Death of a Serpent (26 page)

“Why aren’t we there yet?” Maria asked.

“You stopped the carriage for that?” he asked. “Who made you the reigning queen?”

They laughed.

“But since you want to know, little sister, the road is not very good today. It’s damp and soft. The wheels dig into the earth more than on a dry day and the mules have a heavy load. In addition, Villa Subiaco is in the mountains and we’re going up a steep hill to reach it. The journey home will be faster.” He made a sled with his hand and drove it downward, whistling to show how fast they’d travel on the return trip.

Maria listened, holding her lower lip with her teeth. She nodded her head while Renata and Giulia snickered.

“What’s so funny? I’m sitting here trying to catch the killer of Rosa’s women,” Serafina pointed at Maria, “and you ask your brother to stop the carriage while you two prickly pears laugh. As if we were watching the clowns at
Li Morti
.” Her remarks made Renata and Giulia laugh even harder. They slapped their skirts, held their stomachs.

Carlo shook his head, kissed Maria, pushed her hat down so that it covered her face. “Time to get going. It won’t be long now.”

The mules strained and the wheels slowly started to roll.

Giulia said to Maria, “If you play in New York, I’d come to the concert. And I might stay and open a dressmaker’s shop, or a fine house of fashion, like Worth’s in Paris.”

“Such dreams we have! Giulia, how old are you now, my honey lamb, sixteen?”

She nodded. “Almost a woman, and—”

Serafina stopped listening. She didn’t understand her children. Their humor today, their dreams for tomorrow: wild. Most of all, she didn’t understand the strength of her own feelings. Had she lost her focus? Had her wizardry vanished?

She felt like weeping for Rosa and her dead women and their dead dreams, for the poor dead Gusti, and for Eugenia whom she never met, but who, in Serafina’s mind, hung unknown from the rafters of a cheap bordello with the mark of the brazen serpent on her forehead. She felt like crying for spending too much on Maria’s boots while their savings dwindled and their prospects dimmed. Her ears were plugged. Her curls, frizzed with moisture, made her scalp so tight it burned. She wished Giorgio were here because she needed to understand what was happening. He’d tell her in words that would make the world clear and well-ordered once again.

“Look!” Maria said. She pointed to movement in the fields. “An orange animal with a bushy tail.”

They all moved to one side. The coach tipped slightly. Silently they watched the animal’s sleek movements, the stretch, the dazzle of him against the sodden earth.

“It’s a red fox, my sweetest girls. Without effort he glides, how supple, how fleeting!”

They watched, silent for a moment.

“The sweeping arc he makes against the grey sky, like the finger of God stroking the earth. How rare! Where did he go?”

“There!” Maria pointed to a tawny flash skimming over the wheat.

The field trembled in its wake. Then Serafina stared at emptiness.

“Blue patches in the heavens,” Maria said, her finger marking a hole in the clouds.

The four of them sat back in their seats, not speaking, calm in the changing light, jostled by ungiving wheels on a dirt road.

• • •

At the entrance they stopped at an iron gate with a guardhouse. Vicenzu jumped down and, dragging his damaged leg behind, lumbered over and gave his name to the armed guard who told them to pass.

When they turned onto the long gravel drive leading to the villa, Renata, Giulia, Maria, even Serafina, were without words. Men were everywhere, some in the palm trees lining the drive, removing fruit and withered seed pods, pruning dead fronds or raking the road several meters ahead. Others cleaned statues and fountains, pushed wheelbarrows, swept debris with pointed brooms.

With his veneer of culture, his love of theater, learning, and especially his knowledge of music, Don Tigro was an anomaly, not at all like the other mafia leaders in and around Palermo. This didn’t lessen his violence—Serafina knew it could be quick and devastating—it only helped him prosper. It spread his sphere of influence among the cultured. He was a friend to the powerful, including, it was rumored, titled landholders, the subprefect, the leading clerics. Most, of course, held him in disdain. Others were puzzled by him, but he was worshipped by the men who served him. And in the countryside around Oltramari, this included all of the peasants who cultivated his soil, planted and harvested his wheat, tended his olive and almond groves. He hired the desperate who would do anything for him.

In her mind, Serafina was visiting the orphanage as a child with her mother, seeing Betta and Tigro, two of the orphans standing side by side. Inseparable the two, her mother told her.

Tigro was dressed in hand-me downs like the rest. But in bearing he was straight and proud, muscular for a boy; hands at his side, and so still, except for his thumb and forefinger, rubbing them together slowly, deliberately, back and forth. Then he was gone, banished by Mother Concetta, Betta told her, but didn’t elaborate. She was on the edge of it once, much later, as she, Serafina, midwifed the birth of her twins, but Betta never finished the story.

Early in Serafina’s marriage, before the children started coming, she and Giorgio met Elisabetta and Tigro in town one evening, the four of them sitting together in the public gardens under the eucalyptus in early spring, with the doves cooing and the breeze soft and Elisabetta’s stomach swollen. They sat, two young couples, talking of this and that. “Hasn’t the weather been fine, oh, fine, quite…the oranges bigger than the moon this year…the peasants happy for once…but now the papers talk of revolution, another uprising in Palermo…” and out of nowhere, Tigro interrupted. “Betta carries my child, needs a midwife, will you—?” Giorgio’s elbow found Serafina’s side, but not before she had said, “Oh, yes, of course.”

So long ago now, it seemed another life. Giorgio was dead, and poor Elisabetta, surrounded by ill-gotten goods, was a prisoner. How she had loved Tigro as a child in the orphanage, loved him even now, Serafina was sure.

And if Maddalena’s story was true? Serafina shivered.

Maria’s Piano

T
he sun shone in earnest as the carriage pulled in front of the villa. Two liveried footmen appeared. Vicenzu jumped from the seat, probably ticking off in his head the cost of all this opulence. He limped over to one of the men who showed him and Carlo the way to the stables. The other footman helped the women out of the coach. They lifted their skirts and followed him up the marble steps to the entrance, where a somber man in formal attire opened the doors leading into the foyer.

Elisabetta, wearing a loose-fitting day dress in rose watered silk greeted them. She was flanked by two servants. “This is Madama Mercurio, the housekeeper. She’s married to our butler, Nello.”

A familiar-looking face.

As if reading her thoughts, Elisabetta added, “When not attending to his duties here, Nello helps Tigro with his work.”

“Enchanted,” Serafina said to Madama Mercurio who, attired in black silk with a white lace collar, inclined her head and smiled.

Inside, Serafina’s eyes were drawn to a vaulted ceiling with frescoed angels banded by egg-and-dart molding. Two young women dressed as maids stood to one side, curtsying when she passed.

Elisabetta gave them a tour of the house and led them to one of the parlors. “My favorite room,” she told them.

It surprised Serafina, this space—an oasis in the midst of overstatement, shaped in an airy hexagon and decorated in cool colors. The furniture was light, oriental looking, most of it upholstered in floral prints, except for a small gilded writing desk and red plush chair in the corner. The windows were draped with flowing batiste. Oriental carpets in patterns of blues, greens, and reds muffled the parquet floors. On the outside wall, floor to ceiling windows faced a sea of grass interrupted by a small garden. In the middle distance were groves of cypress and almond trees. Beyond these sat the Madonie mountains.

But the center of the room held its magic, a grand piano. Slightly to one side and suspended from the ceiling so that when lit, its light rimmed the head and shoulders of the pianist, was a four-tiered crystal chandelier.

“Perhaps your young women would like to stay here while the three of us go somewhere and talk.” Elisabetta turned to Renata. “We won’t be long.”

Serafina looked at the piano, then at Maria.

“Yes, and thank you, Signura Maltese, we’d like that very much,” Renata said.

Serafina watched as Maria’s eyes riveted on the piano. She whispered in her ear. “Count the candles in that chandelier, and tell me how many there are when I return.”

“A concert grand, a Steinway. If I had this room, I’d never leave.” Maria began walking toward the keyboard. She reached out, but Giulia grabbed the back of her smock.

Just then a sharp movement piqued Serafina’s curiosity. Looking out at the park and the hills beyond, she saw a man gallop into view. He dismounted, limped over to the head gardener. They exchanged a few words and the gardener walked toward the house, wiping his hands on his apron. While the man in black led his horse to the stable, Serafina stood at the window, wondering where she’d seen him. Of course, in town with Betta the other day, helping her into the carriage. He had the same hobbled gait, the same cobra eyes.

Serafina quit the room with a backward glance and saw Maria perched on the edge of her chair. With a forefinger pointed toward the chandelier, she was counting candles.

• • •

Elisabetta directed Serafina to a parlor on the other side of the house.

“Let’s sit here. The light from that window will let me have a good look at you,” Serafina said. “I don’t like the color of your skin, Elisabetta, and I see dark circles underneath the eyes. Are you resting, eating abundant meat, cheese, pasta, drinking goat’s milk, or are you watching your figure and trying to do too much work?” From the corner of her eye Serafina saw Madama Mercurio nodding her head. “Ah, too much work, I thought so. This is true, Madama, no?” she asked.

“Between lady’s maids right now, so Agata has taken on that duty as well as remaining my housekeeper, so she has her hands full. But in my condition, I feel lucky to have such a dear by my side.”

A competent, self-effacing servant, Serafina could tell, not the least bit arrogant. She liked the woman.

“Lately I’ve had certain obligations—more entertaining, more engagements, Tigro and I. I have, perhaps, overdone? Yes, you’re right; I need to slow down.”

“Make an appearance, excuse yourself, retire by ten. For the sake of the unborn, tell him. He’ll understand. I’ll say something to him myself before I leave. Agata will make certain that you do as I suggest.” Serafina glanced at Madama Mercurio who smiled.

She continued. “May we talk with your cook? There may be some essential foods that you’re forgetting to eat. Rest at least once a day, twice, if you’ll be entertaining that evening. And I brought you this.” Serafina reached down and opened her bag, pulling out several bottles. “The juice of medicinal herbs in a special mix, Mama’s secret recipes. Two spoonfuls a day from each bottle. Simple. Perhaps have a talk with your physician. Who knows? He might have a good idea, men sometimes do. But don’t worry, all will be well if you follow my advice and Agata watches over you. I want to see you again the week before Christmas. Should we arrange it now? Say, Tuesday the 18th?”

Elisabetta teared up. “Serafina, I knew you’d make everything right. I thought, maybe I’m too old—”

“Too old? Nonsense! If Giorgio were alive, we’d be working at it morning, noon and night. Plenty of time for you to have another child. Not to worry. I see color returning to your cheeks already. Crying and laughing? Like the clouds and sun today.” She took Elisabetta’s pulse, patted her hand. “Heart strong like an ox.”

Elisabetta kissed her on both cheeks. Arm in arm, the three women walked down to the kitchen to speak with cook, who was preparing afternoon tea and laying out Renata’s pastries.

If Serafina had this kitchen, she might even take a turn planning menus. But no, she must remain focused on solving these murders. She must ignore this great domed room with kitchen hearth and spit, the double-oven newly blackened; covet not the cook’s staff of six, the tiled walls and floor, the gleaming copper hanging from a central rack, the porcelain, the stemware, the silver.

A crash of chords. The crystal vibrated in response. Music filled the house. The kitchen staff looked up. Serafina cringed. “Brahms,” she said, and turned to Elisabetta. “Maria’s agog over him. Perhaps because he’s young? I’ll go up and stop her.”

Elisabetta touched her shoulder. “Please don’t. Let’s go upstairs and enjoy it.”

Maria was beginning the second movement when Serafina and Elisabetta walked in, followed by Madama Mercurio and two maids carrying in the tea service. The servants set down the trays and stood at the edge of the room.

Serafina motioned to Giulia who walked over to Maria, said something in her ear. Maria stopped. The audience groaned.

“What talent, Maria, my dear. Your mother told me, but I had no idea,” Elisabetta said. Maria pushed up her spectacles and looked solemn.

The door opened and a voice boomed. “What happened to the piano? Such playing.”

Maria faced Don Tigro.

“Continue, please,” he said.

She looked at Serafina who nodded.

As Maria played, Elisabetta whispered something to Madama Mercurio who tiptoed out of the room. In a few minutes the housekeeper returned, followed by the other servants. They lined the walls—downstairs maids, kitchen staff, footmen, gardeners in their blue aprons clutching straw hats. The group was silent for the rest of the performance.

Don Tigro showed his teeth and clapped. The rest followed. When they stopped, he spoke. “How old are you?”

“Eight.”

“Well. Thank you for the gift of Brahms. He fills my house today in a way I thought impossible. Third piano sonata, I believe?”