed, although lovemaking should be the crowning episode of an enchanting evening, not a scheduled commercial transaction like a haircut. There are plenty of prostitutes for that. He was quite different!"

  "Different how?" I asked. I was finding the conversation stressful. The woman I love was telling me about other men in her bed.

  "Weird! He was rough and aggressive, almost a different person." She, who is all women by turns, did not seem to notice the irony. "I had to ring the bell."

  "What bell?"

  She smiled sphinxly. "I have a hidden bellpull by the bed. Antonio came. Avonal drew on him. Antonio disarmed him, snapped his sword over his knee, and threw him out. No, not into the canal. But I shall not come in with you to see His Excellency."

  Antonio is the senior bouncer at 96. He is nowhere near as big as Bruno, the Maestro's porter, but a sight more blood-curdling, with a forked beard and the scarred face of a lifelong fighter.

  "Was Avonal one of Lucia's patrons also?"

  "I don't know. He could have been. She had retired, but that doesn't mean… Maybe not completely retired. If she was asked nicely." At that point, Minerva inexplicably yielded place to Helen, threw her arms around me, and kissed me until my hair smoked.

  "Mm…" I said when I was allowed a chance to breathe. "I do think this case is insoluble. The best thing we can do is go home and discuss it."

  "Later." She smiled a promise and cuddled a little closer.

  "I love you," I said. "You rule my heart as la Serenissima rules the seas."

  "Oh, really? That would have been a much better compliment a hundred years ago."

  And so on. Banter was very enjoyable but did not help me plan a strategy for calling on Senator Avonal. I knew nothing about him except that his name was uncommon and nobles from small clans rarely win election to senior offices. He must be personally impressive or extremely rich or both. Violetta was not much better informed, unable to tell me what other posts he had held, or what allies had helped him win his seat in the Senate.

  The Senate meets three or four afternoons a week, but I had not heard the dei Pregadi bell in the Piazza ring to summon it, so he might be home. Or not. Having no official standing, I cannot command an audience with anyone, and Avonal was neither a patient of Nostradamus's nor a client for astrological counsel. If he were not home I should have to leave my name; if he were home he might refuse to see me, and either way I might never get a chance to speak with him at all. Proper procedure would be for me to go home and pen an effusive letter begging a few moments of His Excellency's valuable time at some date and hour he would select, for some reason I must invent. Normally I would have played safe and done so, but that day I was making inquiries on Violetta's behalf, not my master's, and tomorrow he might remind me that my time is his time and tell me to stop wasting it. I would have to risk the direct approach.

  Violetta directed us to a watergate opening directly onto the Rio di San Nicolo-no grandiose frontage or loggia, just an unprepossessing doorway in a plain brick wall.

  "Announce me," I told Giorgio.

  He crooked his eyebrows. "To call upon Senator Avonal?"

  "The villain himself."

  "One floor up," Violetta said. "The door to your left."

  Giorgio brought the boat in and moored it with the stern nearest the steps, so he could disembark. Then he adjusted his bonnet, stepped ashore, and vanished into the dark corridor.

  I had to ask, "You are absolutely convinced that Lucia did not commit suicide or just fall into a canal in her party clothes?"

  "Absolutely." But her eyes gleamed gold.

  "Not you, Delilah. I want to hear it from Aspasia."

  "Oh, Alfeo, you idiot! I wish you would stop this silly game of giving me different names." But then she spoke in Aspasia's voice. "Lucia was a very hardheaded and sensible woman. A merely pretty woman can amass a fortune, but only a very clever one can hang on to it."

  "Thank you." I kissed her.

  At last Giorgio reappeared and nodded to me-His Excellency would be graciously pleased to receive me. Now it was my turn to climb the stairs. The relevant door was closed and I was left to enjoy the customary urinal fragrance of a communal corridor for several minutes before it opened. A manservant confirmed my name and bowed me in.

  The hallway was tiny by Ca' Barbolano standards, and niggardly for a senator, even one setting an example of frugality in the ever-cramped city. Four doors led off it, all closed, and several works of art cried out to be inspected, if not necessarily admired, but I had no time to study them or the furniture because my host was standing in the center of the room, arms akimbo, studying me. He had the windows at his back.

  I bowed very low, as nobles do to one another. The minimum age for election to the Senate is forty and I would have judged Avonal at less than that, still a giovane in politica
l terms. He was big, but broad more than tall, with a heavy face supporting a thick sandy beard and a grim expression. Part of his size came from the scarlet robes of a senator, but the nobility do not wear their robes at home, so he had put his on especially for me, either to honor me or impress me.

  My first thought was that this man had bedded Violetta once and frightened her another time and I had a sword and he did not. I suppressed bloodthirsty instincts.

  "I am more honored, Your Excellency-"

  "Just state your business." Avonal had an oddly squeaky voice for such a monolith. I had expected a boom.

  "I am doing a favor for my servant Maria da Bergamo," I said. "Two weeks ago you retrieved the body of a woman from the lagoon and delivered it to the authorities, a most Christian act. The unfortunate woman has since been identified as Maria's aunt. She wishes me to convey her deepest thanks and appreciation. Of course I add my own, clarissimo. Now she has recovered from her initial shock, she is dearly anxious to know more about this terrible affair. So far I have learned no more than your name, Excellency, and I presume to inquire what other details you can supply to put the child's mind at rest?"

  He paused, as if debating whether to throw me out at once or bid me buona sera first and then throw me out.

  "I was on my way to the Lido to ride my horse, which I stable there. Riding is an uncommon pastime in Venice, but not an illegal one. We saw the body floating, so I had my boatmen lift it aboard and we delivered it to the sbirri in Castello for Christian burial. I took possession of the valuables still visible on the corpse, because I knew what would happen to them otherwise. The next day I handed them to my attorney and told him to have them identified and see that they were returned to the dead woman's family."

  I opened my mouth but he forestalled me.

  "Before you ask, I will add that the corpse had obviously been in the water for some days and I spent the previous three weeks in Milan. I was part of a senatorial delegation to the duke; we returned the previous day, so there is no possibility that I killed her. Furthermore, yes I did recognize the amber brooch. I saw it four or five years ago, on a woman whose name I do not recall and have no wish to be informed of now."

  His beard bristled aggressively. His squeak rose a fifth. "She was a whore and I have no doubt your so-called servant is another. If you are truly a nobile homo, then I suggest you spend more money on clothes and less on servant girls. Go back to San Barnaba and stop pestering your betters."

  San Barnaba is indeed the parish of my birth, but his remark was only a taunt, not a spectacular guess, because it is also home to many of the impoverished nobility, the barnabotti.

  I bowed low. "I thank you for a very succinct statement, Your Excellency."

  The manservant still stood by the door. He opened it and I left.

  As I trotted downstairs, I mused that what a successful politician in Venice needs, apart from the accident of noble bloodlines, is oceans of money, a large family, and a strong speaking voice, in that order. Avonal seemed to have none of those and yet he was already in the Senate. He seemed to be an honest man, but I doubted that this was the secret of his success.

  4

  I insisted then that we let Giorgio go home to his brood and Violetta and I celebrate Carnival, for dusk was falling. If the Maestro's orders to be back by curfew had been intended seriously, he should have known better.

  Donning masks, we went off to celebrate Carnival, dancing and drinking, laughing and eating by the light of bonfires. We cheered the fireworks and booed at a bullbaiting, while all around us swirled bishops and abbesses, duchesses and clowns. It was an enchanting evening, and the crowning episode, as provided by Helen, was beyond compare. It was well after midnight before I hammered Ca' Barbolano's door knocker to waken Luigi, the archaic night watchman.

  When I let myself into the apartment I saw light under the Maestro's door, so I peeked in. He was leaning back on a pile of pillows, reading-and still awake, which was not surprising for he sleeps little at the best of times and even less lately. He reads so much by artificial light that I cannot understand why he hasn't long since gone totally blind. Scowl and nightcap, sheets and book, together formed a puddle of lamplight in the darkness as if an apprentice artist had been practicing chiaroscuro.

  "Need anything?" I inquired helpfully.

  "No. Learn anything?"

  "I met an honest senator."

  "Incredible!"

  "We thought so." I summarized our afternoon. "Lucia was expecting an old friend and went off in a public gondola with an unidentified man. I did not talk with the women who last saw her, because Violetta had already done that. A week later her body turned up in the lagoon. It took a couple more weeks to establish her identity and inform her friends, and if she hadn't been found by an unusually public-spirited person, no one would ever have known what happened to her. I agree that the case seems hopeless."

  Nostradamus nodded with satisfaction that the minor mystery of the valuables had been disposed of and the murder case looked so impossible that he need not be tempted by the reward. Then I told him about the second summons and my visit to Palazzo Gradenigo. His face darkened. He loves all mysteries except those he cannot hope to solve and Giovanni Gradenigo might have taken his secret to the grave.

  "I could hardly push myself into a house of mourning when the old man was still warm," I concluded. "But first thing tomorrow, I go to find Battista."

  "Not first thing. It will wait. I have letters to be encrypted."

  "His master has died. He may well be out of a job and gone. He may be gone already."

  The sage had not thought of that, so I won that round.

  Normally I snap awake just before the marangona bell in the Piazza announces sunrise. That day I heard it as I was walking-or possibly sleepwalking-across the Campo San Polo, heading for the Palazzo Gradenigo. I had not bothered to disturb Giorgio, hoping that some exercise would clear my sleep-deprived wits. Already workers were hurrying to work, many darting into the churches for a hasty prayer. It was a fine day for early February, promising a timely spring.

  At that dewitching hour I did not expect to run into any of the Gradenigo family and even their senior servants might snatch a little extra time on the pillow. A manservant should be an early riser, though, and perhaps an unemployed manservant facing the need to find a new employer would have worried himself awake. I found the rear entrance, a gate into the yard, and to my delight it was already unlocked. Routine in the palazzo was still in disarray, or seemed to be so, for no one argued when I appeared at the servants' door and announced that it was urgent that I speak to Battista-I did not even have to invent some tale about being sent by the morticians or the attorneys. I made myself as comfortable as possible on a stone bench in the yard and shivered in patient silence.

  In a few minutes a man emerged from the house and hurried over to tell me that he was Battista da Schio. Servants rarely possess family names, and normally have no need of them, anyway. They are often immigrants from the mainland, and for legal purposes are then identified by their birthplace. He was around fifty, a brown-gray sort of person smaller than me, looking as if he might have been chosen for timidity and mousiness.

  "Sit down," I said cheerfully, which he did distrustfully. "I'm Alfeo, assistant to Doctor Nostradamus."

  To my surprise, he turned chalk white. His fright was so obvious that I could not ignore it.

  "There's no need to be alarmed. I apologize… The doctor apologizes for misunderstanding your message and not sending me over right away. As I wrote… You did receive the reply I sent?"

  Battista shook his head and seemed to grow smaller still. I began to understand.

  "Did sier Giovanni tell you to write to Nostradamus?"

  Shake again. The man had lost his tongue.

  "Then tell me why you did, please. I will keep your secret if you have one, I promise."

  His tongue returned and played with his lips for a moment. "The master kept asking for…" Hi
s voice was very soft and hesitant. "… for someone to send for Nostradamus. He was a kind master and he was dying and no one was doing what he said." Taking encouragement from my nods, he went on, a little more sure of himself. "I was attending him all the time. He needed… a lot…"

  "How did he die?"

  "He bled to death, kept vomiting blood. It started about four days ago and was getting worse. The doctors… He sent the doctors away."

  "Wise of him." Hematemesis is not the worst way to die, but not the best or most dignified, either. The most likely cause was a tumor in the stomach. "Was he in much pain?"

  "He never said he was, not to me. But I never remember him complaining about anything."

  "So you were attending him, cleaning up, changing sheets. Horrible job! I hope they paid you extra?"

  He shook his head and avoided my eye.

  "So who else was there?"

  "Friends, family. They'd been coming to say good-bye ever since the doctors told him to send for a priest."

  I could imagine the scene: The dying man struggling to say his farewells to all the visitors, fighting against nausea, probably also pain and the gross indignity of puking out his own lifeblood. And Battista creeping around like an ant between all the grandees.

  "But you managed to slip away and write for Nostradamus to come?"

  "Er… yes."

  I had not got it quite right, but I had a trump to play. We get good luck and we get bad luck, and there is no sin in taking advantage of the good. As it happened, at my Monday evening fencing class my good friend Fulgentio had grumbled that it was impossible to keep good servants and his man had just left him, after less than a month. Every gentleman in Venice has his own manservant, of course, so I'm told.

  "What will you do now that messer Gradenigo has been called to the Lord, Battista?"

  "Look for another job, lustrissimo."

  "I'm not a lustrissimo, but I know one. A good friend of mine, who has more money than the king of Spain. He's looking for a manservant. I swear as I hope for salvation that that is the truth, or it was true four days ago. Tell me the story properly and I'll take you to him and introduce you to him in person if he's home, or to his steward if he's not. Now talk, because this bench is freezing my ass."