The Devil in Music (9 page)

"The
devil!" muttered Raversi. "I didn't want such a great
group all at once. Tell me: does anyone know of this crime except
ourselves?"

"We
told no one else," said Donati. "But I expect that, now
you've sent for the most important people in the neighbourhood, the
news will be all over Solaggio, and boatmen will be carrying it to
all the villages round the lake."

"No,"
said Raversi. "I had notes delivered to Von Krauss and the
others, telling them about the murder but urging them not to reveal
it to anyone yet. Even the servant who delivered the notes wasn't
privy to what they said."

"But
Signor Conte," said Donati, "people will have to know about
the murder soon enough."

"I'm
afraid I've kept you talking too long, Maestro," Raversi said

solicitously.
"You must be exhausted after such a terrible shock. Matteo,
Lucia, will you take Maestro Donati back to the villa? Remain there,
all of you, until I come to join you. And speak to no one no one, do
you understand? about what you've seen and heard here today."

Of
course the first thing Lucia did on their return to the villa was to
look for Orfeo. He was not there. "Some of his things are
missing," she reported to Donati. "A change of linen, his
riding coat, and his top-boots. And the dress coat he was wearing
last night is hanging in the wardrobe."

"So
he left deliberately," said Donati. "And very quietly he
didn't wake me when he came to get his things, and I sleep lightly."

"That's
not the worst of it," she said. "His pistol is gone, too
the one he kept in the night-table drawer."

Donati
crossed himself. "God help the boy. I hope he wasn't a
Carbonaro. I'd rather think he killed the marchese out of anger at
his treatment of him. It's more human, somehow."

"Maestro,"
she said reproachfully, "didn't you know him any better than
that?"

Donati
set his face resolutely. "We have to tell Conte Raversi and the
others what you've discovered."

"I
was going to tell them, Maestro," she said calmly. "They
might find Orfeo with his pistol and the other things he took away,
and then they would know I was lying. And what good could I do Orfeo
after that?"

They
waited an hour or more for Raversi to come and tell them what was to
happen next. Donati sat at the piano but was too shattered to play a
note. Matteo, unused to being indoors, went tramping about, knocking
into tables and candle-stands. Lucia kept the coffeepot replenished
and went about her usual household tasks.

At
about noon, Raversi, Ruga, and Don Cristoforo brought back Lodovico's
body, along with one of the villa lanterns that had likewise been
found in the belvedere. Von Krauss had returned to his barracks to
send out parties of soldiers to hunt for Orfeo. Don Cristoforo had
given Lodovico the Last Rites, and Curioni had examined his body.
Now Curioni was on his way to the village to engage a trustworthy
woman to help prepare Lodovico's body for display in the parish
church. There it would remain until the Malvezzi family determined
where, and with what pomp and ceremony, it would be buried.

Raversi
said Curioni was reasonably certain the body had not been moved after
the murder. This scotched any theory that Lodovico had been killed
outside the belvedere, and his body hidden there afterward. Curioni
had also confirmed that the shot that killed Lodovico was fired at
close range probably within six feet. Not only was Lodovico's chest
badly blackened and torn, but the wad that had been used to ram the
bullet up the gun's muzzle was lodged in the wound. It proved to be
a piece of paper ruled with staffs for composing music. As best as
Raversi could tell through the blood and powder burns, there was no
writing on it. "Could Orfeo have got hold of paper like this?"
he asked Donati.

"Yes,
Signer Conte, very easily. Both he and Tonio used that sort of paper
to copy out exercises I composed. The marchese himself used to
scribble on it a restless habit he had. But there was nothing unique
about it. You could buy it at any stationer's in Milan."

"When
was the last time you saw I mean, encountered Marchese Lodovico
alive?"

"He
sent Orfeo and me to bed when the church bells chimed ten. I heard
him playing scales on the piano downstairs, but not for very long.
Just before I fell asleep, I thought I heard someone go out through
the front door. But that might have been Orfeo. He went downstairs
after he helped me prepare for bed."

"Lodovico
sent him to bed, but he went downstairs again?"

"Yes,"
said Donati unhappily.

"Curioni
thinks Lodovico was dead by three or four in the morning, but might
have died much earlier. So we know he was killed some time between
ten and four. If it was earlier rather than later, Orfeo's had a
very great start of us. God knows if it will be possible to find
him, especially with such a vague description. Still, he hadn't a
passport to leave Lombardy. If he tried to cross any border, he
would have been stopped."

Unless
he had enough money to bribe the customs officers, Donati thought.
Or someone provided him with a false passport. Or he tramped over
the mountains into Switzerland, as the smugglers do. Oh yes, for an
unscrupulous or desperate man, there are many ways out of Austrian
Italy.

Lucia
told Raversi about Orfeo's missing clothes and pistol. Raversi was
more confident than ever that Orfeo was a Carbonaro. "This
confirms me in what I've proposed to Comandante Von Krauss. You know
that Piedmont, right on our border, is in the throes of a revolt, but
you may not have heard yet that the King has abdicated, and the
Regent, Carlo Alberto, has been forced to proclaim a constitution.
The Piedmontese rebels' success has emboldened our own Carbonari. If
it's known that Marchese Malvezzi has been assassinated, and his
killer has escaped, the murder will be hailed as a signal for
radicals all around the lake perhaps all over Lombardy to rise in
revolt. Lo-dovico was so closely identified with our Austrian rulers
that his murder will be seen as a blow directly against the
government."

"What
are you saying, Signer Conte?" Donati stammered. "You
want us to keep the murder a secret?"

"Not
for long, Maestro," Raversi assured him. "Just until the
political situation calms down or until Orfeo is found and can be
made an example of. It's an extreme measure, and Comandante Von
Krauss was sceptical about it at first. But in the end he couldn't
take the responsibility for inciting an insurrection."

"But
how can you hide the marchese's death from his family, his servants,
his friends?"

"My
dear Maestro, no one said anything about hiding his death. Dr.
Curioni has agreed to certify that he died of heart failure. I
regret carrying the deception so far, but I have no choice. Curioni
was persuaded of the urgency of the need."

Donati
had no doubt that an Austrian commander and a contingent of soldiers
could persuade Curioni of almost anything. "But Signer Conte,
how can you search for Orfeo without revealing that he's suspected of
killing the marchese?"

"A
man can be sought without anyone's knowing what he's wanted for. Von
Krauss has agreed he won't even tell the soldiers hunting for him why
they're to find him. They may have ideas so may the people they
question. But they won't know for certain, and in the inevitable
flood of rumours, murder will be only one possibility."

Donati
shook his head. Raversi might prevent an insurrection, but he would
never find Orfeo at that rate. He himself had been a city dweller
all his life, but even he knew that the peasants living around the
lake profoundly distrusted Austrian soldiers and cooperated with them
as little as possible. They had long protected smugglers against
them, and they would do as much for Orfeo, if they did not know he
was suspected of a crime as serious as murder. In his zeal against
the Carbonari, Raversi seemed to have forgotten what he owed to his
friend, whose murderer might well go unpunished.

"Now
then," Raversi proceeded, "here's what we've decided to do.
Our good Don Cristoforo will break the news of Lodovico's death in
the village. Signor Ruga will send out gendarmes to assist in the
search for Orfeo and to look for Tonio. I've suggested they make
enquiries for Tonio at the Nightingale. It's the only inn in
Solaggio he's quite likely to have stayed there last night."

"Signor
Conte," remonstrated Don Cristoforo, the priest, "surely
you can't mean to conceal the true manner of Marchese Malvezzi's
death from his family."

"I'm
afraid I must, Your Reverence. Lodovico's family pose the greatest
danger of all. If they find out he's been murdered, they'll make a
public outcry and demand drastic action by the government. Secrecy
will become impossible."

The
others had no choice but to fall in with Raversi's scheme, and
promise to keep dark that Lodovico had met his death by foul play.
Raversi said he would write to Marchese Rinaldo in Milan, telling him
only that his father had died unexpectedly, and that he, Raversi,
awaited Rinaldo's instructions about property matters and funeral
arrangements. He would also write to Marchesa Beatrice in Turin,
though it might take some time for the news to reach her, given the
political chaos there.

Ruga
and Don Cristoforo returned to Solaggio. Soon after, Donati heard
the passing-bell toll solemnly for Lodovico's soul. An old woman
came from the village to wash and dress Lodovico's body. Since she
would see the bullet hole in his chest, she too had to be sworn to
secrecy.

Raversi
made a thorough search of the villa, keeping Matteo with him to bear
witness that he neither removed nor disarranged any of Lodovico's or
Orfeo's possessions. If anything interesting came of the search,
Donati was not told about it. He was present, however, when Raversi
asked Matteo and Lucia where they had been between the hours of ten
and four last night. They both said they had spent the night at the
castle. Matteo had lodged with the gardener, while Lucia had shared
a bed with two maidservants, Maria and Bona. Maria had

had
a toothache, and the other two had sat up with her all night. Donati
supposed this story would be easy enough to verify.

"You
have an alibi," he told Lucia.

"What's
that, Maestro?"

"Someone
who can swear you were somewhere else when the crime was committed."

"Oh,"
she said shrewdly.

"What
are you thinking?"

"I
was just wondering if Tonio has one of those."

Tonio
did have an alibi but Tonio was missing. Marianna Frascani, the
landlady of the Nightingale, reported that he had come to her inn
yesterday evening in a sullen, angry mood, and had drunk himself into
a stupor in the public room. He had bespoken a bed, but no one
wanted to carry him upstairs to it. He was a big young man, and
neither plump enough in the pocket to make it worthwhile to do him
favours, nor agreeable enough to make people want to help him for his
own sake. Marianna had left him lying on the brick floor in the
public room. As she was not a trusting woman, she had tied a bell to
his ankle and made a waiter sleep close by him, in case he awoke and
took this opportunity to steal something. She and the waiter were
absolutely certain that he had remained there all night.

In
the morning, said Marianna, Tonio woke up with an aching head,
sluiced his face at the pump, and wandered away from the inn. After
a short while, he came back, packed up his belongings in a bundle,
paid his reckoning, and ran off as if the devil were at his heels.

"When
was that?" Raversi asked Ruga, who had brought this information
to the villa.

"Marianna
said, between eight and half-past." Ruga's voice took on the
questioning lilt it always had when he spoke to men of rank, as if he
hesitated to make any definite statement without their approval. As
usual, he sounded a little breathless. Donati surmised that he was a
portly man, with muscles too slack to support his weight.

"Did
he say where he was going?" Raversi asked.

"No,
Your Excellency."

"Did
he mention anything about Orfeo?"

"Not
so as Marianna could recall."

"Are
you sure about all this?"

"Yes,
Excellency. I spoke to her myself."

"He
can't have committed the murder," Raversi said slowly. "So
why did he run away?"