“Sophie has claimed your insurance,” Loffredo said. “You don’t think l’Assicurazioni Generali won’t investigate? They’ll charge you with fraud. You’ll go to prison.”
Elena was silent. She put down her brush. Her hand moved to her side and dropped from view.
Arcangelo whispered in Serafina’s ear.
She narrowed her gaze and watched Elena’s side. “Take care, Loffredo,” Serafina said, loud enough for him to hear.
Loffredo took a step toward Elena. “You missed your latest appointment with Dr. Tarnier. He waits for you. He’s the best doctor there is. He will help you and the child.”
“All I want to do is paint.” Elena fumbled in her pocket.
There was no reasoning with her. It was time to leave.
“I’d love to see your paintings,” Tessa said.
Elena looked around. “Where are they, my canvases? They’re gone! Who took them?
Serafina heard a door open and felt movement behind them.
“Do not turn around. Keep talking to her. Begin to back away,” a low voice whispered in back of them.
“You were the one who killed her, weren’t you, Elena,” Serafina said.
She heard Rosa gasp, saw Elena’s smugness.
Serafina spoke again. “You stole your lover’s gun and killed the street walker. You put the chain of your reticule around her neck. You placed the smoking pistol in her hand.”
“Near enough to the truth. She was a nobody. She was sick.”
“And when I got too close to discovering your secret, you shot me. You were in your apartment the night I visited, weren’t you? The concierge said you’d just left and would return. He tried to tell me, but I didn’t listen to him. Then you had a talk with Sophie. You told her you’d changed your will. She’d inherit your fortune, all she needed to do was assist and keep her mouth shut. Just a little help, that’s all you needed. You told her what to do.”
Her laugh was like a thunder clap. “Liar, you whore, stealing my husband. I may have killed the streetwalker. I may have done. But she was a tramp. All I wanted to do was paint. I found the slut. Easy enough. Yes, it was my idea-the pistols, everything. Long after the deed was done, long after my burial, a mockery, I heard you were in town. I knew you’d come snooping sooner or later. I needed you dead. How dare you invade my apartment? Sophie knew good luck when it bit her in the face, why didn’t you? You’d have Loffredo, but now you’re going to lose him, you stupid whore. You think you have to save the world. Well this is what you get for it!”
Serafina heard footsteps approach. From the corner of her eye she saw the police moving into view, Valois’ doing. Elena didn’t seem to notice them. It was time to leave and let the officials do their work.
“Step back,” a low, steady voice said.
“Get down. Loffredo, down!” Serafina yelled.
Rosa held Tessa by the arm and led her back. She motioned to Teo and Arcangelo to follow.
Loffredo moved in front of Serafina.
Elena pointed her pistol at Loffredo, blinded by her fury. “Some husband you are! Because of you I came to Paris. You fatigue me, always did. I had one chance, one chance to paint like the others. I knew when I saw the exhibit, those glorious works changing forever the course of painting, the expression of feeling. You wouldn’t understand. I had to do something. And Gaston, such a shame, another weak excuse for a man. Yes, I stole his pistols. I killed the streetwalker, worthless creature. If you think I’m going back to Paris with you…” Elena drew her pistol, aimed it at Loffredo.
“Put down the gun,” a voice said.
“Get down!” Serafina said. “Loffredo, down!”
“If you think I’ll succumb to the wishes of my father, do what is expected…You boor. Husband? Hah! And you, you slut! I could kill you both with my bare hands. At last I’ve created the life I’ve wanted. With child, yes, yes, and with no help from you!”
Elena steadied the gun on Loffredo.
“Put down the pistol or we fire!”
The police moved forward.
Serafina watched in horror. Her fault, all her fault. She should have realized Elena was a madwoman and yet she had persisted, put them all in danger.
“Put the gun down, Elena,” Rosa called from the rear of the room.
“Yes, please show me what you paint, your brush strokes, I’d like to learn from you. I came to Paris because I love art and perhaps you can teach me,” Tessa said.
Elena paled, brushed hair from her face, her eyes distraught.
The police were in sight now, their firearms drawn.
“Let us help you, Elena,” Serafina said.
But it was useless. The more they pleaded with her, the more distraught Elena became. She was wild.
Loffredo stepped forward. “Give me the gun, Elena. It’s not good for the child you carry.”
She aimed, the gun shaking in her hands. “Don’t come near me.” Elena clenched her teeth. She was trembling, her eyes other worldly.
Suddenly Elena became aware of the police. She fired.
A blinding light. A blast. An acrid stench.
Serafina watched as Loffredo lifted in the air. Suspended for the briefest of seconds, he flew backward as if he had wings.
Serafina saw the red appear on his white shirt, a rose suddenly blooming.
She heard herself wail as she flew to him, helpless, holding him in her lap, his eyes staring, his face fixed.
One of the policemen rushed to him with strips of cloth, pressing them into the wound and holding it while the medics ran in with a gurney. Loffredo looked at her and smiled, pressed her hand and closed his eyes.
Through tears, Serafina looked up in time to see Elena stick the barrel into her mouth and fire again.
Chapter 34: Praying to the Virgin
“We came prepared,” the policeman explained. “Valois warned us of a madwoman.” He introduced himself as the friend of Valois. They’d been students together years ago in Paris. “He gave us the address and told us to take all necessary precautions, and so, you see, we did.” His men wrapped the body of Elena in a muslin sack and it was taken to the morgue in a wagon dispatched for that purpose.
Medics lifted Loffredo into an ambulance drawn by two horses.
“They’ll take him to the central hospital in Aix,” a policeman told them. “It’s an old building on the main square near the Cathedral Saint Sauveur run by an order of nuns.”
“I’d like to ride with him,” Serafina said.
He shook his head. “We’ll need statements from everyone present. A brief description of what you saw and heard, and perhaps someone give me some background on the woman.”
“You’ll send a copy of your report to Valois?” Serafina asked.
“Of course.”
When they’d each written an account of the events in Elena’s studio, they rode in the carriage, making arrangements for rooms at a hotel recommended to them by the driver, clean, pleasant, and close to the hospital.
The afternoon was hot, the air, still.
“It’s all my fault. I should have known how mad she was,” Serafina said. She rocked back and forth.
When they arrived, she vowed she would keep him alive, staying by his side without sleeping or eating, except during the cleansing of his wound.
“His chances, Doctor?” Serafina asked.
“We’ll know more after the operation,” the chief surgeon said. He was a kind man with a round face and half-moon glasses. “Pray, my dear.”
Serafina watched the procedure from the gallery, praying to the Virgin, impressed by the staff and the cleanliness and efficiency of the hospital.
After the operation, Loffredo, looking like a flattened version of himself was wheeled back into the room. Serafina followed.
The doctor paid a visit. “It entered his far right side, mercifully avoiding the major organs until it reached the stomach where we were able to extract it.”
He smiled and held the deadly thing between his thumb and forefinger. “The bullet is small, but he was standing relatively close to the shooter and the lead was propelled at a rapid velocity. It ricocheted off his ribcage, tearing through muscle and came to lodge in the wall of the stomach. The quick action of the police helped to prevent too much loss of blood, but he’s had internal bleeding.”