2 - Painted Veil (13 page)

I cocked my head and pretended to ponder the question. “Perhaps. Who knows what hidden knowledge lurks behind those bright eyes of yours? If you wore a caftan and carried a witch’s ball, you would quite convince me.”

A slow smile transformed the stage manager’s face. Without his usual scowl, Aldo appeared surprisingly amiable, friendly almost. He said, “If I were a magician, I would keep the ropes on the pulley for the last backdrop from tangling, add a few more notes to Niccolo’s top register, and blast the delicate songbird who loves to wallow in imaginary ailments out of his dressing room on time. Then we might all be home and abed before the sun rises.”

“Is it Florio that’s been holding us up?”

“He offered a temporary dyspepsia as the excuse for the last delay, but it was not his stomach that kept him offstage.”

“What was it then?”

“Florio and his manager are organizing a claque. They were closeted in his dressing room with one of the leaders, giving him instructions on positioning his men and timing their applause. They were offering ten
soldi
apiece for general clapping with enthusiastic bravos and a
zecchino
for cheering sufficiently insistent to interrupt the performance.”

“Why does Florio bother with that nonsense? Venice can hardly wait to hear him. When
Cesare
opens, he will receive tumultuous applause for simply walking out on stage.”

“Ivo Peschi explained it for me. No matter where he appears, Florio always demands insurance.”

“Insurance?”

“Signor Peschi likens Florio to the shipholder who sends his fleet out on waters swept by storms and infested with pirates. The prudent merchant purchases insurance to offset the threats to his goods. The claque is Florio’s insurance. Even if he comes up with a sore throat or swollen tonsils, his singing will not fail to garner a wild display of admiration.”

I shook my head, wondering if Florio was also paying the claque to hinder his fellow singers with boos and hisses. “Who will lead the applause?” I asked Aldo.

“Giacomo Croce, one of those threadbare nobles from San Barnaba.”

Aldo was speaking of the Barnabotti, impoverished noblemen so called because they clustered their lodgings in a poor neighborhood near the church of San Barnaba. With family fortunes swallowed up by the vicissitudes of the day or ruined by personal extravagance, the Barnabotti existed on tiny allowances provided by the Senate. Like all the heads of families listed in the Golden Book of the nobility, they fulfilled their duties as members of the Great Council. But after they had deliberated cheek by jowl with their more affluent brethren, the Barnabotti could only return to their squalid rooms for a glass of cheap wine and a dish of plain polenta. These paupered aristocrats were notorious for wasting their allowances at the gaming tables, selling their votes on the Council, or launching schemes designed to regain the luxurious life they fancied their exalted pedigrees deserved. If he was a typical Barnabotti scoundrel, Signor Croce wouldn’t stick at booing one of Venice’s own to enhance the vanity of a visiting star—not if there was money to be had.

“Perhaps I should also have a talk with Signor Croce,” I said to myself as much as to Aldo. “And, by the by, I need to talk with you about…”

The stage manager’s friendly smile had been replaced by his more familiar harried scowl, but Aldo was no longer attending to me. He was regarding the delegation fumbling its way through the folds of the curtain and coming onto the stage.

Chapter 13

“
Dio mio
,” Aldo muttered, as Carpani found a velvet handhold and pulled the curtain aside for the Ministro del Teatro and his followers. “We’ll never get to Act Three if Morelli starts his usual harangue.”

The Ministro had dispensed with his patrician robe for the night. He was clad in a coat of sky blue silk figured with twining vines of a darker hue that exactly matched his breeches. The garments were beautifully tailored, but for another man’s frame. Morelli’s narrow shoulders failed to fill the coat, and though the buckles on the breeches were drawn tight, the dark blue silk bagged about his knees like the hide of an African elephant. Several other gentlemen, including Messer Grande, who had not abandoned his red robe for less official garb, attended Morelli. All the men were frowning.

Morelli bore down on Torani as the director was correcting the phrasing of Niccolo’s last aria. I mentally saluted Torani’s bravado as he made his bow to Morelli and invited the Ministro to congratulate the performers on an outstanding performance.

Morelli answered in a snappish tone, “Outstanding, Maestro? I suppose that term is accurate, if you want to describe something that stands squarely outside the boundaries of excellence and convention.”

“You are not satisfied with our opera, Excellency? I admit it needs a few more days of polishing, but everyone has been working day and night to make
Cesare
a success.”

The Ministro narrowed his eyes. “The Senate particularly wishes an entertainment that will spur patriotic fever and glorify our distinguished ruler. You were to draw parallels between Caesar and the Doge. Instead, you have served up a nauseating stew of squabbling pharaohs, superstitious infidels, and a Roman general besotted with an Egyptian harlot. The Savio will not be pleased. If so much money had not already been wasted, I’m not sure I wouldn’t simply advise him to cancel the opera.”

Signor Morelli’s words precipitated a collective paralysis. The crew that had been scurrying to change the scene halted in their tracks. A seamstress who was bent over Rosa’s bodice stitching a torn seam froze in the act of biting off a thread. The singers all stared at Morelli in incredulity. Even Florio was shocked into silence.

After a strained moment, Torani took up the challenge. He reminded Morelli that the Savio had approved the opera’s libretto before the first rehearsal ever took place. The Ministro countered with more recriminations. The obsequious Carpani stood at his master’s elbow, ready with nods of agreement for every criticism Morelli raised. To my mind, the Ministro was spouting nonsense. In my short career, I had learned a thing or two about audiences.
Cesare
was destined to be a crowd pleaser. Even without the excitement engendered by Il Florino’s first appearance in Venice, the opera’s stirring arias and spectacular effects would keep the entire theater entranced.

Only one person appeared oblivious to the battle of words between the director and the Ministro. Messer Grande was striding around the stage with a brusque energy that made the sleeves of his red robe swirl around him like the wings of a blood-drenched bird of prey. After stirring up a good deal of dust and peering up into the grid like he expected Luca’s murderer to descend on a wire from the cotton wool clouds, he came to rest beside me. Aldo had been edging unobtrusively toward the wings, but he backtracked a few steps when Messer Grande addressed me in a gravelly whisper.

“Signor Amato, you have been asking questions about the murder of Luca Cavalieri. Why?”

“I am trying to be of some small assistance to Maestro Torani.”

The chief of Venice’s peacekeeping force eyed me disparagingly. “Yours is bound to be a trifling inquiry. You spend your time singing amusing ditties at supper parties and traipsing around the stage as some dead prince or pagan god. What would a creature like you know about the kind of brute who committed this crime? You and Torani should leave this task to those who are capable of handling it.”

“That would be you and your
sbirri
.”

“Exactly.” Messer Grande squared his shoulders and raised his sloping chin. “I am the authority entrusted with this investigation.”

I forced a humble smile to my lips. “And how does your investigation proceed? Are you near to finding the… brute?”

As Messer Grande hesitated, I sensed Aldo stretching to lean as close as he dared. The movement caught the chief’s eye as well. “You there—you seem very interested in this conversation. You’re the stage manager, I believe. Don’t you have some business to attend to?”

Aldo was not intimidated. “Everything that affects this opera is my business, Excellency. Right now, my crew is spending more time speculating about the murder than doing their jobs. This show won’t go smoothly until Luca’s killer is put under the Leads.”

“Don’t worry. We will deliver him to prison soon enough,” Messer Grande replied. “He’s a violent man, a raging beast that couldn’t stop at bashing his victim’s head but also had to strangle him. He does not have the wit to evade us much longer.”

“I’m curious, Messer Grande,” I said. “Why do you think this violent beast attacked Luca?”

“I’m told a valuable statue is missing. The killer must have slipped into the theater to steal whatever he could lay his hands on. The painter caught him in the act and was killed for his trouble.”

I spread my hands. “The statue of Venus was not so very valuable—Luca kept it in the studio as more of a keepsake than an ornament. Is anything else missing from the theater? Money from the box office perhaps?”

Messer Grande suddenly took a great interest in adjusting the folds of his robe. “No, but that doesn’t signify. The killer didn’t have time to take anything else. He was surprised by the painter and then had a dead body to dispose of.”

“But if the killer was a simple thief,” I mused, “why take the time to convey Luca’s body to the lagoon. Why not just run away?”

Messer Grande’s thin cheeks were flushing as scarlet as his robe. “What a ridiculous question! Only a frivolous dabbler would try to complicate the matter with such foolishness. I’ll get at the meat of the details once the killer is found—I have a man able to get the truth out of anybody in less time than it takes for me to have my dinner.” He punctuated his comments with several grunting snorts, then lifted one long finger and poked me in the chest. “Look you, just leave the investigating to me. Keep your mind on your singing—while you still have a theater to sing in.”

The angry voices of the Ministro and the director had died down, but the looks on their faces told me that no accord had been reached. The arrival of the Ministro’s wife had only deferred their dispute. I could see why: Signora Isabella Morelli could be quite distracting. Though no one would mistake her for a bride fresh from the convent, she was younger than her husband and still an uncommonly attractive woman. Her upswept curls had been coaxed to a sumptuous shade of golden red, and her heart-shaped face turned to porcelain by a dewing of white paint tinged with a faint rosy blush. A gummed patch in the shape of a star nestled near the corner of one lively, black eye. It would be hard to say where the
signora’s
chief attraction resided—her curious, playful intellect or the full-blown loveliness of her face and figure.

I had heard the whispered stories of her history: how adept she had been at slipping away from the watchful nuns at the convent where she had been schooled, how she had later held her own in the company of Venice’s literary philosophers and wits, then still later been publicly ruined by a handsome, but fickle Spanish count. The dashing Spaniard had been followed by a Venetian naval officer and, most scandalous of all, a Sicilian prizefighter. Her family had been forced to offer a generous dowry to be rid of her. Her marriage to Morelli could not have been a happy match. While the nobleman distanced himself from the world with his air of scrupulous superiority, his lady embraced the delights of Venetian society with as much gusto as her position would allow. After I sang the next act, I had the opportunity to observe Isabella’s amorous strategies in action.

Gussie had been watching the
prova
from the luxurious heights. From the stage, I’d had no trouble picking out his box. The
prova
was meant to duplicate the conditions of opening night in every respect, so all the candles in the great chandeliers above the pit and in the sconces along the walls had been lit. During my arias, my friend had fixed his elbows on the box railing and regarded me with an intense expression, intermittently transferring his attention to something in his lap. When Torani called the last break, I ascended the stairs to see how Gussie was faring.

On opera nights the wide, curving corridors behind the boxes were always crowded with footmen running errands and elegant ladies and gentlemen mingling with acquaintances, but that night the second-tier corridor was nearly deserted. Only the few who had been invited to the
prova
by someone connected to the company were in attendance. I had almost reached the door of Gussie’s box when a lilting voice called my name.

“Signor Amato, what incredible music you are making tonight. Your last aria left me quite overcome—you sang with such fervor. How on earth is a
castrato
able to raise such a passion?”

I bowed and acknowledged Signora Morelli’s left-handed compliment with a murmur of thanks, but didn’t waste my time attempting to answer her question. A woman so infatuated with audacious masculinity could never understand the passions of a eunuch. There were some women who found our physical charms as fascinating as our voices—I admit to having dallied with several myself—but the
signora
was not one of our admirers. In fact, I suspect she had only approached me to lead her to her preferred quarry.

As I turned back to Gussie’s box, Signora Morelli snapped her fan shut and tapped me on the shoulder. “Oh, no, my pretty nightingale, I can’t allow you to fly away so easily. I’m told the Englishman in this box is a friend of yours—I wish to be introduced.”

There was no refusing her. Signora Morelli and I entered the box and startled Gussie from his chair. The mellow candlelight flattered my female companion; it erased the lines at her eyes and throat and gave her painted complexion a radiant glow. Surprised as he was, Gussie was unable to take his eyes off her. The lady seemed no less transfixed.

After the Englishman had been formally presented, Signora Morelli gave the interior of the box a pert, inquiring look. “Have you no refreshment? Is it possible you have survived this endless rehearsal without a drop of wine?” Gussie threw me a stricken look, but the
signora
had the situation well in hand. She seated herself on an empty chair, spread her damask skirts, and opened her fan. Over its fluttering folds, she tossed a command disguised as a request. “Be a dear, delicious songbird and tell Fabrizio to fetch us some wine. I imagine you’ll find him right outside the door, in the blue livery.”

Thus Isabella Morelli demoted me still further, from the company’s
secondo uomo
to her messenger boy. I stuck my head out the door, but Fabrizio was lax in the performance of his duties. I had to search the length of the corridor before I finally found the surly footman gossiping on the back stairs with some other servants. When I returned, the
signora
was teasing Gussie to show her something he obviously wanted to keep hidden.

“I pray you, Signora, these are poor scribbles, not worthy of the time it would take for you to peruse them.” Gussie sat in a chair that had been turned away from the railing to face the interior of the small but beautifully decorated box. Signora Morelli bent so low over his shoulder that I could have counted the stays on the corset that defined her shapely waist and supported her upthrust breasts. As she whispered in Gussie’s ear, she was tickling his midriff, coaxing him to release a small, leather-bound portfolio that he was shielding under his coat. When my friend appealed to me with an outstretched arms, the aristocratic minx plucked the portfolio from its hiding place and danced a few gamboling steps around the box.

Giggling like a schoolgirl, she waved the book in the air. “I’ve been watching you sketch all night—bent over the papers, your pen flying, your tongue between your teeth. I’ve been dying to see what you find so inspiring.”

I smiled at my friend. “You’ve started drawing again? Have you taken up your brushes as well?”

Gussie shook his head, eyes trained on the pages that Signora Morelli was leafing through. “I just wanted to see if I still had the knack. I thought I’d try a few sketches, but… they’re not… very good.” The Englishman’s voice trailed off to a miserable whisper as Signora Morelli positioned herself under a lamp bracket and began to study Gussie’s drawings in earnest.

With the candlelight burnishing her ringlets to copper coils, the noblewoman held the first page at arm’s length. In a moment, her eyes slid away from the page to give my features a brief inspection. She turned a page and repeated the procedure—a second time and a third.

“Did none of the singers besides Signor Amato interest you tonight?” she asked.

Gussie remained silent but gave his head a tiny shake. Intrigued, I moved to her side and peered down at the pages she was slowly turning. Gussie had sketched me in my Egyptian tunic and crown, in my battle armor, and in the loose robe I wore in my love scene with Rosa. He had undervalued his work. The sketches were brimming with grace and energy. My form looked as if it could spring right off the page.

Signora Morelli shook her head as her beringed finger paused at the next page. My image was still in the flowing robe, but Gussie had drawn my hair loose around my shoulders, not in the tightly curled wig I wore in the scene. The next drawing changed my form even more. I was reclining on a low divan, my head thrown back, my chest thrust forward in a decidedly sensual manner. It was not a pose I struck on stage.

“I’m beginning to see what inspires your art, Signor Rumbolt.” The noblewoman closed the portfolio with an impatient snap and handed it to me. “Perhaps you are not quite the man I imagined you to be.”