3 - Cruel Music (10 page)

I’d given my story some thought. Not wanting to involve Liya in any unpleasantness, I lied like a trooper reporting for duty after an all-night drunk. “The necklace came from a trinket stall at the market. I thought it might make a nice souvenir of Rome for Annetta, but when I gave it a good look, I wondered if it might not have some pagan significance.”

I wasn’t sure if Liya gave any credence to my tale, but she did explain the symbolism. “It’s a sprig of rue fashioned o
f silver. Both the plant and the metal are sacred to the goddess Diana.”

“What are these charms dangling from the branches?”

“Let’s see. Each cimaruta is different, made according to the wearer’s inclinations.” She turned the bright amulet to catch the sunlight. “Here’s a half moon, in its waning phase, to banish evil. And this little five-petaled flower is vervain, for purification. The fish is for health and strength. And…what’s this one?” She wrinkled her brow.

I bent my gaze to her palm and poked at the tiny charm with my forefinger. Telling her what I’d already observed, I said, “It seems to be a cross.”

“So it is,” she whispered under her breath, “a Christian cross.”

She raised her chin to look me in the eye. “Tito,” she said with grim foreboding. “What have you gotten yourself into?”

***

After delivering Liya to the theater and making plans to meet again, I spent the rest of the afternoon snooping. My first stop was No. 38, Piazza di Spagna, but Tucci had not returned home. It must have given the singer quite a turn to see the rival he had been following in the company of someone he counted as a friend. Nearby, I spotted several boys playing tag on the magnificent flight of steps that swoops up to a twin-towered church overlooking the square. The boys knew Tucci as “the scarecrow man with the puppets” and showed me the little park where he often staged a show on Sunday afternoons.

With nothing more to be done in that quarter, I hired a carriage to return to the villa. On my order, the driver set me down when we reached the edge of the estate. I wanted to take another look at the pavilion without Rossobelli hanging over my shoulder. I raced up the path until I reached the half open gate, then slowed to slink from tree to tree. This part of the garden seemed deserted, but voices from the hothouse that served the villa’s kitchen floated over the hedges and cypress trees. Realizing that I was behaving in a ridiculously suspicious manner, I forced myself to stand tall and stroll toward the pavilion as if I had every right to be enjoying the cardinal’s garden.

Once inside the rustic little building, I hesitated a moment to let my eyes adjust to the dim light admitted by the thick ivy lacing the window lattices. Gradually I saw that little had changed in the few hours since I’d first viewed Gemma’s corpse. The three benches made a circle in the center of the pebbled floor, and the pyramid of terra cotta pots sat to one side. No more gauzy scarves or pagan amulets were in evidence, either inside or out.

The hidden doorway was shut, its stucco front tight against carved pilasters of dark wood on each side. It failed to yield to my prodding and poking, so I stood back to study the swags of flowers and festoons of fruit chiseled into the oak. About knee level, a cornucopia of oranges contained one piece of fruit that looked slightly different from the rest. I bent to look closely: not an orange depicted there, but a coin bearing the crest of some long-ago ruler. Of course, a coin made perfect sense. Rossobelli had told me that the original owner of the palazzo was a banker. Using two fingers, I pressed the circle into the wood and was rewarded with a grating creak and a sliver of damp darkness.

My skin prickled at the thought of traversing the old aqueduct again, but I forced my feet onto the stone stairway nevertheless. Rossobelli had seemed quite at home in the tunnel; I doubted that he was the only resident of the villa who knew of its existence. I ran my hands around the inside of the jamb and soon discovered a used, but serviceable candle in a holder complete with flint box. I struck a spark and got a feeble light going. Not yet cognizant of the door’s mechanism from the inside, I folded my handkerchief into a tight square and wedged it in the catch before descending the steps.

I took a deep breath as I lowered my head to enter the aqueduct itself. The air was different here: thin, cold, with a metallic tang that coated the back of my throat. The stillness was profound, so deep that my breathing sounded as loud as the wheeze of a blacksmith’s bellows. I moved haltingly forward on a downward slope, keeping my eyes alert for I knew not what. If the damp walls held any secrets, they did not reveal them to me. At my feet, the seam that I had stumbled over the night before was the only irregular feature in the blocks polished smooth by slow-dragging centuries of flowing water.

After what seemed like an eternity of groping through the chill gloom, daylight from the distal end of the tunnel shone as a dim pinprick and quickly expanded to a welcome thumbprint of blue. In the growing light, my attention was drawn by some curious shading on the ceiling between me and the mouth of the tunnel.

I raised my candle and my stomach contracted into a tight ball. Bats—hundreds of them—clustered in furry knots not a foot from my head.

By reflex, I jerked my head into my collar and scrambled my way to the opening as fast as my feet would move. I dropped the candle in my ignominious flight, but it was of no consequence. Nothing could tempt me to enter that aqueduct again.

Blinking my eyes in the afternoon sun, heartily glad that the bats had slumbered on, I brushed myself off and searched the densely packed bushes for a way to the river bank. Opposite the mouth of the tunnel, broken branches marked the spot where Rossobelli had pushed through last night, but a quick inspection revealed something more promising. A short distance away, a sinuous path snaked its way through the brush. I examined the tips of the branches as I passed. No ragged edges or broken twigs here; they were as smoothly clipped as the hedges in the villa’s garden.

The Tiber’s yellow waters lapped at the bank where Rossobelli and I had laid Gemma’s body. I paused there for a few moments, hanging my head at the thought of her rowboat cortege and final resting place. A bell from a church across the river tolled the hour. Five o’clock. The cardinal would soon be calling for his nightingale. With a sense of unease, as if I’d left something important undone, I followed the bank until I found a steep path up to the Lungara and flew back to my cage on swift wings.

Chapter Ten

A footman whose face I didn’t recognize was manning the main entrance. The bronze doors had barely thudded shut behind me when Rossobelli appeared and fastened himself to my elbow. Before keeping my appointment with Liya, I’d been obliged to ask his permission for an excursion across the Tiber. He’d given me leave with a return of his fawning manner, which was now joined by a nauseating whiff of collusion that he conveyed by resting his pink-rimmed eyes on mine in long, meaningful stares. I attempted to shrink away from him with even more determination than I had that morning.

“I know I’m later than I said, Rossobelli, but I had…er, some business to attend to…”

“Indeed, and a fine day it is for…business,” he interrupted, tightening his grip.

“Has Cardinal Fabiani asked for me?”

He nodded, writhing in mock deference. “As much as it pains me to hurry you—with so many matters of import that must require your attention—but His Eminence is lying down and would very much enjoy a serenade. I would take it as a particular favor if you would go right up.”

“Of course.” I swallowed a sigh.

He released me with an encouraging nod.

I started toward the stairs, but not before I’d taken a good look at the secretary’s spider-fingered hands. Back in the garden, I’d tried to picture the fatal attack. I imagined Gemma wandering the paths in search of the marchesa or perhaps waiting for someone on one of the ironwork benches in the pavilion. The girl must have been taken by surprise, or have known her assailant well enough to let him draw close. Either way, when the scarf tightened around her neck, she would have put up a desperate fight. Anyone with access to the villa and grounds could have wielded one of the marchesa’s discarded scarves, but only Gemma’s killer would have scratches from her clawing fingernails on his hands and wrists.

Rossobelli was sending me on my way to the cardinal’s suite with one of his obsequious half-bows. Angry-looking red scabs decorated the fleshy mound of his out-stretched palm.

“Goodness.” I halted in my tracks. “You’ve hurt your hand.”

“No, not at all.” He immediately straightened, making tight fists right and left. “It’s nothing.”

“But it is. You must have that seen to.”

The abate shot his gaze around the hall, making sure that the footman was well away at his post, then whispered in a most unservile growl. “Shut up, you fool. When I fell last night, I caught myself with my hand. The less said about it the better.”

It was my turn to bow and continue up the stairs.

The cardinal’s commodious suite was awhirl with sky blue livery, as full of people as I had expected to find it the night before. Amid the stuffy grandeur, several footmen adjusted widow draperies, while another arranged a vase of flowers. From a sweating silver carafe, the cardinal’s valet poured a golden ribbon of wine into a cup on a nightstand already crowded with vials of drops and potions. Fabiani was abed, squirming and thrashing in an effort to find a comfortable resting place. Even for a nap, he capped his head with the cardinalate scarlet, a satin nightcap of Turkish style whose folds gleamed against the snow-white pillow case. When his servants saw me, they paused in mid-activity and seemed to heave a collective sigh of relief.

I approached the bed. The cardinal beckoned with a clawing gesture.

“Ah, my songbird. You’ve come at last. I need rest if I’m to last through the opera tonight. Sing something that will soothe me to sleep.” Fabiani stretched his lips in a beatific smile and addressed me as if Gemma’s horrifying death had never occurred.

“Do you enjoy Vivaldi, Your Eminence?”

He frowned. “Too gaudy. Give me simple melody, not fireworks.”

I knew just the thing. I modulated my voice to its softest tone and began a sweet rendition of a
canzonetta
by one of my old maestros, a tender reflection on unrequited love. The valet applied a cloth to Fabiani’s brow, and the cardinal sighed and snuggled into his pillows. Before I reached the end of the second stanza, the cardinal was the picture of repose: eyes closed; catlike nose no longer twitching; lips parted to emit deep, regular breaths. I took particular note of the pale, unblemished hands crossed loosely on the coverlet.

Before sleep totally prevailed, Fabiani opened one eye to whisper, “You’d best rest, as well, Tito. You’re coming to the Argentina with me tonight.”

***

“Guido’s saying that Gemma quit. Just demanded her wages, threw her clothes in a bag, and walked out.” Benito frowned at the velvet patch which refused to adhere to the skin between my right eye and temple.

“Doesn’t that strike anyone as odd?” I was trying to talk and hold my head still at the same time. “Are positions in service so easy to find in Rome? Judging by the number of beggars I’ve seen in the street, I’d guess that jobs are hard to come by.”

“Guido says that Rome is a dole town. There’s a free bread ration, and the religious confraternities fall all over themselves to fulfill their charitable duties. Plenty of free hospitals, too. Why should a man work when everything is provided?”

“Why is Guido working, then?”

Benito grinned as he applied another dot of mastic to the star-shaped patch. “Ambition. Guido says he wants more than a crust of bread and a spot of sunshine to nap in.”

“Your new friend seems to say a great deal. I trust you’re not revealing any of our secrets in return.” I had recounted the details of the midnight tragedy when Benito found me puzzling over the cimaruta that morning.

“Don’t worry about me, Master. I understand what will befall Signor Alessandro if we fail. As far as Guido is concerned, I’m valet to a dimwitted but kindly castrato who thinks of little besides the health of his throat and his next good meal.”

“Dimwitted? Me?” My jerk of annoyance dislodged the tiny patch that Benito had labored over.

Licking his forefinger, Benito nudged the reluctant patch back to its original position. As he reached for more mastic, he calmly stated, “You know how it is—people tend to discount castrati as vain, self-absorbed songsters—as if cutting off our balls removed any other interests or pleasures besides music. It will work to our advantage if people believe we’re a pair of lightweight fools. They’ll be less on guard and the more we’ll learn in the end.”

Sighing through my nose, I gave his strategy a nod of assent. “Did Guido mention how the staff learned of Gemma’s supposed decampment?”

“Rossobelli announced it this morning, at breakfast in the house servants’ dining hall. Said that Matilda would be seeing to the old lady’s needs from now on. That’s why nobody wondered. The marchesa gave Gemma fits—the girl had threatened to quit a hundred times. Now, Guido’s taking bets on how long Matilda will last. I put ten
paoli
down on three weeks.”

“There is something else. Guido called Gemma away from the music room, right after the conversazioni. Why, I wonder.”

“Oh, I know why. He found the marchesa outside without her shawl. Gemma and Matilda were still trying to coax her inside when I went down to the kitchen for your dinner.”

I nodded thoughtfully.

Benito curled his tongue over his upper lip, intent on his task. “Good God, but this patch would try St. Peter’s soul.”

“Just put it back in the box—it’s time I should get downstairs. It hardly fits my mood tonight, anyway.” I was, of course, referring to the convention that a patch placed at the corner of the eye denotes a man of passionate temperament.

“Is that so? I would have thought that spending the afternoon with Signorina Del’Vecchio would have raised a bit of passion in your breast…or perhaps lower down.”

“Oh, Benito. What am I going to do with you?” I moaned in mock exasperation as I shrugged into my coat. “Do try to remember, she’s Signorina Pellegrina now, and we’re just getting to know each other again.”

“She may have changed her religion and her name, but she’s still Liya, daughter of a ghetto rag merchant.”

“Not a fair statement. Her family deals in high quality used clothing.”

He rolled his expressive eyes. “You know what I mean—it’s like the old saying about a leopard and his spots. We are who we are, though we may try mightily to convince ourselves and others that we’re not.”

I nodded, assessing my reflection in the mirror. Even without the beauty patch, I looked a fine sight: coat of claret-colored brocade that I’d worn for my first concert at the villa; shirtfront of Burano-lace ruffles; full dress bob-wig, powdered to a starch white; and a subtle dewing of cosmetics to give my skin the lily-and-rose complexion that was fashionable for both men and women. But was that really me? Somehow I pictured my true self at about nine years old, chasing Alessandro and his friends through the calli and campi of Venice, dreaming of sailing away on a pirate ship and discovering buried treasure. Back then, becoming one of those peculiar eunuchs that I’d seen singing the high parts of Mass at the Basilica was the farthest thing from my mind.

I dragged myself back to the present and addressed Benito’s back as he rummaged through a drawer. “While I’m at the opera, perhaps you can get this loquacious Guido talking about Gemma. Was she friendly with the rest of the staff? Or were there feuds?

“And…” I fingered my neckcloth thoughtfully. “I’d also be interested to know if there’s any possibility that her relationship with the cardinal went beyond master and servant.”

Benito flashed a saucy grin over his shoulder. “It will be my pleasure, Master. Here…” He stood up and unfurled a handkerchief for my perusal. “Silk, don’t you think? For the opera?”

I gazed at the lace-edged fabric in horror.

“Master?”

“Oh, Benito, I must be the biggest fool in all of Italy. I’ve left my handkerchief stuffed in the secret door of the pavilion.”

“Not one with a monogram?” Benito’s expression mirrored my own.

“I’m not sure.” I took off at a run. “I’ll have to get it.”

Darting past me, Benito pressed his back against the door. “No, let me. The back stairs will be quicker, and no one will think twice about me running up and down.”

I hesitated. It was my mistake and I should be the one to rectify it.

“Besides, it’s time for you to go down.”

“It is, but I would like to be sure that all is well before I leave the villa.”

“I’ll bring it to you in the front hall, as if I had forgotten to supply a handkerchief for your pocket.” My manservant nodded decisively.

We entered the long corridor. While Benito trotted toward the servant’s staircase, I made my way downstairs by the sweeping marble cascade. I’d been told that Cardinal Fabiani’s box at the opera house contained six seats. Rossobelli and I were to ride with the cardinal in his black and gilt coach; a small party from Prince Pompetti’s circle would meet us at the theater.

Fabiani greeted me with a nod, obviously anxious to be off. But as he donned an ermine-trimmed cloak, the old marchesa came loping through the grand hall. A diamond headpiece circled her tangled locks and scarlet dots of rouge decorated her cheeks. Even more startling was the outdated ball gown of crushed velvet that covered her bony form. No one had done the laces up the back, so the bodice had slithered down to reveal breasts as limp and flat as two empty meal sacks.

Holding her skirts bunched in two fists, she made a beeline for her son. “Lorenzo,
caro
. Don’t leave without me,” she entreated in a rasping croak. “I want to see the opera…I’m all dressed.”

The cardinal’s mouth fell open. “Merciful Heaven! What nonsense is this? Rossobelli, find Matilda at once.”

The abate scurried off, knees pumping awkwardly from side to side.

Fabiani fixed an apprehensive smile on his lips. With tentative fingers, he tugged the marchesa’s bodice to a less revealing position, then took his mother’s hands in his. I observed her hands with interest. A thick ring, embossed with the Fabiani crest framed in tiny seed pearls, sprouted from her forefinger like an ornamental carbuncle. Blue veins snaked between wrinkles and spots of brown discoloration, but the skin on the back of her hands was unbroken. “Mama,” he said, “you can’t…that is, you wouldn’t want to come. This opera will be very dreary. And long, very long. You would be bored to tears.”

The old woman drew one hand away. She plucked at her gown, then at her straggling hair. “I want everyone to see my diamonds. Especially the Marchesa Albioni. She brags on her jewels, but they aren’t nearly so fine as these.”

Fabiani spoke slowly and firmly, “Mama, just think a moment.
It’s 1740. The Marchesa Albioni has been dead for five years. And you are ill—in no shape to go to the opera. You must go back to your room with Matilda.”

The marchesa’s new nursemaid had arrived. Quailing under the cardinal’s dagger-like gaze, Matilda patted her charge’s bare shoulder. “Yes, My Lady, back to your room. I’ll make you some chocolate. And we’ll play a game. Any one you like.”

The marchesa gave the woman a gaping smile, but her milky eyes darted this way and that, searching the air, wordlessly asking: Who on earth are you, and what am I doing here? Hugging her velvet bodice up under her neck, she allowed Matilda to guide her. They were turning toward the stairs when the marchesa’s gaze caught mine. She wriggled away from her keeper and threw herself in my arms.

“I know you. You’ll take me, won’t you? We’ll see the opera together.”

“Mama, stop,” Fabiani gasped.

But the marchesa did not stop. “Yes, my pretty tall one.” She rose to her tiptoes and pressed her fingers to my lips. “Your beautiful mouth. Kiss me now, carissimo, show me all the wonderful things you can do with that mouth.”

“My Lady, please…” I stammered as footmen came running and Matilda flapped her arms in useless agitation.

The marchesa fought like a tigress. Her memory may have betrayed her, but her will endured. By the time she was carried away, one footman was limping, one had a bloodied nose, and Matilda had been knocked flat on her skinny rump.

I hardly knew what to say. Should I beg my patron’s pardon for being the unwitting spur to his mother’s outburst? Or pretend that nothing out of the ordinary had just occurred? Rossobelli offered no clue. He merely shuffled a nervous tattoo on the marble tiles, bleated a cough, and announced several times that the carriage was waiting. And where was Benito? The unfortunate drama had given him more than enough time to run to the pavilion and back.