Death in a Serene City

by Edward Sklepowich

  He could see that the untroubled, serene life he preferred would be almost impossible as long as there was no satisfying answer to the question of who had killed Maria.

  And there was something else. Despite the disdain for contemporary society that in large part was behind his decision to live in Venice, he found himself fascinated by this example of just how repulsive that society could be. He had thought himself beyond any real interest in such brutish things, had believed he could willingly remain aloof, isolated, yet here he was at Florian’s, surrounded by its emblems of a sane and civilized life, finding what could only be called a perverse pleasure in contemplating that very brutishness.

  It was an unsettling position to be in, and he wondered where it all might lead.

  9

  “A penny for your thoughts? Isn’t that what you Americans say?”

  Urbino looked up into the smirking face of Christian Kobke. Noticing the newspaper on the table, the young man added, “But the answer is self-evident, I suppose. L’affaire San Gabriele. It doesn’t surprise me, though. In fact, it’s the kind of thing we northerners have come to expect of this country. Old washerwomen giving all their pennies—or rather centesimi—to the Church and being murdered when some fanatics steal a moldy old corpse. By the way, you wouldn’t mind if I sat down for a few minutes, would you?”

  Without waiting for an answer he put his briefcase on the floor and sat across from Urbino. When the waiter came over, he ordered an espresso and Urbino asked for a fresh cup of coffee.

  “This will have to be fast. I have to be at the Marciana Library in”—he consulted his watch, an expensive Swiss model—“ten minutes. If I’m not, Clifford will absolutely have my head. Some business about Quinton. I’m bringing some papers of hers that Adele gave me this morning. I think the girl has them stored away and is doling them out piece by piece, for what possible reason I have no idea.”

  Urbino still hadn’t said anything and it looked as if he might not have to for several more minutes. He wondered what conversations between Voyd and Kobke were like since they both seemed to prefer monologues.

  “I almost didn’t come down from London with Cifford, you know. Who wants to be in Venice this time of year, I thought. So beastly dull, and I knew Clifford would never stay for carnival. We were at Nice last year and he hated it. But now there’s this bit of excitement to keep us going for a while, murder and body snatching and only the Pope knows what else. Not dull at all but fascinating in a macabre sort of way.”

  While Kobke was going on in this way that made Urbino slightly uncomfortable since it was a bit too close to what he had been thinking himself, Stefano Bellorini came into the room and approached their table.

  “I don’t think you should be joking about such a thing, Signor—?”

  His usually cheery face with its fringe of red beard shot through with gray was grim and tense.

  “Kobke.” Far from being disconcerted the Dane seemed amused. “I believe we’ve met several times before. At the Contessa da Capo-Zendrini’s and”—his eyes moved quickly to the foyer—“right here earlier the same day although you might not remember. You’re Bellorini. You’re making those frames for the Contessa’s dead relatives. Surely someone of your interests can appreciate what I mean. All that pulling and tugging at the body of some soi-disant saint dead for hundreds and hundreds of years! What a magnificent subject for a painting, a Bosch version of that Tintoretto at the Accademia—what is it called?—The Theft of the Body of St. Mark.”

  Bellorini made no response. Instead he asked Urbino if the Contessa was there yet.

  “I wasn’t aware she was coming this morning.”

  “We had an appointment. She was going to do something at the Marciana first.”

  “She probably can’t pull herself away from Gifford.”

  When the waiter brought over the coffees, he said to Bellorini, “The Contessa da Capo-Zendrini called a few minutes ago. She regrets she will be unable to see you this morning.”

  Kobke downed his espresso in one swallow like a native Italian, grabbed his briefcase, and stood up.

  “I must be off. Good day, gentlemen. The next coffee is on me, Mr. Macintyre.”

  He was barely out of the room when Stefano said, “I may not understand English well enough to say this but just about everything that young man has to say is irritating. Doesn’t he have any regard for other people’s sensibilities? The less I see of him the happier I’ll be.”

  “I agree with you. The two of them won’t be around much longer. You would think he’d have the sense to be less flip about it even if he didn’t know Maria.”

  “Even if I hadn’t known her myself I’d find the man offensive. I’m glad Angela wasn’t here to hear what he had to say.”

  “Would you like some coffee?”

  It would help to discuss Maria’s murder and Carlo’s possible role in it with someone who might be depended on to have more than a little sympathy. And it might be a good opportunity to ask about the incident with Kobke last week at Florian’s that the Dane had just referred to.

  But Stefano declined.

  “I should take advantage of the rest of the morning although I’m afraid I won’t be able to do much concentrated work under the circumstances. If you see Barbara before I do, would you tell her I came all prepared with a convincing argument in favor of the opals?”

  After he left, Urbino ordered another coffee and read through the articles again. As he was paying his check twenty minutes later, Kobke walked slowly past the window, seeming abstracted. He didn’t look in. Urbino extended his conversation with the waiter so there would be little chance of meeting the Dane out in the Piazza.

  10

  THE murder of an old woman in a back quarter of Venice is local news even in a city that, as Gemelli had pointed out, sees relatively few homicides. But the theft of a religious relic that happens to be a centuries-old corpse is national and even international news.

  In the days following the murder and the theft, hundreds of thousands of words, official and unofficial, written and spoken, reverent and irreverent, were generated about the case that the media were calling the “Relic Murder.” As for the people of the Cannaregio and the other quarters, they didn’t have to give it a specific name. All they had to do was start talking about it in even the most indirect way and everyone knew exactly what they were referring to.

  It Gazzttino continued to run articles during the week after the murder even though there was nothing new to report; the editors knew when they had a good story. They hoped it would carry them into carnevale. There was hardly an issue without a photograph of either the relic, the Church of San Gabriele, Don Marcantonio, or Maria Galuppi. There were interviews with the police, friends of the murdered woman, Don Marcantonio, and the church officials, including the Monsignor from the Congregation for the Causes of Saints. Many letters were written speculating about the case, the large majority of which agreed that the murder was the unpremeditated act of religious fanatics who wanted the remains returned to Sicily.

  Don Marcantonio, who might have been expected to agree with a religious motive, however twisted, believed firmly in an economic one. “The body of our dear virgin martyr has surely been stolen for ransom by those who see only what most of the modern world sees: dollar signs. We all pray for the safe return of the blessed remains of Santa Teodora,” went his statement in Il Gazzettino. “and of course for the repose of the soul of Maria Galuppi who defended the saint so spiritedly.”

  As one day followed another with neither a ransom note nor statements from any religious or political group, Commissario Gemelli maintained, albeit unofficially, that the murder and theft were the acts of one man, Carlo Galuppi. Why else had he fled? Why else hadn’t he turned himself in? In fact, it was rumored that the Substitute Prosecutor, a relatively young man recently transferred from Bari, was already preparing the case against him.

  Depending on whom you talked with, Maria Galuppi was either praised
or criticized. Some—these mainly the elderly of which the quarter had many—called her a martyr herself who had died in defense of her beloved saint. Others said that she had merely gotten in the way of something bigger than the life of an old laundrywoman and that it was only fitting that if one relic had been stolen, another should have been left in its place.

  11

  THE funeral of Maria Galuppi was a simple affair as befitted the woman herself. At the urging of the authorities the service was being held not at San Gabriele but at the Church of San Michele on the cemetery island, where it would be easier to detain Carlo Galuppi if he made an appearance.

  The illogicality of this amused Urbino. What sense did it make to assume that Carlo, after hiding away as he seemed to be doing, would risk his neck by paying these last respects to a mother he had supposedly murdered? And if they really believed he might, wouldn’t it have made more sense to have had the funeral at San Gabriele in accordance with the common belief that the criminal revisited the scene of the crime?

  Urbino sat with the Contessa, Sister Veronica, and the Bellorinis near the chapel of the Zorzi family of Doges. Perhaps the change to San Michele was the reason or perhaps it was the weather—the rainy end of a bora—but very few people from the Cannaregio were there. Only Bettino and Netta Tullio from the restaurant near the Madonna dell’Orto, Cavatorta, two elderly sisters from the Convent of the Charity of Santa Crispina, and five old women in what looked like identical black coats and scarfs. The strategically placed police outnumbered the mourners at least two to one.

  Urbino was surprised that Don Marcantonio, who had been permitted to say the Mass on the cemetery island, didn’t deliver a eulogy. He seemed to try to make up for it, however, by infusing the requiem service with more emotion than was usual with him, especially the long sequence before the Gospel that had an uncanny appropriateness:

  What horror must invade the mind

  When the approaching Judge shall find

  And sift the deeds of all mankind!

  For now before the Judge severe

  All bidden things must plain appear,

  No crime can pass unpunished here.

  There were even references to Maria and a thief, and although they were the Blessed Virgin and one of the crucified thieves, Urbino was moved by the coincidence.

  After the Mass Urbino and the Contessa followed the plain wooden coffin from the church to the boat landing for its short trip to the other side of the island. Sister Veronica and the Bellorinis joined the Tullios. When Urbino started to guide his friend toward their boat to follow the coffin, the Contessa shook her head.

  “I want to walk. The rain has let up.”

  He told Don Marcantonio they would go to the grave on foot. He took the Contessa’s arm and they walked slowly across the cloister and through the gates into the cemetery. They walked in silence down the graveled paths with the crosses, tombstones, and markers stretching out all around them. Many of their inscriptions were familiar to Urbino from his wanderings but this morning they held no interest for him other than as memento mori, the circumstances of Maria’s death having taken away their romantic aspects.

  “We would have to be passing one of these fields,” the Contessa said with a stiff nod in the direction of the campo on their left It was in the process of being disinterred and was littered with piles of broken pottery, slivers of wood, crosses, votives, memorial photographs of the dead, and withered flowers. This was the field of the poor where the dead’s rest was now ended and room had to be made for the ones who were to come—who, in their own turn, would have to relinquish their narrow space to others yet alive.

  They continued on in silence to Maria’s open grave, which was surrounded by the coffin, Don Marcantonio, and the small group of mourners.

  Once again, the usually phlegmatic Don Marcantonio gave the words of the service special emphasis: “Give us grace to make ready for that last hour by a devout and holy life, and protect us against a sudden and unprovided death. Teach us how to watch and pray that when our summons comes, we may go forth to meet the Bridegroom and enter …”

  Urbino’s mind wandered. It was the reference to Christ, the Bridegroom, that did it, for he was reminded of how the body of Santa Teodora had often been likened to Snow White awaiting the kiss of Prince Charming and of how Maria used to call the saint her “biancbissima.”

  By the time he brought his mind back, Don Marcantonio was asking for the perpetual light to shine upon Maria Galuppi.

  As the coffin was lowered into the grave, Urbino wondered what the point was in asking for perpetual light when Maria Galuppi’s body, like those of most of the Venetian poor, was being commended to a mere twelve years’ rest in the marshy soil. Wouldn’t it be better to cast it at once on the pile of crosses, votives, and dead flowers from which the Contessa and he had averted their eyes?

  Despite his love for his adoptive city there were some of its customs he would never understand.

  12

  TWO days after Maria Galuppi’s funeral, the Patriarch of the city, an old man with gaunt ascetic features and an abundance of unruly white hair, visited the Church of San Gabriele to pledge his solidarity to the faithful and to say Mass. It was shortly after eight in the morning.

  The notoriety of the recent events and this participation by the usually reclusive Patriarch had attracted a large crowd at this early hour. As he sat with the Contessa, Urbino realized that this was the third service associated with death and violence they had attended in the past week. Last night over dinner the Contessa had said that she was finding it all very distressing. She did in fact look strained. The lines around her eyes and nose were more prominent and there even seemed to be a new, or deeper, one between her eyebrows.

  Many of the sisters from the Convent of the Charity of Santa Crispina were there, among them Sister Veronica with a small group of hospice guests. There were many more dark-clothed old men and women than usual and even quite a few young ones.

  No one’s presence, however, not even that of the twenty or so curiosity seekers craning their necks for a good view or the noisy journalists and photographers in the back, surprised Urbino as much as that of Clifford Voyd and Kobke. The Contessa had drawn his attention to their late arrival by a regal inclination of her black-hatted head.

  The two men were taking their seats when the Patriarch started to address the congregation in a melodious voice that many years ago had earned him the title of the modern Chrysostom, the golden-mouthed.

  “This most monstrous and senseless act has struck deeply into the heart of our entire community here”—he made a gesture that included the gathered group—“as well as far, far beyond into the hearts of all those who, regardless of their faith, cherish life and the good examples of the Lord’s servants. The body is a sacred temple. This we learn when we are but children still filled with the first wonder of life and the world. To pass beyond this world into the blessed next we must, we know, be again as children. And now, faced with these two most senseless acts that violated the sacred temples of a good, simple woman and the saint she loved so well, we must be as children in the expression of both our horror and our fervent hope. Maria Galuppi is among those who have passed beyond this world in which such trying events are a common occurrence. Yet she is also with us this January morning. Surely she joins us not only in our deep hope that the person or persons responsible are soon apprehended but also in our prayers that Santa Teodora may be found unharmed and be restored to her proper place here in the Church of San Gabriele. Let us pray.”

  The Patriarch bowed his white head.

  Behind him two fidgeting altar boys and Don Marcantonio, looking ashen in his green robes, sat on a long bench. The old priest kept glancing at the empty chapel now barred by a thick scarlet cord. Propped on the catafalque was a small sign written in a shaky hand that asked the faithful to “pray for the safe restitution of the blessed body.”

  13

  AS Urbino and the Contessa walked up
the aisle after the service, a flurry of movement and slightly raised voices came from around the holy-water stoup. It was Clifford Voyd in the midst of several photographers who pursued him into the vestibule between the two sets of doors. When they went into the vestibule themselves, Voyd was standing in front of the glass-enclosed notice board with its various death announcements and parish information. Over his left shoulder was a black-and-white obituary photograph of Maria. The photographers were taking his picture. Kobke, leaning against the wall, his hands thrust into the pockets of his camel-hair coat, looked on impassively.

  “Good morning,” Voyd said when the photographers had finished. “Yet another tragedy brings us together. Let’s hope this is the last.”

  Urbino, remembering their meeting in the Piazza and Voyd’s somewhat callous comments about Maria’s murder, allowed the Contessa to commiserate with him. He hadn’t mentioned Voyd’s comments to her.

  “I was indisposed for the poor woman’s funeral—my back—but I felt I absolutely had to be here today for her sake.”

  “And for Quinton’s,” Kobke said in an insinuating tone.

  “I was just about to mention her, my boy. Youth is so impatient.” He gave Kobke a quick glance that made him straighten up and assume a less insolent pose.

  “Margaret Quinton?”

  “Yes, Contessa, my dear friend Margaret Quinton—and, it would seem, the dear friend of Maria Galuppi as well.”

  “Something he learned only yesterday or else he might have made the effort despite his back,” Kobke said with a slight quaver in his voice. It was difficult to tell whether this was meant as a helpful clarification or some kind of thrust at Voyd. The writer ignored him this time.

  “I knew Quinton had an interest in this poor dead woman. She mentioned it in several of her letters. I was looking through them a few days ago. Perhaps I read them rather hurriedly the first time through, but there it was as plain as milk in mud. Quinton used only her first name, you understand, but there’s no question it was this Maria Galuppi who has come to such an unfortunate end. I suspect Quinton was on the lookout for material as usual—as all of us always are. Stories can come from the most unlikely places”—this with a significant glance at Urbino—“and although she wasn’t of your religious persuasion, Contessa, she was fascinated by your Santa Teodora. In fact she didn’t seem to be able to get enough of that sort of thing here in Italy. She had leanings, as we say. Surely you must have known that yourself, Contessa, you knew her well enough for that. So I came here this morning, you see, for poor Quinton’s sake as well as the old woman’s. I believe Maria Galuppi was at Quinton’s service and, as I said, I was indisposed for her own.”