The Veils of Venice

by Edward Sklepowich

Alessandro looked puzzled, but said nothing in response.

  ‘Perhaps I can do something to help,’ the contessa continued. ‘I’d like to offer to have a security system installed.’

  ‘After the horse gets out of the barn – or into it.’ Apollonia gave a laugh that provoked an even deeper rattle. ‘You feel guilty. Because of Mina.’

  ‘I feel concerned, as I said.’

  ‘It’s not your business, Barbara. But why mention it to me? Have you spoken with Gaby and Ercule? In my house by San Zanipolo, we always were careful about keeping the front door locked and bolting the windows. But this is their house.’

  ‘I haven’t mentioned it to either of them yet. I thought that – that’ – the contessa searched wildly for something plausible – ‘that you could help me convince them.’

  ‘Why do you think they would need convincing? You would be paying for it.’

  Apollonia’s thoughts were never much farther away from money than they were from religion.

  ‘You think more clearly than they do.’ Well-placed flattery was almost always good. ‘Gaby thinks they have an obligation to keep the front door open during the day time because of a relative who was a monk. I am sure you know whom she means. With your understanding of religious things, you might be the best person to have her see that the monk didn’t mean for the door to be kept unlocked in – in perpetuity.’ The contessa was proud of coming up with a word with such religious resonance. ‘He lived centuries ago. It was a different world.’

  ‘Are you saying religious advice must bend with the times like a reed in the wind?’ Apollonia came back with, marshalling her own appropriately Biblical image.

  ‘Of course not,’ the contessa said, even though her opinion was very much the opposite. She fished around in her mind for another suitable approach. After a moment, she said, ‘And if Gaby and Ercule aren’t concerned about themselves and about their things, certainly they’ll be sensitive to your worries. You just said you think it is a bad arrangement. People often take better care of others than they do themselves.’

  ‘Do you think so?’

  ‘I’ve often found that to be true. By convincing them, you – you would be helping them to do a good deed, to be good Samaritans, so to speak.’

  ‘The good Samaritan helped a stranger. Alessandro and I are family.’

  ‘But the story of the Samaritan is a parable. We have to interpret it. Like the one about Christ feeding thousands of people with hardly any fish and bread.’

  ‘That wasn’t a parable! Are you saying you don’t believe it?’ Apollonia’s eyes widened. Another rattle sounded from her chest.

  ‘You’re wiser about these things, Apollonia. And in your wisdom you can surely see that not only would you be advancing Ercule and Gaby spiritually when you encourage them to do a good deed for you, but you would be advancing yourself spiritually, too.’

  ‘How is that?’

  It was obvious she had quickened Apollonia’s curiosity.

  ‘When we make it possible for another person to do good, we – we earn a spiritual profit for ourselves. Yes, a spiritual profit!’ The contessa was proud to have stumbled upon – or rather improvised – this irresistible appeal to Apollonia’s two most dominant motives.

  Apollonia looked at the contessa with what seemed to be a newfound respect.

  ‘I see your point.’

  ‘And there’s another reason.’ The contessa feared she might be risking what she had accomplished so far but she could not help trying to apply another turn to the screw. ‘By being responsible for encouraging them to put in a security system, you would make it impossible – or very, very difficult – for anyone to commit the sin of theft.’

  Did Apollonia look at her with more skepticism now? It seemed so.

  The contessa was starting to regret having overplayed her role when Apollonia, who had been studying her face, said, ‘You make sense. Not like Gaby and Ercule. I have told them a hundred times that they have to take better care of what God has been good enough to bestow on them. It’s a slap in God’s face to put it in any danger.’

  ‘Exactly.’ The contessa marveled at Apollonia’s enunciation of a theological principle that was also a neat justification for her miserliness.

  Alessandro, who had been following the exchange with a great deal of nervous attention, helped his mother to some more water.

  Apollonia applied her handkerchief to her mouth and started to speak in a voice even weaker and fainter than before. Her first words, muffled by the handkerchief, were garbled, but the contessa soon made sense of what she was saying: ‘And I’ve always thought it peculiar how they seem almost happy to have this building vulnerable. As if they want someone to come inside who shouldn’t. Someone to steal or do something worse, like your Mina did.’

  The contessa bowed her head. It seemed that she had made her point with Apollonia. ‘May we all help each other be as good and kind as possible.’

  ‘I now see why you came this morning, Barbara.’

  The contessa slowly raised her head. ‘Why is that?’

  ‘To show your better side. To allow it to shine. You have been keeping it hidden. Don’t forget that it’s like a candle that can be easily extinguished.’ She wet two fingers and quenched an imaginary candle that was standing on her chest. ‘God works in mysterious ways. It was wrong of you to try to resist him.’

  Apollonia broke out into a severe spasm of coughing. Alessandro hurried over and sat beside her. The contessa put her cup and saucer down on the table. Guilt and embarrassment consumed her as she looked at Apollonia lying on the sofa, her eyes closed. In pursuing her agenda, she had wearied an already weary and gravely ill woman. When Apollonia had stopped coughing, the contessa said, arising, ‘I do hope, dear Apollonia, that you will have Dr Santo stop by again soon. I have stayed too long and taxed your energy. I’m sorry.’

  ‘We shouldn’t count time or effort when it’s a matter of doing God’s work.’

  When the contessa was out on the landing, she cast a quick glance up to the attic landing. The door of Olimpia’s atelier was closed. The contessa gave an involuntary shiver, remembering the scene she had witnessed, the one she doubted she would ever be able to expunge from her memory.

  As she continued to linger on the landing, the sound of Alessandro’s baritone from the other side of the door rewarded her. She strained to hear what he was saying:

  Luogo è in inferno detto Malebolge,

  tutto di pietra di color ferrigno,

  come la cerchia che dintorno il volge.

  Nel dritto mezzo del campo maligno

  vaneggia un pozzo assai largo e profondo,

  di cui suo loco dicerò l’ordigno.

  It was from one of the cantos of Dante’s Inferno. Knowing what Apollonia’s opinion of Olimpia must have been, the contessa did not find it difficult to imagine the kind of Dantean punishments of her cousin that Apollonia had coldly thrilled herself with. She wondered how much she might have influenced Alessandro and Eufrosina against their cousin. Even if she hadn’t influenced them, they might want her to believe that she had, in order to advance their own interests.

  When the contessa reached the vestibule, Gaby, still in the ocelot coat, was sweeping the floor near one of the blue rooms. She kept her head down as she said goodbye. Twenty minutes after leaving the Palazzo Pindar, the contessa ascended a bright, well-swept staircase that would bring her to another stage requiring her talents this morning. It was the offices of Italo Bianchi, located in a building on the Grand Canal near the Rialto Bridge.

  Bianchi’s secretary, a prim, middle-aged woman, greeted her and ushered her into a large room where reflected light from the Grand Canal played among the dark, solid furniture and old framed oil paintings. Bianchi, who had some of the wealthiest and most prominent clients in the city, believed that it would be in keeping with his conservative skills if he didn’t change anything in his offices from the days of his father. The senior Bianchi, whom the contessa had k
nown in his later years, had handled the conte’s affairs.

  A heavy writing desk crouched against the far wall. The junior Bianchi, plump, pink, and in his fifties, sat behind it. The contessa seated herself in a carved Venetian armchair with faded brown and maroon upholstery. It provided a view of the Rialto Bridge through the wide windows. A small group of tourists stood on the stone bridge, looking at the Grand Canal and taking photographs. Soon enough, with the coming of carnival, the bridge, as well as other popular points in the city, especially the great magnet of the Piazza San Marco, would be crowded with revelers.

  ‘What a surprise, contessa! A surprise and a coincidence! I am happy to see you,’ Bianchi said in the slowest and most deliberate Italian possible. ‘But what is this that I see? You look very nervous. It is Mina Longo, yes. It has drained you.’

  The contessa hoped that his observation meant that she had succeeded in projecting an appearance of stress, nerves, and fatigue, and not that her face was actually etched with them. ‘I am stressed, Signor Bianchi. That is the reason I have come to see you.’

  Bianchi smiled. ‘Have you forgotten? I am a lawyer. Not a physician.’

  ‘I need advice. You are correct. It is directly related to Mina Longo.’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘I’m concerned that I may be held responsible in some way for – for Olimpia Pindar’s murder.’ She had no need of her histrionic skills to make her voice quaver. ‘Because of Mina. I have heard that people have been brought to court and sued for large sums of money because their children had done something illegal. Of course, Mina is not any relationship to me, blood relationship, I mean, whereas Olimpia was. But Mina was my employee, and she’s young. I suppose I could be considered – what is the term? – in loco parentis. I want to distance myself from her, you see.’

  She had spoken her lines. She waited for Bianchi’s response.

  He raised his eyebrows slightly. ‘A wise decision. But do not worry. You have no legal responsibility.’ Bianchi paused. ‘And no moral responsibility. Put it out of your mind, dear contessa.’

  ‘A great burden has been removed.’ The contessa, trying to project a sense of disburdenment, lifted her head, smiled, and straightened her shoulders slightly – slightly but not too much, always being aware of the perils of over-acting. ‘But of course I’ll never forgive myself. This tragedy came from my own house, from the hands of the very person who turned down my bed at night, who fixed my hair, who brought me my evening chocolate.’

  The contessa, fearful of getting too caught up in her performance, restrained herself from going on with any more of Mina’s personal attentions, happy that Bianchi had no Marxist sympathies.

  ‘The shock is still new, contessa. The wound is still fresh.’

  ‘Indeed.’

  The contessa took in the rows of leather-bound law volumes, the rather grim oil painting of Bianchi Senior, and a neat stack of files on the desk. As casually as she could manage, she said; ‘I wonder what will become of that lovely building now that poor Olimpia is gone. The income from her business must have been an indispensable help in keeping it afloat.’ The contessa sighed. ‘Just one more thing for me to add to my plate of worries.’

  ‘Olimpia’s business didn’t bring in much, but she had been seeing an improvement. Her bank account received an infusion of fresh sums over the past few months.’

  ‘I understand that she had recently signed a contract to design costumes for a theatrical production.’

  Bianchi nodded.

  The contessa remembered something Bianchi had said when she had arrived. ‘Why is it a coincidence that I’ve come this morning?’

  ‘Because I was going to telephone you. About Olimpia’s will. She made a new one two months ago. You are mentioned in it.’

  The contessa was sure that her expression of surprise could not have been greater if she had feigned it.

  ‘Me? Are you sure? I had not the slightest notion. That’s most unusual.’

  ‘Not really. One client made a bequest to her grandmother. And your will leaves the Ca’ da Capo-Zendrini to someone older than you are.’

  The contessa’s genuine surprise had to make some brief room for an equally genuine irritation at Bianchi’s clarifications. ‘I meant that Olimpia and I weren’t close.’

  ‘Bequests have been left to strangers.’

  ‘And what did she leave me?’ The contessa hoped that her question reflected the curiosity she felt but none of the avidity she didn’t.

  ‘Her ocelot coat.’

  The image of the ocelot-clad Olimpia walking back and forth in her morning room last week was quickly followed by one of Gaby, wrapped in the fur coat at the Palazzo Pindar.

  ‘But it belonged to her mother. I’ll give it to Gaby. She should have it.’ She didn’t say that Gaby already did have it.

  ‘You are free to do with the coat as you please. No conditions were placed upon the bequest. But Olimpia wanted you to have it.’

  ‘Did she say why?’

  ‘No. And I do not ask such questions. If the client gives me a reason for a bequest, it is of his own free will. Sometimes the reason is mentioned in the will. But it wasn’t in your case.’ He paused. ‘Or in Mina Longo’s case.’

  ‘Mina?’

  ‘Olimpia left all her possessions and assets – other than the house, the collection, and her coat – to Longo. Her clothes, her jewelry, the contents of the atelier, and close to ten thousand euros, not much, but good enough for someone in Longo’s line of work, I would say. But Longo will never get anything. A murderer cannot inherit anything from his victim – no bequests of any kind, nothing from a life insurance policy. Unless Olimpia is survived by a child or a husband, which does not seem to be the case, the generous legacy she left to Mina goes to her oldest, living sibling. Gaby.’

  ‘Did Olimpia have a life insurance policy?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Are Gaby and Ercule aware of the provisions in Olimpia’s will?’

  Ercule had not given any indication to Urbino yesterday that they had been, but Gaby had referred to Mina as clever when she was criticizing her sister for not seeing things clearly. Now the contessa thought she understood why Gaby had said this.

  Bianchi gave her a condescending smile. ‘My dear contessa, of course they are aware of it! I would not be speaking about any provisions of the will that do not concern you if they were not. I went to the house to read it to them.’

  Still in a state of astonishment and perplexity over what she had learned from Bianchi, the contessa made another visit. It was to the theatrical company that had commissioned Olimpia to design costumes. The offices were above a mask maker’s shop near the Campo San Tomà.

  The outer office was filled with potted plants and plastered with posters and photographs of previous productions.

  No one was in the outer office except the assistant, a small, thin girl dressed in black.

  ‘I’d like to see the company director about your upcoming production of La Locandiera,’ the contessa said.

  The assistant knocked on a closed, leather-covered door and went inside for a few moments. ‘Signor Walther will see you,’ she said when she returned. ‘Let me take your coat.’

  The director of the company was a short-haired blond man of about thirty-five dressed in a salmon-colored suit and purple tie.

  After she sat down, she introduced herself, dispensing with the ‘contessa’ as she usually did.

  ‘How may I help you?’ He spoke Italian with a strong German accent.

  ‘Olimpia Pindar was my cousin.’

  A more serious expression passed over Walther’s regular features. ‘I am very sorry for your bereavement, and especially under such tragic circumstances.’

  ‘Thank you. I know that my cousin was designing costumes for La Locandiera.’

  ‘Yes. We engaged her three months ago. She had done some preliminary sketches. We were pleased with them. Your cousin was accomplished.’

  ‘She was.
It’s about her work for your company that I’ve come.’

  Walther looked puzzled. ‘But we don’t have any costumes she worked on. Just her sketches. I believe she was close to finishing one costume. And even if we did have the costume, it would be our property, along with the sketches and anything else she had finished. According to the contract, you understand.’

  The contessa shifted in her seat and cleared her throat, even though she was seldom a seat-shifter or a throat-clearer, no matter how embarrassed and ill at ease. But she wanted to create the proper effect, since her audience was now a professional one, unlike the ones she had already performed before this morning. Walther seemed to be studying her intently.

  ‘Let me explain why I’m here, Signor Walther. The young woman being held for her murder was in my employ.’

  Walther opened his eyes wider. ‘I thought I recognized your name. You are the English contessa.’

  Walther’s three words, ‘la contessa inglese,’ made a tight knot form in the stomach of the owner of this title. The contessa realized the implications of his words – to be more exact, the histrionic implications. Her concern for Mina had prevented her from seeing them clearly and fully.

  The terrible event that had occurred in Olimpia’s atelier was a fascinating drama – even a melodrama – in which she, ‘la contessa inglese’, had an essential, deliciously ambiguous role. It was an intriguing triangle: the murdered dressmaker; her murderous lover, a simple lady’s maid; and the English contessa, the recipient of the domestic attentions of the passion-crazed murderess.

  The contessa could only too easily imagine the script that went along with these precisely defined roles, especially hers.

  And she had revealed something to Walther that the gossiping masses – the contessa could paint such a vivid picture! – would seize on as a marvellous fillip. La contessa inglese was actually the cousin of the brutally murdered woman.

  ‘Yes,’ the contessa said, gaining control over herself. ‘It is because my cousin’s accused murderer was working for me that I have taken it upon myself to come here. One feels a strange responsibility in such matters. I am not speaking morally or legally. Yes, a strange responsibility for having been, however innocently, a link between the two parties.’