The Golden City (6 page)

Then Alessio had died.

His death nearly a year and a half ago had been suspicious. He’d gotten involved in an argument over a lover and ended up dueling another gentleman in a clearing outside the city. Both parties had seen it was foolish and in the end both men deloped, firing their guns into the air. Yet somehow Alessio was shot through the heart. Duilio had talked to witnesses, and none had any idea from where that fatal shot had come. With no evidence to the contrary, the police had called it an accident.

Duilio wondered if that
st
ray bullet was linked to Alessio’s hunt for their mother’s pelt. In his journals, Alessio had indicated he was close to a breakthrough right before his death. But he hadn’t recorded that breakthrough, whatever it was, leaving Duilio in the dark.

It turned out they a
ct
ually knew who’d taken the pelt from the house: a footman hired only a month before. The man had pinched both the pelt and a
st
rongbox from the desk in the library. When Alessio had located the footman’s apartment, the
st
rongbox and the pelt were already gone. And they couldn’t que
st
ion that false footman about it. He’d been
st
rangled to death. That made it likely he’d merely been
hired
to find the pelt and
st
eal it. Whoever hired him had probably killed him to keep him quiet.

Duilio’s father had continued the search for the pelt, but one damp night while out hunting, Alexandre Ferreira contra
ct
ed a chill that all too quickly became pneumonia. He died before Duilio could make it home from Paris. In the intervening year, Duilio had recon
st
ru
ct
ed every la
st
st
ep his father and brother had taken in their searches, with no more success. His gift had proven singularly unhelpful in this particular que
st
.

The thief hadn’t de
st
royed the pelt; Duilio knew that much. His mother would have died if that were the case. No, it was secreted away somewhere, an item of indescribable magic. Without it she would never be whole again. If she were to answer the call of the sea, she would be as vulnerable to the waters as any human. She fought that desire con
st
antly.

After one rueful look at his mother, Duilio headed to the door to colle
ct
his things from the long mahogany table in the front entryway. He hadn’t found her missing pelt yet, but perhaps he could find one missing servant.

The butler, an elderly man who had served the Ferreira family his entire life, bu
st
led up the hall in time to hand Duilio his gloves. “I’ve heard your sleep was di
st
urbed la
st
night, sir. I am so sorry . . .”

Duilio tugged on the kid-leather gloves and shook his head. “No need to worry, Cardenas,” he said reassuringly. “It was an important message, and I was awake anyway.”

“I’m concerned about security is all, sir.” The butler handed over Duilio’s top hat. “I don’t like
st
rangers in my house.”

“I do under
st
and, Cardenas. I’ll ask Erdano again not to send others from his harem here.” He hoped that would placate his ruffled butler. He didn’t want the man worrying himself into an early grave. “Is the young lady
st
ill in the house?”

Cardenas blushed. “Yes, sir. In Mr. Erdano’s room.”

Duilio managed not to grin at the man’s vexed tone. His long-suffering butler tended to consider Erdano and his women a nuisance. Their presence invariably disordered Cardenas’ well-run house- hold. “I’m certain she’ll leave soon enough.”

The butler’s spine was ramrod
st
raight. “She’s not alone, sir.”

Ah, that explains the blush
. Well, it meant João hadn’t spent the night out at the quay, but that was permissible as long as he had all the boats in sailing shape when they were needed. “Be patient, Cardenas. I believe this morning is João’s half day anyway,” Duilio lied, giving the butler an excuse not to throw out the boatman. “Now, I’m off to meet with Joaquim. I’ll likely be gone pa
st
luncheon, so don’t hold the meal for me.”

“Yes, sir,” Cardenas said with a brisk nod.

Duilio headed out the door. Once on the flag
st
one
st
eps, he heard the door lock behind him. As his gift had lately been warning him of impending danger, Duilio patted the flap pocket of his frock coat to verify that his revolver was there, then tucked his newspaper under his arm.

The Ferreira house was set back from the cobbled
st
reet by a small garden, the flowers all faded so late in the year. A tall fence of wrought iron about it warded away trespassers. An unpretentious manor of dark brown
st
one, the house had originally been built to adorn a
quinta
—a vineyard. The owner moved it to the Street of Flowers nearly a century before,
st
one by
st
one, but died with no child to inherit it. It had passed to the Ferreira family then, to Duilio’s newly wealthy grandfather. Although the house had been in his family for more than sixty years, they were
st
ill considered newcomers.

The traffic on the Street of Flowers was brisk that time of morning. While the broad avenue was forbidden to wagons and commercial carters, its width invited all other manner of traffic. Pede
st
rians bu
st
led pa
st
the wrought-iron fences separating the
st
reet from the houses, either heading down toward the river or up toward the palace or the government mini
st
ries centered in what had once been the Bishop’s Palace. Finely dressed gentry and government officials shared the busy
st
reet with fishermen and boatmen.

A tram ran up the center of the road, the gold-painted car rattling by all day long. The line had been ele
ct
rified at the turn of the century, eliminating va
st
quantities of mule manure that had required colle
ct
ing almo
st
hourly. Fortunately for the sanitation workers, the horses drawing private carriages and hired cabs up and down the
st
reet ensured that they
st
ill had jobs.

Duilio walked down to his gate and let himself out,
st
anding back as a lovely lady in a
st
ylish peach-colored walking suit passed him. Her poodle tugged on its leash, trying to get a better sniff of him, no doubt thinking him an oddly shaped seal. Dogs always found him perplexing. The woman ca
st
him an appraising glance, smiled coyly, and slowed her pace, her hips swaying attra
ct
ively.
One of the demimonde,
Duilio decided,
hunting for her next prote
ct
or.
He admired her lush figure for a moment. She was tempting, but he nodded to the woman politely and resolutely walked the other dire
ct
ion, up from the river.

It was a
st
eep climb. The Golden City rose from the north bank of the Douro River near where it fed into the sea, spreading across several hills. The Street of Flowers traversed the di
st
ance from the quay up to the palace itself. While it had once been a narrow lane occupied by goldsmiths and fabric sellers, less than half a mile long, businesses and churches and homes alike had all been demolished to make room for ari
st
ocratic newcomers. The country had been embroiled in a civil war, the throne claimed by two young twin brothers—or, rather, their advisers. The Liberals in the south pushed for political reform and a break from the Church, while the Absoluti
st
s in the north preferred the
st
atus quo.

But when an earthquake de
st
royed much of Lisboa in 1755, the war had fizzled out. The southern prince, Manuel III, threw all his efforts and his army into helping his city recover. In the north, Prince Raimundo refused to take advantage of his twin’s di
st
ra
ct
ion. In
st
ead his councilors set up a rival capital, cutting Portugal into two princedoms rather than a single united kingdom. Prior to that time, the Golden City had been mode
st
ly known as the Port, a city of commoners, although many would argue it had belonged to the Church in
st
ead. That was easy to believe, given the number of spires that dotted the hills, the tower that marked the city’s heights, and the grand cathedral that rose above the river.

Nevertheless, the ari
st
ocrats
had
come, along with their prince, and had changed whatever suited them, for good or for ill. They had moved their houses from the farthe
st
edges of the city, from the resort of Espinho to the south, or from the countryside. Some homes, like that of the Queirós family two doors up from Duilio’s, were newer, built in the neoclassical
st
yle, with pillars and pediments, the marble imported from far away. Others had the whitewashed walls and red tiles common to the area about the river. It made a jumble of a
st
reet, the houses unmatched save for their arrogant consumption of space.

Duilio had always felt a touch guilty about living there. He didn’t believe that having inherited his home and wealth made him any better of a person than João, the young man who watched his boats. That was one reason he’d chosen to continue his work with the police, hoping to, in effe
ct
, earn what he’d been given.

He passed several more houses before reaching the crossing of Clérigos Street and the Street of Flowers. Clérigos had less traffic, so he turned we
st
on it and began the
st
eep walk up to the higher levels of the city. Built on one of the highe
st
points, the baroque bell tower of the Clérigos church had long served as a landmark for sailors, a slender beacon of ornate gray granite. The thing also made the navigation of the old city’s narrow
st
reets easier for those on foot. Once Duilio reached the heights, he walked along, keeping one eye on the tower as he unfolded his newspaper and hunted for the social page. He brushed pa
st
other pede
st
rians as he did so, but not sensing any danger on the
st
reets that morning, he didn’t worry.

The social page li
st
ed the normal comings and goings of the ari
st
ocracy—who was seen where and with whom. For those readers unfamiliar with the persons li
st
ed, the significance of the entries was limited. The news that Lady X had visited Lady Y at her home meant nothing if one didn’t know of the long-
st
anding feud between the families. But as Duilio a
ct
ed as an interpreter of these affairs for the police, it was his business to keep apprised of all the foolishness of the upper cru
st
. He read through the fir
st
column of entries, making mental notes as to what needed further inve
st
igation. Nothing in particular jumped out at him until he reached the second column.

He
st
opped in the mid
st
of the foot traffic, causing a portly gentleman in a brown tweed suit to bump into him. Duilio apologized to the equally apologetic gentleman and
st
epped back again
st
the wall of the building to his right to get out of others’ way. Then he read the notice in que
st
ion again.

Lady Isabel Amaral and her companion left the Golden City for Paris Thursday night via train, following the evening departure of Mr. Marianus Guimarães Efisio. Friends of Mr. Efisio expe
ct
they will be married in Paris within the week.

Duilio frowned down at the page. He should be shocked that Efisio had eloped with a woman other than his meek betrothed, Pia Sequeira. But that wasn’t what troubled him.

Miss Paredes had been in the river at midnight la
st
night, but if he recalled corre
ct
ly, that train left for Paris via Lisbon at ten in the evening. She couldn’t have been on that train.

He felt a chill, not simply because of the cold
st
one wall behind his back. Had his gift been wrong? For a moment Duilio
st
ared up at the tower, realizing only then that he was in the square before the church itself, the baroque facade of the building looming almo
st
as if in accusation.

Fortunately, the Church in Northern Portugal didn’t hold his natural talent again
st
him. Here the prince himself employed seers, and it was common knowledge that the Jesuits had many witches within their ranks. Not so in Spain, where seers and healers and any other
st
ripe of witch were made to disown their gifts or be imprisoned.

Duilio had more than once considered trying to disavow his gift, trying to ignore it, not using it at all. But his gift was a part of him, ju
st
as his mother’s pelt was a part of her. Now was not the time to
st
art doubting it. He closed his eyes for a moment, arguing with that inner voice. It insi
st
ed again that Aga’s my
st
erious web-fingered woman
was
his Miss Paredes.

Opening his eyes, he glanced down at the paper clutched in one gloved hand. He read the entry again as a group of young girls walked pa
st
him, whispering among themselves. He pondered the disparity for a moment and a horrible possibility occurred to him. What if Isabel hadn’t been on that train either? He closed his eyes again and asked himself a different que
st
ion:
Will Isabel Amaral marry her Mr. Efisio?