“A shame we broke up so soon,” said Harry Williams, staring at his glass of wine. “We may not get as nice a day again before we reach England. There could be another storm tomorrow.”
“Damn me if we didn’t have enough of a storm today, thanks to Tess,” said Mercer, shaking his head. He looked around the group as if for sympathy, but none of the others betrayed any emotion. “She and Bobby were a pretty good match, don’t you think?” he asked, elbowing Williams. “I don’t think I’d want to have lived downstairs from them once they married, though.”
“Well, I never saw ’em argue much with each other, if that’s what you mean,” said Williams. “Bobby had a temper, sure, but he was mild as a minister around her.”
“That’s the truth,” Jimmy Archer agreed. “But he’d get his Irish up right fast if he thought somebody was paying too much attention to her. You saw how he went after that silly old German who started flattering her piano playing.”
Mercer gave a low whistle. “Wow, didn’t I? But Bobby went a little too far there, I’d say. Of course, how was he to know the fellow was going to murder him because of it?”
“I still don’t see how they can be so sure it’s murder,” I put in. “I got to know that German fellow a little bit, and he doesn’t seem that bad to me. A bit of a stuffed shirt, but that’s no proof he’s a killer.”
“Bobby’s dad says it’s murder, and he’s the expert,” said Mercer, shrugging. “He’s seen scads of murderers since he’s been a prosecuting attorney, and sent plenty of ’em to the gallows, too. I guess I’ll take his word for it.”
“I don’t know,” I said. “My father’s an attorney, too. Every time I’d try to get him to speculate about a case in the news, he’d tell me ‘Don’t judge by the newspapers. Twelve good men and true will tell us who’s guilty and who’s not.’ If the fight is the only evidence Mr. Babson has, I don’t see how he’ll get a conviction. Did anybody even see the German fellow out on deck? For all any of us know, he went back to his cabin and licked his wounds all night.”
“Good question,” said Trombauer. “I sure didn’t see him—that wasn’t a fit night to stick your head outside. I don’t think Bobby would have gone out, if he hadn’t been so drunk. I wish he hadn’t gone, so help me God. If I’d known what was going to happen, I swear I’d have stopped him.” Several of the others around the circle nodded and murmured their assent.
“No disrespect toward the deceased, but who’s to say he didn’t fall overboard by himself?” said Holtzman, raising an eyebrow. He took a cigarette case out of his pocket and offered it around the group before taking one for himself and lighting it. Jimmy Archer and Trombauer joined him.
“Well, if I had to bet, that’s what I’d bet on,” I said, keeping my expression neutral. “Poor Bobby got caught by a lurch of the ship, slipped on the deck, and went over the side. If he hit his head, he couldn’t even have called for help.”
“You’d lose that bet,” said Alan Mercer, a smug expression on his face. “I can’t tell you all the details, because I didn’t hear them all, but I heard my papa and old Babson talking. And I can tell you for a fact, Bab-son’s got an eyewitness.”
“A witness!” said Harry Williams. Everyone in the group turned to look at Mercer. “Who is it?”
“Now, I’m not sure I ought to tell you,” said Mercer, smirking. He picked up his wineglass and took a sip.
“Damn your eyes, Mercer, if you don’t tell us, I’ll throw you over the side, and every single man here will swear I’m innocent,” said Williams. “There’s not twelve Christians in the world that would vote to convict me. Who is it?”
Mercer looked around the silent group, grinning broadly. Then Williams raised his fist in a mock threat, and Trombauer said, “You’re a dead man if you don’t spill the beans.”
“Oh, very well,” said Mercer, savoring his moment of power. He paused, milking the suspense for one more instant. Then he leaned forward and said, in a conspiratorial whisper, “It’s that silly artist, Signor Rubbia. He saw it all.”
21
“Rubbia!” said Mr. Clemens. I had gone directly to our cabin to tell him the news of a witness to the murder. He sat and listened to my report with an open mouth, shaking his head in disbelief. After I had finished, he leapt to his feet and demanded, “What the hell was he doing out on deck in a storm? It’s crazy enough that Babson boy was out there. I can’t believe that little peacock would risk getting his feathers wet on a night like that.”
“Nonetheless, that’s what Alan Mercer says he overheard Mr. Babson say,” I said. “I can’t vouch for it myself.”
“Damnation!” said Mr. Clemens. He stalked over to the whisky decanter and sloshed some of the contents into a glass, then raised it in my direction with a questioning look on his face. I shook my head, and he stoppered the decanter again, then took a long sip of the whisky.
“I guess we’ve got our work cut out for us now,” he said, after a moment. “I want to know what Rubbia’s story is before I talk to the prince.” He pulled his watch out of his pocket and inspected it. “We’ve still got an hour and a half until dinner. See if you can run Rubbia down and get him to talk, Wentworth. If he really did see Prinz Karl throw Babson overboard, there’s nothing more we can do. And if he’s lying, I damn well want to find that out—more important, I want to find out why.” He began to pace, by which I knew he was thinking furiously.
“Why would he be lying about something so serious?” I asked, taking the seat Mr. Clemens had vacated. “He’s taking a man’s life in his hands. If it comes out that he’s lying, he’ll get himself in hot water with the authorities—not to mention losing credibility with his patrons in Philadelphia.”
“Damned if I can make any sense of it,” said my employer. “I don’t think Rubbia would blink an eye at telling an ordinary garden-variety stretcher, if it magnified his own importance. But why he’d lie about something that could send a fellow to the hangman is way too deep for me.” He stared out the porthole, then took another drink and turned to face me with raised eyebrows. “Of course, there’s a chance Rubbia did it himself. Maybe he’s trying to shift suspicion.”
“Excuse me? What makes you think he could be the murderer? He’s even less likely than the prince, I’d think.” This was an angle I hadn’t expected; I looked up to see if Mr. Clemens was serious.
“You’re not thinking with your whole brain, then,” said Mr. Clemens. “Remember that lecture you told me about, where Babson and his cronies sat in the back and heckled Rubbia until he was ready to try and lick ’em all? Remember the time Babson baited Rubbia until he stomped out of the dining room? I thought Rubbia was ready to spit right in the boy’s face—hell, I bet he would have, if the men who’re paying for his ticket to Paris hadn’t been sitting right there. Rubbia had plenty of reason to hold a grudge against the Babson boy, and it wouldn’t surprise me one bit to find out he sneaked up behind the brat when he was leaning over the rail and gave him a shove.” He picked up one of his pipes from the table and peered into the bowl, trying to decide whether there was anything left in it to light.
“I suppose you’re right,” I said. “But if he did murder Babson, he’s not likely to reveal it to a near-stranger. I hardly know what to ask him.”
Mr. Clemens grimaced. “Hell, he’s even less likely to reveal anything to me—the son of a bitch stuck his nose in the air the minute he found out I was getting more attention from the other passengers than he was. He might talk to Kipling, but Kipling’s off trying to learn whether the crew saw anything that night, and I don’t have time to go run him down. And Kipling’s wife is busy eavesdropping on the ladies. So the job’s yours. Maybe you can just tell him you heard a rumor he’d seen the murder, and ask if it’s true. Almost anything you learn will be better than what we have now. So go find Rubbia and pump him. If his story holds up, our whole goddamn case is a bust.”
He knocked back the rest of his whisky, then stood in silence for a moment, the burned
-out pipe in one hand and the empty glass in the other. “Jesus, Wentworth, do you suppose we’ve all three been fools—you, me, and Kipling? First we go snitching on the prince because we think he’s some kind of phony. Then when he’s accused of something really serious, we turn right around and try to get him cleared. Maybe I’ve let all this detective foolishness go to my head. Sure, I saved an innocent man from the gallows down in New Orleans, but that don’t mean I’m right this time. Maybe the only one who can’t see the plain facts is pig-headed Sam Clemens, who thinks he’s a master detective.”
He gave me a sharp look. “Well, Wentworth, what do you think? Are we chasing a wild goose, or is there still a chance Prinz Karl is innocent?”
I didn’t know what I was going to say until I opened my mouth. “Well, sir, I suppose we could have been carried away by our successes. But where’s the harm if we try to establish Prinz Karl’s innocence? If the case against him is overwhelming, we’ll know it soon enough. And if it’s not, someone should point that out. I don’t think Mr. Babson is in any mood to seek a fair verdict—he’s made up his mind, and he’s out for revenge. And Mr. Jennings may not be doing much more than going through the motions in his investigation. So I think we ought to keep looking for answers—because it’s important that the truth be known, whether Prinz Karl is innocent or guilty. And I don’t think anyone except us is making any attempt to find it out.”
Mr. Clemens nodded. “You know, they did teach you a few things at Yale, Wentworth. Or maybe I should take the credit. Well, no matter—I’ve made up my mind. Go find Rubbia and see what that little poseur has to say for himself. We may not clear Prinz Karl, but we can try to find out the truth.” He made an impatient motion, shooing me out the door. I quickly took the hint and went in search of Signor Rubbia.
I still found it hard to understand Mr. Clemens’s low opinion of Signor Rubbia. I had noticed that my employer’s interest in the visual arts was rather limited, and that his judgments were more often based on an accurate portrayal of the world as he saw it than on concerns of technique and composition. I could see that Signor Rubbia had an inflated sense of his own worth, and perhaps a certain resentment of Mr. Clemens’s fame. And I could understand my employer’s including the artist among our suspects. That did not invalidate the fact that the artist had sensible and interesting things to say about painting—even if there was a hint of vanity in his character.
I remembered having seen Signor Rubbia bringing his drawing pad out to the rear deck of the ship to sketch, so I headed aft in hopes of finding him there. I was in luck; there he sat in a folding canvas chair, his pad on his knee. He was tapping a pencil against the corner of his jaw, and he had a faraway look in his eye, as if in deep thought. My first instinct was not to disturb him, but then I remembered that a man’s life might well depend on what I could learn from him. “Good afternoon, Signor Rubbia,” I said.
He started, looking up at me with his mouth open, then quickly recovered. “Good afternoon, young man,” he said, with a slight nod of his head. His distinct Italian accent gave the words a musical inflection that I could not help but find charming and exotic, raised as I was among flat-voiced New Englanders.
I held out my hand. “Signor Rubbia, I’m Wentworth Cabot. I don’t think we’ve actually been introduced, but I wanted to tell you how much I enjoyed your talk on modern art the other night.”
Rubbia shook my hand without rising from his seat. “Ah, you are not with the tour, then? I am glad to know that my lessons have been valuable to you, in any case.”
“Oh, they certainly have,” I assured him. “In fact, I’m sorry that I’m not traveling with your group—after hearing your comments on the French artists, I’m looking forward to seeing their work. I’m sure I’d enjoy it even more if you were along with me to tell me about what I was seeing.”
At this, Signor Rubbia rose to his feet, positively beaming. “What a grand pleasure to meet such a sympathetic young man,” he said, taking my hand in both his and shaking it again. “It is a pity the sea voyage will so soon be finished. Perhaps I could have found time to give you some private drawing lessons. More than anything else, learning to draw would teach you to see what another artist has seen.”
“A pity indeed,” I agreed, quite sincerely. I had shown some interest—and, I believe, some ability—in drawing during my school days, before my father had discouraged it as a frivolous pursuit. I was not bad at getting a general impression of a scene into a sketch, but beyond that I knew my shortcomings all too well. I pointed to the pad he had left leaning against his chair leg. “What were you drawing, if you don’t mind my asking?”
“Bah, this is nothing, really,” said the artist. He held up the top page of the drawing pad, a view of the stern of our vessel with the wake streaming out: behind it. “I was merely keeping my hands busy. To really capture the sunlight and the sea, one wants the full palette of colors.”
“Yes, I can imagine,” I said, peering closely at the sketch. “Still, this must be tricky, to get all this into proper proportion and perspective.” It really was quite good, I thought, though it was evident even to my eye that it was a quick, unpolished piece of work—the artist’s equivalent of a writer’s first draft.
“All that can be taught,” said Signor Rubbia. “Why, I could teach you more than you might think in only two or three lessons. The part nobody can teach is the little spark of genius. But if it is there, a good teacher will see it, even in an untrained artist. Here!”—he thrust the pad and pencil at me—“Do me the kindness to draw something. Anything you wish. I will know right away whether you have the capability.”
“Well . . .”
“Draw!” he insisted, fixing me with a stern look that admitted no protest. He stood there with his arms folded across his chest, and I cast my eye about for something I could delineate in a few quick strokes. In any other circumstance, the offer of lessons from a real artist would have been a very appealing prospect. But Mr. Clemens would have me working double-time to help solve the mystery, and my entire purpose here was to get Signor Rubbia to tell me what he had supposedly seen the night of Robert Babson’s death. Still, I saw no harm in picking up a few hints about drawing if at the same time I could learn something that advanced Mr. Clemens’s interests.
Perhaps inevitably, I found a subject for my drawing standing directly in front of me: Signor Rubbia himself. I hesitated for a moment, thinking he might consider my drawing him an impertinence, but then I decided that he would most likely be more interested in assessing my ability. He might even find my choice of him as a subject flattering—unless my depiction was so wretched that he took it as mockery. Well, if that turned out to be the case, I would have only myself to blame.
He must have divined my intention, for a little smile came over his lips as he stood there in front of me, now clearly posing for his portrait. For myself, now that I had taken on the challenge, I felt an obligation to do the best job I could. I was immediately reminded that the human face and figure were among the most difficult subjects to capture accurately. I discovered unexpected asymmetries—his eyes were not exactly the same size, and my first attempt at rendering the angle of his broad-brimmed hat was not quite accurate. Neither was it easy to portray a man of his bulk without risking caricature, which he might take as an insult. I tried instead to emphasize the flowing lines of his cape, and his aggressive stance. While I was well aware of how long it had been since I’d done any serious drawing, I thought the likeness was not bad.
Finally, after perhaps five minutes, I decided that any further attempt would only worsen my sketch. I sighed and handed the sketchbook to him. “I fear it’s not as good as it might have been,” I said. “I should have tried something easier.”
“Let me judge that,” he said, taking the pad and holding it at arm’s length, squinting. Was it the sun that made him squint, or were his eyes going bad? Surely that would be a severe blow to someone whose livelihood depended on his vision—and for a man s
o obviously vain, wearing spectacles would be a terrible concession to age and infirmity. That last thought made me wonder how reliable his claim of having witnessed the murder might be—could his identification of the prince as the murderer be mistaken? I tried to think of some way to test his vision. Then I realized that it would have to be at night and in bad weather to provide an accurate comparison. Those conditions might be difficult to arrange.
“This is not so bad, for someone who has had no training,” he said, interrupting my train of thought. “You try to show what you really see, rather than what your mind tells you must be there.” He pointed to my rendition of his eyes, then to his raised chin, which I had done my best to make look heroic. “That is really the hardest thing for a beginner to overcome. But of course you have no technique at all—you don’t even know how to hold the pencil properly. That would make all the difference. I could teach you a great deal, if you wished to study. Even two or three lessons would take you a long way.”
“What a shame we didn’t speak earlier,” I said. “If we had met at the beginning of the voyage, I might have had time for a few drawing lessons.”
“Oh, it is still not too late,” he said eagerly. “We could meet tomorrow morning, and again in the afternoon, and then again before we reach England. I would not charge you very much—it is such a rare pleasure to work with someone who has so much of the natural ability. Not many of my students do.”
I thought for a moment; it seemed impossible that I would really have the time. Mr. Clemens would surely have work for me, even if his hope to exonerate Prinz Karl turned out to be a failure. I wondered, as well, whether Signor Rubbia’s praise of my amateurish sketch was not just a ploy, to persuade me to sign up for lessons. Perhaps he said the same thing to everyone he thought might give him a few dollars in exchange for half a dozen rudimentary hints on technique. Even so, it was tempting—I had enjoyed trying to capture his stance and expression, and I knew I could probably do better with instruction. “It is very tempting,” I admitted. “But Mr. Clemens sometimes has me working all through the morning and afternoon—I never really know in advance what demands he will make on my time.”
[Mark Twain Mysteries 03] - The Prince and the Prosecutor Page 22
