Venice Noir

by Maxim Jakubowski

  “Scorpions?” The detectives exchanged dubious looks.

  “She was interested in murders and rapes and things like that.” Taddeo immediately realized it would have been better to say nothing.

  “Well, let me tell you about her,” said the older policeman. “She was English—that you know—twentyseven years old. Unmarried. One sister, younger, called,” he screwed his face up into a grimace, “Tabitha. Parents divorced. Mother’s whereabouts unknown. Father lives in London. Interpol has sent the information to Scotland Yard so they can inform Signor Hughes about his daughter’s death.”

  “She had been in Venice only a week,” said the younger officer. “Had no friends or contacts here. The only person whose company she has been seen in is you.”

  Micola arrived back from a friend’s house at that point. When Taddeo explained why the police were there, she shrieked at him.

  “What did I tell you? That Englishwoman is trouble!”

  She had said that. But then Micola had feared he was sleeping with her. Taddeo shuddered to remember how he had once contemplated doing that. Now all he could see in his mind were the obscene tongue and eyes.

  The police wanted to question Micola too. And at the end of their interview with her, they arrested Taddeo on suspicion of the murder of Kathy Hughes.

  He was not at the office when the news came, but in his tall thin house in Tufnell Park. The doorbell rang and there were two uniformed officers on the doorstep—one male, one female. He knew what that meant; anyone who had ever watched a TV crime series knew what that meant.

  “Which one?” he managed to get out, meaning his daughters.

  “Can we come in?” asked the policewoman, professionally gentle. “It’s Kathy, I’m afraid,” she continued, when the three of them were seated at his scrubbed-pine kitchen table. Her male colleague moved instinctively to the kettle.

  But when the facts had been conveyed, the father stood up, passed his hands through his already disheveled gray hair, and said, like a character in one of those TV shows, “I’m going to need something stronger than tea.”

  Russell Hughes didn’t even bother to offer them the malt. He poured himself a slug and knocked it back too quickly for something that expensive, and then poured another glassful which he just cradled in his big hands.

  “What was your daughter doing in Venice, Mr. Hughes?” asked the policewoman. “Can you tell us?”

  “She was on vacation, I suppose,” he said.

  “You suppose? When did you last see Kathy, Mr. Hughes?”

  “About nine months ago.” He didn’t see any reason to mention the book proposal.

  “You were not close?”

  How often was it normal to see one’s adult children? He shrugged. “Why all the questions? Have they caught the bastard who did this?”

  “The Italian police will keep us fully informed,” said the male officer.

  “What would you like to happen to the body?” asked the female.

  Russell Hughes stared at her, appalled.

  “I mean, after the autopsy in Venice,” she explained. “Would you like her body flown back here? You and your exwife are her official next of kin and we have not been able to reach Mrs. Hughes. Do you know where she is?”

  “I haven’t had any contact with her for thirteen years,” he said.

  The policewoman did a mental calculation. “Who had custody of the two girls when you divorced?”

  “My wife. It’s always the wife, isn’t it?”

  “And you haven’t seen her since Kathy was—what?—fourteen?”

  “That’s right.”

  “But you had contact with Kathy? And her sister?”

  “Of course,” he said irritably. “Their mother just kept out of my way.”

  “Do you have contact details for Kathy’s sister, Mr. Hughes?” asked the policewoman. “We’re trying to get in touch with her.”

  “You want to tell her what happened to Kathy?”

  “Not necessarily. We assumed you’d want to phone her yourself. But we’d like to ask her about Kathy’s Venice trip. She might have said more to her sister.”

  “I don’t think they saw that much of each other,” he said. “But I’ll go and get Tabby’s details. My Filofax is in the study.”

  He took another swig of malt and left the room unsteadily.

  The policeman rolled his eyes. “What kind of a father has to look up his daughter’s address?” His own little girls were aged nine and seven.

  “One who’s just had a shock?” suggested his colleague.

  The gondolier community of Venice is a close-knit one. There are just over four hundred of them. Two are women. One has published a right-wing book. Three have recorded albums. But usually they are not in the headlines. They are background figures, charging outrageous prices for less than an hour’s ride—shorter than even a psychoanalyst’s hour—but feeling exploited if a passerby takes their photograph without permission. And now Taddeo Columbini has his picture in every local paper, his wife has red-rimmed eyes, and his friends shake their heads.

  Taddeo had been arrested though not charged, and released after twenty-four hours. But the word on the canal was that it was only a matter of time before he was charged and remanded for the murder of Kathy Hughes. A strand of her hair had been found twisted around a button on his shirt and his DNA had shown up on her clothes too. There was no other suspect.

  But why would he kill her? That was what they were saying amongst themselves. It would have been like slaughtering the golden goose. She was giving him plenty by all accounts. And stealing a laptop? Without taking its cable, which would not be that easy to replace in Venice. It didn’t add up.

  And it was having a bad effect on trade. No female tourist would get into a gondola alone now, and though this had never been a large part of their custom, it was a slur on their reputation. Yet they did not spurn Taddeo, who was not working at the moment; they banded together to give him money and support. He was one of them, and when a gondolier was in trouble, it was them against the world.

  They decided to mount an investigation of their own.

  There were not many mourners at her funeral. The body had been flown back once the pathologists were through with it, and was about to be cremated in East Finchley. Her father and sister were the chief mourners and there was a handful of friends; Kathy Hughes had not been much liked. Of her mother there was no sign.

  The service was impersonal and brief. Russell Hughes and his surviving daughter, Tabitha, sat two feet apart in a front pew. She gave a suppressed sob as the coffin slid away between the curtains to its fiery destination, but her father remained almost impassive. Ever since the police officers had first contacted him, he had moved like an automaton, numb to what was going on around him.

  After the service, an awkward knot formed on the gravel drive outside where a light summer rain was falling; they decided against going to a pub and drifted apart again.

  “Can I give you a lift anywhere?” the father asked the daughter formally.

  She flashed a glare at him. “I came in my own car,” she said, walking quickly to where she had parked. She hoped she would never see him again.

  Two mourners at the back of the chapel came out and saw the parting of the ways. No one ever recognized them when they were off duty.

  “That’s one messed-up family,” said the policewoman.

  “I can’t get over Tabitha not knowing her mother’s address,” replied her colleague.

  They had followed up on the last known address for Caroline Fletcher, formerly Hughes, but it was five years old and she was no longer there. There just wasn’t enough personpower in the force to follow the trail any farther, and she’d missed the funeral now. Perhaps Kathy’s mother would never know she’d died.

  The gondoliers mobilized to find out what would release one of their number from suspicion. Taddeo might cheat on his wife, might overcharge a customer, might lie if in a tight corner, but not one of his c
olleagues believed him capable of murder. He had an honest, open face and a generally sunny nature; had he not been Mr. August a few years ago in one of Piero Pazzi’s calendars that sold so well to tourists, especially middle-aged women and gay men?

  The gondoliers who moored up regularly near the Gritti Palace got more out of the doormen than the police had. The one who had been on duty the night of the killing was nephew to one of the gondoliers and willing to talk over a Cynar with his Uncle Giorgio and two others when his shift ended.

  “I told the police all I knew,” he said. “They told me the lock on her door wasn’t broken and no one could have climbed in the window, so she must have opened the door to her killer.”

  “So he came in through the main door of the hotel?” said his uncle.

  “Yes, I suppose he did. There are staff entrances but you need a card to get through those. As I told the police, I don’t stop people and ask for their ID, do I?”

  “Calm down, young Stefano!” said Giorgio. “No one’s blaming you. No one expects you to know what the killer looks like. They don’t all wear shades at night and have a bulge in their jackets.”

  “No,” agreed Stefano, draining his drink. “And this one didn’t have a gun—he strangled her.”

  All the gondoliers knew the gory details; Taddeo had told them everything. These three nodded and crossed themselves.

  “But can you remember any strangers, any people you hadn’t seen before?” one of them inquired.

  “They asked me that. She was killed at about eleven o’clock, but her body wasn’t found till the next morning when the maid brought her breakfast. She’s still out sick, poor Eva—can you imagine? But the killer could have come in earlier and had a drink in the bar or just hidden somewhere in the hotel. It’s very busy in high season and there are many places he could have hidden.”

  It was a long interview for Stefano so they bought him another drink.

  “I didn’t recognize everyone who came in,” he continued. “But it’s the same every shift. The hotel is so expensive people come just for a few nights; they change over all the time. As long as they walk confidently, I just open the doors.”

  They all acknowledged that the doorman probably took more notice of guests and visitors leaving than arriving. Those coming out often wanted a gondola or a water taxi, and the doorman had all the relevant information on hand.

  Something about this, or perhaps it was the effect of a second Cynar downed rather quickly, gave Stefano an idea.

  The hit man had been lying low since the murder. He had done all the usual things—dyed his hair, wore glasses, bought new clothes—but first he had checked out of the Gritti Palace. The police had of course recorded the names of all hotel guests, but it was beyond their powers to keep nearly two hundred wealthy Americans, English, and other Europeans from continuing their holidays or flying back home. And once the police were sure of Taddeo’s guilt, they forgot about the list.

  And even if they hadn’t, the assassin had used a false name and fake passport. He was now in a much less grand hotel that was costing his employer a fraction of the price of the Gritti Palace. He didn’t really mind though. The bed was comfortable enough and while it didn’t have air-conditioning, no one minded if he leaned out of his window wearing no more than boxer shorts. But he’d been holed up here for nearly two weeks now and was getting bored.

  After drinking half a bottle of vodka a night and smoking his way through many packs of cigarettes, he did not feel very good. And he didn’t sleep well either; the woman with the ponytail floated just behind his eyes whenever he closed them. He hated killing women. He charged extra for that.

  One night when he couldn’t sleep, he opened up her computer. His English wasn’t great and it didn’t look that interesting. But he couldn’t sell it; that would bring the police right down on him. He decided the bottom of the canal would be the best place for it; indeed, this is precisely what he’d been instructed to do with it. The little silver thing shaped like a bullet, on the other hand, he kept in his inside jacket pocket and was reluctant to part with. You never knew when it might be helpful to have something you could use for blackmail.

  Tabitha Hughes had been in a daze since her father had phoned her a fortnight earlier. It was true she had not seen much of Kathy since they had left home, and as far as she was concerned she had no mother. Tabitha had created a new family for herself out of workmates and lovers. She didn’t like reminders of the past. But Kathy had been her only sibling and no one else had shared the same childhood.

  She had no idea that Kathy had been in contact with their father.

  After a few days off work, she had gone back to her job at a catering firm in Holborn. It mainly involved making fancy sandwiches for upmarket offices, which a fleet of young men took out on bicycles with big baskets, but they catered some special occasions as well, usually office parties but sometimes book launches or after-show parties, where the clients were usually more interested in the drink than the food.

  Home late after one such party, she poured herself a glass of white wine and opened up her computer for the first time in weeks, intending to catch up with some friends on Facebook. The first thing she noticed was an e-mail from her dead sister.

  Hey stranger,

  I’m in Venice! Remember how we used to talk about coming here? Not the Danieli but this place, the Gritti Palace, is quite cool. He is paying for everything, one way or another. Read the attachment, at least the last story. It’s all there. I’ve had enough. Blackmail has lost its novelty, I’m up for revenge now. You?

  * * *

  The hit man answered his door as carelessly as the woman had. Three shots with a silencer and he was dead. The new assassin searched the man’s possessions, took the flash drive from his pocket, and slipped down the stairs as quietly as he had come in. No one would ever associate this crime with the other one: no connection, quite different MOs, and nothing as sophisticated as CCTV in the Hotel Roxy. He waited till he had crossed several little bridges and was in another sestiere before pulling out his phone.

  Stefano realized that they needed to concentrate on someone leaving with a bag concealing the victim’s laptop. He asked the person who had worked the shift after his and then reviewed the records for checkouts late at night, which were not that uncommon in the upmarket hotels.

  So the gondoliers had a name, almost certainly a false one. And a photocopy of a forged passport. The face was not very distinctive, but hundreds of copies were made of the man’s photo. Before their inquiries had gotten very far underway, however, there was the same face, with a neat bullet hole over one eye, in the papers. He was a bleached blonde now, but the killer was dead.

  At that point Giorgio and Stefano went to the police. The gondoliers were the only ones who had made a connection between the man at the Hotel Roxy and the murder at the Gritti Palace.

  And the second hit man had made a silly mistake. He had gone to a bar and drunk several cocktails, then flagged down a passing gondola. There was a poster on it saying, Have you seen this man? And a reward offered. The passenger had started to laugh hysterically and the gondolier became suspicious. He had leaped on his passenger and held him down, calling for help from his fellow oarsmen.

  Stefano and Giorgio then took the detectives to where they had the man bound in a safe house and there they found the flash drive.

  Russell Hughes thought he had gotten away with it, as he had last time. The computer had been deep-sixed somewhere in the muddy waters of a Venetian canal. The strangler had been eliminated.

  There had been sympathy at work; a terrible thing for a father to lose his daughter so. Not one of the employees knew she had been given a contract for a book. He had drawn it up himself after hours, using the office template, buying time; he had never intended to publish it.

  Now it was a closed book. He roused himself to take a tie from his desk drawer and a brush to push through his unruly hair. They were having a launch party tonight for a ce
lebrity memoir whose advance orders were looking so healthy it was clear the house was going to make serious money. There was already the sound of laughter and clinking glasses coming from the boardroom; he must get a move on or he would be late.

  A young woman in a black dress and a white apron gave him a glass of champagne as he entered the room to subdued greetings. The celebrity author had not arrived—was waiting to make an entrance. Another young woman in the same uniform stepped forward to offer him a canapé. There was something familiar about her.

  “Hello, Dad,” she said.

  “Tabitha!” He didn’t have a chance to wonder why she was there; a commotion erupted in the doorway, which could only mean the Big Name had entered the building.

  But no, there were policemen and they were coming toward him. Handcuffs appeared and his rights were read. The house photographer was flashing away—at this stage everyone thought it was a stunt.

  Everyone except Russell and Tabitha Hughes. He was staring at her. She looked like her sister—and her mother too. She was smiling. But how had she known?

  “‘The Good Father,’” she whispered as they took him away.

  He had a stroke in the elevator as they told him about the evidence from his younger daughter’s computer and the connection established by the gondoliers between two seemingly unrelated deaths in Venice.

  They didn’t know about Caroline. He tried to tell them. But all that came out was, “Short stories are notoriously difficult to sell.”

  They were his last words.

  About the Contributors

  BARBARA BARALDI has been called “the Queen of Italian gothic.” Her first book, The Girl with the Crystal Eyes, appeared in Italy in 2006 and has been translated into English. She has since written a variety of acclaimed novels and books for young adults, including Il Bacio del Demone and Scarlett. She was featured in the BBC documentary Italian Noir as one the foremost contemporary Italian crime authors, and has won several awards. She has also worked as a photographer and a model and lives near Bologna.