Island of the Mad

by Laurie R. King

  And I was ruthless in fighting my way to the side of the Hon Terry, whose boat was sure to be the fastest there.

  Except that we were third out of the little harbour. And the Hon Terry was both safety-minded and distracted by his handsome Venetian friend.

  The laguna’s speed limits are set for good reason. Between floating débris and the chance of late-night gondolas and swimming poets, outdistancing one’s front lantern is an act of murderous irresponsibility.

  But the boat ahead of us held a small, blonde-headed woman and a figure with a black half-mask.

  So I took a resolute breath, and elbowed Terry out of the way.

  At least I had the sense not to instantly push the boat into water-skiing speed, setting off a drunken race. Instead, I veered away, maintaining our sedate progress but in the direction of the lagoon’s southern reaches. Protest rose up, voices calling for Terry to take back the wheel, that we were going wrong, that we’d never—

  But the moment I’d put San Servolo between us and the others, I shouted a command to hang on, and hauled the controls all the way up.

  When the two boats came back into view, we were not only at a distance, but at an unexpected angle. And since I did not immediately roar up to the front of the pack, but instead kept well to the side, I became a different boat entirely, a curiosity instead of a challenge.

  I took the slim canal between the Giudecca and San Giorgio Maggiore at a marginally slower pace, then instantly resumed our breakneck speed the instant we emerged into the channel. Whoops and cries rose from my passengers, although the Hon Terry looked more and more alarmed as we approached the mouth of the Grand Canal. The sleek boat leaned on its side as I swung around la Salute. Courting couples and insomniacs propped against the railings of the Accademia Bridge leapt back in terror as we roared beneath their feet.

  Only then did I pull back on the throttle, wondering which one was Ca’ Rezzonico. I expected the equivalent of the Lido noises, tumult and a blare of music, but either the Porters’ festivities had finished early, or the ballroom was back from the Canal—then at the next kink in the canal it became obvious: who but a pair of obscenely rich Americans would adorn their entrance with brilliant flaming torches and an array of Greek wrestlers?

  I glanced back along the Grand Canal. When I saw no lights approaching, I let out the breath I’d been holding since San Servolo: we were here before Vivian. I came in to the palazzo a bit firmly—Terry let out an anguished protest—but the instant our rope was in the hands of the resident Greeks I waved my cohort forward, commanding, “Go! Hurry up! This party’s just getting started!”

  Laughter and shrieks resumed as if a switch had been turned. The puzzled Greeks sprang to help these late arrivals, but when the man holding our rope moved to tie it, I told him not to, that I’d move the boat over myself.

  Terrence made to take the wheel, but I clung on hard. “Oh, you two go ahead in. I’ll just make sure there’s room for the other boats, and be up in a minute.”

  My calm demeanour convinced him, along with his new friend’s eagerness. But before they got out, I said to Terry, “Oh—and would you look around for a violinist dressed as Zorro? Please? He’ll want to know I’m here. Thanks.”

  The next boat chugging along the Grand Canal held our fearless leader. Elsa Maxwell disembarked grandly into the muscular bare arms of the Greeks, followed by an extraordinary number of passengers in a sort of circus clown-car effect. I made the Greeks (they weren’t Greeks, they were a mix of dock-workers from all over) tie that boat down at the far end—which meant that the third boat to arrive would put in beside the Runabout.

  By this time, rumour of the gate-crashers, or perhaps of my dramatic arrival down the peaceable waterway, seemed to be percolating among the Porters’ guests, a few of whom had come out onto the balcony—which had strings of electric lights rather than torches—to view the entertainments below.

  I kept my Harold Lloyd mask in place, and waited for the next boat and its small, golden passenger.

  It came at last, lumbering down the waterway, barely nosing out the fourth in our procession, which had left the Lido on our heels. The two would dock nearly simultaneously. I could not take a chance at it being the wrong side.

  I clambered out to jump onto the slippery forecourt, grabbing one substantial biceps to keep from going down. “Hold this rope for a minute,” I ordered, and pushed between his fellow Grecian stevedores to await the next invaders.

  The lumbering boat slowed more, turned its nose, and came into the light, directly in front of me. I stepped onto its prow before any of its passengers could move.

  She’d taken off the golden mask, her naked face staring up at me as I dropped down beside her.

  “My lady—Vivian—wait here a moment.”

  She jerked back, terrified at the sound of her name from a concealed and unknown man. The nurse’s arm came forward—and with a curse under my breath, I shoved up my bespectacled mask. “It’s me, Ronnie’s friend, Mary. Mary Russell, remember? We met at…at Bedlam.”

  Three years before, I’d had long hair gathered atop my head, steel-framed spectacles, and the pallid complexion of an Oxford undergraduate. Vivian stared, one timid hand reaching out for the support of her friend. At last she glanced sideways, by way of consultation, and I let the mask drop so as to restore my vision. “I’m terribly sorry about this,” I began, but my explanation was cut short when her gaze flicked upwards to the Porters’ official guests, gathered along the upstairs balcony.

  Her mouth dropped open, a rictus of pain underscored by a high-pitched moan. Her hands snapped up, her body bent away, and the nurse wrapped strong arms around her, searching for the threat.

  When I looked up, I saw it staring down, caught in a flare of the fiery torches.

  Edward, Marquess of Selwick.

  Chapter Forty-four

  “COME!” I SNAPPED, PUTTING ONE arm around the smaller woman and half-lifting her into Terry’s boat. Nurse Trevisan hesitated, not having seen the Marquess, but faced by Vivian cringing in terror and a stranger in a Harold Lloyd outfit offering escape, she decided to go now and sort it out after.

  I’d left the boat’s motor running for precisely this reason, and slapped it into Reverse, nearly yanking my Greek attendant into the Canal. The instant our prow was clear of the other hulls, I spun the wheel and shoved the handle into Forward. The throaty engine bit into the water, nearly obscuring the shouts from behind—but when I looked back, I immediately took it out of gear and let the nose drift towards the side.

  The dark figure racing along the narrow frontage tore off his mask and, as our two paths coincided, he simply took to the air—to come crashing against the rear passenger well just as two figures in black burst out of the palazzo in pursuit. I waited until my new passenger’s legs had drawn up towards safety, then slapped the motor into gear and headed for the mouth of the Canal. A backwards glance assured me that he was in—and that one of the pursuers had gone down on the slick stones, the other man stopping to help him.

  But the boats at the palazzo would all have their keys in them, so I pressed on the speed, and flew as fast as I dared over the dark water.

  I felt his presence at my back, and shouted over my shoulder. “Welcome aboard, Holmes.”

  “Had I known that Zorro would be required to take flight,” he answered, “I’d have rigged a line from the roof-top.”

  We were under the Accademia Bridge when a woman’s voice came. “Slow down, and turn here.”

  Nurse Trevisan. I throttled back, and followed her directions into the side canal.

  “Pull to the side up there, just after the sandòlo, and shut down the motor.” Figuring she meant a kind of boat, I pulled into the only gap I saw. As we slowed, she clambered onto the Runabout’s front to shut down the forward light, then retrieved the dripping rope, stepping onto the fondamenta
to pull us in. Holmes turned off the aft light and took hold of a cleat set into the walk-way. Our motion stopped. There was not enough light down here to reveal us—unless they, too, came down the canal.

  We waited. And waited…

  Two minutes, three—and a boat roared past the mouth of the canal.

  I let my shoulders slump with the relief of tension, but I made no move to get us going again. Instead, I asked Holmes to see if there were any travelling rugs under the back passenger seats. When he found one, I waited until the nurse had wrapped it around Vivian’s shoulders against the night.

  And then I asked the woman to walk away out of earshot.

  She looked to Vivian, who hesitated, then nodded. The boat bounced as Nurse Trevisan’s weight left it, and I waited until her footsteps faded before I spoke, keeping my voice low.

  “Vivian, this is my husband, Sherlock Holmes. We’re here because I promised Ronnie and her mother that I’d find you. But before I can explain any further—and certainly before I can decide what to do—I need to know what is going on. Why did you leave England so suddenly, and steal the necklace, and not tell anyone where you were going? Didn’t you realise it would look as if something had happened to you? Am I right in thinking you’ve been hiding on…” I heard my voice rising, and forced myself to stop. We could sit here all night while I pelted her with questions—and that was before I tried to explain how her brother came to be here.

  First things first: “Vivian, I simply need to know who’s in charge of your life.”

  She had looped the ties of the mask around her left wrist, and played with it now, its ornate surfaces gleaming in the faint light. “I am sorry…I intended to write Dorothy and Ronnie as soon as I could find someone to post a letter from some town far away. I do understand how concerned the two of them must be. But in truth, Miss Russell, I took nothing that was not mine to begin with. And there is nowhere I wish to be other than here.”

  “All right, well, let’s begin with that last. I’m guessing you’re on Poveglia, right? Look, last night Holmes and I went out there and we saw that…that doctor, who lives on the island. He’s doing some dreadful things there.”

  Vivian looked amazed—but then, to my astonishment, she burst into merry laughter. It was a startling sound, one I had never heard before—one I’d not expected to hear ever, much less in reply to a question like that.

  “I believe I should invite you home,” she said, and raised her voice a fraction. “Rose?”

  Nurse Trevisan’s footsteps returned out of the darkness, until she stood looking down into the boat.

  “We shall have guests,” Vivian told her.

  The nurse looked from me to Holmes, then nodded and went to light the front lamp. Holmes did the same to the rear one, and I nursed the big engine into a slow crawl up the narrow canal.

  Near its end, Nurse Trevisan had me pull aside and wait while she walked up to the Giudecca Canal to look for our pursuers.

  When she came back, she asked if I dared cross the water without lights.

  “It would not be the first maritime sin I’ve committed tonight,” I told her. This time, I went slowly, so as to give our hull a chance against large floating objects. Holmes moved up, sitting on the decking that covered the motor and dropping his feet onto the empty seat behind where I stood. Nurse Trevisan also remained standing, watching the water first in one direction, then the other.

  Drawing near the other side, she directed me into a narrow opening, and we passed through that canal as well, the throb of the engine echoing off the high buildings. At this one’s end, she repeated the manoeuvre of walking ahead and looking.

  When she stepped back into the Runabout, she said, “Let’s light the lamps but go slowly. If they’re out there, they’ll be looking for someone in a hurry.”

  So I took my leisurely time, tucking our passage in beside the string of islands as closely as I could. The night grew chill; Vivian leaned against the other woman’s legs, for warmth and companionship, her feathered bandeau dancing in the breeze. Holmes waited for a hidden patch to light a cigarette, and smoked it behind sheltering hands. Santa Maria della Grazia, then San Clemente, with its mysterious Portuguese woman and its inconvenient First Lady, followed by Santo Spirito—until finally, Poveglia lay before us.

  “Turn off the motor,” said Nurse Trevisan, the first words spoken since we had emerged from the last canal.

  I silenced the boat and we lay, bobbing gently, straining to hear the sound of a motor above the breeze. Nothing.

  Our engine coughed into life and I eased our valiant and twice-stolen craft in beside the other vessel in the narrow boat-house, trying to ignore the spill of lights from the macabre ground-floor laboratory. The nurse tied up, shut the boat-house doors, and pulled out a tiny pocket-torch to lead us towards the inner side of the long building.

  This side was the campo, or perhaps derelict orchard, that Holmes and I had passed through the night before. Keys rattled into a lock. A click of mechanism turning; a door wheezed open.

  Inside was a dimly-lit foyer that joined the middle of a long institutional corridor with many doors on either side. A small light bulb burned directly overhead in this cross-roads, with another over the stairway we climbed. The layout on the upper floor was much the same, although the walls here were covered with fresh-looking wallpaper rather than the dingy paint below.

  The nurse went through the first door to the left. As we filed in, she set about lighting a paraffin lamp, then crossed the room to make sure the curtains were drawn. This was a communal sitting room, with chairs and settees that would accommodate twenty or more people, arranged in three casual groups. A large fireplace occupied the inner wall, clean and bare for the summer but for a vase of dry grasses.

  Nurse Trevisan said, “I need a cup of tea. Vee?”

  Vivian had sat in what seemed to be a favourite chair, which in the daytime would be next to a garden window, and was in the process of unpinning the plumed crown—slightly the worse for wear—from her blonde head. “Oh, yes thanks.”

  “And for you two? Tea, coffee, cocoa? A drink?”

  Holmes and I were both happy with tea. She nodded and walked out, crossing the hallway to an open door on the other side: the run of water; the scrape of a match, and the puff of gas igniting. I exchanged glances with Holmes, who followed the nurse. Vivian placed the headdress, mask, and a small pocketbook on the low table at the centre of her chosen circle of chairs, then kicked off her shoes and tucked her feet under her on the wide cushion.

  “Which is your room?” I asked.

  “Why?”

  I did not answer, but after a moment she nodded as if I had. “You want to know if there are bars on the windows. Back into the hallway and to your right, it’s the fourth one on the right after the stairs. Take a lamp. And kindly be quiet, Miss Russell. Women are sleeping.”

  The hallway was plain, its floors of tile cracked here and there but clean to the edges. The walls had fresh wallpaper; the fourth door had been recently painted. And it was clearly her bedroom: the first thing that caught my eye when I held up the lamp was an odd flesh-toned half-mask with moustache, precisely the size of one of the gaps on her wall in Selwick. Hanging beside it were two photographs, both taken in the Selwick garden. One was of her brother Thomas, which from his carefree stance was taken before the War. The other was more recent, showing Thomas’ wife and daughter. This one I could date with some precision, because Ronnie’s pregnancy was just beginning to show. She glowed with happiness.

  The room was even more sparsely furnished than the rooms she had made for herself at Selwick. It could be simply that she’d only just arrived. Still, its walls had been freshly painted, and in the same colours as the other: warm terra cotta, cool turquoise. Which, I suddenly realised, were the very colours of Venice.

  There were no bars on the windows. Her wardro
be held colourful new clothing, from skirts to shoes to four brand-new belts. A pretty bowl on the table held an assortment of fresh fruit. A tiny, pitted bronze figurine—probably Roman, probably a dog—stood beside the lamp on her bed-side table. Inside the table were some papers and two small jeweller’s boxes. The smaller one had a Medieval locket on a modern chain; the larger one held an exquisite lapis-and-gold Fabergé egg. I looked carefully at the papers, and as I shut the drawer, I could not help thinking that the bed itself was plenty wide enough for two people.

  Smiling, I went back towards the communal room. I could hear snores, and the voices of Nurse Trevisan and Holmes from across the hall, though not the words. I set down the lantern and closed the door, then took a chair across from Vivian, pulling off the Harold Lloyd mask at last. It took some time to disentangle the spectacles, but I did not rush: the nakedness of a face that normally wears glasses is disarming, and I wanted Vivian to feel herself in a position of strength. I finally dropped the mask beside hers and donned the spectacles alone, wrinkling my face to settle the unfamiliar nose-rests into place.

  I sat back in the chair, returning her scrutiny.

  Why did I keep thinking of Vivian as older than she was? In part, I supposed, because the aunt of a contemporary is usually of the previous generation, but also because when I’d seen her she’d seemed as small and bent as a geriatric. Lady Vivian Beaconsfield was in her early thirties. Tonight, she looked it.

  Her hair, artfully tousled by the bandeau, might have belonged to any Young Thing on an Excelsior chaise longue—though her skin was not as tanned, and her eyes were considerably clearer. She’d spent a night dancing followed by two fraught hours in an open boat, and yet she looked less exhausted than I felt.

  Time to see how resilient she actually was.

  “You came to Venice to get away from your brother.”

  She winced, but did not retreat. “That’s right.”