A Rich Full Death (25 page)

Meanwhile I at last heard from Beatrice’s lips the news I had longed for—that Browning had been to visit her, and she had severed her relations with him.

‘I said that I was grateful for all he had done for me, but that his visits had become inconvenient, since I had lately been the subject of the attentions of another gentleman, who had proposed marriage to me. I thought it better to say so’—she went on quickly, having caught the look I gave her.

‘Did he ask who he was, this gentleman?’

‘No.’

What
did
he say?’ I asked in some exasperation. I had expected something more satisfying than this.

‘Nothing, at first. He just looked at me very long and very hard. Then he shrugged, like one who wishes to pretend that he does not care. “Very well,” he said. “But you’ll be sorry!” ‘

‘Was it a threat?’ I asked.

‘I don’t know. Perhaps. Or a prophecy.’

A dark cloud seemed to settle on her face, normally so serene, and I made haste to dissipate it with renewed demonstrations of affection.

‘At all events,’ I pursued, ‘the important thing is that he is out of your life—out of both our lives. Why should we mind what he says? He cannot harm us!’

But Beatrice remained doubtful.

‘For my sake, be careful!’ she urged. ‘He is clever, and has powerful friends. Such men are always dangerous.’

The rest of the weekend and the Monday passed without further incident, and shortly before ten o’clock on the morning of Shrove Tuesday, in accordance with our arrangement, I presented myself at Mr Grant’s suite. I found that former pillar of the City of London already fully attired in the costume he had ordered, and as excited as a girl on the eve of her first ball. We accordingly wasted no further time in joining the merry throng in the streets, where everyone in Florence—rich or poor, young or old, foreign or native—was out savouring the intoxicating atmosphere of light-hearted revelry.

It must be admitted that much of the entertainment on offer is of a distinctly juvenile variety: bags full of lime and flour are carried, and liberal quantities of both distributed indiscriminately in all directions, and dropped on to the heads of the passers-by from balconies and windows—all to the accompaniment of loud squeals and giggles. Missiles far more dangerous are the
confetti
. These were originally sweetmeats, but are now more usually plaster imitations, rock-hard, which are flung with merciless force at any unsuspecting or distracted bystander, the more venerable or respected the better. Indeed, this aspect of Carnival epitomises life in Italy, where there are no bystanders, and the highest possible tax is levied on anyone who allows his attention to be distracted for a single moment from his immediate surroundings.

My masked companion and I proceeded at a leisurely pace through the streets and piazzas, where Mr Grant attracted much attention. But the Florentines are above all an articulate race— from a jester they expect jests, and finding my companion unable to satisfy this want, despite his fetching costume, they soon deserted us to admire some other prodigy. But these fickle folk were immediately replaced by fresh admirers, so that upon the whole Mr Grant had no reason to feel that his efforts had been wasted.

The fresh air soon gave us an appetite, and as Grant wished everything that day to be as typically Florentine and as different from his usual life as possible, I took him where no foreigner would normally dream of going—to a little cook-shop near Santa Croce, where we dined off the modest local fare—slices of fried polenta, artichoke fritters, chestnut dumplings and river fish, with a flask of the new wine to take off the taste of the old oil. Mr Grant enjoyed himself hugely, making a considerable impression both on the other clients of the establishment and on our flask of wine, which in turn made a considerable impression on him.

Midday had struck when we at length arrived in the great square before the Franciscans’ basilica, where the procession was already forming up. By and by it moved off amid the clacking of hooves and the rumble of wheels. As the leading coach-and-six lumbered by we caught a glimpse of the Grand-Duke Leopold himself, waving mechanically to the crowd. He is an utterly inoffensive and insignificant person, who would do very well as Governor of Rhode Island. His sole wish in life—to be spared any trouble whatsoever—is one which he is unlikely to be granted, the times being what they are. But it cannot be denied that he has done far better by his subjects than many Italian sovereigns, and it is a measure of how exaggerated some reports of their discontent have been that he is able to appear in public protected by no more than a couple of lackeys and an ornamental cuirassier or two. As for the notorious Austrians, they were nowhere to be seen—having no doubt realised that whatever pleasure they might extract from the spectacle would hardly compensate for the twitting and the taunts they would have to endure.

After the horse guards, looking as operatic as such characters generally do south of the Alps, came another equipage enshrining the Grand-Duchess—a much more formidable proposition; one of the Neapolitan Bourbons of the grand old ‘Let them eat cake!’ stock—and then a long train of more or less decrepit carriages filled with the nobility of Florence.

I now suggested to Mr Grant that we might to advantage cross town and watch the
défilé
pass down Via Tornabuoni to the Piazza Santa Trinità, where the quality and the foreign community most thickly gather. Here, I hinted, my companion might Le advantage of the licence of Carnival to play a prank or two upon some of his friends. We accordingly set off through the heart of the old city towards the river. The streets, as I had expected, were eerily deserted, their inhabitants having taken themselves off to enjoy the gratuitous entertainment.

I was more than a little worried about the time, but when I finally emerged in the Trinity square the procession—which makes a long detour by way of the Cathedral—was not yet in sight. I accordingly took a turn up and down the street, accompanied at a slight distance by my masked companion. I was recognised and hailed by a number of friends and acquaintances, and thus the time passed very agreeably. The only slightly discordant note was struck by the very large number of uniformed police to be seen about the square—a show of force which no one to whom I spoke seemed able to explain.

At length I fell in with a company which included Mr Hiram Powers and Dr Harding, a local physician. The conversation turned upon the terrible slaughter in the Crimea, where Harding has a son serving — this is indeed the modern way of sending our fellow-creatures to the next world, Prescott! A thousand here, a thousand there: a whole nation of the dead raised at one fell swoop. It makes the efforts of our murderer here in Florence seem as much of an anachronism as Cellini’s salt-cellar beside the serried ranks of the standard Birmingham model!

Suddenly I caught sight of the slight figure of Commissioner Antonio Talenti moving slowly and watchfully through the crowd. I immediately extricated myself from the discussion on the war in the East, and went to greet him.

‘Are you alone, Signor Boot?’ the police official remarked, with that insinuating smile of his.

‘No, I am with Mr Grant,’ I replied, indicating the figure in motley who was busily jingling his bells at some attractive young ladies.

‘And Mr Browning? Where is he today?’ Talenti pursued.

‘I have not the slightest idea, I am afraid. I have severed all connections with Mr Browning.’

The Commissioner gave me an appreciative glance.

‘Really? You have done well, Signor Boot.’

‘I trust that you are not expecting anything in the nature of a disturbance?’ I asked the police official, who never ceased peering alertly this way and that the whole time we were talking.

‘I received a note this morning, hinting that some attempt might be made to disrupt the Carnival as it passed along Via Tornabuoni,’ he murmured. ‘It is most likely a hoax, but I am bound to take every precaution.’

Since Talenti appeared to be in a confiding mood, I asked him if any further progress had been made in apprehending those responsible for the murder of Mr Tinker. But it appeared that the police were baffled, principally because of the apparent absence of any motive for the crime.

‘Motive is what always traps the criminal in the end, Signor Boot!’ the official told me. ‘CW
bono?
as our ancestors put it. Find that out, and ten to one you have your man. But in this case there appears to be no answer to this question, and so for the moment we remain in the dark.’

While we had been talking the procession had come in sight at the end of the street, along which it proceeded towards us at crawling pace, at length rolling past to some rather desultory cheers. To the Commissioner’s evident relief no incident occurred, and the crowd began to disperse to seek further diversion at one of the many public and private functions which enliven the final evening of the Carnival.

I looked around, but could not see the figure of the portly jester anywhere, although until then he had been as conspicuous as a circus elephant. Talenti had already taken his leave of me and was walking away, but I went after him and asked if he had noticed Mr Grant leaving; he had not. My companion seemed to have been there one moment and gone the next.

Then, suddenly, one of the constables came running up to Talenti and gabbled out some news so quickly that I could catch only two words. But that was enough, for the words were ‘terrible’ and ‘murder’!

I was of course quite forgotten as the Commissioner barked orders at his men and ran off down an ancient street leading off into the slum quarters. I followed as fast as I could, but what with one thing and another it was five minutes before I caught sight of a knot of people huddled about the entrance to a little courtyard. I pushed my way forward, and by dint of much ruthless elbowing and peering over shoulders was able to make out what they were looking at.

The yard was occupied by a workshop where boats are brought from the nearby Arno to be repaired and recaulked. Several of these vessels lay about, together with a prodigious quantity of timber—and an enormous cauldron of pitch, with a fire of wood-shavings smouldering underneath it, on which all attention was fixed. Or rather not on the kettle itself, but on the pair of legs that were hanging over the side of it.

Two constables were endeavouring manfully, but without apparent success, to raise the remainder of the body out of the molten pitch in which it was entirely submerged. But neither I nor Commissioner Talenti—who was seemingly engaged in a heated altercation with one of the bystanders—needed any further clue as to the identity of the victim. Those dangling shanks told their own pathetic tale, clad as they were in tight-fitting gaily-coloured jester’s motley.

Suddenly I heard my name called out—and realised in the same instant that the man quarrelling with Talenti was none other than Robert Browning.

There he is!’ cried Browning. ‘God be praised—it is the man himself! Mr Booth, kindly explain to this overbearing official that you did indeed write me that letter! Come, all will soon be clear!’

Talenti motioned to me to come forward. Browning, I was told, claimed to have received a letter from me, urging him at all costs to meet me that afternoon just a few steps from where we were standing. It was for that reason that he had been at the spot where the police had arrrested him a few minutes before.

‘Well, Signor Boot?’ Talenti demanded.
‘Did
you send this man such a letter?’

Browning was looking at me with the calm confidence of one who is about to be vindicated at last.

‘I am sorry, Browning,’ I said to him. ‘I cannot continue to lie to the police.’

Then, turning to the Commissioner: ‘I know nothing of any letter, and certainly did not ask this man, or anyone else, to meet me here this afternoon.’

‘That will do!’ cried Talenti in a voice of triumph. And he directed his constables to take Browning away.

My former associate, for his part, shot me a look of infinite contempt.

‘You will be sorry for this!’ he hissed. ‘Both of you!’

The formula was the same—deliberately so, I felt—as he had used to Beatrice. But while she had been in some doubt as to whether or not it had been meant as a threat, I was left in none whatsoever. I did not make any atttempt to respond, however, contenting myself with maintaining a dignified silence.

Of course, it was easier for me to be gracious, for it was not I who was being hauled off to the Bargello like a common criminal this time! On the contrary, if there is one person in Florence other than the Grand-Duke himself who is utterly above suspicion in this affair, then it is your correspondent. How could it be otherwise, when during the entire time from Grant’s disappearance in Via Tornabuoni to the discovery of his corpse in the courtyard I was engaged in conversation with Police Commissioner Antonio Talenti himself! A finer alibi could not be wished for, I think.

Before leaving the scene, I could not help remarking the attention being given by spectators and police alike to an inscription in chalk upon the hull of a nearby wherry. It read: