As Urbino followed the photographer from the foyer into the living room, he was assaulted by all the chrome and glass and tubing. The effect was much sharper and stronger this early afternoon with the bright Venetian light pouring in than it had been three nights ago.
Urbino couldn’t help feeling that someone who lived with so much brightness and open space and lines was trying to give the impression he had nothing to hide.
As if to show how little he did have to hide, the photographer said, “I hear that you’re trying to get to the bottom of this murder.”
He poured Urbino a glass of red wine. On the long shining coffee table was a folio-sized volume with a photograph of the throne in San Pietro di Castello, said to have been used by Saint Peter at Antioch. In tasteful letters was spelled out LE RELIQUIE DI VENEZIA DI PORFIRIO.
“Mother Mariangela asked if I might try to smooth things over at the convent.”
“It certainly provides you with a convenient excuse, this request of Mother Mariangela. Oh, don’t be offended. I only meant that a man in your profession—that of a biographer, I mean—doesn’t need too much encouragement to satisfy his curiosity about people. Violent death certainly gives an extra interest.”
“Couldn’t the same be said of people in your own profession?”
“You forget I’m not a photojournalist, or even a portrait photographer. As you know, I try to have as few people in my photographs as possible.”
“What kind of photographer was Val Gibbon?”
Porfirio stirred uneasily in his tubular chair.
“I haven’t seen that much of his work, but what I have seen confirms my feeling about most photographers, especially the ones who swarm over Venice at this time of the year—or at any time, for that matter. They have no real love for anything. They’re exploiters.”
Urbino involuntarily looked down at the book on the relics of Venice. Porfirio caught his glance.
“And what they also lack is concentration. You can’t be anything but a passable photographer without it. Choose one subject and stay with it. That’s what most of the great photographers have done.”
“Did you have a personal opinion of him?”
“I barely knew the man, although what I knew of his work told me as much about him as a day of intense conversation. There’s something to be said for types, and maybe even the Renaissance humors. I would say that Gibbon was of the sanguine temperament, ever hopeful, ever optimistic about a relatively small talent.”
Had he explained it in this way to Hazel? Was this what she had meant when she had told Urbino that Porfirio hadn’t liked Gibbon professionally or personally?
“It’s a bit ironic that Hazel Reeve is a link between the two of you,” said Urbino.
“To be honest with you, I didn’t have the slightest idea that she knew Gibbon any better than I did. I’m not upset, but it does seem as if it might have come up at some point.”
“Maybe she assumed you knew.”
“In that case she assumed wrong. No, I don’t think that’s it at all. She told me about him only after he was murdered. How could she keep it a secret after that?”
Urbino didn’t know how much Hazel had told Porfirio or how much she wanted him to know about her relationship with Gibbon. Hadn’t she said Porfirio would be the last person she would confide in about him?
Porfirio had an insinuating smile on his face. He seemed happy to be putting his houseguest in a somewhat bad light. It might be simply jealousy—but jealousy about what? About Hazel’s interest in someone he considered artistically inferior to himself? About Gibbon’s work itself? Urbino suspected that Porfirio didn’t have quite as low an opinion of the English photographer’s work as he said he did.
Urbino stayed only a few minutes longer. Porfirio said that he would tell Hazel he had stopped by to see her. He was sure she would be disappointed to have missed him.
19
The Piazza had a fey, elfin spirit this afternoon, the kind that came in fairy tales from the passing of a wand.
Revelers walked under the arcades, sat on the steps, leaned against the pillars, and thronged the square. Laughter and shouts were a counterpoint to the Vivaldi playing over the speakers. Brightly costumed men and women danced the moresca on the large stage while on a miniature one a Punch and Judy show was entertaining a group of children. A Queen of Hearts and an Ace of Spades were doing a pas de deux of love and death near one of the souvenir wagons.
In front of the Basilica a family of tumblers in white suits with large white buttons and ruffled collars were performing their act and a man in a tall turban was cavorting agilely on stilts. Three young women walked slowly on huge wooden platform heels—the zoccoli of Renaissance Venice. They wore long, richly embroidered gowns of green and gold. On their heads were straw hats with the crowns removed so that they could pull their long, blond hair out to be bleached by the sun as Venetian women used to do in former days.
Involuntarily, Urbino’s eyes looked up at the space between the Campanile and the Basilica, half expecting to see a wire on which an acrobat was balancing. It would have fit perfectly into the dreamlike scene. Urbino felt as if he had stepped into the pages of a children’s book.
Amid all this carefree activity, solitary figures in fanciful and grotesque costumes stood immobile as if part of the city’s architecture. They leaned against the columns, perched on the base of the Campanile, and secluded themselves in niches and narrow openings where they could easily be mistaken for pieces of colorful sculpture.
As Urbino walked past one of these silent figures dressed in orange robes, a shaggy silver wig, and a huge five-pointed star glistening with silver sequins, Giovanni Firpo emerged from a lively cluster of people, carrying his mask in one hand, his mirrored fan in the other. He moved almost majestically in his blue and green robe and baubled headdress, his fan fluttering in the chill wind that blew across the domes of the Basilica. In order to take part in Carnevale the way he wanted to, Firpo had a reduced schedule at the hospital. He made up for it by working extra shifts during August when everyone else was running off to the seashore and countryside,
Firpo came over, revealing pointed azure boots beneath the embroidered hem of his gown. His costume gave his paunchy body svelter lines. So far his ambition to get on a calendar or a postcard hadn’t been realized but neither had his enthusiasm been dampened. Each year he tried to outdo himself, expecting each year to be the one when he would finally achieve his goal. Urbino hoped that he would eventually get what he wanted. There was something to be said for such a simple dream.
“Have you been having any success?” Urbino asked him.
“Marvelous! Everybody’s been taking my picture today.”
“Did you know the English photographer who was murdered in the Calle Santa Scolastica Wednesday night?”
“I didn’t know him, no, but I knew who he was.”
“Did he take any pictures of you?”
The baubles on Firpo’s headdress tinkled as he shook his head.
“No, unfortunately.”
Firpo seemed about to add something but his attention was caught by a man in a heavy black turtleneck aiming his camera at two women in pink gowns, white stoles, pearls, and large sunglasses with pink feathers sprouting from them.
“Were you anywhere near the Calle Santa Scolastica on Wednesday night?”
“Why would I go there? This is where most of the action is.” He looked over at the photographer, who was finishing with the two women in pink. “I didn’t see the English photographer that night, if that’s what you want to know.”
“What about Xenia Campi?”
“I’m sure I would have known if she was around!”
Urbino had to agree. If Xenia Campi had been there in her usual capacity that night, she certainly would have made her presence known, but suppose she hadn’t wanted to be seen? He had only her word that she hadn’t left the Casa Crispina after Gibbon and Nicholas Spaak had left and Josef had come in.
“Did you ever see the English photographer paying attention to any young women in particular?”
“In particular? No.” Firpo was getting impatient to be off. The photographer in the turtleneck was now exchanging names and addresses with the two women. “He talked to a lot of the girls.”
Firpo excused himself and hurried away, holding his headdress as it swayed perilously in his effort to get the photographer’s attention before it was caught by someone else. But the photographer passed Firpo by and started taking pictures of a figure dressed as an Inamorata from the commedia dell’arte, voluptuously robed in gold, scarlet, and silver. Firpo stood watching the figure pose at the foot of the ramp, then started to walk up the ramp sedately, off again in search of the photographer who might make him an icon on next year’s calendars or collection of Carnevale postcards.
20
On the edge of the crowd, looking as sullen as he had yesterday, was Giuseppe, wearing his cowboy hat and holster. He recognized Urbino, too, and seemed to want to slip away but Urbino went over to him before he could.
“Giuseppe, how are you? Where are your cousin and Fabio?”
“Somewhere.”
His eyes shifted over the crowd in the Piazza, not meeting Urbino’s gaze.
“I was wondering if you saw Xenia Campi anywhere around here on Wednesday night.” He paused. “It was the night the English photographer was murdered.”
“She could have been.”
“But did you see her?”
Giuseppe took a few moments to think. He still didn’t look at Urbino.
“People wear masks and costumes. Maybe she did. She could have been here but I might not have known it was her.” He finally looked at Urbino. “Are you trying to get me in trouble? If she thinks I told you she was here, she’ll have it in for me. No!” he said. “I didn’t see that strega, that witch! None of us did.”
“Leo said something about a girl she was trying to get you interested in. Who is she?”
“I don’t remember her name. She was the girlfriend of a dead boy. She’s the girl who paints faces sometimes, the one who told Leo who you were. She’s too old for me, and even if she wasn’t I don’t want anything to do with someone that crazy woman likes. Good-bye!”
He disappeared into the crowd.
21
The waiter brought over Urbino’s Campari soda. A teapot and a plate of little cakes were already on the table. Despite the press of people waiting in the foyer, Urbino had found the Contessa comfortably ensconced at her usual table by the window in the Chinese salon.
“Tell me everything,” she said. “And when you’re finished I might have something of interest for you, too.”
As he filled the Contessa in on what he had learned since yesterday morning from the Neapolitan boys, Hazel Reeve, and Xenia Campi, he was grateful for the opportunity to review it all himself.
“So what do we know about Gibbon?” the Contessa said when he had finished. “He was a good-looking man, he was talented, he flirted with women, he wanted to marry Hazel Reeve but didn’t want to sign a prenuptial agreement, and he was found stabbed to death in a rather louche area. He also rubbed people the wrong way. Josef, Porfirio, Xenia Campi, and Nicholas Spaak didn’t like him. Hazel says she loved him but can we be so sure of that? She might have loved him at one time but love can turn to hate. So what do you think, Urbino? Did the girl love him or hate him?”
The Contessa smiled at him in a playful way that he found somewhat inappropriate. When he didn’t answer, she said, “Or is that too much like the Lady or the Tiger?—or rather, the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea?” She paused and nodded knowingly. “She’s having her little success, isn’t she, Hazel Reeve? Or perhaps I should call it a big success.”
“What do you mean?”
“She’s succeeded in confusing you.”
“It’s you who are trying to confuse me, Barbara!”
“I’m trying to help clarify things, caro. Hasn’t it occurred to you why she cares what you think, what you know?”
“Of course it has.”
“Well, then, I hope that you’re just a little bit suspicious that she’s giving you all these confidences. Look at the way she said that she hadn’t told the Commissario about her old boyfriend but was telling you. That itself should make you suspicious. You’re proving yourself to be just like a man, and I had such great hopes for you! Don’t be too eager to assume that what Xenia Campi or Nicholas Spaak has to tell you about Gibbon is more to the point than the positive things you’ve heard from the others.”
“I wasn’t aware that you had liked Gibbon so much.”
“I didn’t particularly care for him or didn’t care for the little I knew about him. That’s just what I mean. I knew so little.”
“Someone else might say that to dislike someone after only limited contact means that there’s a good, visceral reason.”
“The viscera can lead you astray, as anyone who’s been blindly in love can testify. No, Urbino, you have to put your faith in a different part of the anatomy”—she tapped a well-manicured finger against her temple—“and you have to separate the facts from the opinions. You’re in search of truth, after all! That’s what your wonderful little lives are all about, aren’t they? But I certainly don’t mean to lecture you, caro—all the more so because I know you’ve saturated yourself in Proust of late, and if I remember correctly, he has almost as much to say about the elusiveness of la vérité as he does about l’amour itself.”
Urbino nodded absently, feeling a little dispirited. He looked around the crowded Chinese salon, filled with the aromas of coffee and of the mint, cocoa, and cherry in the small Rosolio glasses.
Most of the other patrons were wearing costumes. Two tables were occupied by men and women in black capes, high-heeled shoes, white stockings, beribboned black-velvet pants and lace-frothed white shirts. The women carried black masks on long sticks and the men had black bautta demi-masks. In the eighteenth-century surroundings of Florian’s, Urbino felt as if he were in a Pietro Longhi painting. Casanova or Goldoni would have felt right at home.
The Contessa was peering with particular attention into the crowd beyond the windows, apparently in search of her friend. An elderly man started to strum his mandolin in front of the window, as if he were serenading her. When he finished the Contessa smiled at him and he took off his tricorn hat and bowed.
Urbino hadn’t yet told her about the incident on the traghetto. Before he did, he wanted to pursue something she had said a few minutes ago.
“You said you had something interesting to tell me.”
“A piece of factual information. Gibbon was found with money on him, all in hundred-pound notes. Thirty of them.”
Urbino was too surprised to do anything at first but stare at her. Then he asked her how she knew.
“Corrado Scarpa.” She named a friend of her husband attached to the Questura. “You know what he thinks of Gemelli. They haven’t got along since they were both in Verona. I hardly had to ask him for any information. I met him at the hospital when I went to see Josef—who isn’t much better, by the way. Corrado was checking some medical records.”
“Gemelli would be furious if he knew,” said Urbino. “It wasn’t in Il Gazzettino and it wasn’t one of the things he condescended to tell me about. The Questura obviously doesn’t want the public to know.”
“I have never thought of myself as the ‘public,’ caro.”
“It certainly seems to rule out random violence or a mugging gone wrong. But what was Gibbon doing with all that money? Three thousand pounds!”
“Maybe it was the price of his death. People are killed for less than that.”
“But the money was still on him. It doesn’t make sense. Why murder a man and not take the spoils?”
“The murder might have been interrupted,” speculated the Contessa. “It’s Carnevale. Any number of people might have wandered into the Calle Santa Scolastica—other than the ones who usually do,
I mean. Do you think he was going to give the money to someone?”
“Someone might have given it to him that night.”
“Or he could have taken it from someone.”
“It seems more logical that he was given the money, that he rendezvoused either in the Calle Santa Scolastica or somewhere nearby and then went there. He was a photographer, don’t forget, which means he was in a classic position to blackmail someone.”
“True, but blackmail isn’t the only motive for murdering a photographer—or even the best.” A mischievous gleam came into her eye. “Anyone who has ever had a bad photograph taken would understand wanting to do it.”
If the Contessa was trying to lighten his mood with her little jokes this afternoon, she wasn’t having much success.
“You said a little while ago, Barbara, that I should use something other than my viscera. When you find a murdered photographer with so much money on him, blackmail is probably the first and most logical thing to come to mind. Hazel said he always had plenty of money. Maybe that’s why.”
“Except why give Gibbon the money and then kill him? Why not kill him before, or take the money back after you’ve killed him?”
They were contemplating this when the waiter came over and told the Contessa there was a call for her.
While she was gone, Urbino considered various possibilities. Although it made more sense to kill a blackmailer before you turned over any more money, there were other scenarios as well. The money could have been given as a distraction, to put Gibbon off his guard, to gain some vital time, and then been forgotten in the confusion or because of an interruption. It was even possible to imagine someone who didn’t care about the money, but only cared that Gibbon was now dead. Or Gibbon could have been given the money by one person and murdered afterward by someone else.
Farewell to the Flesh Page 12