Alibi: A Novel Read online

  “What do I do?” my mother said. “Officially. Do I fill out a form?”

  “Not tonight,” Cavallini said, putting his empty brandy glass on the table. “Tomorrow I will make more inquiries. So we see. And you, signora, please, some rest. If I need you to help me.”

  “Help? How?”

  “You are his fiancée, yes? So who knows him better?”

  “Yes,” my mother said vaguely.

  “Till tomorrow, then,” he said, taking my mother’s hand. “Make yourself easy.”

  “Thank you. I’ve kept you so late.”

  He made a small “it’s nothing” gesture.

  “I’ll see you out,” I said, leading him to the stairs.

  “You have some pills for her? To sleep? Tomorrow will not be pleasant.”

  “What do you mean?” I said. We were walking down the stairs, then through the hallway where Gianni and I had fought. Without thinking, I glanced up at one of the sconces, as if it might be dripping blood, but everything was in shadow, kept dim by night-lights.

  “She’s right. A man like that—why would he run away? He wouldn’t. So why is he missing?” He left it open, a question that answered itself.

  “Let’s hope not,” I said, opening the door for him, reaching up to the old handle, then quickly dropping my hand, moving the raw knuckles behind me.

  “Yes, we can hope. Meanwhile, some sleep, I think. You too.” He turned in the doorway. “The maid? She doesn’t answer the phone?”

  My hand went farther back, as if it were moving on its own.

  “Yes. Oh, you mean tonight. They all went to Mimi’s to help.”

  “So you were alone in the house.”

  “Well, not alone.”

  “I meant you and Signorina Grassini.”

  “Yes, why?”

  “I’m sorry to ask before, in front of your mother. I know how it is. An opportunity, yes? How do you say, the mice play when the cat’s away?”

  “Yes.”

  He shook his head, amused, then patted my arm. “To be such an age.”

  I leaned against the door after I’d locked it, looking down the hall, my forehead sweaty. One slip was all it took. I needed to go through everything tomorrow with Claudia. Exact times. When she had left her hotel, how long it had taken to get here. The rest was safe, playing while the cat was away.

  “You don’t have to wait up,” my mother said.

  “He’s right, you know. There’s nothing we can do tonight. You should get some sleep.”

  “I know. I just want to sit for a bit.” She was picking at her gown, the black velvet skirt now flecked with ash. “I’m frightened.”

  “I know.”

  “He could be hurt. Dead.”

  “Yes.”

  She looked up. “Well, that’s a change anyway. Cavallini—the man’s impossible. Every time I say something, he just tut-tuts and pours another brandy.”

  “I said could be.”

  “And now I’m supposed to help. How? I don’t know where Gianni goes, what he does. It’s funny, isn’t it? You know somebody, and then something like this happens and you don’t. I mean, I know him, who he is, but the details—” Her voice trailed off.

  I reached into my pocket, pulling out the necklace, and handed it to her.

  “Here. Before it gets lost.”

  “Yes,” she said, looking at it. “You know, I never thought. What a night for a robbery. Everyone at Mimi’s. No one home. Perfect, wouldn’t it be?” She paused, her eyes still on the necklace. “You’re serious about this girl?”

  “Yes.”

  She sighed. “Not the best time to talk, is it? I can’t think about anything.”

  “I know.”

  “Of course, it doesn’t matter what I say, really.” She reached out her hand to cover mine. “You know that I’m always—”

  I leaned over and kissed her forehead. “It can wait. Get some sleep, huh?”

  “But, Adam, if it’s—I don’t know what I’ll do.”

  “You’ll be fine. You’re always fine.”

  “I’m not always fine, you know,” she said, looking down at her lap. “Not always.”

  I stood there for a minute, uneasy, not knowing what to say. Then she patted my hand. “Well, look at the time. Off to bed.”

  “Do you want a pill?”

  “No, I don’t want to miss anything,” she said, without irony.

  “All right,” I said, flustered. “I’m going to have a bath.”

  “Darling, you’ll wake the maids.”

  “A short bath.” I leaned over to kiss her forehead again. “Don’t sit up too long.” As I left, I lifted my head toward her. “That’s some dress.”

  A faint smile, acknowledging the gesture. “It was all right in the end, wasn’t it?”

  “Mimi couldn’t take her eyes off it.”

  She nodded, a wry grimace. “Hm. But I didn’t wear it for her.”

  “No,” I said, meaning, “I know, I’m sorry,” whatever she wanted it to mean, more an embrace than a word.

  There was enough hot water for a soak, and everything that had happened began to drain away as my head grew logy with steam. Every part of me ached with a different exhaustion—my shoulders from rowing and lugging the tarp, my legs from the party, my back just from being on edge. But it was going to be all right. My mother would be all right too, though she couldn’t know that now. I washed away sweat, whatever else my skin had picked up. Clean. While the cat was away. Who was to say otherwise?

  I looked at my hands again. No rust. But I grabbed the brush anyway and ran it over my nails, pulling the skin back to get the bristles in under the rims. Back and forth, scouring, until they were pale. I sank against the tub, relieved. It was gone; I’d caught it in time. What else? I closed my eyes for a second, back in the dim light of the downstairs hall, seeing everything again, the brocade chair I’d used to pull myself up, the sconce where he’d hit his head, the smug face over the white shirtfront.

  I sat up, eyes wide open. The smallest thing could give you away. I got out of the tub quickly and toweled off, and grabbed a robe. No time to dress. The maids would be asleep anyway. I went down and crossed through the piano nobile. No light was coming from the sitting room—my mother must have finally gone up. Down the main stairs, grateful for the carpeting, steps that didn’t creak.

  The marble in the hall was cold on my bare feet. I walked over to the door of the room where I’d waited. Reconstructing. He’d had his cigarette here. But I’d already cleaned the ashtray. I’d backed him into the wall there—exactly which sconce? I took a handkerchief and wiped both, looking for any smears, flakes of blood. What if one of the maids came? Then he’d pushed me here. I walked slowly, trying to move with the fight in my head to the spot where he’d lost it, where the shirt stud had popped out. A tiny thing, not even thought of until the bath, but lying here somewhere, waiting to give us away.

  I got down on my hands and knees and felt along the dark floor under one of the side tables. It might have rolled, might be anywhere. Every inch, if I had to. They’d know it was his. I patted the floor in front of me. If I turned on the lights, someone would get up, come down to investigate, and then I’d make up something else and someone would ask about that and—an endless spiral of detail, easy to slip up.

  I moved my hand in front of me, barely touching the marble, hovering over it like a mine sweeper. The stud must have rolled until it hit the wall. I ran my hand along the edge of the room, then stopped, thinking I’d heard a sound upstairs. I held my breath for a minute, listening, but there was only the water lapping outside, the faint creaking of the boat pulling against its rope. Yes, we’d been near this end, the stud popping out of the shirt. Maybe with blood on it—even more damaging.

  I kept feeling my way along the floor, carefully sweeping around the table legs, the crevices where it might hide forever, until they found it. And then there it was. Round, smooth metal, the gold warm even in the dim light. I snatched i
t and looked at it. The smallest thing. I went to put it in my pocket, then decided to keep it in my hand, to feel it until I could get rid of it in the deep water off the Zattere. Then everything would be all right again.

  I put my left hand up to my forehead, surprised to find that I was sweating again, even with my feet cold on the floor. But my whole body was awake, and I knew then what it was going to be like, even when it was all right, a wariness that took over your life, what happened to animals, who either killed or became prey.

  CHAPTER NINE

  Il Gazzettino had two full pages on Mimi’s ball, mostly pictures of women in gowns and couples standing together, but nothing about Gianni. Cavallini, however, had started his investigation, already up while the rest of Venice slept in, gray and hung over from the night before. His men badgered Gianni’s household staff, questioning them over and over to hear what they’d already heard: Dr. Maglione had left before eight, dressed for the party. He went in the direction of Santo Stefano, presumably headed for the Accademia bridge. He had been in good spirits.

  Policemen made some random checks of the canals along the route, but no body had been spotted, no suspicious object had bobbed to the surface. Gianni’s daughter had been called in Bologna and, bewildered, asked if she should come right away and was told to wait until they had more information. His assistant at the hospital was asked to go through his patient list to see if there was anyone he might have stopped to visit. In a small city like Venice, only a few calls from the Questura were necessary: by midmorning everyone knew Gianni was missing. The police had now begun questioning the hotels.

  “The hotels?” my mother said. “Why on earth would he go to a hotel?” She was back in the chair beside the ashtray, looking haggard under her fresh morning makeup.

  “It’s a procedure, signora,” Cavallini said. “We always ask the hotels, for everything that happens in Venice.” He stopped, putting down his coffee. “It’s not for him, you see. But you must prepare yourself for this—if there has been a crime, there are two people to look for, not just the victim. There is the other. So, anything suspicious.”

  “Crime?” my mother said, whose imagination up till now had ended with a heart attack.

  Cavallini spread his hands. “We don’t know, signora. Perhaps he saw a crime, a burglary, and then someone had to—”

  “But were there any? Burglaries, I mean. Surely that would have been reported.”

  “Not as yet,” Cavallini said. He looked at her, his voice soothing. “We don’t know.”

  I sipped my coffee, trying not to show any expression. Hotels. Burglaries. No suspicion at all. The desk clerk would confirm what Claudia said, the time she left, the time she came back. With me. Who later was seen by Cavallini himself—a perfect circle.

  I had expected to spend the day in a void, dreading any knock on the door, but now I saw that Cavallini’s personal interest gave us a peephole at the Questura—what they were doing, what they were saying, looking everywhere but here. When he left, promising to report later, I took a few minutes to look over the water entrance. Maybe a film of blood had stuck to the canal steps like a bathtub ring, maybe some stains had soaked into the marble. But everything was clean, even tidy, the paving stones piled neatly under the tarp, no smears on the damp floor. Nothing on the boat outside, washed by rain. One of the cleaning women would do the entrance hall today, swabbing down the marble floor, wiping away every mark, every trace. I went back upstairs.

  “You don’t have to stay,” my mother said, feet up under an afghan now that Cavallini was gone.

  “Of course I’ll stay.”

  “No, don’t. I know you. You’ll moon around and treat me like bone china. And I’m not, you know. I won’t break.”

  “Somebody has to answer the phone.”

  “Oh god, it’s going to start, isn’t it? All the friendly little calls. And we can’t not answer,” she said, shooting me a glance. “What if it’s the police?”

  So I spent the rest of the day at home, making cups of tea while my mother retreated into herself. She made no pretense of passing the time by reading, playing cards. She was waiting. She would walk over to the window, then back, absorbed in a world of her own, not even hearing the phone. She smoked and drank tea, thanking me in a voice so abstracted it was almost a monotone, like that of someone who’d taken painkillers and become vague. I fielded Mimi and Bertie and everyone else who called, an afternoon of them, all eager for news, sniffing drama. “She thinks he’s left me,” my mother said when Celia called. “Walked out on me.” So far from what Celia or anyone was thinking that for a second I wondered if she had, in fact, taken pills.

  I looked at Il Gazzettino again. Mimi with stars in her hair. The man she called Ernesto, evidently someone important. Not the picture of us with the police, but Cavallini would remember it, which was all that mattered. When exactly had my mother called? While we played and someone else rowed out to the lagoon.

  Inspector Cavallini stopped in at the end of the day, in time for drinks, but had nothing new. None of Gianni’s patients had heard from him. No accidents had been reported.

  “Imagine,” my mother said, her voice flat. “You can just disappear. I didn’t know it could be so easy.”

  “I’m sorry, I must ask. Do you have any thoughts yourself, signora? Something he might have said to you?” My mother was shaking her head. “Anyone who might have wished him some harm?”

  I glanced up, but his eyes were on my mother, not even taking me in.

  “Of course not. Why would anyone?”

  “In this life, every man has his enemies.”

  “Why do you think it’s someone—why not a stroke?”

  “Because we would have found him by now. A man falls in the street, he would be seen. So of course the possibility is that someone put him somewhere.”

  “Where?”

  Cavallini shrugged. “The usual place in Venice is the sea.”

  I went over to the drinks table, an excuse not to look at him. I heard the tarp splash in.

  “The sea? But then—”

  “Yes, it’s difficult. We cannot dredge the lagoon. A canal, yes, but not the lagoon. It’s too big. We have to wait for the sea to give him up.”

  “Give him up,” my mother said quietly. “You mean his body.”

  Cavallini said nothing.

  After he left, I made two drinks, but my mother waved hers away. Angelina had lighted a fire and my mother sat next to it, staring, listening to the sound of the burning wood. The phone had stopped. The servants, sensing a kind of illness, had gone silent in the other rooms. I sat pinned to my chair, unable to break the quiet, feeling it like a weight around me, pressing. My mother kept staring at the fire, her eyes dull. I knew it wouldn’t always be like this, that it would pass, but while it was here, the terrible quietness between us, I felt it squeezing, worse than Gianni’s hand on my throat.

  At dinner we sat at the same end of the long table. The cook had made a risotto dotted with shellfish, but my mother only picked at it, barely sipping her wine, still talking to herself somewhere else. Finally she put down the fork and lit a cigarette instead.

  “Adam,” she said, “that business at the party.”

  I looked up.

  “You know, when Claudia—” She stopped, waiting to see if I was following. I nodded. “It’s because she thought Gianni had worked for the Germans, you said.”

  I nodded again, waiting.

  “That’s what you did in the army. Investigate people like that.”

  “Yes.”

  “And you thought so too. Because she said?”

  “No, because he did. All Claudia knew is that he reported her father.”

  She took this in without moving, wanting to see it through.

  “So if it’s true—” She hesitated. “There would be this hate.”

  “She didn’t hate him enough to—”

  My mother looked at me, puzzled, then waved this away. “Darling, not her, the o
thers. Inspector Cavallini said, who wished him harm? and I thought, well, if it’s true, there might be people—they’d wish him harm. But that was the war. I thought all that was over. I mean, who goes around now—?” She paused, taking another sip of her wine. “He’s the last, you know. His brother was killed in an accident.”

  “No. He was killed by partisans. For collaborating with the Germans.”

  She flinched. “What a lot you know.”

  “I had his file pulled.”

  “You investigated his brother?”

  “And Gianni. I thought we should know.”

  She looked down, flustered, busying herself putting out the cigarette. “You had no right to do that, Adam. No right.”

  “Mother—”

  She raised her hand to her forehead. “I know, I know. But the point, darling,” she said, taking a breath, controlling herself, “is that if he did those things, or people thought he did, by mistake or something, then they might have a reason—” She drifted off, letting me finish.

  “Yes, if they thought he did,” I said, making it easier.

  “It just doesn’t seem possible somehow. That he would. You know, I’ve known him, my god, all my life. Almost all my life.”

  “People change.”

  “Yes. But they don’t, really.” She looked down at her glass. “He was in love with me, you know, even then.”

  “And you?” I said, staring across.

  “Me? Oh, no. I was in love with your father. I was, you know. And then I came here—I don’t know why, really, I wasn’t looking for him—and there he is and he’s still in love with me. All those years. It’s funny, the curves life throws at you.” She raised her head. “Did he really do that? Work with them?”

  “Yes, I think so.”

  “Maybe he had to. They forced people, didn’t they?”

  I said nothing.

  “But that would be a reason. For somebody to—”

  “It’s possible.”

  She thought about this for a minute, then started brushing the tablecloth, a nervous movement. “Oh, what’s wrong with me? Here we are burying him and we don’t know anything. He could be in a hospital somewhere, anything.”