5 - Her Deadly Mischief (14 page)

Sary puffed a snort from her wide nostrils. “My mistress is in the crypt of San Fantin where she belongs. When she was alive, her family never did anything but stretch their hands out for gold. Why should they be allowed to carry her body out to their desolate sandbar?”

Poor Zulietta. Even in death she was caught between warring religions. Many years ago, the Hebrew cemetery had been consigned to the Lido, a barren, windswept island that protected our lagoon from the full force of the sea. From Liya, I understood that Jews must be buried in the dirt if they hoped to achieve life beyond death. Dirt was in short supply on Venice’s main island; most Christians were consigned to the crypts of their parish churches or to the convent cemetery on the nearby island of San Michele. If Zulietta’s spirit knew or cared where her earthly remains rested, I wondered which burial she would have chosen.

While Liya wrested details of the funeral from Sary, I put morbid thoughts aside and tried to imagine a living, vivacious Zulietta entertaining Signor Monday or Tuesday over an intimate dinner. Instead, I conjured the image of a tranquil woman in a quilted dressing gown reading alone by the light of an oil lamp.

Perhaps it was the books that crammed the shelves. Or the good taste displayed in the well-proportioned furniture, open writing desk, and wall panels painted with convincing
trompe l’oeil
scenes. But this casino didn’t strike me as a place meant for lascivious amusement. It seemed more like the comfortable study of a woman of letters. The only thing that marred the pleasant tone was some soiled articles of clothing draped over a chair, destined for the laundry no doubt.

“All this will be sold?” My sweeping gesture took in the entire room.

“All proceeds to be divided among my mistress’ mother and sisters.” Sary pursed her lips with a kind of helpless intensity.

“What about you and the footman?” Liya asked. “Didn’t your mistress provide for you?”

Her lips relaxed in a sad smile. “Don’t worry about us, Signora. We’ve been well taken care of. My mistress left cash bequests with orders to the magistrate to dispense at once.”

“I’m curious about your mistress,” I said. “What can you tell me about her?” As I took note of a gentleman’s jacket of silver-threaded blue brocade that lay on top of the laundry, I used a casual tone that I hoped wouldn’t startle this obviously intelligent woman into wondering why a singer from the opera was asking questions more appropriate for Messer Grande.

Sary fidgeted a bit before answering, “She was a kind mistress, Signore. What more could you wish to know?”

“I was onstage when she fell. It was a shocking scene.” I shook my head. “I would very much like to see her killer brought to justice. Can you think of anyone who meant her harm?”

It seemed that Sary was avoiding my question. She busied herself with rolling the jacket and other garments into a tight bundle and setting them on a nearby table. As she again reached for her broom, she murmured, “That is not for me to say, Signore.”

“What about Alessio Pino?”

She shrugged, sweeping at a nonexistent bit of fluff.

Liya spoke up encouragingly. “My husband has a knack for solving puzzles of all kinds. Even Messer Grande sometimes seeks his counsel.”

“Does he, now?” Sary sent me a long look. “Then I wish you luck. No one would like to see my mistress’ killer taken more than I would.”

I returned her level gaze. “You could help by telling me if you’ve seen Alessio Pino since he escaped from custody.”

She shook her kerchiefed head. “What strange questions you ask. This is the last place Signor Pino would show up.” Then she turned her attention to Liya. “You said you wanted a token of my mistress. Perhaps you’d like to look through her desk. She had several very nice pens. I’m sure we can find—”

“That will have to wait.” I rose and went to the bundle of clothing Sary had whisked from my sight. After digging through the bundle, I unfurled the blue brocade jacket. “If you’ve not seen Alessio Pino, then how does his jacket come to be here?”

Liya stared open-mouthed.

Sary took a deep breath, nostrils flared. “Before my mistress died, Signor Alessio was often here. If that is his jacket, he must have mislaid it.”

“No, Sary. I visited Alessio after he’d been arrested. He was wearing this very jacket. The pocket is torn, just as I noticed before.”

“You’re mistaken.”

“I’m quite certain.” I buried my nose in the expensive fabric, then held it out to the maid. “See for yourself. It still carries the stench of the guardhouse.”

Sary raised her broom as if she meant to wield it as a cudgel. Her ebony skin shone, stretched tight over brow and cheekbones. Her lips drew back from her white teeth. “Get out—both of you. You have no business—”

I heard a creak. Felt a draft of air. A door swung open wide.

Alessio Pino stood in the entrance to the bedchamber, shirt unlaced, loose chestnut hair dusting his shoulders.

“It’s all right, Sary.” His voice was heavy and resigned. “I’ll speak with Signor Amato.”

Chapter Eleven

“Have you ever heard of a place called South Carolina?” Alessio asked, leaning forward with hands on knees. His face had grown thinner in just a few days, and his brown eyes were sunken and shadowed.

Liya and I both shook our heads. After calming Sary, Alessio had thrown himself into a stuffed armchair and invited us to hear his story. He had insisted that Sary join us, but the maid shook her head vigorously. She retrieved an armless chair from the desk in the window recess and placed it in the archway that led to the foyer. She kept silent guard, neither in our company nor completely removed from it.

“South Carolina is one of the American colonies,” Alessio continued in a weary voice, “a remarkable place. The flat country near the coast is covered with rice marshes—they tell me acres and acres grow as far as the eye can see. Farther inland are plains with loose soil that are perfect for the cultivation of indigo. The planters own vast stretches of land and live like kings.”

“Ye—es,” I responded slowly. I’d heard of these American colonies whose goods and riches were competing with Venice’s traditional trade routes. Some said they would eventually make paupers of us all. “What does this…South Carolina have to do with you and Zulietta?”

Alessio gave a frustrated sigh. “Skilled artisans are in short supply throughout the colony. The residents need glass like beggars need shoes. In the principal city of Charles Town, buildings are sprouting like mushrooms, and in the backcountry, the planters are building villas to rival any we have on our mainland estates. Think of all the windows that must be glazed, the many tables and taverns that need drinking vessels. The opportunities for glassmakers are boundless.”

“Fine villas?” I asked. “I thought the warlike savages and wild beasts kept settlers from moving inland. And aren’t America’s towns just wilderness outposts?”

“Oh, Tito,” Liya put in. “America is becoming quite civilized. Papa told me of some distant cousins who traveled to a place called Philadelphia to take up the manufacture of silk. They describe it as a land of milk and honey. You just assume any town lacking an opera house must be located in a wilderness.”

Well, yes.

“Charles Town does have an opera house,” Alessio challenged my unspoken thought. “At least a theater of some kind, because I’m assured the populace enjoys plays and concerts in addition to all manner of recreations. There is society there—and a blossoming economy. So many boats transport country produce to the wharves, their rivers often resemble floating marketplaces, and the deep harbor can accommodate every type of sailing vessel. Ships arrive daily from all points of the globe—especially England and the Sugar Islands.”

“It sounds almost like the prosperous Venice of our fathers,” I said.

Alessio nodded, then continued wistfully, “With hard work, a glass master could build a fortune in Charles Town.”

“You were going to settle there—you and Zulietta,” Liya observed softly.

“We were going to make a new life in a land of fresh ideas and promises,” Alessio answered in a rasping whisper, “far from the sink of vice that Venice has become, completely beyond the reach of my father’s petty tyrannies.” The exhausted young man paused to stroke his unshaven chin. He threw a longing glance toward the open door of the bedchamber, and I almost thought he was going to shed tears. But Alessio went on, straightening his shoulders like a soldier setting off on a twenty-mile march.

“Zulietta and I weren’t going alone. We were taking several of the men from the factory along with their families—they all have more skill at blowing glass than I do. In the New World, they will be acknowledged glass masters and I’ll run the business. Charles Town is the perfect location for a glassworks. It has pure beach sand, sea plants rich with potash, plenty of fuel in the cypress swamps, and most importantly, investors willing to fund construction of the crucible kilns. A pair of agents from Charles Town approached me last winter, and I’ve been making plans for emigration ever since. The only thing left was to arrange passage for the lot of us.”

Now I understood. The meeting Alessio had refused to tell Messer Grande about was with the captain of a ship leaving for America. It had to be conducted in utmost secrecy because of the Council of Ten’s proscription against glassmakers quitting the Venetian Republic. Alessio was planning nothing less than the deliverance of his father’s put-upon workers. I remembered the anxious inventor of the petal-scope, his fear that his young master’s imprisonment would
ruin everything
.

“Is Zenobio one of the men who intended to make the journey?” I asked.

Alessio gazed at me steadily. “Are you making a habit of questioning all my associates?”

“I met Zenobio by chance, when Messer Grande ordered me over to Murano. I was needed to take your father’s measure, just as I took yours.”

Alessio managed a weak laugh. “So the astute lawman suspects Father of plunging a knife in Zulietta’s ribs, eh? He can’t know Cesare Pino very well. My father might have wished Zulietta dead in her grave—he’d ordered me to give her up time and again—but he would never have sent her there himself. That would risk his immortal soul. He might end up roasting on Satan’s spit alongside one of the Hebrews he hates so much.”

“And yet your father was on the scene, actually standing outside the box rattling the door handle while Zulietta fought her attacker.” That was Liya.

“He’s not your man,” Alessio snapped. “Do you not agree, Signor Amato? You are the closest thing to an eyewitness that exists.”

“If the observations of a man who stood across the breadth of the theater are of any worth, I do agree with you. The killer’s gaze practically leapt out of the holes of his mask. I doubt your father could muster such a powerful stare given the mutilation to his eye. What I find more intriguing is the anonymous message that brought your father to the theater in the first place.”

“A message? I’ve not heard anything about a message.” Alessio narrowed his eyes and stared at the slatted pattern of light on the neatly arranged bookshelves.

“I suppose the glassworkers who broke you out of the guardhouse weren’t aware of it.”

“I haven’t explained who made my escape possible,” he quickly retorted, snapping his focus back to me.

“You didn’t have to. Who else would be so desperate to gain your freedom? On the one hand were the
garzoni
and
serventi
under your father’s domination, watching as their chance for advancement slipped away. On the other was the ship’s captain either foolish enough to risk the Ten’s reprisal or willing to avoid the port of Venice until the incident would be long forgotten. You were the only link between the workers and their passage, and you were trapped behind bars. I can imagine their frustration, the many whispered conferences. The weather has been fine, how many days would the captain wait before setting off for America? I’m only surprised your rescuers delayed so long.”

Alessio glared, lips pressed firmly together.

“Not going to tell me if I’ve hit the mark? Point of honor and all that?”

He rubbed the back of his neck, then replied, “I have the right to discuss my own affairs, but I’ll not reveal information that could harm good men.”

“So be it.” Seeing that there would be no changing his mind, I explained about the message that sent his father rowing over to Venice like a madman. “Do you have any idea who was behind it?”

Liya added, “It had to be someone who knew about the culmination of the wager—someone who realized Zulietta would be displayed in your box for all to see.”

Alessio chewed his lip, seemingly deep in thought. Liya must have been uncomfortable with the silence for she brought up a new subject. “It’s a shame about your father’s injury. Around the blazin
g kilns, I suppose accidents like that happen quite often.”

“It wasn’t an accident,” Alessio tossed back. He cleared his throat several times, and I realized he was struggling to regain command of his voice. At last, he continued, “When my mother died, and the infant along with her, my father was crazed with grief. I was too young to remember, but I’ve pieced the story together from scraps I picked up from servants’ gossip and loose-lipped workmen.”

Liya and I inclined forward in unison, Cesare’s mysterious message forgotten for the moment.

“My mother’s labor was so prolonged, my father dismissed our local doctor and sent over to Venice for a medical man renowned for saving difficult births. This doctor convinced my father that all would be well. Of course, it wasn’t. Hours passed, and still the child refused to leave the womb. With my mother near death, the doctor cut her open hoping to at least save the infant. Neither survived. After my father viewed the bloody scene, he ran straight to the factory and threw himself in the kiln. His workers immediately pulled him out, but…” Alessio released a long breath. “You’ve seen the damage, Signor Amato.”

Liya sank back against the sofa cushion. As she murmured condolences, I thought of the learned ghetto physicians who were often called to Christian sickbeds as a last resort. In exception to the prevailing curfew, a physician attending a patient was allowed through the gates at any hour. Even the Doge was rumored to sometimes employ a doctor from the ghetto. I asked bluntly, “The doctor who tended your mother, was he a Jew?”

“Indeed he was,” Alessio answered in a hushed tone. “My father’s hatred of Jews is deep and intensely personal. When he found out about my love for Zulietta, he was cut to the quick. He made all sorts of threats, but against me, not her. If I persisted in the affair, he would never allow me to run the business—he would cut me off entirely—he would sell the glassworks to a stranger. He actually believed marrying me into the aristocracy would bring me to heel—poor little Maria was to be some sort of prize.” Alessio gave his head a vigorous shake. “Father and I were at a complete impasse.”

“You and Zulietta must have been seeing each other for some time,” I said. “Months before the wager with La Samsona.”

Alessio managed a strained smile. For the first time, he addressed the silent woman in the doorway. “How long, Sary? I’ve missed so much sleep, I don’t trust my head for dates, but I know you remember.”

The black woman rose and drew near. She stood with one arm folded across her belly and the other hand to her cheek, the pose of a worried woman, no matter what her race. “Seven months, Signor Alessio. My mistress met you at the theater when it reopened after Lent. She brought you home that very night.” After a sigh, Sary added, “Nothing has been the same since.”

“Of course,” Alessio answered. “It was late March. What a lovely spring it was—just Zulietta and I spending long nights here, and when we felt the need of air, taking a boat to a secluded garden on the Giudecca where no questions are ever asked. This casino was our sanctuary. We were in paradise—until my father intruded with his dictums and threats.”

“So the wager over the jewels must have been a complete sham,” I said. “You and Zulietta were already lovers.”

Alessio nodded slowly.

“Was La Samsona in on it?” Liya asked. “Did she know about you two?”

Sary threw back her head and gave a throaty laugh.

“In on it, you ask?” Alessio replied with a hint of a smile. “Quite the opposite. Zulietta hatched the plan when she realized La Samsona had taken a fancy to me.

“What an obnoxious woman! Dripping jewels, reeking with scent, she pursued me at every masquerade, ridotto, or concert I attended. At the opera, she would send her footman around with invitations as endless and regular as the lagoon tides. If she did manage to worm her way into my company, she couldn’t keep those huge hands off me. La Samsona assumed I was without female company, you see. Up until then, Zulietta and I had been very discreet in order to keep gossip from reaching my father’s ears.”

“What was this plan? Were La Samsona’s diamonds and pearls meant to fund passage to the New World? What about Zulietta’s jewels?”

Alessio gave me a heavy-lidded look, then gestured to Sary. “Fetch your mistress’ jewel box, if you please.”

The black woman stepped into the bedchamber and returned with a sizeable marquetry casket which she placed on Alessio’s lap. When he flipped the lid open, we saw it was empty save for some simple gold bracelets, a long string of pearls, and several pairs of earrings.

“She’d already sold most of her things?” Liya asked.

Alessio nodded. “Little by little she’d sold everything except these pieces her father gave her. Zulietta would never part with these, and La Samsona would have grown suspicious if she hadn’t worn any jewelry at all.”

“Zulietta didn’t hold back,” I observed.

“Neither of us did. Once we decided on our course of action, we set about to gather as much gold as possible. Since we could never return to Venice, Zulietta was determined to leave her mother well provided for. Besides the exorbitant payment Captain Vinci demanded, I was going to use the funds from the wager to also leave my father a sum that would compensate him for the loss of my work.”

Liya pursed her lips. “What sum could possibly compensate a father for the loss of a son, especially when he’s already lost so much?”

“You think me cruel,” Alessio replied gravely. “I’ve tried to get along with my father, I truly have, but even before I met Zulietta, I couldn’t countenance the shabby treatment of his workers. There’s no pride in loyalty to a tyrant. A complete break was necessary.”

Liya opened her mouth and shut it just as quickly. Before she ducked her head, I saw tears glittering in her eyes. I fancied she was thinking of Pincas, her own deserted father, though one as least like a tyrant as possible.

“What are you going to do now?” I asked Alessio. “The Council is convinced you murdered Zulietta. If you remain in Venice, you’ll be arrested again, and this time there will be no escape.”

He sighed. “I promised the glassworkers I would lead them to a new land, and I intend to keep that promise.”

“How?”

“That I don’t know, but I’ve made my promise and I will fulfill it.” Alessio set his jaw and his eyes shone with a steady light. Had I ever been that young and unafraid? He went on, “Perhaps I can tap my investors a bit farther. We’ll see. But I refuse to leave Venice until I discover who killed my Zulietta. That’s why I’m talking to you—you appear to have your own reasons for finding the brute.”