The Vivaldi Cipher

by Gary McAvoy

  As the men continued to talk, Hana and Livia wandered off to see more of the palazzo and take in the pageantry. A live string ensemble in a corner of the ballroom was performing classical works, foremost among them many of Antonio Vivaldi’s own masterpieces, including The Four Seasons and L’Estro Armonico.

  Walking up the grand staircase to the upper levels, Livia noticed many beautifully framed pieces on the walls as they ascended, a cluster of original musical compositions signed by various famed composers: Bach, Beethoven, Liszt, Pachelbel and several other maestros. Stopping to inspect one in particular, she gasped.

  “Hana! There’s more handwritten music signed by Vivaldi here!” Peering at it, she hummed a few bars, then recognized that it, too, seemed to be constructed using the Solfa Cipher, for its notes were like the previous works she had seen.

  Removing her phone from a small pocket in her outfit, she took a photograph of it, thrilled to have discovered yet another page, and curious why the contessa hadn’t mentioned it. She couldn’t wait to decode it.

  From across the room, Karl looked around to see where Hana and Livia were, just to keep track of them. Seeing them on the grand staircase, his mind was eased. He continued watching as they were approached by another guest.

  Descending the stairs above the two women was an older gentleman dressed in a Medico della peste outfit, that of a Renaissance doctor with a long, ugly bird’s beak nose, a black ankle-length overcoat and black tricorn hat. He had an air about him Hana instinctively took a dislike to; perhaps it was in his prideful swagger, or the way he blatantly stared at her décolletage. Apart from his masked eyes, she could see a snarl of a smile showing rotten teeth on a face wrinkled with age. Probably from too much smoking, she figured.

  “Buona sera, le belle Donne,” he said as he stopped just above the wide step they were standing on, making him all the more intimidating. He continued in Italian. “My name is Don Angelo Gallucci. And you are…?”

  “Leaving, I’m afraid,” Hana said in English, then, “Non parliamo italiano… scusaci.” As she and Livia kept moving up the stairs, Hana hoped he didn’t speak English, for she had just excused herself quite capably, telling him they did not speak Italian.

  He turned in silence to watch both women ascend the staircase.

  Though Don Gallucci did, in fact, speak perfect English, he chose not to pursue the conversation. Besides, his informants had already told him who the two women were. He wondered what their purpose was for being in Venice, if not just for Carnivale.

  No, no need to engage them now. He was certain their paths would cross again.

  Observing the encounter, Karl made a mental note to keep an eye on the man.

  Chapter 14

  “Why did you put him off so harshly?” Livia asked.

  “I’m not sure,” she smirked. “There was just something creepy about him. And isn’t ‘Don’ the formal title for a Mafia capo?”

  “Well, yes, but it could also be used for addressing a priest.”

  “I can assure you, that man was no priest. I couldn’t seem to stop my breasts from staring at his eyes.”

  Livia giggled, then the two of them burst out laughing, breaking the tension of the encounter.

  Back in the Grand Salon, Dominic had run into his old friend, Father Carlo Rinaldo, who had been speaking with other party guests until they wandered off.

  “Hey, Carlo, shall we go find a beer and catch up?”

  “Great idea, Michael. I see a bar in the corner over there.” He nodded in that direction, and they set off through the crowd. Having gotten served two bottles of Birra Moretti, they stepped outside onto the portico, leaning up against the concrete balustrade overlooking the Grand Canal to watch the festivities on the water.

  “Quite the soirée, isn’t it?” Rinaldo asked.

  “I’ll say. Hana and Livia are having the time of their lives. I imagine it’s rarely they get to dress up in such fantastical outfits and hobnob with Italian aristocrats. Me too, for that matter, though I’d just as well stay home and read.” He smiled at his friend, then took a swig of beer.

  Looking back inside the great arched windows, Rinaldo pointed out one of the guests.

  “See that man dressed as a cardinal? That’s not a costume, he is one. Cardinal Salvatore Abruzzo, the Patriarch of Venice. A very powerful man here. You may want to introduce yourself at some point, he could be useful in your work here.

  “By the way,” Rinaldo continued, “I’m celebrating Mass at St. Mark’s tomorrow at 11:00. I’d love it if you and your friends can come, provided you’re awake by then.” He grinned.

  “Of course, we’ll be there. I’d even join you if you needed the help.”

  “That’s a great idea. You can be my concelebrant. And perhaps we can have lunch afterward?”

  “You bet,” Dominic replied. “I’m sure everyone would love that.”

  “By the way, Michael, have you given more thought to that dilemma I’m dealing with? With Don Gambarini dead, I feel we have to do something, but I must confess, I do fear repercussions by the Camorra. Don Angelo Gallucci took over as the new capintesta, and he has a nasty reputation which can only grow worse given his promotion. I saw him inside just a short while ago, talking to Hana and Livia on the staircase. You must tell them to avoid the man.”

  “Hana is pretty capable of taking care of herself, but as it happens, we’re not without protection. Those two guys dressed as Swiss Guards in their colorful striped pantaloons you saw among the guests? They’re real Swiss Guards, both friends of mine. And Hana’s grandfather sent his personal bodyguard here to make sure Hana comes to no harm. Not that the situation should demand it, I hope.

  “There’s something else I should tell you, though,” Dominic said, going into detail about the encoded Vivaldi manuscript and its confirmation of what Don Gambarini had confessed.

  “So, it does go back for centuries!” Rinaldo said, astonished by the revelation. “Then I have to ask again—how can this possibly be?!”

  “That, my friend, is what I intend to find out.”

  As he said this, Dominic looked back through the window into the ballroom, recognizing someone he knew. The man was dressed in a simple business suit, wearing only a standard black eye mask as his only accommodation to the festivities.

  He invited Rinaldo to join him as they went inside to greet the man.

  “Marcello! What are you doing here?”

  Startled at being recognized, Sabatini looked at the masked man who approached him, with not a clue who it might be. Dominic lifted his mask, a welcoming smile on his face.

  “Father Dominic! Finally, someone I know… I’m here at the request of Cardinal Petrini to learn more about the Giulia Lama painting you and your colleagues found in the contessa’s library.” He looked around him, his voice dropping to a near whisper.

  “May I see it?”

  “Of course. Yes, Cardinal Petrini told us you were coming. But first, let me introduce Father Carlo Rinaldo, an old friend of mine from seminary who is, well, somewhat involved in this matter.”

  The two men shook hands.

  “Now,” Dominic continued, “let’s find my friends, then we’ll all go see the painting together.”

  Taking his phone out of a pocket, he texted Hana, asking where she was. A moment later she replied: We’re just chatting here in the library, where it’s quiet.

  Perfect. “Just follow me.”

  The three set off for the library on the ground floor at the other end of the palazzo. Once there, Dominic made introductions. Then Sabatini stood gazing up at Giulia Lama’s painting, a mixture of fear and bewilderment on his face.

  “Astonishing. It appears to be identical.”

  “Identical to what, Marcello?” Hana asked, confused.

  “To the same painting we have in the Vatican Museum.”

  Chapter 15

  “But, how is that possible?!” Hana asked, incredulous.

  “How is what possible?” an
older female voice inquired.

  Everyone’s head turned from the painting to the door, where Contessa Vivaldi was standing next to Renzo Farelli.

  “Why, Signor Sabatini!” she exclaimed, recognizing Marcello. “I am delighted to see you again, and all the way from Rome! Are you a guest of Father Dominic’s?”

  Quickly appraising the situation, Dominic replied for him. “Si, Contessa. Marcello came at my invitation to view your lovely art collection. As curator of the Vatican Museum, he jumped at the opportunity. We were just admiring your Giulia Lama piece. I was about to tell him about her background, which you so kindly shared with us.”

  “Lovely,” she responded with a warm smile. “I’m afraid I don’t have the time to tell the story myself just now…” she said, glancing out into the hall at other guests vying for her attention, “… but I am sure Signor Farelli here would be happy to fill you in on any details. It is from his gallery I purchased the painting.” The contessa placed a comforting hand on Farelli’s shoulder, smiled, then turned and walked out the door to speak to other guests.

  Taken by surprise, Farelli paled for a moment. A careful, prepared man under optimal conditions, he did not care for being ambushed.

  “Please, excuse me,” he mumbled hurriedly, turning toward the door. “I do not mean to be rude, but there is an important potential client I absolutely must speak with before he leaves. Might we continue this discussion a bit later?”

  Without waiting for an answer, he left the room.

  Everyone stood there, blinking in silence.

  “Did anyone else find that rather strange?” Hana asked.

  “I certainly did,” Livia huffed. “For all he knew, we could be important potential clients.”

  Sabatini fixed his gaze on the empty doorway. “I know of this Signor Farelli. He owns the Studio Canal Grande in the San Polo district. He is a prominent art dealer, yes, but one also known amongst a very few for, shall we say, somewhat shadier practices.

  “I wonder if our collective focus on this particular painting was cause for his agitated departure. Perhaps… issues of provenance he couldn’t explain?”

  “Marcello,” Hana said, “before they came into the room, you were about to explain the duplicate paintings.”

  An exasperated Sabatini tossed his hands into the air.

  “That’s just the thing. I can’t explain it! They do ‘seem’ to be identical. I saw its twin in the Vatican just yesterday. But one of them must be a forgery. I would stake my reputation on that. Only which is the question.” He drew his face closer to the canvas.

  Peering closely at one small section in a corner of the painting, the curator pointed to a series of small cracks in the pigment.

  “In paintings of the Italian Renaissance, typical patterns called craqueleur resemble a series of tiny disordered bricks, much like we see here. Look closely at Leonardo da Vinci’s Mona Lisa, for example, and you will find similar craqueleur as this. By comparison, such rifts in French paintings tend to look like spider webs, branching outward from a central nexus. Different locations and their periods, such as Dutch and Flemish artists, often had distinctive aging signatures like this in the oils and canvases they used; even the air of the environment in which they worked had a contributing effect. The natural faults in this painting seem to exhibit what one would expect. But I will, of course, compare what I see here to our counterpart in Rome, but first I need a sample….”

  Hana, Livia, Dominic and Rinaldo all peered from behind the curator for a glance at the craqueleur, intrigued by the mystery. As Sabatini reached into his pocket, he looked at the door, then at Dominic. He pulled out a small leather case. Opening it, he withdrew a set of stainless steel Dumont conservation tweezers, selecting the one he needed for this task, one that had a small magnifying glass attached to it.

  Understanding what the curator was about to do, Dominic stood at the door, keeping guard. He nodded at Sabatini, who then got to work extracting an infinitesimal speck of green pigment; something that, without damaging the canvas, would go unnoticed by the casual observer. He removed a white handkerchief from his suit pocket, then dropped the particle onto it, carefully folding and re-pocketing the cloth.

  Dressed in his sinister bird-beaked costume, Don Angelo Gallucci stood on the lower steps of the ballroom staircase, looking out over the crowd for someone he wished to speak with. Seeing his quarry, when their eyes met, Don Gallucci motioned for the man to join him.

  As Renzo Farelli made his way through the crowd to the stairs, the Don stepped down, walking toward a remote corner of the Grand Salon. Farelli followed him.

  “So, Renzo,” he began as he continued scanning the crowd, “one of my men tells me that Don Gambarini may have jittari i virmiceddi with Father Rinaldo on his deathbed. Do you know anything about this?”

  Farelli scowled. His refined sense of culture never much cared for the old Sicilian Mafia slang phrase—roughly translated as ‘vomit the pasta,’ meaning to ‘cough it up,’ or divulge innermost secrets—but he took Gallucci’s meaning.

  “I have heard this too, Don Gallucci. Word gets around.”

  “So what are we to do with this Rinaldo priest? Is the seal of the confessional good enough to protect Operation Scambio?”

  “I do not know yet, signore. I must make further inquiries,” Farelli whispered. “There is a small group of people in the library, including Father Rinaldo. They were inspecting the Lama painting I recently sold to Contessa Vivaldi. They had questions about it, but I avoided answering them for the moment.

  “There was another man there, too, someone from the Vatican Museum, whose presence gives me pause. I’d rather not have anyone looking too closely at our work like that.”

  Though a respected art dealer in his own right, Renzo Farelli possessed another prominent title few people were aware of: Camorra capo of the San Polo district, or capo di sestiere. His forte, appropriately, dealt in the sale and acquisition of fine art pieces, whether legal or illicit. And business was brisk on both counts.

  “This is all making me quite uncomfortable, Renzo,” the Don muttered, an edge of anger to his low voice. “This is your area. I expect you to take control of it. I want a progress report. Soon.”

  Chapter 16

  At the prompting of Palazzo Grimaldi servants who circulated the room, all guests were encouraged to step outside onto the balcony overlooking the water for an immense fireworks display the contessa had arranged as the fitting denouement to a magnificent evening.

  Hana and Livia stood alongside Dominic, with Karl, Lukas and Marco next to them, leaning on the balustrade. Marcello Sabatini had already left the party, eager to get back to Rome and analyze the speck of pigment he’d taken from the Lama painting. Looking around, Dominic couldn’t find Carlo Rinaldo, but figured he too may have left.

  Oohs and aahs erupted from the assembled guests as each spectacular display flew high into the sky and exploded over Venice, launched from a barge in the center of the Grand Canal.

  Earlier, as the guests had filed outside, two burly white-masked men dressed in black Bauta capes had approached Farther Rinaldo, asking him to accompany them for a ‘religious emergency.’ Confused by their meaning, but being an accommodating sort, Rinaldo walked with the men to an alley out behind the palazzo, stepping into a waiting private motorboat at their insistence.

  “Where are we going, signori?” he asked as he settled himself on the aft seating area. “What is the nature of this trouble, may I ask?”

  Both men were silent as the motorboat started up the dark canal, bright glints of color from the fireworks reflecting off the quiet buildings lining the narrow waterway.

  The priest grew anxious as the craft made its way along the canal, passing under low bridges and moving farther away from peopled areas, without a word being spoken by anyone. Rinaldo’s mind whirled with fear, the impulse for ‘fight or flight’ demanding an action. He leaned slightly to peer into the inky black water passing the craft. Instantly th
e one man sitting next to him pressed the barrel of a gun against his right side. Escape was not an option.

  Too late, Father Carlo Rinaldo feared he was in God’s hands now, praying for mercy.

  With the fireworks ending, everyone on the palazzo’s balcony began applauding, thanking the contessa for a splendid evening as they gradually made their way to the entrance dock and a fleet of waiting gondolas and water taxis.

  “Did everyone have a good time?” Dominic asked, looking around at his now unmasked friends.

  “It was fantastic, Father Michael!” Lukas gushed. “What a great introduction to Venice. Such a romantic city.” He glanced at Karl, who took his hand.

  “I agree,” Karl said. “It will be hard to compete with this kind of experience when we do return someday.”

  “Oh,” Dominic said. “Carlo has invited us to tomorrow’s late morning Mass at St. Mark’s, then we’ll all go for lunch afterward. Sound good?”

  Hana looked at him and smiled. “What would a trip to Venice be without taking in a Mass at St. Mark’s? Count me in.”

  “Me too,” Livia added. “I like Father Rinaldo. He reminds me of you a little, Michael. Suave, handsome, and unavailable.”

  They all laughed, then took their place in the line forming for gondolas and taxis.

  A few minutes later, Dominic’s cell phone hummed. He answered it.

  “Michael, it’s Carlo,” the voice said tersely. “I need a favor.”

  “Carlo! You missed the fireworks. Where are you, my friend?”

  There was a long pause, then Rinaldo spoke again. “Michael, I need you to take my place celebrating Mass tomorrow. I know it’s a big favor, but would you do this for me?”

  Dominic noticed Rinaldo’s strained voice, as if he was in pain.