Page 22 of Vengeance in Venice
“Would it be too much of an intrusion,” he asked, “to see his study? His correspondence?”
It was a question that risked their being thrown out of the house, and Constance more than half expected it. Certainly, Elena’s bold eyebrows rose very high.
Unexpectedly, she laughed. “You are looking for evidence of his secret life? The dancing girls and the mistresses? The vices that a mere wife is never shown? Come, then, but you are wasting your time.”
“I believe you,” Solomon said. “But there may be other things to see—acrimonious correspondence with some enemy none of us knows of, or even with Giusti. Or some cause for having left the house by the back door in the early hours of the morning.”
Elena paused at the door and glanced back over her shoulder. “You think he went outside to meet someone there? Why would he do that without protection? Especially if it was Giusti, whom he had just had beaten. Or you, Mr. Grey, whose beautiful wife had just been taken and frightened by strangers.”
“That is a good point,” Solomon agreed. “Especially when he had hired bodyguards. Why did he do that, by the way? Was it normal? Or did he fear some particular threat?”
“He did not say so. He said it was for me. But I am irritated by followers and prefer my own company.”
She led them down the grand staircase again and threw open a door beyond the drawing room. From his expression, Solomon recognized it.
“This is his private study,” Elena said, “where he could bring friends when he chose to. He has offices downstairs, too.”
It was another lovely room, flooded with light and lined with books and furnished in beautiful walnut wood. Elena wandered toward the glass cabinets at the far end.
“My husband collected antiquities,” she said with odd bitterness, waving one hand over the first cabinet without looking at it. “Weapons, largely, as you see.”
She was right, Constance saw with one cursory glance. If the man collected antiquarian jewelry like Elena’s father’s ring, it was not obvious.
Nor did he keep correspondence here. No papers littered his desk. Only blank paper, pens, and inks were kept in the drawers. As if, even here, his personality was suppressed.
Wordlessly, Elena led them out and down a less-grand staircase to the ground floor, where a suite of rooms were clearlyused as offices. The largest and most comfortable was clearly the master’s.
Here at last was a busy room, full of bookcases and desks, ledgers and papers. Everything seemed to be tidy and ordered.
Elena stood by quite rigidly as Constance and Solomon poked around his desk, rifling through a few business letters. Because it was different, Constance picked up an invoice.
“Who is Signor Rossi?” she asked.
“Domenico? He is—was—painting our portrait.”
Constance laid it down again.
“My husband was a good man,” Elena said with sudden sadness. “And a good husband. No one had a reason to kill him.”
“There is always a reason,” Solomon said. “Even if it isn’t one the rest of the world understands.”
“You are being very cooperative and very patient with us,” Constance said. “Does that mean you believe us to be innocent of the murder?”
“I don’t think you would be—ah…inquiring into the crime if you had committed it. You would invoke the protection of the British consul and flee. Or at least keep quiet. Are you protecting Giusti?”
She may have been speaking to both of them, but it was Constance she looked at, and just for an instant there was deep feeling in her secretive eyes. Constance could not read it. And then it vanished.
“He is easy to like,” Elena said, just a little too carelessly to be natural.
Is that jealousy?In a dog-in-the-manger kind of way. She chose Savelli, but no one else should have Giusti either?
Elena moved toward the door. “Come. I’ll take you to the servants.”
They followed her, though Solomon cast a last look over his shoulder, as though still trying to learn something that the room was determined to hide.
“How was your husband in the last few days?” Constance asked her. “Did he seem anxious about anything or anyone?”
“No. But then, my husband was not a talkative man. He would not…upset me with his concerns.”
