So he escaped me as he escaped my counterparts elsewhere. Should he return to Rome, he will stand trial. But I doubt that will happen. This man is too clever. He deceives us by appealing to the better part of our nature, our generosity, our love of art, our proclivity for welcoming the charming stranger. That makes for a much more cunning villain than your average rogue.
Still, if he is brought to justice somewhere, I shall buy myself a ticket for the trial. And when a lull occurs in the proceedings, I shall remember the most horrific sight I witnessed that evening: the shattered body of that poor maidservant lying upon the marble terrace of the mansion of the Duchess of Longhena, all through the pompous stupidity of an old Roman magistrate who put the letter of the law above the need for simple human compassion.
With that image in my head, I shall abandon my lifelong devotion to so-called justice, take out my stiletto, walk over to the dock, and carve the bastard’s guts out on the spot.
I doubt you will print this, my publisher friend. Yet, of all the tales I have to tell, it is, I submit, in some ways the most edifying.
49
Sant’ Erasmo
The morning ferry from the Fondamente Nuove crawled across the expanse of lagoon at a snail’s pace, depositing Daniel a good fifteen-minute walk from Piero’s smallholding. The Adriatic shimmered a weak shade of grey on the eastern horizon and sent a welcome breath of air across the neat rows of vegetables that lined the footpath.
Daniel had waited in the house for an hour and she had not come. Giulia Morelli said she had been released the day before. If she planned to return to Ca’ Scacchi, she would surely have done so already. Her comments in the jail seemed plain enough. She must have known where he would be. So she would have fled elsewhere, to the elderly mother in Mestre, perhaps, or some nearby relative.
To Piero’s, even. He tried to imagine seeing her in these verdant green fields, much as he had done on the day of the boat trip in those final moments before their world had disintegrated. He recalled her standing triumphant after the ridiculous game with the eels. He remembered, too, the taste of the fish in his own mouth and the way she looked at him after he braved the inky bucket of squirming bodies. It was at that point that he had committed himself to the city and, as a consequence, to her.
The cottage grew larger on the horizon. There was no female figure outside, beyond the artichoke field, where the green, flowery heads nodded in the light wind. Only Piero, hacking at some wood on the spare ground with Xerxes by his side, seated, nose erect, staring at his owner in admiration. Daniel shouted a greeting. The dog’s head turned and a loud bark rang across the still of the island. Piero looked up. It was impossible for Daniel to discern his expression from this distance. Even so, he felt Piero seemed disappointed.
The dog bounded up to him, leaping at his thighs.
“Get down!” Piero shouted testily. He was covered in wood shavings from the object he had been carving in the garden. “Damned dog.”
“It’s all right, Piero,” Daniel said, extending a hand. The huge man took it with some reluctance. His skin bristled with wood chips.
“I don’t mean any offence, Daniel,” Piero said. “But why are you here? There must be so many things to do in the city, what with the funeral and this concert I keep hearing about? What can concern you in this backwater?”
“A friend, I thought,” Daniel replied carefully. “One who reminded me of happier times.”
Piero nodded, accepting the reproach. He went to the rough outdoor table, pulled out a plastic bottle, and poured red wine into a couple of paper cups.
“Here,” he said. “To absent companions.”
They drank and there was, Daniel realised, some palpable distance between them. It occurred to him that Piero was Scacchi’s cousin and had not been mentioned in the will. Perhaps this was some source of resentment on his part.
“I wanted to talk to you,” Daniel said. “About so many things. I don’t wish any misunderstandings, Piero. I didn’t write that will. I didn’t even know it existed. Tell me what you want from Scacchi’s estate and you’ll have it.”
The thick brows knotted, and Daniel realised, on the instant, that he had made a mistake. “Money? You’re offering me Scacchi’s money? What need do you think I have of that, Daniel?”
“I apologise. It is just… You didn’t seem pleased to see me.”
“No.” He downed the wine and poured himself more. “I hate deaths. I hate everything about them. I worked with the dead once. You won’t see me on Friday, not on San Michele. I know that place too damn well. But look here. I was going to send it. Now you can save me the trouble.”
He went back to the makeshift bench and pulled from the nest of shavings a small piece of dark, stained wood and placed it on the table. “I carved this for Scacchi. He would have hated the thing in life, but now he’s dead he can’t stop me. Promise this will be in the coffin. That old man needs all the help he can get where he’s going.”
Piero’s work was an intricate cross carved from a twisted gnarl of olive wood.
“Of course,” Daniel said. “It’s beautiful.”
“It is an idiot’s offering to his smart-ass cousin. Who knew me to be an idiot all along. Scacchi would have thrown it in the fire and then complained it burned meagrely.”
Daniel felt the smooth wood and thought of the long care that had gone into the piece. Piero was correct: Scacchi had had little time for the mundane. “I’ll place it there myself. I promise. And I hope you’ll reconsider your decision. I’m no expert on funerals, but I feel you may regret not being there.”
“No. The person is gone with that last breath. Why say good-bye to a carcass? I have Scacchi where he belongs, in my head, still alive there, where he will remain until I join him. I have no need of a funeral to convince myself he is dead. But you must go, Daniel. You are young. For you it’s different. And…” Piero wrestled with the words. “This is all so strange. Scacchi gone. The American too. For what?”
He required an answer, which was impossible. “I have no idea,” Daniel admitted.
“Ah! I’m a cretin. Why should you? Scacchi was a difficult man. He wound himself in mysteries and dealt too often with people best left alone. I know. Sometimes I was his errand boy on those excursions, more fool me.”
Daniel said nothing. Piero scanned his face closely.
“So he treated you the same way too, eh?” he asked. “Don’t deny it, Daniel. We were all, to some extent, Scacchi’s playthings. I loved the old man, in the way one loves a dog that never behaves. But when he wanted something, we were all merely pawns upon his chessboard, and there, I feel, lies the answer to his death. He has cheated someone, no doubt, and for once pushed too far.”
“Laura…” Daniel began to say.