The Stargazer: The Arboretti Family Saga - Book One

by Michele Jaffe

  The boulder settled on his stomach, and Ian sat forward again, suddenly drained of energy. He reached for the grappa bottle but Francesco moved it out of his grasp, giving him such a threatening look that Ian did not dare stretch toward it. Then he sighed and his eyes moved to Crispin.

  “You accuse me of keeping secrets, painful secrets, and you claim that they hurt others. I can only suppose you mean secrets about Bianca. Very well, I will spill them all, and you can draw your own conclusions.” Crispin wanted to protest that there were older, harder secrets that he was keeping, but Ian was speaking as if in an impenetrable daze.

  “I betrothed myself to Bianca Salva because I thought she was a murderess.” With that as prelude, Ian knew that he would have all their eyes upon him. “Having received an urgent summons to the house of Isabella Bellocchio, I went, entered, and ascended to the woman’s apartments. There I found Bianca standing over the stabbed body of Isabella, brandishing,” he paused while he fished in the drawer of his desk for a moment and brought out the garish dagger, “this. As you can see, it has the Foscari arms on it. Like anyone confronted with a woman, a corpse, and a weapon, I assumed that she had murdered Isabella, and I accused her. She, like the stubborn, muleheaded female that she is, denied it.”

  His eyes moved to where Francesco and Roberto were standing together. “You had been pressuring me to marry, arguing that comfortable companionship would help quiet the demons that tormented me and other such nonsense. Looking at that woman, covered with blood, I saw the opportunity to teach both her and you a lesson. Betrothing myself to her publicly and irrevocably was completely without risk, I concluded, because she would soon be put to death as a murderer, and sharing a house with her would undoubtedly stop your lectures about the necessity of taking a wife.”

  Ian’s eyes left his uncles and moved across the faces of his cousins. When he spoke his voice was tight. He had to bite the words to get them out. “Because she needed something to do while she waited to be condemned to death, I allowed her to undertake a sham investigation into the murder of Isabella Bellocchio. I gave her until midday today,” he stopped and consulted his watch, “a little over an hour ago, to produce the real murderer. If I am not mistaken, it was almost exactly that hour when her sentence was read. It would appear, therefore, that she behaved quite punctually.”

  Francesco was horrified by what he heard. “You mean to say, you were just using her to get at us for caring about you? You hurt her this way because you were upset with us? Dear God, I cannot bear the thought of it.” Roberto gripped him by the arm, to support him, and was going to pull up a chair, but Francesco balked. “I don’t want to hear any more. Please let us leave.” Roberto acquiesced, pausing only to glare fiercely at Ian before moving to the threshold of the room.

  There was silence until the door closed behind the two men. “That is foul,” Miles declared then with emotion before Ian could speak, if he had been planning to. “I suppose you figured that since she was a murderer, she had no right to little things like honesty or, worse yet, happiness.”

  Ian’s only response was to reach for the now unguarded grappa decanter. He was pleased to see that they were finally coming to understand what a monster he was.

  “What evidence do you really have that she committed the murder?” Tristan challenged.

  “More than I have that she did not.” Ian’s renewed assault on the grappa bottle had been successful, and he now sat back in his chair sipping at his glass, not offering any to his visitors.

  Sebastian moved a chair up next to Crispin and sat down, wanting to be at hand in case Crispin’s appetite for strangling was suddenly awakened. “You were still there today when she mentioned some drawings. What were they? Were they really stolen?”

  Ian studied the bottom of his glass. “Yes, they were really stolen.” He sighed, and looked up at his cousin. “I had Giorgio move Isabella’s body into one of the vacant rooms on the top floor and told Bianca she could dissect it or do whatever perverse thing she pleased with it. Apparently, her tastes ran toward drawing. She cut the girl open and drew her organs and her bones and things. The pictures were still in the laboratory after the body was removed, and the night the prowler broke in, he took them.”

  “If the court had the drawings, then what Bianca said is correct, that whoever stole them must have denounced her. Or are you saying she organized the whole thing herself?” Tristan was incredulous.

  Ian pushed back his chair and stood. He had told them everything but he could not listen to any more rational arguments, nor did he need to hear his secret doubts articulated by others.

  “Unless, afraid that she might produce proof of her innocence and you would have to marry her and be happy, you denounced her yourself.” Crispin stood and was meeting Ian’s gaze, the slate gray in his eyes exactly matching that in his brother’s. “Yes, I am sure that is what happened. She threatened to become inconvenient to you and you got rid of her. Bastard!”

  At last. At last it had happened. At last even Crispin had given up on him. Ian had often wondered what had taken his brother so long. A strange sense of calm suffused his body. Without bothering to either confirm or deny the accusation, Ian moved past him to the door, shutting it quietly behind him.

  Returning five hours later, Giorgio was informed by every member of the household staff that Ian was desperately seeking him. If he waited, he knew he would lose his nerve, so Giorgio went in search of Ian as soon as he heard, without even changing his wet boots. After checking in all the likely places, he finally found his master in his laboratory. Ian was sitting on a stool, strangely placed before a mirror, intensely scrutinizing nothing. When Giorgio entered, he did not turn around, but made a sign of greeting in the mirror and beckoned him over.

  “I am glad you have returned.” Ian spoke to Giorgio’s reflection in a voice so completely without emotion that even “glad” sounded like an overstatement.

  “Of course. I should never have left like that, for such a long time, without leaving word,” Giorgio conceded.

  Ian continued to speak into the mirror. “No, you shouldn’t have, but I understand why you did. It makes perfect sense.”

  “It does?” Giorgio scanned the reflection of his master’s face, looking for a hint of sarcasm or irony—or even emotion—but found none.

  “Yes. Completely. You did the right thing.”

  “I did?” Giorgio was too perplexed to question Ian’s intonation. “You really mean that? I thought you would be furious with me.”

  “How could I be? There are times when a man becomes bewitched by a woman…” Ian waved a hand in the air as his voice trailed off.

  “There are? I mean, yes, there are. But I did not think you would understand so easily.” Giorgio looked closely at the mirror, as if he suspected it might be distorting the conversation or at least Ian’s mind.

  “I must admit that at first I did not. I was actually very angry. But then I thought about it and I saw how correctly you acted. And how selflessly.”

  Giorgio was not sure that he had acted completely without self-interest, but who was he to quarrel with his master. “Thank you.”

  “You know, you took a grave risk.” Ian pointed a finger at him in the mirror. “I might have been furious with you. You could have lost your place here. I considered letting you go.”

  “I know, but it was a risk I had to take. The way I saw it, there was nothing else I could do. The situation called for desperate measures. You seemed to be getting more comfortable with the idea of marriage, and it looked to me like in time you would become accustomed to and even happy about having her around.”

  Ian glared at himself and his weakness, so clearly evident to everyone but him. “I am a fool, Giorgio. I am lucky I have you. Sometimes I think you know me better than I know myself.”

  “Only where women are concerned,” Giorgio stated withou
t hesitation.

  Ian sighed deeply and admitted his servant was right. But he did not think he himself was entirely blameworthy. “I am sure you will agree that she is a very remarkable woman,” Ian stated rather than asked.

  The pleasure Giorgio felt hearing his master describe her that way far outweighed his surprise. “I concur completely. ‘Remarkable’ is exactly the right word for her—if I may take the liberty of saying so.”

  “Of course you may. After all, you were the one who got her in the end.” Ian turned from the mirror and reached for a half-empty bottle of grappa sitting on one of the worktables. “I think that deserves a drink.” He filled the one glass, took a sip, then held it out to Giorgio to do likewise.

  Giorgio had been so overwhelmed by Ian’s easy acceptance of his action that he had not bothered to wonder how, when he had purposely told no one, his master had come to know about it. As the liquor burned down his throat, it finally occurred to Giorgio that this might be the right time to inquire.

  “May I ask how you found out?” He set the glass down, still half full.

  Ian raised it to his lips and drank down the remaining contents in one swallow. “That was easy. I just guessed. It seemed so obvious once I stopped to think it through.”

  “Then she did not tell you?” Giorgio took a sip from the replenished glass.

  “She?” Ian scowled at his servant.

  “Your betrothed, Signorina Salva.” Giorgio was holding the glass out to Ian, who looked, suddenly, desperately in need of a drink.

  Ian wondered if perhaps one or both of them had not already imbibed too much grappa. “Bianca? Tell me? How would she know?”

  “I think she suspected.” Giorgio grinned slightly as he remembered the scene Bianca had burst in on. “She saw us together once, and I think it must have been fairly obvious.”

  “She knew that you denounced her?” Ian was incredulous.

  “Denounced her? Why would I denounce Signorina Salva?” Giorgio reached for the grappa bottle and held it up. “How much of this stuff have you drunk?”

  “Not enough, apparently.” Ian scowled for a moment, reached out for the bottle, withdrew his hand, scowled some more, then looked at Giorgio. “Then you did not denounce Bianca?”

  “No, why would I denounce her? I think she is innocent.”

  “Will you swear to it?” Ian’s voice was suddenly deadly serious.

  “S’blood, my lord, you have my word.” Giorgio put his hand over his heart. “I swear that I did not denounce Signorina Salva.”

  Instead of lessening, Ian’s scowl only deepened. “Then what the devil were we just talking about?”

  Giorgio took care to move the grappa bottle out of Ian’s reach, newly apprehensive about his master’s reaction to his announcement. “My getting married.”

  “Married?”

  “Married.”

  “Married?”

  Giorgio made a quick inspection of Ian’s head to ensure his ears were still in place. “Yes, M-A-R-R-I-E-D. Married. To Marina, Signorina Salva’s maid. When Signorina Salva was denounced, I was worried that you would make Marina leave, so I took her out this afternoon and asked her to marry me.”

  Ian’s reaction was not at all what Giorgio had expected. “That is all? You are getting married? That is all we were talking about?”

  Giorgio was almost hurt by Ian’s casual attitude to this major change in his servant’s life. “That is all I was talking about,” he said indignantly. “I wouldn’t hazard a guess as to what was going through your head.”

  Ian was shaking the just mentioned body part slowly. “Nor would I, Giorgio, nor would I. The right thigh indeed! I think I lost my wits for a time. But they are back now, and we haven’t a second to lose. We must devise a way to rescue Bianca from the Doge’s prison.”

  Giorgio regarded his master with keen skepticism. “Oh, certainly. This is fine evidence of your wits coming back. You know that prison is famous, or rather infamous, for being impossible to escape from. It’s said to be the most impregnable prison in Christendom.”

  “Then we’ll just have to be devious, won’t we?” There was a gleam in Ian’s eye that made Giorgio shudder.

  Indeed, his skepticism turned to alarm when, before his very eyes, Ian’s face assumed the aspect of a man who whistles and chuckles and explodes hunting lodges. “What a fine idea, my lord.” Giorgio assessed the situation and saw that he would need reinforcements. “Why don’t we include the rest of the Arboretti in our scheme? Certainly we could use their help too.”

  Ian’s frightening zealousness did not waver, but it became slightly subdued. “You are probably right. Tristan’s skills with locks will be indispensable. I suppose it is inescapable that we shall have to share the glory with them.”

  “Glory?” Giorgio echoed. “The glory of being banned from Venice when the Senate hears that we have helped a criminal break out of prison?”

  “Come on, Giorgio. Don’t be so inflexible. People might mistake you for a block of stone.” Ian pushed past his sorely abused servant and out the door.

  “Mistake me for a block of stone?” Giorgio asked the empty room, before turning to follow his master. He wouldn’t want to miss out on his own share of the glory.

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  In the large meeting room below the library, Tristan was glaring at the jeweled dagger, glad that his family arms had not been so aesthetically abused.

  “Are you thinking about adding it to your collection?” Crispin asked, observing his extensive study of the object. “If you offer me a fair price for it, I’ll undertake negotiations with Ian.”

  “Tristan, I suggest you consider Crispin’s offer,” Sebastian counseled. “I think it would look perfect displayed just under your Michelangelo.”

  Tristan pushed the dagger aside. “Thank you both for your consideration of my collection, but I am not planning to extend it from contemporary painting to other, um, objects. Besides, this eyesore is the only clue we have to guide us.”

  “That and the fact that Ian was summoned to the scene,” Sebastian interjected. “Obviously someone wanted him to find the body or, rather, wanted to find him with the body and this self-identifying dagger. Someone who took the time to replace the actual murder weapon with this toy solely to direct suspicion at Ian. So the question we need to answer is who would want to frame Ian for murder?”

  “We would have a much shorter list if we asked instead who wouldn’t want to frame Ian for a murder.” They all knew Crispin was only half joking. “I for one have considered it plenty of times.”

  Miles, who had been deep in thought the whole time, pushed a stray lock of hair off his forehead and spoke up. “Perhaps we are going about this all wrong. As Crispin pointed out, Ian would win no popularity contest, so we could spend days examining all the possible people who bear him a grudge.”

  Sebastian interrupted him. “Are you suggesting that the decision to frame him for the crime might have been made merely out of spite rather than to satisfy some personal craving for revenge.”

  “Yes, exactly,” Miles resumed. “Which means that we might be better off devoting our energies to the question of why anyone would want to kill Isabella Bellocchio. You two knew her best.” He turned to Tristan and Crispin. “Do you have any ideas?”

  Crispin shook his head. Tristan looked pensive for a moment, then spoke. “The only thing that comes to mind is the rumor Bianca told us about. Remember? That Isabella was going to marry a nobleman?”

  “If what Ian told Crispin is correct, Bianca made that rumor up just to scare all those men into meeting her at Tullia’s,” Sebastian objected.

  “No.” Crispin, fired by his memory, rose in his seat. “No, that can’t be. A few days before Bianca told us about it, Ian called me into the library to ask me in front of her if I was plannin
g to marry Isabella Bellocchio. That means that they both believed the rumor, at least enough to badger me with it. You should have seen them.” He shook his head, recalling the less than amicable atmosphere in the room. “Anyway, I think we can be fairly confident that she did not make it up.”

  Miles spoke to Tristan. “Are you suggesting that Isabella’s fiancé killed her? Why would someone who loved her enough to risk being ostracized by his class decide to kill her?”

  “Maybe he was mentally unsteady. Look at Ian,” Tristan offered in his standard wry tone. “One moment he’s draping Bianca with the family jewels, the next moment he is denouncing her for murder.”

  “So what we are looking for,” Sebastian summarized, “is someone who resembles Ian—”

  Tristan pointed to the dagger. “—But dislikes him in an ugly way.”

  “That’s it!” Miles hit the table with his palm. “The dagger. If we find out who commissioned the dagger, I bet we will find out who the murderer is.”