Frail Barrier (18 page)

‘Jack of all trades, you know,' Urbino responded. ‘I confess to being a bit of a dilettante. I might as well admit to it, maybe be a little proud of it, since I'm criticized for it. Turn it into a virtue.'

‘The more I know about you the more I realize that you would have had a lot in common with my stepfather. Pity you never met. I don't mean that
he
solved crimes, but he was a dilettante, too. And I see it as a distinct virtue. Tell me, are you working on one of your books now?'

‘Goethe's experiences in Venice. But I've barely begun. Do you know Goethe?'

‘I'm afraid not. But my stepfather collected editions of his works. They're in the house in Munich.' Hollander opened and closed the little wooden doors on the Moroccan mirror. ‘And what about in the realm of detecting? Are you involved in anything there?'

‘It's high season for tourism, but fortunately low season for crime. At least the kind I'm interested in.'

‘Not bag-snatchings and muggings and cut-throat pricing?'

‘No.'

‘What does attract you?'

‘It has to have something of a personal nature in it.'

‘What do you mean?'

‘I know it well enough when it comes along. Sometimes it sneaks up on me and sometimes it gives me a good, sharp bite.'

Hollander considered Urbino's response. He stared at the Moroccan mirror. Despite his humor, Hollander seemed uncomfortable with the topic of Urbino's sleuthing. This tended to be the response of most people, but in this instance Hollander had been the one to bring it up.

When he turned his face to Urbino, he smiled. ‘You know what I'd like to see?' he said. ‘If you don't mind, that is.'

‘What?'

‘Your gondola. It seems to have stopped raining, for a while at least. I'll help you take off the tarpaulin and put it back on.'

‘Let's go down,' Urbino said.

As they were walking down the staircase, Urbino said, ‘I'd take you out in it but Gildo isn't here and even if he were, I wouldn't impose on him. I've given him some time off. Not only because of the heat we've been having, but also because of the regatta. Maybe we can do it another time, after the regatta, and in better weather than this.'

Half an hour later, after seeing the gondola and examining the
felze
with a great deal of interest, this being the first time he had seen the small, detachable cabin outside of paintings and photographs, Hollander thanked Urbino and set out for the Gritti Palace on foot.

‘So tell me,
caro
, did Nick enjoy himself after I left the two of you together?' the contessa asked Urbino over the telephone that evening from Asolo.

‘He seemed to.'

Urbino described Hollander's visit. When he finished, he asked her what she thought of Hollander.

‘I like him,' she responded without any hesitation. ‘He's intelligent and interesting, and he has a good sense of humor. He reminds me of a cultivated sea captain.'

‘I don't quite see that.'

‘All that tanned skin and his bright blue eyes? And that bald head? All he needs are some side whiskers and a pipe. Well, maybe I got to know him better than you have so far. We had a nice talk over lunch. The more he told me about his stepfather the more I realized how unfortunate it is that we never had the opportunity to know him.'

‘Hollander does talk about him a lot.'

‘You somehow make that sound bad!'

‘Do I?'

‘Yes, you do. Don't you like him?'

Urbino decided to make a joke of it. ‘I like him a lot better than I thought I would when I heard that he's Sebastian's friend.'

‘Sebastian is a fine boy. That's not very nice of you.'

But Urbino could tell that the contessa was amused. She had her own criticisms of her young cousin.

‘By the way,' Urbino said, ‘did you mention anything to him about Albina?'

‘Not a single word. I didn't even come close to a slip the way I did about Benigni. So you told him about them and he didn't know?'

‘He gave every appearance of not knowing.'

‘But you think he might have.'

The contessa sounded a little irritated.

‘I have to keep an open mind, Barbara. Don't forget that although we don't know anything against him or anything that connects him to Albina, he inherited a veritable fortune. The apartment on the Grand Canal and everything in it, and from what he said, Zoll's house in Munich with Zoll's art collection.'

‘All that's good reason for having killed Zoll. It has nothing to do with Albina.' The contessa drew in her breath sharply. ‘But listen to me! Is this what you've brought me to? You—'

The contessa broke off, as if hesitant about voicing her thoughts.

‘Listen, Barbara,' Urbino said in a placating tone, ‘you might understand why I have to be open-minded and cautious – why
we
have to be cautious – after I tell you what I learned today before I joined the two of you for lunch.'

He gave an account of his conversations with Clementina and Perla.

‘But I don't understand exactly what all this has to do with Nick,' the contessa said when he finished.

‘Maybe nothing, but maybe something. And maybe a lot, at that. Of course, we already knew that he had a connection with Benigni, but we didn't know he had one, so to speak, with Albina.'

‘So to speak? What does that mean?'

‘It means that since Albina knew Zoll and Benigni, he could have known Albina – through them. But by saying that I get a little ahead of myself.'

‘You are
too
far ahead of
me
!'

‘Surely you see it, Barbara? When I said that I was suspicious about Albina's death and when we agreed that three deaths so quickly together were unusual, we had no idea that there was any relationship between the three of them.'

The contessa took this in without any immediate response. Then she said, ‘But why are you so focused only on Nick Hollander?'

‘I'm not.'

‘Because there's the little
cartaio
,' the contessa pointed out. ‘Benigni was her brother – her half-brother. And she knew Zoll and Albina.'

‘Exactly.' Urbino paused. ‘And Perla. She knew all three. She was providing Zoll with herbs.'

‘And from Perla we can move to Romolo, I suppose?'

Urbino seemed to detect a slight ironic tone in the contessa's words.

‘Yes.' He decided to take her words at face value. ‘Following a certain line of logic we can, and should. To get back to Hollander, there's something I'd like you to do.'

‘I'm afraid to ask what it is.'

‘I'd like information on Hollander Tours. How they're doing financially. What kind of reputation they have. Who might be involved with the firm besides Hollander and his mother. It wouldn't be hard for your solicitor in London to find out information like that, would it? And if anyone knew he was looking for information, there would be no way to link it directly with you or me.'

‘I could do that. Is it important?'

‘It could be. We can neglect nothing that might bring us closer to the truth. And I think I'll get Rebecca's help with something else. She has contacts in Munich. She worked with a colleague on a project there. Several lawyers were involved. Maybe she can find out about Zoll's will. And meanwhile there are other angles to look into. No, I'm not focusing only on Hollander, but at the moment he suggests some of the most obvious angles. Because of the money, though I'm not saying that Zoll was murdered.'

‘I'll ring Bascomb tomorrow,' the contessa said. ‘But we shouldn't expect him to get back to me right away. It's the end of August. Most of his office is on holiday. It might not be until after the regatta that we hear from him. In the meantime, why don't you try to get these notions out of your head? Unless you think that there's some reason for urgency?'

‘You know the answer to that. In situations like these, there always is. Or at least we must assume there is. Give my regards to Ausonio.'

Ausonio was the conte's nephew from Capri.

After his conversation with the contessa, Urbino called Rebecca Mondador. It didn't prove hard to enlist her help, and he didn't have to tell her more than he wanted or needed to. She was happy enough that her suspicions about his involvement in another case were confirmed and that she could be of assistance again.

That night Urbino took another corpse tour of the city, but this one was different from the one he had indulged in last week.

All the corpses on this night's tour were recent.

The rain had come to an abrupt stop before midnight, but now, as Urbino walked to Dorsoduro, there were dark, rolling clouds overhead. The city was the way he liked it. Empty, silent, serene. Urbino and the few other lone souls were like night guards making their rounds of the corridors of a vast museum after the crowds had departed. A sense of camaraderie passed between them as they met each other in the night.

Some of the
calli
were flooded, but tonight, so as not to impede him on his walk, Urbino had put on a pair of high boots he had bought last winter on a visit to relatives in Inveraray. And in his pocket was a flashlight.

His first stop on his tour was a dank
sottoportico
between the Grand Canal and the Campo Santa Margherita. The odor of decaying garbage and cat urine was faint but unmistakable. Pools of water were like black glass.

He played his flashlight over the uneven stones. A cigarette butt was wedged against one wall of the
sottoportico
where the pavement was slightly higher. There was no way of knowing whether it had escaped the cleaning that Giulietta had given the area yesterday or had been deposited afterward. The cigarette had not completely disintegrated, and still revealed traces of blood-red lipstick.

This was where Albina had died. Since she hadn't collected her keys from Da Valdo, she must have died on her way to the café – unless she had decided to return before getting there or been forced to do so by the storm or something else – or someone.

Information about the physical disposition of the body on the stones might have helped him to determine whether Albina had been on her way to her apartment or from it when she had died. This was the kind of information only the police would have. On some of his previous cases, Urbino had established contact with the Questura, and received the begrudging help of the commissario. But he didn't think that the circumstances of this case would encourage Commissario Gemelli to open an investigation or give Urbino any information. And his relationship with the man had always been strained, at best, even when Urbino had helped him solve crimes for which Gemelli took most of the credit.

Urbino stared down at the stones. Had Albina been rushing? She had been tired that night, so he doubted that her pace had been any quicker alone than it had been with him. No one seemed to have seen her. But Urbino believed that she had encountered at least one person, and in far less pleasant circumstances than Urbino had been encountering people tonight.

Some person, either a stranger or an acquaintance, possibly even a friend, had been responsible for her death.

Urbino had an instinct about these things, and something wasn't right. The fact that someone had broken into the Gonella apartment only reinforced his suspicions. Some person, for some reason, had been after Albina, and had caused her death, had benefited from it. This person was now happy she was dead, but not just happy. Surely also anxious and worried about being exposed.

Albina might very well have died from a heart attack – although he wasn't convinced of even this – but a heart attack could be provoked, either intentionally or not. Fright, a struggle, a fatigued woman trying to run away from danger – any of these could have brought about a crisis in a person who had a heart condition. And he shouldn't forget about the possibility that some substance, under the guise of a medication or, unbeknownst to her, put in her food or drink, could have caused the attack.

With one last look at where Albina had spent her last moments, Urbino left the
sottoportico
.

He walked down the dark, silent
calli
and through the deserted Campo Santa Margherita and the Campo Barnabà to another spot in Dorsoduro. It was at the far end of the quarter, in the area between the Palazzo Guggenheim and the Salute. He walked down half its length until he stood beneath a building that was in the process of being renovated. The lower windows were boarded over. A temporary metal door had been installed at the entrance. All the shutters had been removed. No construction scrim had been placed around the building.

He leaned back and looked up toward the roof. He could make out an empty space about three feet wide in a corner of the top story. The sky was visible through it. Transferring his gaze to the pavement, he saw a small pile of bricks placed neatly on the ground and against the side of the building.

This was the
calle
that Clementina Foppa had mentioned, the one where her half-brother had been killed. Surely the storm would not have been able to do any damage to Benigni if the parapet stone had been secured properly. He examined the pavement again but couldn't see any evidence of the stone, which must have broken into pieces. The fragments must have been cleared away.

The young man's family would be entitled to compensation if there had been any neglect and it could be proved. Once again Urbino regretted that he didn't have access to information that was in the possession of the police. They surely would have looked into the matter because of the circumstances and its implications for compensation to the victim's relatives.

Who would get the money if money were forthcoming? Clementina? Their mother? Benigni's father? Were Benigni's mother and father still alive? Urbino knew little about Benigni and nothing about his family.