Let it be Me (Blue Raven) (8 page)

“It was not the seduction and betrayal—it was her telling of it.”

Oliver refrained from allowing his judgment to show on his face. Again, when the muse left Vincenzo . . . women, women, women. The more troublesome, the better. And the beautiful, vain, and spoiled Signora Galetti had certainly proved troublesome. What did Vincenzo think would happen when he started up with her? And then started up with her maid?

“But she is making up for it now,” Vincenzo continued. “With this!”

He stood up with his characteristic energy, his mood swinging into elation as easily as it could in high dudgeon. He rummaged through a pile of letters and scratched-out sheets of music that littered the top of the pianoforte, beneath it all finding two pieces of card and, with a triumphant flourish, handing them to Oliver.

They were heavy stock, ornately gilded around the edges. He turned them over in his hand. But it was what was written on them that was most interesting.

“This is an invitation . . . to the Marchese’s ball.”

“It is.” Vincenzo smiled mischievously at him.

“I’m assuming that the Marchese does not know that you have this. Because if he did, either his guards would be here to take it back or all would be forgiven and his servants would be moving you back into the palazzo.”

“True, he does not know. But I ran into the Signora Galetti the other day at the Piazza San Marco—”

“Because you just run into aristocratic ladies walking around the city all the time, do you?” Oliver interjected sardonically.

Vincenzo ignored him. “Her husband is at the villa near Padua for the winter. Antonia—the Signora—has been so saddened by his departure, she has taken to walking through the piazza. So I paid a call or two on her recently, to keep her company. She feels very badly for what happened between us, and said I should attend her father’s ball.”

“But if the Marchese doesn’t know you are coming, he’ll throw you out on sight.”

“No, he won’t.”

“You have a greater faith in your ability to beg than I do, then.”

“No, he won’t,” Vincenzo continued patiently, “because it is a
Carnival
ball. Everyone will be wearing carnival masks.”

Oliver ruminated and had to admit there was some intelligence to that argument. Carnival masks, faces blank and frozen, were used for hundreds of years to hide the identity of anyone—thus, one could be dancing with a Duchess as easily as with a milkmaid. Some had been made of plaster, some heavy ceramic, some embellished with paints and gold, some austere and staring. Yet all were strangely beautiful and grotesque.

While they had been banned during Napoleon’s reign, the tradition had begun to filter its way back in during the height of the Carnival season. And for someone of the Marchese’s consequence, no Austrian Emperor was going to kick up any fuss.

The mask could make Vincenzo as anonymous as the next guest. And chances were the ball would be so crowded, one more person would not be remarked upon.

“So . . .” Oliver said slowly, putting together the pieces of Vincenzo’s jumbled plan in his head. “You sneak into this party, find an opportunity to play your new piece. You tell the Marchese it is dedicated to him and only him. And once he sees that you and Antonia have mended fences, all will be forgiven?”

Vincenzo blinked at the mention of Antonia, as if he had not considered her as more than a stepping-stone on his path to the Marchese. But he then nodded fervently, latching on to the idea.

“
Si
,
si
, I will make it known the lady loves me once again. And when the Marchese hears this music, he will fall to pieces weeping, and I will once again live in the light of Venice!”

Vincenzo finished his speech with a flourish, his future triumph vibrating through his wiry frame. Oliver was always struck that such a lean, sinewy individual could have so much energy. Oliver himself was much more solidly built and seemed, therefore, much more grounded. Then again, Oliver had spent his formative years in boxing lessons, and Vincenzo had spent his at a pianoforte. And while Oliver could not help but envy Vincenzo’s talent, there was one thing that went along with his grounding that Vincenzo never seemed to grasp. Practicality.

“Well, I had better get started, then,” Oliver said on a sigh. “It’s rather late for us to get proper costumes. There isn’t a chance that any tailor could make something up in two days . . . our only hope of finding any masks is likely at La Fenice. I’ll ask my friends there, although I have a feeling every opera singer in Venice is invited, and therefore their stores are likely well picked over.”

“Us?” Vincenzo looked up at him, happy surprise in his voice. “You mean you will come as my guest, help me with the Marchese?”

Oliver sighed again. “Of course I’ll help you. If you go by yourself I will likely end up paying for your release from prison. I figure the expense of a second costume is much cheaper.”

Oliver was being glib, he knew, but deep inside, a spark of hope came to life. This could be the solution to their difficulties. If Vincenzo found himself back in the Marchese’s good graces, Oliver could start putting his meager funds into his warehouse-theatre. It was far-fetched, but if Vincenzo could do it . . .

“Marvelous!” Vincenzo cried, clapping his hands like a pleased child, for all that he was in his thirties. “I will come with you to pick out costumes. The costumer at La Fenice adores me; they will have something for us.”

“No. That is my part. You have your own work to do.”

“Nothing that can’t wait until the afternoon,” Vincenzo replied with a wave.

But Oliver pushed him back firmly to his seat at the pianoforte.

“I will arrange the costumes. You have a masterpiece to finish.” Oliver checked his pocket watch. “And seventy-eight hours in which to do it.”

Six

T
H
E
Marchese di Garibaldi was not a man who did things by halves. It was an instinct bred by the generations of wealth and power that preceded him, the family name having been in the Golden Book for centuries before that document of Venice was forsaken. The Palazzo Garibaldi was evidence of that commitment to luxury. Built in the seventeenth century, designed by that god of Baroque architecture, Baldassarre Longhena, its three stories of white marble facade faced the Grand Canal. Lined with double colonnades, scrollwork, and flourishes, it spoke of greater wealth than anyone from the ancient lineage of the Merricks of East Sussex could dream of.

And that was just the outside.

The Marchese di Garibaldi was also one to hold to traditions. And as a product of the previous century, his version of Carnival was an echo of the old spectacle—bullfights in the streets, acrobats crowding the Piazza San Marco, and lavish, lavish parties that lasted from noon until dawn.

Even though the Austrians now controlled the city and so many of the old names had faded away, the Marchese liked to do what he could to keep the past alive.

“This is madness,” Oliver breathed, making the close air under his mask hot and humid. The Palazzo Garibaldi was lit by a thousand torches, making it as bright as day, a beacon calling to all the boats on the Grand Canal. Long lines of gondolas stretched all the way back to the Rialto Bridge.

“This is Venice, my friend.” Vincenzo clapped him on the shoulder, as they disembarked at the front steps of the palazzo. Oliver had to hold up his trouser legs up to keep them from dropping onto the wet stones.

They were each dressed in the only costumes the Teatro la Fenice had available, taken from her dusty attics. They were clowns, in the traditional commedia dell’arte style. Vincenzo had grudgingly taken the bright, diamond-patterned Harlequin with his cloak, cane, and nimble antics, while Oliver wore the loose white costume of the Pedrolino, with stiff ruffled collar and cone-shaped hat. However, they forwent the painted faces, instead wearing
bautas
, the traditional male Venetian Carnival mask.

With the dust and moths pounded out of the clown costumes and the
bautas
firmly in place, they looked as mysterious and anonymous as the next guest. But still—regarding the hulking guards at the door who silently took their invitation, a degree of caution was pragmatic.

Once they crossed the threshold, Oliver let out a small sigh of relief but refused to let his guard down for long.

The inside of the palazzo was no less opulent than the outside and would have been even without the festooned draperies and the trapeze artists hanging from the ceiling. Tintorettos lined the entryway; marble coated every surface. Unlike many of the palazzos that lined the Grand Canal, which had seen better days before the fall of the Republic, the Palazzo Garibaldi was still proud, still in its full flush of beauty.

And currently filled to the brim with a complete crush of men and women in seventeenth – and eighteenth-century costumes, drinking and dancing the last night of amusement away before they became penitent in the morning.

“Do you see the Marchese?” Oliver asked in Italian, scanning the room from behind his mask. “Or his daughter?”

“Hmm?” Vincenzo replied, distracted. “Oh, he will be found eventually. I would not worry so.”

“The whole point of this endeavor is for you to play your new piece for him, and to show him you and Antonia have mended fences.”

“Yes, yes.” Vincenzo waved his hand in the air. “But we should not attack the man the minute we are through the door. He will be much more relaxed later on into the evening.”

That made complete sense, of course, and Oliver nodded in agreement. But there was something about the way Vincenzo dismissed the notion with a wave and the barest quaver in his voice. It set alarms off in Oliver’s head.

“How is it, by the by?” he asked, as nonchalantly as possible.

“How is what?”

“The piece. The symphony, the sonata, or whatever it turned out to be. I’ve been out of the house, trying to give you space to work, so I haven’t heard you play it yet.”

“Oh. The piece. It is marvelous, a triumph. Do not worry, all will be well.”

Beneath the mask, Vincenzo was beginning to sweat. Oliver knew it like he knew the back of his hand.

“Damn and blast,” he swore, and pulled Vincenzo to a stop. “You haven’t written anything, have you?”

“Of course I’ve written . . .” Vincenzo blustered.

“Hum it.”

“Hum it?”

“Hum the tune. What have you come up with?”

After a moment, Vincenzo began to hum, so softly that with the crowds and the mask, he was almost inaudible.

Well, at least one of those circumstances could be remedied.

Quicker than Carpenini could blink, Oliver reached out and ruthlessly pulled off his mask. Black eyes blinked back at him.

“Hum the tune, Vincenzo.”

Instead of pretending, Vincenzo threw up his hands. “Fine! I have nothing. Are you happy now that I have confessed it? I have slit my wrists and bled onto the keys and yet the muse gives me nothing. I cannot find the theme for the piece; I know I could grow it into something beautiful if I had a theme, but I will not play something for the Marchese that is less than perfection.”

Oliver shook his head. “You have nothing? Then what, pray tell, have you been doing for the last two days, locked in my house with your piano?”

“Vincenzo! Darling!” came a melodic voice, trilling high above the raucousness of the crowd. “You naughty boy—masks are not meant to come off until morning.”

Both Vincenzo and Oliver turned and caught sight of Antonia di Garibaldi—now Antonia Galetti—floating toward them. There was no doubt it was her. Only the spoiled daughter of the Marchese would be able to get away with such a costume. A wig in the style of the previous century, so tall that Oliver wondered how she kept her balance, was pinned through with stuffed birds, which had unceremoniously had their eyes replaced with fine jewels. Her dress was equally bejeweled—except, that is, for her bosom, which was unadorned and pushed up alluringly, catching the eyes of every guest, male and female alike, who marveled at her bodice for the cantilevered feat of engineering it was.

“But then how would you have been able to find me, my sweet?” Vincenzo replied in equally enthusiastic tones.

Antonia was wearing only a half mask, and thus she was not burdened at all when she leaned forward and gave Vincenzo a lingering kiss on the mouth. Then she pulled his mask back into place.

“Now, keep this on, at least until midnight. Oliver was out for days trying to get you this costume; the least you could do is wear it longer than ten minutes.”

“Well, then he should have done better than a clown suit,” Vincenzo grumbled, with a dark look at Oliver.

But Antonia saved him from any rebuttal by saying, “I quite like it, actually.”

“You do?” Vincenzo asked, a smile playing on his lips.

“Yes, usually you are so overpowering, so forceful. It makes me quite nervous. But no one can be nervous in a circus, with a clown.”

Whatever Vincenzo thought about being emasculated by a clown suit he kept to himself, while Oliver had to choke back his laughter. But as Antonia flashed a naughty smile at him and held out her hand to be kissed (although with the masks, it was more of a bend over than a kiss), Oliver suddenly knew what Vincenzo had been doing in the drawing room for the past two afternoons—and it had nothing to do with composition.

When the muse left him, Carpenini found trouble.

And Antonia Galetti had been trouble for him before.

Antonia was one of Venice’s finest creations—a dark-eyed beauty who was married at the age of twenty to a man four decades her senior. It was inevitable that she would take a lover; in fact, Oliver wouldn’t have been surprised if that expectation had been written into the marriage contract. The only difficulty was, should that lover ever break with the girl, they had to face the wrath of not only Antonia but also her indomitable father.

“Antonia, my dear, introduce me to your friends.”

Who, as it turned out, was right behind them.

“Father, I do not believe any introduction is needed,” Antonia tittered, as she placed a far more chaste peck on her father’s cheek.

The Marchese di Garibaldi had no need of a costume. He would have owned the attention of everyone in the room even in full masquerade, so why bother with fancy dress? Instead, he watched over the festivities like some sort of demigod, unafraid to show his face to the anonymous masses. Indeed, his lack of a costume only made it easier for everyone in attendance to bow and scrape before him.

A man about the age of his daughter’s husband, the Marchese wore his age well. His frame was tall and strong, without an ounce of the weight that normally comes with a lifetime of excess. His face, tanned from living on the Adriatic, contrasted sharply with his silver hair. All in all his physical appearance was as imposing as his reputation, as one of the last standing members of the old guard of Venetian aristocracy.

Of course, the Marchese di Garibaldi’s shrewdness with money and a well-timed third marriage to a German countess contributed to his survival. But not nearly as much as his reputation for supporting and fostering all the musical talent to be had in Venice.

“Marchese,” Vincenzo said, as he bowed low. “It is wonderful to see you again. Thank you for inviting us back into your home.”

The Marchese leveled his gaze at Vincenzo, then Oliver. “Mr. Merrick,” he finally said, his face splitting into a calculated smile. “I enjoyed that little comedy you had a hand in at La Fenice last season. You, are of course, welcome here.” Then he turned to the still somewhat bowed Vincenzo. “Signor Carpenini. The
Great Master
.” His words dripped with sarcasm, as if they could turn their recipient into the lowest form of vermin simply by hearing them. “My daughter told me she was inviting you. And I admit to discouraging it—if only to spare her another heartbreak.”

“I assure you, Marchese, I have no intention of causing your daughter any more pain. Indeed, I found my heart hurting far more than I realized without her gracious presence in my life.”

“See, Father, I told you.” Antonia hung on her father’s arm. “Now, can’t you say something pleasant to him?”

“It has been less lively of late, I grant you. I even had to go to Vienna over the New Year to alleviate my boredom,” the older gentleman admitted grudgingly.

“I am only too happy to do what I can to enliven things for you, Marchese. And for your beautiful daughter.”

The Marchese gave a small smile, while his daughter giggled on his arm. Then, while the father and daughter turned away briefly to greet another newly arrived guest, Oliver leaned into Vincenzo’s ear.

“Doing it a bit thick, aren’t you?” he muttered.

“Shh! If this plays out as I hope, I won’t need to have a new piece for the Marchese. Showering his daughter with the love she deserves will be enough to earn back my place,” Vincenzo whispered. “Hell, he practically admitted to missing me!”

“‘The love she deserves?’ A consideration she should have had before she found you in bed with her maid.”

But Vincenzo waved that away. “Just you watch. I will be at his daughter’s side all night. And then I will engage him in conversation, which will naturally turn to music, and I’ll have my place back before the night is over.”

“What will happen before the night is over?” Antonia asked, her attention returned to her lover.

“Ah—wouldn’t you like to know, my little pet,” Vincenzo replied. Antonia giggled. Oliver rolled his eyes beneath the mask.

“Oh, Vincenzo,” the Marchese said, breaking the focused concentration of the overly happy couple, “have you heard of a composer named Gustav Klein?”

Vincenzo perked up, obviously pleased to have conversation brought around to something musical. Perhaps his plan would take less time than imagined. “Indeed I have, Marchese—he composed variations on one of my concertos. He is young, but well regarded in Vienna, I believe.”

“He’s not in Vienna anymore.” The Marchese smiled like a serpent and gestured to the newly arrived member of their circle, a blond masked man with a short, terse bow. “Gustav, this is Carpenini. Carpenini, this is Gustav Klein—my new protégé. Come listen to him play later; I would enjoy learning your opinion of him.”

Vincenzo Carpenini was a self-made man. His mother gone before he reached the tender age of four, raised by a kind but absentminded grandmother, Vincenzo learned early on that if you wanted something, you could not wait for it to be given to you. You couldn’t hope it would land in your lap after you had been very, very good and worked very, very hard. You had to
take
it. By any means necessary.

Once he had achieved a certain level of fame, he had hoped to be able to enjoy that status. And for a time, he did. His music was his life, his soul, and sacrificing a part of his attention to scrambling for recognition made him weary. Even when he had toured the Continent and England, being feted as a master everywhere he went (his last opera,
The Virgin and the Chrysanthemum
, had been particularly artful, he knew without conceit), that feeling of always having to scrounge, always being chased by someone younger, smarter, better, would not leave him be.