Joseph Kanon - Alibi

“You have to get him out of here,” Claudia said, maybe seeing it too, shivering as if she were back in the boat. “It’s not fair, to be blamed for this.”

“Go, then,” Rosa said. “Somewhere after the opera. If they come, you won’t be here. I’ll say you never knew. I came to steal the boat. They’d believe that, stealing the boat.”

“You wouldn’t even get the motor started,” I said.

“I’ll row, then. What do you want me to do? Sit? Let him bleed to death?”

Nobody said anything, waiting for someone else to move. Moretti, on the floor, fumbled in his jacket and pulled out a gun, aiming at me.

“Take us,” he said.

“Stop,” Rosa said. “They’re friends.”

But Moretti’s eyes were blunt, beyond niceties. I stared at the gun, feeling dislocated. A gun, where we used to give parties. All he had to do was squeeze the trigger.

“Give it to me,” Rosa said, holding out her hand. Then, fondly, “ Imbecile.”

He lowered the gun, not giving it to Rosa but putting it back in his pocket.

“Where did he get a gun?” I asked.

“The guard who shot him, it’s the one he used. So we took it after.”

I tried to imagine the scene in the yards, the guard slumping forward, Rosa helping the boy across the tracks, a confusion of shots, the boat racing away from the pier. Or that moment, earlier, when she’d fired at the guard. Not the first. How many had there been? Paolo and all the others. I wondered if it got easier, or if each time was like Gianni, with blood pounding in your head.

“What happened to the other guard?”

“He was ours,” she said simply.

And now the others would kill him. No end to it, the war that kept going, the only thing real to her. But not to me, nothing to do with me.

It must have been utterly still, because the doorbell, when it rang, was louder even than Moretti’s scream.

Claudia jumped. “Oh, dio,” she said, frantic, looking at the bloody towel in her hand.

Rosa sat up, rigid, clutching Moretti.

“Somebody heard,” Claudia said, a gasp.

“Angelina,” I said, “that’s all.”

“She rings? With a key?” She held out the towel in front of her as if it were alive, about to bite her.

I stood, for a moment almost dizzy, my head turning left, right, anywhere. “All right,” I said finally, pretending calm. “Get over there, behind the stones.” I stepped over to help Rosa drag Moretti behind the pile. “Get under the tarp. It’s probably Angelina. I’ll come back when she goes up. Just stay there.”

“What do I do with this?” Claudia held out the towel, panicking.

“Under here. Come on, quick. We need to see if anything shows,” I said, tucking the side of the tarp down. There was a murmur from underneath. “You okay?” I loosened the edge, letting some air in. The doorbell rang again. “Not a sound. Not a sound,” I said, grabbing Claudia. “We were upstairs. It took us that long to answer.”

She nodded and I closed the wrought-iron door. I hurried down the hall. “ Momento,” I said out loud. When I reached the door, I looked over my shoulder to see Claudia standing halfway up the stairs, patting her hair, everything in place, only her eyes startled.

I opened the door and heard the blood in my head again.

“So, home early,” Cavallini said. “I saw the light.”

“Inspector,” I said dumbly, staring at his arm, wrapped in white bandages and set in a sling. “Are you all right? At the opera, the policemen-”

“Yes, I know, poor Filomena. To worry her that way. I spoke to them. Acting like women. A scratch, and she comes for the last rites. Well, maybe wives hope for that,” he said, genial. He looked toward the stairs. “Signora Miller. Buona sera.”

She nodded, stiff.

“You enjoyed the opera?”

I stepped aside to let him in. Behind him a uniformed policeman waited by the door.

“Yes, but I had a headache,” she said, wary. “I was just going to bed.”

“I’m sorry to come like this.”

“But what happened? What do you mean, a scratch?” I said, trying to remember what I was supposed to know. If I’d only been to the opera.

“A bullet, but not serious. You know, I felt today something might happen. A superstition. Remember?”

“A bullet. You were shot?”

He smiled. “There was an incident. I told you I expected something.”

“Tonight? I didn’t know you meant tonight.”

“Well, whenever we moved Moretti. We moved him tonight.”

“But what happened?”

“He was shot. So they defeat themselves.”

“He’s dead?”

“We don’t know. He’s still with them. But we’ll find him.”

“Still with who?”

“Communists. So of course this is what they do. Always the same methods.”

“Was anyone else hurt?”

“Yes,” he said, solemn. “Now he murders police.”

“Moretti?”

He nodded. “This time you can be sure.”

I said nothing.

“I thought you would be interested,” Cavallini said.

“That’s why you came-to tell me?”

“No, no. Why I came.” He looked around, as if for a second he’d forgotten. “To ask you.”

I glanced toward the stairs where Claudia was still standing, her hand gripping the rail.

“Did you know that your canal gate was open?”

“The canal gate?” I said.

“Yes, it’s open. Did you know?”

Was I supposed to know? How else could it have been opened?

“Yes, I left it open. In case we took a taxi home from the opera.”

“But you didn’t.”

“No.”

“You permit me to see?” he said, starting down the hall.

“Yes, if you want. What’s it all about?”

“Your boat is still there? Not stolen?”

“I suppose so. I haven’t looked. I never thought-”

Claudia was following us now, walking tentatively, as if she were bracing herself for each step. “Someone stole the boat?” she said.

“Signora, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to disturb you. Ah, this door is not locked?” He opened the door to the water entrance. “You’re very trusting, Signor Miller. The light?”

I drew a breath and flipped on the switch, listening for a sound, any rustling of the tarp. Under the yellow overhead light, the dark clumps were only partly illuminated, still leaving shadows around the edges. I took in the smell, damp stone and musty wood, but nothing more, any boathouse, even the peroxide faded now, something that might have come in from the canal.

“Yes,” Cavallini said, taking stock, remembering. “The gondola.”

I walked toward the steps, trying to draw him away from the tarp. “The boat’s here. Why did you think it was stolen?”

“We had information they would come here.”

I wondered if Rosa could hear under the tarp. Everybody breaks.

“Here? Why here?”

“Your friend Rosa. This is how they are. She knew you were going to the opera?”

“I don’t know. How would she know?”

“No matter. That type, they would steal under your nose.”

“They came here? They’re in the house?” Claudia said, looking frightened. “Upstairs?” Drawing him away too.

“No, no, don’t be alarmed. They don’t want to stay in Venice. They want to leave Venice. I thought perhaps they came for the boat, but as you can see-” He waved his hand to the mooring post. “So, a change of plans. You were lucky,” he said to me.

“But we should look upstairs. If they’re hiding,” Claudia said, trying to move us through the door.

“Would that make you feel easier, signora? One of my men can search, if you like.”

“You think it’s foolish.”

“I think it’s careful,” he said politely. “And you,” he said to me, “lock the gate.” He turned from the water, stopping again to look up at the gondola on its supports.