“What, Paolo’s killers? Why not? They deserved it. Haven’t you ever wanted to get rid of someone?”
I looked up at him.
“What stops you? You think you’re going to live, you might have to pay for it. But if you know you’re going to die anyway, it’s-not so unthinkable. It’s easy, if you don’t have to pay.”
“Not even afterward?”
“Oh, afterward,” he said.
“I thought you believed in all that.”
“I did,” he said, running his hand over the chair now, talking to himself. “It’s odd about the Church. Just when you think it ought to come in handy, it doesn’t matter either. You see that it’s all tosh, really. All those wonderful paintings, Judgment Day this, hellfire that, puttis flying around everywhere-do you think they believed it, at the end? Lying there with some sore full of pus and not a hope in hell anything was coming afterward. Maybe. I doubt it. I think they were like me-waiting for their time to run out.” He stopped, staring at his hands. “It was just gossip, you know. That’s all it was. Except for Gianni.”
“Except for Gianni. Why you?”
He waved his hand. “I was his patient. Nothing could have been more innocent than my going to see him. That was important to him, that no one would suspect anything.” He made a face, uncomfortable even now. “I think it was his idea to use me. I think he told them I was dying, that I wouldn’t want to leave Venice, so I’d be- amenable.”
“To be his messenger boy. So Bauer called you.”
“Who? Oh no, I never met with the Germans.”
“Then who gave you the names?”
He glanced up at me, surprised. “Who? Who do you think? Your friend Cavallini. I reported to him, remember, as a foreigner. He even came to the house. Surely you knew.” He nodded toward the Frankfurt letter. “Or did they just tattle on me?” He peered at me over his glasses. “Are you all right? You’ve come over queer. Do you need something? Water?”
“Why didn’t he tell Gianni himself?” I said, barely getting it out, short of breath.
“Well, Gianni was something of a snob, you know. There was a family connection, through the wife, but Gianni wouldn’t have anything to do with him. He wouldn’t have him in the house.”
Now sitting in the pew at Salute, family at last.
“Gianni thought he was common,” Bertie was saying. “Police are always a little rough around the edges, aren’t they? And Cavallini-well, you ought to know. Slick as oil. It’s one thing to be on the take, everyone is over here, but he does very well for himself. And there were stories during the war. You know, the way the police could be sometimes. I never saw it myself, but Gianni was careful-maybe a little afraid of him. Said he was the kind who would get away with murder.”
I swallowed, still gasping a little, as if my neck were being held to the wall.
“Are you sure you’re all right? Here.” He handed me a glass of water.
I took a sip. Always one step ahead, pulling tighter and tighter even while I thought I was slipping away. Put yourself in my hands.
“Everybody gets away with it,” I said, picking up the beige envelope.
Bertie moved away from the bed. “What do you want me to say, Adam? I never thought-”
“I know. You never did a thing. Nobody did.”
He stood for a minute, not saying anything, then went to the chair and picked up his hat. “I don’t like this very much. Kangaroo court.”
I dropped the letter, my body sinking with it, weighted down by a nameless disappointment. Walking away from it. But what had I expected? We were all plea-bargaining now.
“Leave, then.”
He paused, looking down at his hat. “I’m still something to you, I think,” he said. “You wouldn’t-you’ll keep that to yourself?” He motioned toward the letter.
“And not show it around? I thought nothing mattered to you anymore.”
“Not to me. But you know, people don’t like to remember. There might be a certain social stigma-”
“And that still matters to you?”
“I live here. I don’t want to spend my last days alone.”
His voice caught me, tentative, almost wispy, and I looked up. Not the dark figure in the transcript anymore, whispering into Gianni’s ear, just a slight old man with half-moon glasses, whom nobody ever loved back.
“No,” I said. “It was just for me.” When I’d wanted to know. When we had gotten away with it.
Cavallini took us to the station in a police launch, heading away from the hospital toward the Rialto, because Claudia said she wanted to go up the Grand Canal. The sun was out, bright as it had been on our wedding day, and she sat in the back, just as she had then with her corsage, not smiling this time, just taking it all in, fixing it in her memory. Cavallini and I had exchanged slings-his had been snipped away, mine put in place that morning-and I still felt a little wobbly, off-balance. He sat up front with the driver, pointing to buildings from time to time, a tour guide. Palazzo Foscari. Ca’ d’Oro. Ca’ Pesaro. The fairy-tale city everyone knew, untouched by the war.
At the station he dealt with the porters and luggage, to give us time alone, but even with him gone it seemed we were playing out a scene he’d arranged, an ordinary couple saying the usual things on the platform: You’re sure you have your tickets. Enough money. Something to read on the train. Then we said nothing, waiting for a cue.
“There’s not much time,” she said. “I’d better get on.” Beginning to turn, so that I saw it was really happening.
“Don’t go,” I said. She hesitated, letting me take her by the shoulders with my good arm, facing me again. “Don’t go.”
She smiled faintly. “I wondered if you would say it. Thank you for that.”
“Tell me what else to say. What do you want to hear? Anything.”
She shook her head. “Nothing. I can’t, Adam.” A loudspeaker blared behind us, announcing the train. “I can’t stay here.”
“No, I fixed it with Cavallini. Even about Vanessi.” I looked down. “It’s all fixed.”
“All fixed,” she said, and when I raised my head again her eyes were moist. “With Cavallini.”
“You don’t have to worry.”
“You did that for me?”
I said nothing, waiting for her.
“You’ll pay for it, you know.”
“Rosa paid for it.”
“And now we’ll pay for her,” she said quietly. “On and on.”
“No, it’s over. You don’t have to be afraid.”
“No. Just when you look at me, what you see. And me, when I look at myself. I want to go somewhere people can’t see it. Do you understand that?”
“We can start over.”
She shook her head. “Not after this. We know about each other. What happened. So how can it change?” She put her hand on my chest. “Shall I tell you something? When I asked you, what did you think, when I had the gun? And you said you didn’t know? I didn’t know either. So that’s who I am now. I didn’t know either.” She brushed her hand over her eyes. “Oh, so stupid. Well, at the station. The one place.”
I held out a handkerchief.
“Do you know how it used to be? My father was a doctor. He sent me to London. We were people of- standing. And now? A murderer. Shooting a woman. And I could do it. So how did that happen? I still don’t know.” She sniffled, blowing her nose. “Look, he’s coming.”
I gripped her tighter. “But I love you.”
She reached up, putting her hands on the sides of my head. “I know,” she said, staring at me, her fingers trembling. “But it’s not safe for me here.” She darted her eyes toward Cavallini. “Say good-bye. He’s watching.”
I kissed her on the mouth, feeling her lean against me. “You’re my wife.”
But she had pulled away, stroking the side of my face. “Yes. My father would be so proud.” Her voice soft, saying good-bye.
