Joseph Kanon - Alibi

“Poor Paolo. And he was so good-looking,” he said, as if he hadn’t been listening. “Not a thought in his head, but so good-looking.” He glanced over his glasses, back with me. “No, it doesn’t stop, does it? Look at Gianni. It didn’t stop with him. Your mother’s a wreck. Clothes with Celia, the new collections. They’ll probably have to roll the two of them off the train. And the lovely Giulia-what’s to become of her? One of the vestals, I suppose, keeping the flame going. You, of course, have already lost your mind. Our little policeman. Still, I suppose if you’ve caught him.”

“I didn’t say I thought he did it. I said the police did.”

“Oh?” he said, interested, wanting to hear more.

But what more could I say? I looked at Bertie, his lively eyes, suddenly wishing that we weren’t talking about it at all, that everything was back to the way it had been before I tiptoed around everything I said. I wanted to talk about his being sick, what it would mean. Is that why he wanted us all to go away, so we wouldn’t see? When all the gossip would be beside the point, not worth the effort? But he was staring at me, not that sick yet, waiting for an answer.

“They’ve made their usual leap to the wrong conclusion, is that it?”

“I didn’t say that.”

“Hm. Now you even sound like them. Never mind, I’ll ask Cavallini myself. If I can pry him away from Mimi.”

“He’s here?”

“Just. Made a beeline for our hostess. You don’t think he suspects-” He smiled to himself. “No, not possible. Celia, yes, I wouldn’t put it past her. But Mimi? Anyway, it was her party. When would she have found the time?”

“I heard that,” Celia said behind us. “Wouldn’t put what past me?”

“Just about anything, darling,” Bertie said, kissing her cheek. “Ready for the train?”

“It’s hours. Come have a drink. I never see you. Wait.” She fingered the lapels of his jacket, smoothing out his back collar. “There. Adorable. Sugar, you look more like Jiminy Cricket every day.”

“How I’ll miss you,” Bertie said.

“Adam, go say good-bye to your mother while we’re all still standing.”

Instead I went to find Cavallini, talking to Mimi.

“Something wrong?” I said.

“Oh, they want to grill everybody again.”

“So you’ll tell them?” Cavallini said, nodding to me as he spoke to her.

“Yes, yes. But after lunch. You can see, I’ve got a houseful.”

“Of course. After lunch.”

“Don’t tell your mother,” Mimi said to me. “It’s the last thing she needs.”

“What is?”

“Starting all this up again. Who was where when. I thought you’d got him.”

“We like to be certain,” Cavallini said blandly, telling me with his eyes to be quiet. “Till later then.”

He bowed to her, signaling me to follow.

“What?” I said as we headed for the stairs.

“Walk with me a little.”

“Something’s happened.”

“A witness.”

“Somebody saw Moretti?” I said, imagining Rosa leading him into the Questura.

“No. Somebody saw Dr. Maglione.”

We went out the calle entrance and walked away from the Grand Canal, as if we were headed to my mother’s house.

“Saw him where?”

“On his way to the ball. Come, I’ll show you. It’s important, where.”

We turned right on the Fondamenta Venier, bordering a canal so still it seemed to have no outlet. There was the faint, stagnant smell of wet plaster.

“She was there,” he said, pointing up. “The window looks to the bridge from San Ivo, so it’s busy here. She likes to watch the people. Of course, what she says is that she just happened to look out.”

I followed his finger to the window, then to the bridge. A few people were walking down its steps. The way Gianni would have come, turning right at the end toward my mother’s house.

“And she saw him?”

“Yes, in his formal clothes, that’s what interested her. She knew there was a big party. She wanted to see the clothes. You understand the importance of this? Now we have a time. And where. Before, we knew only that he left his house. Then what? It could have been anywhere. Now we have him seen here.”

“She’s just telling you this now?”

“She’s an invalid, she practices the economies. A friend saves the papers for her and then she reads. She says the delay doesn’t matter-anything important she hears from the street.”

“They must have talked about Gianni being missing.”

“Yes, but not what he looked like. For that, she had to wait for the papers. So now we know he came from Accademia through San Ivo. Along here, and then at the end, left to Signora Mortimer.”

He turned, facing the point where the fondamenta split, his eyes fixed in Mimi’s direction, as if he were actually following Gianni, listening for footsteps. But they would have echoed off to the right, on their way to Ca’ Venti. Without thinking, I looked toward the calle he’d really taken, then realized Cavallini had noticed and was now looking with me, thinking.

“Unless he was going somewhere else,” I said, forcing it out, waiting to see his response.

He kept looking for another minute, working it through, then shook his head. “But you called him at the hospital, yes? Go to Signora Mortimer’s. Where else would he go from here? I thought, you know, maybe a stop at the Incurabili-a doctor, after all-but he would have turned earlier in San Ivo. No, if he came this far, he was going to Signora Mortimer’s, just as you said. Now the question is, where was the boat?”

“The boat?”

“The boat is important. There had to be a boat, to take him so far into the lagoon. If he was killed here-right after the woman saw him, it would have to be, but I don’t like to tell her that-then the boat was also here. There is only this canal and that one, where it connects. It’s lucky, this part of Dorsoduro, so few. Anywhere else in Venice-” He spread his hands, indicating a web of canals. “But here they fill in the old canals. So it’s just this one.”

And what would happen when they turned up nothing? Another idea, just down the street in the opposite direction? I had to move him away.

“But he could have been put in a boat anywhere,” I said.

“It’s possible. But if he’s already hit, they don’t like to drag him far. Somebody sees.” He paused. “Of course, it’s possible he is killed after he gets into the boat.”

“After.”

“Yes. And I thought, but where is that likely to happen? Signora Mortimer’s. Boats coming and going. Moretti’s waiting with a message-he’s needed urgently. So he gets in the boat.”

“And that’s why you want to talk to the servants again.”

“Yes, everyone at the landing stage. Although I will tell you frankly, I doubt it was that way. Very risky for Moretti to show himself to so many people. It’s more likely that it happened here,” he said, pointing back down the fondamenta. “After the corner, I think, where it’s quiet. But that would depend on whether he found somewhere for the boat.” He smiled at my expression. “I can see you’re not a Venetian. It’s not so easy to tie up in this district-look, so few spaces. So we talk to people-what was free, who was gone? And if we’re lucky, someone saw. Then we have him.” He looked down the canal again toward the turn to Mimi’s. Where Gianni must have gone. “I will tell you,” he said, smiling, “some in the Questura will be surprised. There have been discussions.”

“They don’t think Moretti did it?” I said, alarmed, unaware that any doubts had been raised. Had they already started looking elsewhere?

“Well, it’s more accurate maybe to say they would prefer someone else. The kind of trial this will mean, once the newspapers-they want something simple. Not a show trial. So they’re suspicious of you.”