Joseph Kanon - Alibi

Cavallini was waiting on a chair in the downstairs hall when I got back.

“Signor Miller, you’re out so early.”

I stopped, hesitating. How long would every question sound like an accusation?

“I couldn’t sleep.”

“Yes, it’s understandable,” he said, getting up. “Your mother, she’s very tired, I think.” Raising his eyes toward the stairs, indicating that they’d already spoken.

“There’s news?”

“I thought I would come myself. A courtesy. The telephone, it’s-”

“What’s happened?”

“A body has been found.”

“What?” How? The rope slipping out of its knots, rocked by the tide? What if the tarp were still there, a match for the one in the water entrance? Why hadn’t I got rid of it? But then someone would have noticed.

“You’re surprised?”

“A body. You mean he’s dead?”

“Yes.” He raised his eyes again. “I’ve told your mother. So at least now she knows.”

“I’d better go up.”

“No, she’s resting. The girl-Angelina? — is with her. Maybe now she can sleep. I was waiting for you.”

“Waiting for me?” I said, feeling a tingling along my skin.

“Yes. I thought-I don’t like to ask your mother, but it’s a formality. We can’t reach the daughter, you see. Another early bird, perhaps. There’s no question, I think-the same description, in evening clothes-but it’s necessary for the formality.”

“What is?”

“To identify the body. It should be family, but you are almost a son. And it’s not good to wait. The condition of the body-he has been in the water. You don’t mind?”

“All right,” I said, not knowing how to refuse. “You know him. Couldn’t you just-?”

“No, no, I am police. It must be someone else. You understand, for the formalities. And now the crime report.”

“Crime report.”

“Yes, he was killed.”

“How do you mean?” I said, maneuvering through this, someone who didn’t know.

Inspector Cavallini made a smashing gesture with his hand. “A blow to the head. So they tell me. I haven’t seen the body yet. We’ll go together, to San Michele. I’ll call the Questura for a boat. Would you open the canal gate?”

“The canal gate,” I repeated vaguely, looking toward the damp room, the steps where I’d dragged him. “Yes,” I said, catching myself, “all right. Just let me run upstairs for a second, see if she’s all right.” To get away, even for a minute. “You can phone in there.” I pointed to the room where I’d waited the other night.

“Thank you. And for this help. I’m sorry to ask you.”

“He was killed?” I said again, because I should be dumbfounded.

“Yes.”

“You mean, not by accident.”

“No, by murder.”

I stared at him, no longer acting, the word itself like a jolt, what it had really been.

“You’re sure? It couldn’t be a fall?”

“No. Not according to San Michele. Of course, I will look myself.”

“But who-I mean, where-?”

Inspector Cavallini shrugged. “We only know where he was found.”

“In the water, you said.”

“Yes, the lagoon. A fisherman, only this morning. The body was caught on a channel marker. Otherwise-” He opened his hands.

“So he could have been put in anywhere.” Far from here.

“Not anywhere. You know, there are channels in the lagoon, like rivers. The tides follow a path. You can see on the charts. This was the major channel from San Marco, behind San Giorgio, out to the Lido. Usually that would mean this side of Venice. But it’s more likely that a boat took him, so the murder itself could have been anywhere.”

“A boat?” I said, my head spinning with charts and currents-this much already known, before the body had even been identified. And then they’d find out the rest.

“Yes, because of the distance from San Marco. It’s unlikely it would float that far in a day. Well, but this is all early, a speculation. First we must see the body. To make sure.”

My mother was sleeping, Angelica indicated with a finger to her lips, worn out by the waiting and now able to go into full retreat. I washed my face and held on to the sides of the basin until my hands were still, looking in the mirror to see what Cavallini would see. Maybe that’s what he wanted-to watch my expression when I saw the corpse, some sly police trick. The smallest thing could give you away. But this was being jumpy. Why should he suspect anything? We’d been photographed together.

When I got back downstairs, he was already at the canal entrance, walking by the tarp, looking up at the gondola. I felt a small tremor in my hands again, then steadied myself.

“You don’t use the gondola?” he said.

“No.” I opened the gate, my back to him. On the canal, the rowboat was bobbing idly at its mooring post.

“Ah, you’re an oarsman,” he said, spotting it.

“Well, not in this weather,” I said quickly. “I haven’t been out yet. Maybe in the spring.” Why say that? What if somebody had seen? Any contradiction would be suspicious. Two things to explain.

“It’s very fine, this one,” Cavallini said, pointing to the gondola. “Old.”

I looked down at his foot, almost touching the tarp. “It came with the house,” I said. “Of course, the lucky thing about Venice is that you don’t really need a boat. You can walk anywhere.”

He nodded, distracted, lifting up the edge of the tarp, used to looking over a room. “Yes, so many boats at Ca’ Maglione, and yet he chooses to walk.”

“Maybe they were put up for the winter too,” I said, raising my eyes to the gondola.

“No, no, all in use.” So he’d already checked. “Many boats,” he said, taking pride in it, a tour guide praising a landmark. “I’ve seen them. My wife, you see, was a cousin of his wife.”

“Oh,” I said, not knowing what to say, what connection he felt this gave him. The endless genealogy of Venice. He was running his hand over the paving stones.

“Yes, a very old family.”

“Everyone in Venice seems to come from an old family,” I said, still looking at the stones. Where was the police boat?

“Well, not all. My family, you know, were simple people. Still, Venetians, educated. But not Magliones.”

And then he had been counting the boats in Gianni’s garage, an in-law invited for tea. I saw him for a second as he must have been-young, the curious eyes over the mustache, smiling at the long-faced girl, moving up.

“You’re making some repairs?” he said, letting the tarp fall back.

“The owner. We lease the house.”

“You see those stairs?” He pointed to the water’s edge. I turned my head slowly, almost expecting to see a streak of blood. “How the sides are weak? You should make the repairs soon. In Venice-”

“I’ll tell the owner.”

“Yes, of course, the owner,” he said, suddenly embarrassed. “Excuse me, I forgot you would be leaving.” I looked at him blankly. “After the wedding.”

The police launch had a motor so loud that we would have had to shout over it, so we made the trip without talking, backtracking up the Rio dei Greci to the Questura, then out past Santa Giustina to the open lagoon. San Michele, the cemetery island, was the first thing you could see from this side, just across the water from the hospital-hadn’t Gianni joked about that? — the low brick mausoleums lined with dark cypresses. We were met at the dock by some of Cavallini’s men, who steered us away from the graveyard paths to the morgue. I pushed my feet one after the other, as if we were wading. There seemed to be no sounds, not even birds, a funeral quiet.

Inside, it could have been any hospital building, white plaster and tile, except for the smell, so heavy and cloying that not even disinfectant took it away. We were led down a corridor by a man in a white coat with a clipboard. He stopped at a heavy double door and said something in Italian to Cavallini.