dredgers. Better to get him out into the lagoon, even if it meant rowing. But that would take hours. I pulled on the cord again. A louder sputter, as if it were choking on itself.
“Adam.”
I turned. A vaporetto had pulled away from its stop on the Giudecca and was heading across toward us, its headlights growing brighter through the mist. I pulled the cord again. The pilot would see us, not run us down. And then be curious-what would anybody be doing out at this hour, in the cold? A witness.
I let the cord sit for a second, not wanting to flood the motor, then yanked it. A louder sputter, almost catching, lost under the noise of the vaporetto. The light was closer. I yanked again. A small cough, then another, settling into a series of spitting exhaust noises as the motor came to life.
“Hold on,” I said, then let out the choke and swung us away from the approaching boat into the dark, close enough to feel a lift from its wake.
I had no idea where to go, except away from the city, somewhere beyond the lights. The open sea, past the barrier islands, was too long a trip and in the dark too dangerous. The lagoon itself was a maze of currents and shallow water-you heard stories about visitors who ended up stuck on an unexpected mudbank. You were only safe if you followed the channel markers.
I turned at the tip of the Giudecca and went behind San Giorgio Maggiore, putting the island between us and San Marco. It was darker here, the thick mist broken only by tiny marker lights, a few bobbing on buoys, the others on those fence posts the Venetians use to outline their water roads. If other boats were out, they’d be here too, hugging the safety of the channel, but what choice was there? In the mist, without even starlight, to drift away from the markers would be to circle in complete darkness. With a dead man in the boat.
I glanced down at the rolled-up tarp, the first time I’d even thought about it. A dead man. Would the blocks be enough to hold the body to the bottom, or would the tides dislodge it? What if they never found him at all?
I moved the boat out of the main channel, keeping parallel to it, the markers in sight. Boat traffic might churn up something from the bottom-this distance could give it a small margin, let it lie undisturbed. The mist was gathering in patches now, almost fog. I squinted, afraid of missing any of the markers. Behind us San Marco had disappeared, just a vague light source without definition. Claudia was bent over in the prow, looking down, arms wrapped tightly around herself, and I realized that it must be cold, that I should be shivering in my damp jacket and instead felt flushed, still excited, the boat trip somehow just an extension of the fight, not yet over. I saw my hand on his throat underwater, the eyes come open. What I’d never had to do in the war, kill a man. I swung the boat away from a buoy that seemed to have come from nowhere. Pay attention. Think later. Now just get rid of it. This was far enough, somewhere between the city and the Lido. What if he washed up on the beach? Where they’d met.
I idled the engine, but it stalled, gave another cough, and then went quiet. Suddenly, without the throb of it, the silence around us had the quality of mist, opaque, opening up slightly for the faint bells on the buoys. There was just enough light from the marker to see her face, staring at the tarp, then looking at me.
“Adam, if we do this, the body, it’s a crime. We can’t explain-” She looked away, unsure how to finish.
“It is a crime. I killed him.”
She glanced back at me, her eyes suddenly fierce. “No, both. Both of us,” she said, her voice steady. And I thought of her that first afternoon, in the hotel near the station, opening a button.
I looked across at her for another minute, not saying anything, then nodded.
“Hold on to the sides. Keep the boat steady.”
She placed her hands on either side. I knelt forward, took up the front end of the tarp, and lifted it over the edge. It didn’t matter where you grabbed it. It was no longer a body, just something heavy wrapped in tarp, pushing the boat down with its weight. Claudia shifted to the other side, as if she could counterbalance the slide.
“It won’t tip,” I said. “Don’t worry.”
And then, before it could settle, I heaved up, lifting the back end with a grunt and swinging it around until its own weight was pulling it over and all I needed to do was push, then quickly right the boat as the tarp plunged into the lagoon. There was a splash, rocking the boat. For a few minutes we just sat looking over the side, as if the body would bounce back up again, but then the ripples died down and the water was smooth all the way to the buoy, just a gentle lap at the side of the boat. I looked around. No other boats. Claudia was still staring at the water.
“So,” she said.
I didn’t say anything, suddenly tired, as if the adrenaline were draining away, a kind of anemia.
“How long before we know-if it’s down?”
“It’s already down.”
“What do we say? We have to think what to say.”
“Nothing. We never saw him.”
“But they’ll ask. Where were we?”
I pulled the cord, grateful the motor started right away, not wanting to talk. I hadn’t thought beyond the body, getting rid of it. But of course we weren’t rid of it. People would ask, the police would be called, we would be part of it. You called him at the hospital. When did you see him last? Where were you? The body was only the beginning.
Now I did feel the cold, the wet air hitting my face in little stings, then harder ones as the mist turned to rain again. Almost as cold as Germany, the terrible sharp wind and people fighting over pieces of coal. You didn’t think about anything except staying warm. Not bodies, not what you were doing there, just getting in out of the cold. The black water streamed past the side of the boat, pelted with rain. We’d be coming up to San Giorgio soon.
I slowed the boat, unable to see more than a few yards ahead. Claudia hunched down under her coat, shivering, folding herself up against the rain. I followed the markers, still looking around for other boats. But who would be out now? No fishermen, no water taxis. Only someone who didn’t want to be seen, hidden by the emptiness of the lagoon.
I wiped my eyes, feeling the cold rain seeping down my neck, the shocked alertness of a cold shower, no longer caught up in a blood heat. What were we doing? A body wrapped in a tarp, dead, not an accident. I saw the tarp sinking, dragged down by stones, deliberately made to disappear. What explanation could there be now? Claudia was right-we had to think what to say. They’d look for him. He had a daughter. Doges in the family. Why would a man disappear? They’d hear about the engagement party. They’d talk to Claudia. And somehow it would come out. Somehow. Only people like Gianni got away with murder. I felt queasy again. But she hadn’t hesitated. Both of us. There was a sudden burst of rain in my face; it was really coming down now, sheets of it. Mimi’s party would be chaos.
The trip back was longer, and by the time we reached the Giudecca channel we were soaked through, my fingers frozen on the rudder. I killed the motor when we were almost at the Zattere, letting the boat bob for a minute, then rowing back under the footbridge to our canal. The sound of the rain now covered the plash of the oars. I didn’t have to let the boat drift. Claudia lifted the coat off her head and looked around.
“It’s okay. No one’s out,” I said.
“I won’t go back to that camp,” she said, as if she hadn’t heard me, another conversation.
“No.”
“Never. No matter what.”
“It’s not there anymore, Claudia,” I said quietly.
“That one. Another. Any of them.”
“Ssh,” I said. “No one’s going anywhere.” I put a finger to my lips, then pointed at the lighted window across the canal. I used the oar to swing around to our gate, catching the mooring pole and tying the boat before I helped Claudia out. She was shivering, her lips moving involuntarily. I helped her up the stairs, then closed the grilled door on the canal. She was standing near the pile of paving stones, staring at the tarp. I looked down to where the blood had been, just a streak of wet now.
“Come on, let’s get you dry,” I said, taking her arm.
She was still looking at the tarp. “What are we going to do?”
“A bath. You’re freezing.”
“No, I mean, what are we going to do?” She motioned toward the pile.
“I know what you mean. A bath. Then we’re going to go to Mimi’s.”
She looked up. “What?”
