Death in the Palazzo

by Edward Sklepowich

  “Mamma sent me,” she said quietly. Then, glancing quickly back at Molly’s body, she lowered her voice even more and said, “To keep vigil. She didn’t like to think of Molly being all alone. She would have come herself but Mamma—Mamma isn’t feeling well. Dr. Vasco is with her. She insisted that I come by. I meant no wrong.”

  “That’s very considerate of you both, but right now we’re going to move Molly.”

  “Move her?”

  “To the bed. Then the room will be locked.”

  “Locked? But why?”

  “Out of respect.”

  “I see. I’ll tell Mamma that she’s being looked after. It’s only because of her that I came. Good-bye.”

  She went out into the hall. Urbino followed and closed the door behind them. He then took the key from his pocket and locked the door. Bambina watched him. For the first time she seemed to notice his rubber gloves, then, with a puzzled expression, the lap desk and the camera. She said nothing further, but now seemed eager to leave and hurried toward the other wing, where her room was.

  Urbino peeled off the gloves and went to his bathroom to throw them in the wastebasket.

  7

  Urbino and Milo, the Contessa’s chauffeur, managed to move Molly’s body to the bed fifteen minutes later. There was no doubt in Urbino’s mind now that the scent of perfume was coming from Molly’s body. He said nothing to the Contessa, however, who stood solemnly watching them and then placed the little woman’s spectacles on the bedside table. She had brought one of her scarves to arrange around Molly’s head.

  She had no success in keeping alight a small votive candle. The draft from the broken pane—Urbino had closed both the louvered and the glass doors to the loggia—kept blowing it out. When Milo left to have Lucia bring up a candle guard, Urbino mentioned Bambina’s visit.

  “To keep vigil at Marialuisa’s suggestion? Strange,” the Contessa said. She sighed and looked down at Molly’s body, which was more grotesque lying on the bed, with the Contessa’s scarf around the head, than it had been when it was impaled by the glass. “But—but death makes everyone act strangely, don’t you find? Out of character, I mean.”

  Lucia came in with the candle guard. The votive flame was properly set alight.

  “I think I’ll stay here for a few moments by myself,” the Contessa said. She drew her shawl more tightly around her shoulders. “It’s very cold in here.”

  “I’ve shut off the radiator.”

  The Contessa looked puzzled.

  “But why—?” She broke off. “Ah, I see,” she said. “Yes, perhaps that’s the best thing to do.”

  As Urbino was leaving he reminded her to lock the door behind her.

  “And I’d like to have the key, if you don’t mind.”

  “There’s only the one.”

  “If you need to go in, I can unlock it easily enough, but Molly should be kept undisturbed.”

  “Yes, I suppose you’re right,” she said vaguely. She looked at the broken pane. “But there’s no lock on the loggia doors and with the pane broken—Listen to me!” She gave a nervous laugh. “As if anyone would want to come in that way. All anyone has to do is just ask for the key.”

  “If you want the key to let yourself in, you can have it, but no one else is to come into the room. Do you understand?”

  The Contessa might have been about to point out to him that this was, after all, her house, but she held her tongue.

  8

  In his room Urbino poured himself a whiskey, sat down in the armchair, and opened Molly’s lap desk. He first took another quick look at the contract for The Blood of Venice, and wrote down the name of Molly’s literary agent in London in case he needed to contact him. He then went through the index cards, but found nothing different to add to his original impression. Each contained some episode of Venice’s more sensational history.

  The small notebook seemed at first to have only more of the same: brief anecdotes about Venice and Venetians throughout history, in which death figured prominently and often melodramatically and grotesquely. Many of the anecdotes had also been on the cards.

  From the cards and these entries he could form no opinion of what the book itself would have been like, or might even already be like if she had begun to write it.

  But then he came upon an entry with the title “Houses with Pasts.” On the list were the Casino degli Spiriti; the “unfinished” Palazzo Venier dei Leoni, with its history of wild parties both before and after Peggy Guggenheim bought it; the so-called House of Desdemona; the Ca’ Rezzonico, where Browning had died, and the Palazzo Vendramin-Calergi, where Wagner had died; the cursed Palazzo Dario. Even the Doges’ Palace, which certainly didn’t quite qualify as a “house” the way the others did, was on the list.

  What surprised him was the last name: the Ca’ da Capo-Zendrini. As far as Urbino knew from his own research on the building, it didn’t have any bloody or even dubious history, as did the others, but it did have the Caravaggio Room—and the deaths that had taken place in there: the Conte’s grandmother, Flora, and Renata.

  And now Molly.

  She had obviously been interested in the Ca’ da Capo-Zendrini before coming to Venice. What had she known about it and where had she gotten her knowledge? And since she had included it on her list of “Houses with Pasts,” he assumed that either she had known about the Caravaggio Room—or had discovered something dark about the palazzo that even he and the Contessa didn’t know.

  Urbino next went patiently through the address book. It must have been redone recently for there were none of those inevitable crossing-outs of defunct names, addresses, and phone numbers. He didn’t recognize any of the names, other than that of Molly’s agent. There were five “Wybrows” listed, all of whom lived in London, scattered across its various districts.

  He got up and went to the window for a few minutes, looking out at the driving rain. The doors to the loggia were buckling slightly inward from the force of the wind. Worries about the Palazzo Uccello came again, and he went to the telephone and picked it up. Still dead.

  Urbino poured himself another whiskey and returned to the contents of the lap desk. At the bottom of a pile of envelopes were two folded sheets of inexpensive notepaper. He unfolded them. They were filled with writing.

  Urbino’s surprise at finding the Ca’ da Capo-Zendrini on Molly’s list in her notebook was nothing to what he now felt as he read the two pages. The writing was in Molly’s hand, but in something approximating shorthand, with initials and abbreviations, dashes and symbols. It wasn’t, however, hard to read. It had a breathless, rushed quality, as if Molly had been transcribing something that was being dictated to her or had been writing it down as quickly as possible because she was afraid of being interrupted.

  The sheets were filled with information about himself and the Contessa. The circumstances of his parents’ death in the fiery crash with the sugarcane truck outside New Orleans. His brief marriage to Evangeline Hennepin. His inheriting of the Palazzo Uccello through his mother, an Italian-American. His decision to live in Venice. His biographies, with the names of the subjects. His amateur sleuthing. And his friendship with the Contessa.

  The Contessa’s life was also fully if briefly documented. Her education, when she was simply Barbara Spencer, at St. Brigid’s-by-the-Sea in England. Her studies at the Venice music conservatory. Her marriage to the Conte Alvise. Her renovation of the Ca’ da Capo. The Da Capo-Zendrini summer house, La Muta, in the hills of Asolo. The childlessness of her marriage. The Conte’s death from pneumonia. Her patronage of Venetian causes. What gossipy Venetians called her “Anglo-American alliance” with Urbino for the past fifteen years.

  Molly’s “gift,” at least insofar as Urbino and the Contessa were concerned, was here demystified. Urbino dismissed the possibility that the list was the result of some bizarre communion with the past, although its unmistakable air of precipitateness might have been seen by someone more credulous as proof of just that.

>   But if one mystery seemed to have been solved, another more disturbing and puzzling one had taken its place: Where had Molly gotten her information from? And had this also been the source of what she seemed to have known about the history of the Ca’ da Capo-Zendrini?

  Although most of the information about himself and the Contessa was in no way confidential, and was in fact a matter of public record, he couldn’t believe that Molly had industriously gathered it all by herself by using the skills of a researcher.

  The inclusion of the story of his parents’ death was the most strange. It was something he kept close to himself, sharing it with few people. But Molly had been in possession of it. Urbino suspected that she had heard it, along with the other details about himself and the Contessa, from someone now at the Ca’ da Capo-Zendrini.

  But from whom? The only ones at the house party who knew all these things, other than himself and the Contessa, of course, were Oriana and Filippo. Could there be some hidden link between them and Molly?

  These speculations led him to consider the possible sources of the other things that Molly had said which had apparently disturbed some of the guests. A vague understanding of what he believed was called Occam’s Razor surfaced to support his hunch that Molly’s information was all of one piece. There was most likely one—and only one—source for everything she had known about the Contessa, himself, and the other guests at the Ca’ da Capo. There was probably an evident fallacy in this, but he nonetheless remained convinced of its truth.

  Urbino refolded the two sheets, returned them to the lap desk, and opened the checkbook. It was all that remained to be examined. There were about a dozen stubs. The first stub was dated the last week of October. The neatness and organization evident in Molly’s address book were also displayed in the checkbook. Each stub was neatly and carefully recorded.

  Checks had been written out to Molly’s Harrods account, several charge cards, Thomasina Wybrow (Urbino remembered her name from the address book), Molly’s landlord for the November rent, the National Gas Board, and British Telephone for over two hundred pounds. Several were made out to “Cash.” These latter were for very large sums, although they hadn’t noticeably diminished the unusually large checking balance.

  The last entry, however, had come close to wiping out the balance. It was made out to Sebastian Neville.

  Urbino barely had time to begin to consider the possible implications of this when a piercing scream sounded above the noise of the storm.

  9

  When Urbino went into the hall, Viola and Robert had already emerged from their rooms. Vasco had his door open and was looking out.

  Shouts came from the first floor, where the sweep of marble steps stopped before making their even broader descent to the pianoterreno. Urbino, Viola, and Robert went to the top of the stairway, where Oriana and Filippo were peering-down at the floor below. Bambina emerged from her room and joined the small group.

  “My God, what is it now?” Oriana said.

  Vasco joined them with a troubled look on his thin, lined face and followed the group down to the floor below. There they found Sebastian and Lucia with several other members of the staff gathered in a circle. Urbino slipped between Sebastian and Lucia.

  Lying on the floor on her back was Gemma in her bathrobe. Her eyes were closed.

  “Vasco!” Urbino called, but the doctor was already at his side and quickly determined that Gemma was alive, but unconscious.

  “Mother!” Robert cried, kneeling down beside her.

  Vasco loosened Gemma’s robe and the high neck of her nightdress. Carefully, he checked for broken bones and said there didn’t seem to be any. Neither was there any sign of blood from the head injury, but in Italian Vasco mumbled something about internal bleeding.

  With surprising rapidity Bambina had fetched a glass of water.

  “Give this to her,” she said.

  “You know better than that!” Vasco shouted.

  In the violence of his reaction he flung out his hand and knocked the glass of water from Bambina’s grasp. It shattered against the wall. For the second time in less than twenty-four hours her offer of water to her niece had met with a rebuff. She looked down at Gemma and a tick came and went several times in the corner of one eye.

  “What’s going on?” It was the Contessa, coming down from the floor above. “My God! Gemma! What’s happened?”

  “She fell down the stairs,” Sebastian said.

  “How do you know that?” his sister challenged.

  He stared at her with irritation for a few beats before he said, “It’s obvious.”

  “What was she doing up?” the Contessa asked. Before anyone might answer, she said to Vasco, “How is she?”

  “She’s unconscious. She hit her head when she—she fell down the stairs.”

  “We can’t leave her here,” the Contessa said. “Carry her back to her room.”

  Urbino, Robert, and Sebastian, under Vasco’s direction and with the Contessa leading the way, carried Gemma carefully up to her room. The bedclothes were already thrown back and they laid her on the bed.

  Viola, Bambina, and Oriana had followed. “My poor niece!” Bambina said. She rushed to the bed and almost threw herself against Gemma, putting her arms around her in an overwrought display of concern.

  “Get away from her!” Vasco shouted.

  Urbino remembered Vasco’s behavior yesterday in the conservatory when Bambina had offered Gemma some water and then again earlier today when he’d knocked the glass of water she had brought for Gemma out of her hand. Vasco now reached out his hand to pull Bambina physically away from her niece, but Bambina withdrew, her ample bosom rising and falling rapidly.

  Vasco, trying to control himself, said that under no circumstances should Gemma be left alone.

  “I’ll stay with her,” said Robert, who seemed oblivious to everything except his mother.

  “We’ll take turns,” the Contessa said. “Let’s hope this storm will be over soon and we can get her to hospital. God! Listen to it!”

  It was now thundering.

  “Maybe not all the telephones are out,” Viola suggested. “Is there any way to signal to a neighbor?”

  “A neighbor?” the Contessa repeated, as if Viola had mentioned something exotic.

  “It’s a good idea,” Urbino said. “Maybe I can call from one of the windows or go across the calle.”

  “Everyone must be in the same position we are. And no one’s boat would be able to go out in this storm. Our only hope is that it’s over soon.”

  “But we should at least see if someone else’s phone is working,” Urbino insisted, realizing that the Contessa wasn’t thinking clearly. “The hospital could surely get an ambulance here.”

  “The hospital?” Robert said. “Where is it?”

  “In the Castello behind Piazza San Marco,” the Contessa said.

  “But you’re forgetting the private hospital near the Madonna dell’ Orto,” Urbino said. “It’s closer.”

  “I’ll go there,” Robert said. “Give me directions.”

  “That’s impossible!” the Contessa said. “You’d never find your way in this storm. Just let Urbino see if the telephone is working across the way.”

  “She’s my mother!” Robert shouted.

  “Come. Let’s go outside and let Luigi look after her while we discuss this.”

  “There’s nothing to discuss,” Robert said.

  “Listen to Barbara,” Vasco said. “Go outside. All of you. I’ll watch over her.”

  “Be sure you do!” Robert said.

  “I always have, Robert, long before you came along. She’s still a defenseless little girl to me.”

  Robert had a dubious look on his good-looking face, but he relented and went out into the hall with the Contessa. Urbino, feeling impelled by Vasco’s look of irritation and impatience, followed, as did Sebastian and the three women.

  “Barbara’s right about the hospital, Robert,” Urbino said. �
�You would get lost in a few minutes. You would have no idea of an alternate route when you reached a flooded area.”

  “I’d go right through the water. I’d get there! I’m not an idiot!” And once again he said, this time with desperation, “She’s my mother!”

  Angelica, looking anxious, now joined them.

  “Has something happened to Gemma?” she asked.

  “She fell down the stairs,” Robert said. “She’s unconscious. I’m going to get help at the hospital.”

  “I’ll go,” Urbino said. “I have a better chance of getting there, and you should be here with your mother.”

  It seemed the inevitable solution. The look on the Contessa’s face, however—a look that spoke of fear and abandonment—momentarily checked him. It was with considerable relief that he heard Filippo’s voice say:

  “I insist on going. I know Venice even better than you do. And Barbara needs you here.”

  “Don’t leave me, Filippo,” Oriana wailed. “It’s just like that movie! One by one, we’ll all be—be snatched away. First Molly, now Gemma! Someone else will be next!”

  “Don’t get hysterical,” her husband said.

  “You’re not thinking of Gemma! You’re not thinking of me! You’re just thinking of the Ca’ Borelli! You’ll forget about us all! I—I hope it gets swept into the Adriatic!”

  “It has your jewelry, wardrobe, and love letters, dear, you had better reconsider!”

  Filippo went into their room next door and came back a few minutes later wearing his trenchcoat.

  “I’ll need a pullover cap and some boots.”

  “Mauro will fit you up,” the Contessa said. “Please be careful.”

  “Don’t worry about him!” Oriana shrieked. “He can’t wait to escape. Can’t you see it?”

  Filippo shook his head silently and went downstairs.

  “Oriana,” the Contessa said in a controlled voice, “I think it would be best if you went to your room. Maybe Luigi can give you something for your nerves.”

  Oriana stared at her without speaking for several seconds.