Page 19 of Vengeance in Venice
“Oh, I don’t think you will need to do that to see me arrested. It is between me and the Englishman. Although,” he added inconsequentially, “he looks a little African to me.”
“I think I met him.” She blinked in the candlelight, as though surprised to be conversing with him. “Can you get out the way you got in?”
He nodded.
She said, “Don’t do it again.” And quietly closed the door on him.
The light beneath it went out. Very gently, he laid his forehead against the wood. He wanted to weep.
Instead, he straightened and trailed back the way he had come, forcing himself to concentrate on not falling into the canal or otherwise giving himself away.
Chapter Five
The magic thatwas Venice burst upon Constance afresh as Alvise guided their boat into the Grand Canal in the spring sunshine. It seemed impossible to mix this beauty of light and color and sheer, bustling life with the ugliness of murder.
Just for a moment, she longed for the uncomplicated peace of their first days in the city with only wonder to disturb her, and the pleasure of enjoying it all with Solomon. But they had never been able to walk away from a mystery.
Alvise—who had also been interviewed by the police—eased the boat into the steps before the magnificence of the Palazzo Savelli. It was hardly the most splendid of the city’s palaces, but it was certainly larger and more ostentatious than the modest beauty of their own borrowed house.
Solomon climbed out and handed Constance up. They walked together across to the front steps of the palazzo. She was glad to see no obvious police guard there. Solomon knocked on the door, and it was opened by a smartly dressed manservant in livery. Though Constance looked at him closely, she did not recognize him as one of her abductors. Not that she had seen them for long, only while Savelli had been telling them off and they had shuffled from the room like naughty schoolboys. And she had tried to recover her courage.
Solomon presented their joint card to the servant—not the Silver and Grey business card, but the new visiting card:Mr. and Mrs. Solomon Grey, with their new London address.
“If Signora Savelli is able to receive us,” Solomon said in creditable Italian.
The servant admitted them to a large, echoing hall with a tiled floor, painted walls, and a massively high ceiling. A magnificent staircase swept upward. The servant indicated a wooden settle with cushions, then made his stately way up the staircase. Only then did Constance notice the other liveried servant by the front door.
Visitors were not left alone. The household guarded its lady, much like in Constance’s far-less-reputable establishment. She wondered if they would be sent away, and if so, how much they could learn from the servants between here and the front door.
But when the servant returned, he invited them to follow him upstairs. He led them along another magnificent hall to a drawing room filled with light. Like most of the city’s interiors that Constance had seen, the windows provided as much art as the walls. But the room was furnished with taste and elegance, without the overblown splendor apparent in many.
Intriguingly, an easel covered with a dust sheet stood in one corner.
A lady in black rose from a brocade sofa, at once commanding Constance’s attention.
Elena Savelli was probably not beautiful, but no one would ever notice that. A little taller than Constance, with luxuriant jet-black hair beneath a wisp of black lace, she had pale skin and dramatic black eyebrows. All her features were strong, from the high, intelligent forehead, to the slightly too-long nose, firm mouth, and determinedly pointing chin.
Solomon had described her as dazed yesterday. Perhaps she still was, for Constance saw no signs of unendurable grief. Shadows beneath her eyes spoke of sleeplessness, perhaps, but her eyes themselves were clear and brilliant.
“Mr. Grey,” the widow said in charmingly accented English. “Somehow I did not expect to see you again so soon.”
“I hope we are not intruding,” Solomon said, bowing. “If so, you must forgive our ignorance of local customs.”
Signora Savelli waved that aside as though such customs did not apply to her.
“May I present my wife, Constance,” Solomon murmured.
Constance curtseyed. “My condolences, signora. I am so sorry.”
For the first time, she had the widow’s full attention and felt a prickle of awareness. Elena Savelli’s gaze was sharp, perceptive, and veiled. A woman used to keeping secrets. Constance could not hold that against her.
“You are kind,” Elena said. “Especially when, I understand, you sustained injury at my husband’s hands. For that, I add my apologies to his.”
“It was a misunderstanding,” Constance said, wondering if she had heard of the incident from her husband or from the police. Or even from Giusti.
“Then you are not acquainted with Ludovico Giusti?”
“We are now,” Constance said.
