Acqua Alta cgb-5

by Donna Leon

  ‘Well, I don’t really, do I?’ he asked.

  ‘What do you mean? We met when I was singing.’

  ‘Yes, but the performance was over. And, since then, I’ve only heard you sing on discs. And I’m afraid it’s not the same.’

  She gave him a long look, glanced down at her lap, and then back at him. ‘If I gave you tickets to the La Scala performance, would you come?’

  ‘Yes, I would. Gladly.’

  Her smile was open. ‘And who would you bring?’

  ‘My wife,’ he said simply.

  ‘Ah,’ she said, just as simply. How rich a single syllable could be. The smile disappeared for a moment, and when it returned, it was just as friendly, but a bit less warm.

  He repeated his question. ‘Would you like me to try to talk to her?’

  ‘Yes. She trusts you a great deal, so she might listen to you. Someone’s got to convince her to leave Venice. I can’t.’

  Unsettled by the urgency in her voice, he said, ‘I don’t think there’s really any great danger in her remaining here. Her apartment is safe, and she has enough sense not to let anyone into it. So there’s very little risk for her.’

  ‘Yes,’ Flavia agreed with a slowness that showed how unconvinced she was of this. As if she had suddenly come back from a long distance and found herself here, she looked around the room and asked, pulling the neck of her sweater away from her throat, ‘Do you have to stay here much longer?’

  ‘No, I’m free now, if you’d like to go. I’ll come back with you and see if she’ll listen to me.’

  She rose to her feet and went to the window, where she stood, looking towards the covered fa ç ade of San Lorenzo and then down at the canal that ran in front of the building. ‘It’s beautiful, but I don’t know how you stand it.’ Did she mean marriage, he wondered. ‘I can stand it for a week, but then I begin to feel trapped.’ Fidelity? She turned and faced him. ‘But even with all the disadvantages, it still is the most beautiful city in the world, isn’t it?’

  ‘Yes,’ he answered simply and held her coat out for her.

  Brunetti took two umbrellas from the cabinet against the wall and handed one of them to Flavia as they left the office. At the front door to the Questura, both guards, who usually contented themselves with giving Brunetti no more than a laconic ‘Buona notte’, pulled themselves to stiff attention and saluted crisply. Outside, the rain pounded down, and the water had begun to rise over the edges of the canal and flood the pavement. He had stopped to pull on his boots, but Flavia wore a pair of low-heeled leather shoes, already soaked from the rain.

  He linked his arm in hers and turned to the left. Occasional gusts of wind pushed the rain into their faces, then switched around and drove it against the backs of their legs. They met very few people, and all of them wore boots and oilskins, obviously Venetians who were out of their homes only because they had to be. Without conscious thought, he avoided those streets where he knew the water would already have risen and took them towards Barberia delle Tolle, which ran towards the high ground near the hospital. One bridge short of it, they came to a low-lying stretch of pavement where the slick grey water stood ankle deep. He paused, wondering how to get Flavia across it, but she let go of his arm and walked on, completely ignoring the cold water he could hear squishing up out of her shoes.

  Wind and rain blasted across the open space of Campo SS. Giovanni e Paolo. At one corner, a nun stood under the wildly flapping awning in front of a bar, her eviscerated umbrella clutched helplessly in front of her. The Campo itself seemed to have shrunk, its far side eaten up by the growing waters that had turned the canal into a narrow lake that spread steadily outwards from its banks.

  Walking quickly, all but running, they hurried across the Campo, splashing their way towards the bridge that would take them down towards Calle della Testa and Brett’s apartment. From the top of the bridge, they could see that the water in front of them was calf deep, but neither of them paused. When they reached the water at the bottom of the bridge, Brunetti switched his umbrella to his left hand and took Flavia’s arm with his right. And not a moment too soon, for she stumbled and fell forward, kept from spilling into the water only by the force of his arm as he pulled her towards him.

  ‘Porco Giuda,’ she exclaimed, pulling herself upright beside him. ‘My shoe. It’s come off.’ They both stood and looked down into the dark water, hunting for some sign of the missing shoe, but neither of them could make it out. Tentatively, she moved her toe from side to side in front of her, feeling around for the shoe. Nothing. The rain pounded down.

  ‘Here,’ Brunetti said, closing his umbrella and handing it to her. Quickly, he leaned forward and lifted her from the ground, taking her so by surprise that she wrapped her arms around him, hitting him in the back of the head with the handle of his closed umbrella. He stumbled forward, one arm around her shoulders and one under her knees, regained his balance and walked ahead. He made the two turns and got them to the door of the building before he set her down.

  His hair was soaked; rain poured under his collar and down his body. At one point while carrying her, he had stumbled and felt the cold water surging over the top of his boot and down into his shoe. But he had carried her to the doorstep, where he set her down and brushed his hair back from his forehead.

  Quickly, she opened the door to the building and splashed into the entrance, where the water was just as high as it was outside. She walked across it and up to the second step, which was dry. Hearing Brunetti splash through the water behind her, she moved up two steps and turned towards him. ‘Thank you.’

  She kicked off her other shoe and left it where it lay, then started up the stairs, he following close behind. At the second landing, they heard the music that flowed down the stairs. At the top, in front of the metal door, she selected a key, placed it in the lock, and turned it. The door didn’t move.

  She pulled out the key, chose another and turned the lock at the top of the door, then went back and opened the first lock. ‘That’s strange,’ she said, turning to him. ‘It’s double locked.’ It seemed sensible enough to him that Brett would dead-bolt the door from the inside.

  ‘Brett,’ Flavia called out as she pushed open the door. The music called out to meet them, but not Brett. ‘It’s me,’ Flavia called. ‘Guido’s with me.’ No one answered.

  Barefoot, dripping water across the floor as she walked, Flavia went to the living room, then into the rear of the apartment to check both bedrooms. When she came back, she had grown paler. Behind her, violins soared, trumpets pealed, and universal harmony was restored. ‘She’s not here, Guido. She’s gone.’

  * * * *

  Chapter Twenty-One

  After Flavia slammed her way out of the apartment that afternoon, Brett sat and stared down at the pages of notes that covered the surface of her desk. She gazed down on charts that listed the burning temperatures of different types of wood, the sizes of the kilns unearthed in western China, the isotopes found in the glazes on tomb pottery from the same area, and an ecological reconstruction of the flora of that same area two thousand years ago. If she interpreted and combined the data one way, she got one result about the way the ceramics were fired, but if she arranged the variables in a different fashion, then her thesis was disproved, it was all nonsense, and she should have stayed in China, where she belonged.

  That word led her to wonder if she would ever belong there again, if Flavia and Brunetti could somehow manage to fix all of this — she could think of no better term — so that she could continue to work. She pushed the papers back in disgust. There was no sense in finishing the article, not if the writer was soon to be discredited as having been an instrumental part of a major art fraud. She left the desk and went to stand in front of the rows of neatly organized compact discs, looking for music that would suit her current mood. Nothing vocal. Not those fat gits singing about love and loss. Love and loss. And surely not the harpsichord; the plunky sound of it would snap her nerves. All right, t
hen, the Jupiter Symphony: if anything could prove to her that sanity, joy and love remained in the world, it was that.

  She was convinced of sanity and joy and was beginning to believe again in love when the phone rang. She answered it only because she thought it might be Flavia, who had been gone more than an hour.

  ‘Pronto,’ she said, aware that this was the first time she had used the phone in almost a week.

  ‘Professoressa Lynch?’ a male voice enquired.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Friends of mine paid you a visit last week,’ the man said, voice well modulated and calm sounds elongated by the slurred undertones of a Sicilian accent. When Brett said nothing, he added, ‘I’m sure you remember.’

  She still said nothing, her hand rigid on the telephone and her eyes closed with the memory of their visit.

  ‘Professoressa, I thought you might be interested to know that your friend; and his voice came down ironically on the word, ‘your friend Signora Petrelli, is talking to those same friends of mine. Yes, even as we speak, you and I, my friends are talking to her.’

  ‘What do you want?’ Brett asked.

  ‘Ah, I’d forgotten how very direct you Americans are. Why, I’d like to talk to you, Professoressa.’

  After a long silence, Brett asked him, ‘About what?’

  ‘Oh, about Chinese art, of course, especially about some ceramics from the Han Dynasty that I think you might like to see. But before we do that, I think we should discuss Signora Petrelli.’

  ‘I don’t want to talk to you.’

  ‘I was afraid of that, Dottoressa. That’s why I took the liberty of asking Signora Petrelli to join me.’

  Brett said the only thing she could think of to say. ‘She’s here with me.’

  The man laughed outright. ‘Please, Dottoressa, I know just how bright you are, so please don’t be stupid with me. If she were there, you would have hung up the phone and would be calling the police right now, not talking to me.’ He allowed that to sink in and then asked, ‘Aren’t I right?’

  ‘How do I know she’s there with you?’

  ‘Ah, you don’t, Dottoressa. That’s part of the game, you see. But you know she’s not there, and you know she’s been gone since fourteen minutes after two, when she left your apartment and started towards Rialto. It’s a very unpleasant day to have gone for a walk. It’s raining very heavily. She should be back by now. In fact, if I might be so bold as to suggest it, she should have been back long before this, isn’t that right?’ When Brett didn’t answer him, he repeated, voice sterner, ‘Isn’t that right?’

  ‘What do you want?’ Brett asked tiredly.

  ‘That’s more like it. I want you to come and visit me, Dottoressa. I want you to come right now, to put on your coat and leave your apartment. Someone will be waiting for you downstairs, and he’ll bring you to me. As soon as you do that, Signora Petrelli will be free to leave.’

  ‘Where is she?’

  ‘You can’t expect me to tell you that, can you, Dottoressa?’ he asked with feigned astonishment. ‘Now, are you willing to do what I tell you?’

  The answer was out before she thought about it. ‘Si.’

  ‘Very good. Very wise. I’m sure you’ll be very glad you did. As will Signora Petrelli. When we finish talking, you are not to hang up the phone. I don’t want you making any phone calls. Do you understand that?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘I hear music in the background. The Jupiter?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Which version?’

  ‘Abbado,’ she answered, filled with a growing sense of unreality.

  ‘Ah, not a good choice, not good at all,’ he said quickly, making no attempt to disguise his disappointment in her taste. ‘Italians just don’t know how to conduct Mozart. Well, we can discuss this when you get here. Perhaps we can listen to a performance by von Karajan; I believe it’s far superior to that one. Just leave the music playing for now, get your coat and go downstairs. And don’t try to leave a message because someone is going to come back with your keys and look around the apartment, so you can save yourself that trouble. Do you understand?’

  ‘Si,’ she answered dully.

  ‘Then put the phone down, get your coat and leave the apartment,’ he commanded, his voice coming, for the first time, close to what must be its natural tone.

  ‘How do I know you’ll let Flavia go?’ Brett asked, fighting to sound calm.

  This time, he laughed. ‘You don’t know it, do you? But I assure you, in fact I give you my word as a gentleman, that as soon as you leave your apartment with my friends, someone will make a phone call and Signora Petrelli will be free to go.’ When she didn’t say anything, he added, ‘It’s all you’ve got, Dottoressa.’

  She set the receiver down on the table, walked into the entrance hall and took her coat from the large cupboard. She came back into the room, went to her desk and grabbed up a pen. Quickly, she wrote a few words on a small piece of paper and went over to the bookcase. Glancing down at the control panel on the CD player, she punched the ‘Repeat’ button, then placed the piece of paper in the empty CD box, closed the box and leaned it upright against the door of the player. She took her keys from the table just inside the door and left the apartment.

  When she opened the main door downstairs, two men stepped quickly into the entrance way. She recognized one of them immediately as the shorter of the two men who had beaten her and only by a conscious effort of will kept herself from shying away from him. He smiled and put out his hand. ‘The keys,’ he demanded. She took them from her pocket and handed them to him. He disappeared up the steps and was gone for five minutes, during which the other man kept his eyes on her and she watched the first tiny wave of water crawl its way under the door, signalling the arrival of acqua alta.

  When he returned, his partner opened the door and they stepped out into the rising water. The rain came down heavily, but none of them had umbrellas. Quickly, one of them on either side of her, dropping carefully into single file when they passed anyone on the narrow streets, they made their way towards the Rialto and over the bridge. On the other side, the two men tried to turn left; but the water had risen too high alongside the Grand Canal, so they had to continue down through the market, empty now of all except the most hardy. They turned left, climbed up on to the wooden boards that had been set on their metal risers, and continued down towards San Polo.

  As she walked, she realized how rash she had been. She had no way of being certain the man who called her had Flavia. But how else could he have known the exact time she left the apartment and where she was going unless she had been followed? Nor could she be certain that he or they would let Flavia go in exchange for her own agreement to see him. It was only a chance. She thought of Flavia, remembered the sight of Flavia sitting beside her bed when she woke up in the hospital, remembered Flavia on stage in the first act of Don Giovanni, singing, ‘E nasca il tuo timor dal mio periglio’ and she remembered other things. It was a chance; she took it.

  The one in front of her turned left, stepping off the boards into the water below, and down towards the Grand Canal. She recognized it, Calle Dilera, remembered that there was a dry cleaner over here that specialized in suede, and marvelled at her ability to think of something so trivial at a time like this.

  In water that was now well above their ankles, they stopped in front of a large wooden door. The short one opened it with a key, and she found herself in an open courtyard, rain pounding down upon the surface of the water trapped there. The two men herded her across the courtyard, one leading and one following. They climbed a set of exterior steps, opened another door and went inside. There they were greeted by a younger man, who nodded to them, signalling to the two men that they could leave. He turned, without speaking, and led her down a corridor and up a second stairway, and then a third. At the top, he turned towards her and said, ‘Give me your coat.’

  He moved around behind her to take it from her. She fumbled at the bu
ttons, thick-fingered with cold and shock, and finally managed to loosen them. He took the coat and casually dropped it on the ground then moved up against her and wrapped his arms around her, cupping her breasts with his hands. He forced his body against hers, rubbing against her rhythmically, and whispered in her ear, ‘Never had a real Italian man, eh, angelo mio? Just wait. Just wait.’

  Brett’s head hung limply, and she felt her knees going weak. She struggled to stay standing, lost the struggle against tears. ‘Ah, that’s nice,’ he said behind her. ‘I like it when you cry.’

  A voice spoke from inside. As suddenly as he had grabbed her, he stepped away from her and opened the door in front of them. He stepped aside and let her enter the room alone, then closed the door behind her. She stood there, soaked and beginning to shiver.