“I’m sorry, isn’t it true that the police didn’t solve the murders?”
“Bribed, all bribed. Even the newspapers. They sell their souls for lire. That’s if they had any souls to start.”
“Who do you think murdered Piero and Gabriella?”
“I just told you, Alessandro Favier—he had his henchman, Sergio Corrin, do it.” Armando turned and spit into the water. “I’m glad he met his end. A painful one.”
“How do you know it was him?”
“The wealthy think the gondoliers are stupid peasants of the water. We have more than four hundred sets of eyes and ears: a glimpse here, snatches of conversation there. Rich people talking, stumbling, drunk after parties, groping each other. Gondoliers are like a family. We compete, we fight among ourselves, yes. But when one of our own is killed, we find out who did it.”
“And take revenge as well?”
“About that, I cannot say. But I did hear he is missing a hand.”
When Anna arrived at the piano nobile and entered the living room, Margo was pacing the floor. She jumped when she saw her. “You scared me! First you give me the slip at the Gazzettino, then you slink in here. How’d you get in?”
“The door was open. Who else is at home?”
“Nobody except me and the dog, and he didn’t even bark. Some protection.”
Anna gave Nero a distracted pat on the head when he came over, wagging his tail.
“Where’d Angela go?”
“Away,” Margo said. “She’s pissed at me. I was only asking her a few questions last night, following up on things Roberto had told us the other day, and her business with Sergio. She left in a huff around seven this morning. Said she had an appointment.”
“That early?”
“You think you know your own relatives!”
“Maybe you were hard on her.” Anna knew that Margo would be tone deaf to her own rat-a-tat questioning.
“Nah.”
“Maybe she didn’t like what you were implying about Sergio.”
“From all accounts, he was a bastard except to Fanfarone, who says he was a saint.”
“This morning, I spoke to someone who thought he was the devil. Armando Tota, Piero’s twin brother. He’s still alive.”
“How’d you find him? And more important, what did he say about Sergio?”
“The gondoliers pieced it all together, he told me. Sergio killed Piero and Alessandro’s family. He was working for Alessandro.”
Margo rolled her eyes. “Their hatred and suspicion of Alessandro is to be expected. Class warfare, pure speculation. Nobody actually saw anything. How’d you find out about whatshisname, Tota?”
“Armando was mentioned in a Gazzettino article. I snuck into the archives while you were with Fanfarone and was making progress until he barged in and kicked me out. The newspaper I’d been looking at had some pages torn out, and he thought I’d done it.”
“Did you?”
“Of course not.”
Margo’s brow furrowed. “Now we can kiss any other nuggets from him goodbye. Luckily, I found out a few things before I left.”
“Such as?”
“More on how Piero and Gabriella died,” Margo said.
“He told you?”
“Thanks to my skills as an interviewer. It was awful. She was stabbed, then her hand was hacked off. Bruises around her throat, too.”
“Brutal and bloody.” Anna jabbed her nails into her palms.
“Why the hand?” Margo asked. “Isn’t that a punishment for stealing in some countries?”
“With all of her money?”
“Gimme a break. Rich people steal, too, you know. That’s how some of them get rich in the first place.”
“Sergio lost his hand, too, if we can believe Armando Tota and Kitty. So we have: one, the same person killing Gabriella and Sergio; two, a copycat; three, a revenge killing if Sergio had murdered Gabriella in the same way; or four, just happenstance. What did Fanfarone say about Piero?”
“Stabbed before drowning.” Margo picked up two pieces of paper sitting on an end table. “Look at what I found here, though. Something better than any newspaper article—a confession from Gaetano! If you have trouble with the Italian, call out the word to me. You’d better sit down.”
She passed the wrinkled pages to Anna, seated on the edge of the green couch.
She begged me. If I didn’t help her to escape her prison, she threatened to kill herself and the bambina. Gabriella was nothing if not headstrong, so I believed her. I could see her light fading day by day, until she almost seemed a ghost. I knew she would leave us one way or the other. Her love was somewhere else. This made me sad, and I thought that for all of their money, for all of their high position, I would not wish to be a Favier.
Gabriella warned me that at a quiet time, when we least expected it, when I was out of the palazzo at the Rialto buying fresh seppie to cook with polenta, or at Jesurum for fluffy towels embroidered with the Favier crest, she would decide for both of them.
Gabriella was one thing, but how could I bear to see young, innocent blood forever staining the floors of the palazzo and my name and that of my father and grandfather, all of us having served the Faviers faithfully for generations? I had witnessed the wedding, full of promise, then the bambina’s birth at the hands of the Peruvian doctor. Together with my father (he had such talent) we built the bambina a dollhouse, and played hide-and-seek with her among the big planters on the altana. By the Virgin Mary, no, I just could not. I could never be responsible for her death, for a sin so great.
One day, when the count was away on business, Gabriella woke me. It was time, she said. I called the family friend for counsel, who told me to follow my conscience. I nodded to Gabriella, who gathered her things. She kissed me, saying that she would never forget this kindness. I told her this was not a day to celebrate, but a day to mourn. The door was so heavy, it did not want to move. Finally, it hissed open. I lifted little Monica into my arms and gave her a kiss on the cheek. Once I carried Gabriella’s bags to the canal, she turned to me with thanks in her teary eyes. My heart broke when I helped them into the gondola. For I did not think that in this life I would ever see them again.
I stood there frozen as I watched the retreating boat. Little Monica’s dark tresses and Gabriella’s head got smaller until they became miniatures, then nothing at all. Afraid of what I had just done, I was afraid to move.
That slick gondolier’s accursed face, his monkey arms outstretched with ragged hands. Grasping money (we could never pay him enough to go away), grasping beauty, grasping the life out of this palazzo. How could she love such a creature? Surely he leaves stains on her silk garments. He calls himself a Venetian. Ha! I made inquiries for the count. The Council told me that Tota’s grandparents were from Naples.
I entered the quiet palazzo. Then I prepared myself for the storm to come. I finished a few of the Bardolinos and a grappa before the count came home. I dozed in the fading light. Awakening to the sound of his feet on the terrazzo as he hurried from room to room calling for little Monica, I heard her name until I could stand it no more. I slid out from my hiding place and whispered to him that I had something terrible to say. We went up to the altana so that no ears inside could hear us.
My throat closed. I tried to tell him, but how could I explain? I could see his fury rising, his face darkening. I stood awaiting my penance and backed away. Like a roll of thunder, I tumbled down the hard gray marble steps. When I came to, I was in a heap at the bottom of the stairs, ready, perhaps, for the dustbin. I would have welcomed it. Eva, one of the day maids, was screaming. I was bleeding.
The next thing I remember was the count carrying me to the ambulance boat. Rocking with the waves, the starry sky was far away, but it comforted me.
Gaetano Popetta
15 June, year of our Lord 1955
“Heartbreaking,” Anna said.
“Gaetano was right,” Margo said with a sniffle. “He never did see
them again. It’s hard for me to think that he had the education to write this flowery language. Someone else, a trusted family friend, like Sergio, must have written it once Gaetano told his story to him.”
Anna fingered the pages. “I can’t see Pablo harming Gabriella, not after delivering her baby. But whether he murdered Sergio is another question. He told me he had hoped Sergio would die.”
“Why?”
“For killing a jaguar and trying to get Pablo involved. Pablo was so enraged, he stirred up the locals against him. Years later, it was payback time. Sergio tried to ruin him after he had made a medical mistake in Peru—the one covered by all the papers here.”
“So that’s what it was about.”
“Maybe. Back to theories about the Gondola Murders. Let’s say Alessandro announces well in advance that he’s taking a business trip. It’s his final test to see if Gabriella will stay—which puts in motion the rest of his plan. He had hired a contract killer to watch the palazzo. That morning, the man follows them and kills Gabriella and Piero, but the daughter accidentally drowns. No wonder Alessandro’s a crushed man. Later on, Sergio finds out about Alessandro’s role and extorts money from him until Alessandro stops paying. Sergio threatens to expose Alessandro and gets killed before he does. What do you think?”
“Ridiculous. That theory again? Almost forty years later?”
“It’s the most logical explanation for all that cash he sent to Sergio. What’s yours?” Anna asked.
Margo flinched as a nearby church bell rang. “We should get this back to the library, before Gaetano returns from the fish market.”
Just as Margo grabbed the papers, they heard a man’s voice calling, “Ragazze, dove siete? C’è un’emergenza. Subito. Dobbiamo partire.”
Margo froze. “How’d Alessandro get back so early from Ravenna?”
“And what emergency?” Anna asked.
Nero barked and Alessandro leaped from the elevator, rushing toward them.
Margo jerked back her hand.
“What are you hiding, Margo?” he bellowed. “Something of mine? Give it to me.”
She extended the pages to him with a tremor.
“These do not belong to you!” He tucked them into his pocket.
“I didn’t mean any harm,” Margo cried.
His eyes darted this way and that. “Both of you, now! Into the elevator!” he said, punching the ground-floor button. “We need to meet Biondi right away.”
“What are you talking about?” Margo asked.
Anna squeezed her hand.
“We take the boat immediately,” he shouted, sprinting to the palazzo entry, pushing them ahead, then slamming the door so hard that a geranium pot shattered on the pavement. He led them to the canal and jumped aboard his boat. “We have no moment to waste.”
On the stern, Anna glimpsed the words La Farfalla—The Butterfly.
“Get in,” he commanded. “Subito.”
Once they boarded, he cranked up the engine and accelerated so hard, the women fell against each other in the aft, like reeds before a fierce wind. As she knocked against a cushioned bench, Anna feared this would be their finale. She imagined a desolate, marshy island on the way to Torcello, where Alessandro would dispose of their bodies. She shouted into Margo’s ear, “He’s tricked us to get us into his boat. He knows we’re onto him. Now he’s going to kill us and cut off our hands.”
Margo looked as white as the passing stucco walls.
“Biondi called me,” Alessandro shouted, the spray punctuating his words, oblivious to their lying sprawled behind him. “They found Angela lying in the Giardini Pubblici. She’s been stabbed!”
Napoleon’s Gardens
Saturday, morning
“Alessandro, talk to me,” Margo yelled over the staccato thunder of the wide-open throttle. She pulled herself up from the heaving teak deck, and steadying herself on the gunwale, lurched forward. “It can’t be Angela!”
When Alessandro said nothing, Margo pulled on his shoulder. “It’s some other American. Angela must be walking around or taking a breather at Florian. She’s heading back to the palazzo now, wanting to nap. You know how she likes to sleep.” Her voice grew strident. “What does that dumb Biondi know, anyway?”
“Stop it!” Alessandro swatted her hand away. “You must understand. Angela spoke.” His voice roared above the blast of the engine as they threaded a gauntlet of low brick bridges. “She said her own name, and mine. Biondi knows more than we do. A lot more.” He turned to look at her. “Insomma, he is a good detective.”
“She’s conscious then. Maybe it’s not too bad. And the baby . . . ”
“No,” Alessandro yelled, slamming the throttle. Whining, the boat careened sideways into the quivering expanse of the Grand Canal. He corrected his steering with furious movements.
We may never arrive, Anna thought.
“Biondi told me it is grave,” Alessandro said.
“What happened?” Margo asked, slumping into the seat next to him.
“I did not wish to waste time and chiacchierare with him on the phone. He would not say—only that if we are too late, we see him at the hospital.”
“All of us?” Anna shouted, leaning forward.
Alessandro veered sharply, missing a slow-moving vaporetto before glancing back at her. “Yes, you too. Specially you.”
“What about Pablo and Yolanda?” Anna asked, holding onto the side of the boat as it pitched.
“They did not interest him.”
Alessandro’s hair flew back as the boat picked up speed again and crashed into the waves. The water met the hull with a savage rhythm that reverberated through Anna’s body and competed for dominance with her heart. She asked herself what evidence Biondi might have collected since they last spoke. And what slim hope did she have to avoid him when Alessandro will no longer be protecting her, but instead, handing her over like a gift-wrapped present?
Margo’s sobs melted into the din of the Grand Canal as Anna took refuge studying the satin marble of Palazzo Dario, the graceful lines of its lunettes, and avoided thinking about herself or Angela. She dug her thumb nail into her forefinger, knowing that soon they’d be out in the open bacino and farther from land. No escape.
She fantasized about standing on the edge of the boat, bare toes clasping the wood, before she pushed off and dove into the canal. It would be a perfect dive, like that of a dolphin, taking her deep under the surface. The canal’s murkiness would shield her as she swam underwater to reach the floating dock in front of the palazzo. She’d hide beneath it, until everyone was gone, coming up for air only when her lungs were about to burst. They wouldn’t search for her long. She could run across the Accademia Bridge, hire a boat to take her to Trieste, and vanish while that arrogant tyrant would still be pacing back and forth at Santa Lucia Station. She’d have to buy a stolen passport and figure out how to doctor it. I should have gone home when I thought about it at the train station, she said to herself.
Margo was crumpled on the forward seat, her head cradled in her hands, immersed in her own private delirium. Anna made her way there to hug her. I may need to be the strong one now, she realized. Turning toward the stern, her gaze lingered on the boat’s watery trail as they passed the Dogana, and with it, her faded chance at freedom. She withdrew into a bitter stillness, dreading the sight of Angela suffering.
Past the curve of the hotels along the Riva and the palazzos, the park trees peeked out and bowed, looking sickly and misbegotten. Police boats, tethered to poles on the emerald shore of the Public Gardens, jostled each other in the waves, like a pack of wild dogs. At last, Alessandro slowed down and pulled alongside an ambulance boat. As soon as he docked, the women jumped out, clambering up the jagged steps to a rock path and onto the broad, sweeping entrance to the park. Freed from its bank of clouds, the sun shone brightly. Far to one side and partially hidden behind a shed, police tape marked an area between pockmarked tree trunks. Anna spotted Biondi in the distance.
> Margo marched them ahead like the commander of an army, with Alessandro as the rear guard. She tottered a few steps to the barrier and froze. All waited in silence, mustering the strength to go on, as their eyes moved to what lay beyond.
Leaves of Green
Saturday, morning
There, in a leafy niche thirty feet away, lay Angela, a jungle-like canopy of trees shielding her from the sun, her sunken eyes set in her ivory face, speckled with dirt. A delicate stream of saliva drizzled from the corner of her mouth. Her chest barely moved in shallow breaths as her left hand dangled from where her sleeve was torn and covered in blood and tissue. Dark stains and bloody puddles encircled her body. The ruby river made Anna retch. How could her baby even be alive with all of that spilled blood? A hot tear slid down Anna’s cheek. A maniac had nearly turned vibrant young Angela into a corpse.
Anna recalled the merciless crescendo of her miscarriage: the pressure, the tearing, and just when she could stand it no longer, doubled over in pain, the abhorrent, clotted explosions. She was powerless to stop the endless waves. Her baby’s body was somewhere in that discarded tissue. Tiny as a bean. Sixteen thousand dollars in treatments had come to that. She had become as skillful as a junkie, giving herself daily injections, followed by deep, intramuscular ones. Ultrasounds, follicle counts, petri dishes. A roller coaster of hope and despair had propelled her downward as each attempt met a grim fate, ending in unforgettable sorrow.
Angela had felt the joy of her unborn baby’s arms moving, feet kicking. Maybe she had even seen a flash of the little girl’s face on an ultrasound. It would be doubly cruel to lose a baby after all that. If Angela recovers—and she has to recover; oh, God, please spare her life—she will feel the same hellish void, the same aching emptiness.
Biondi was crouched close to Angela, talking to her and stroking her hair as the paramedics applied pressure to her wounds and readied a stretcher.
Alessandro passed his hand over his face. “Dio nel cielo,” he cried—“God in heaven.” He turned to the solace of the open water, dancing like a mirage between the trees.
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