Isle of the Dead

by Alex Connor

  The following week I watched the loathsome Aretino passing by St Mark’s. This time he was walking with Angelico Vespucci.

  Everyone suspects Vespucci of the murder of his wife. Everyone talks of it. But Vespucci is a wealthy man with clever friends. He slides into his pew on a Sunday at the Basilica di Santa Maria Gloriosa dei Frari, and clasps his hands together, looking upwards to the painting of the Assumption of the Virgin, his bulbous eyes catching the glance of no other.

  Every week Vespucci slides himself and his wavering reputation to the studio of Titian. I have seen him enter, and wondered what the artist thinks of this sitter. Wondered if, as he draws in the line of brow or slant of cheek, he suspects that he is painting the likeness of a killer.

  9

  New York

  Knowing that most of the important dealers would attend the auction in New York, it wasn’t a complete surprise when Farina spotted Jobo Kido in the lounge at the Four Seasons. Assuming her famous smile, she moved over to him, Jobo leaping to his feet and nodding as she approached.

  ‘Jobo! Lovely to see you.’

  ‘And you, Farina. I expect I will see many familiar faces at the auction,’ he replied, ushering her to a seat next to his. ‘Would you like some tea? Or a drink perhaps?’

  She shook her head, eager to dispense with the pleasantries and get down to business. Important as the upcoming sale was, there was little of interest to Jobo Kido. So perhaps his trip to the USA had been for another reason? Perhaps he hoped that being among his peers he might hear the latest gossip? From the instant Farina had heard of the Titian she had suspected Jobo knew of it. It was too macabre, too peculiar to his taste, to pass unnoticed by the dealer. Jobo had many connections in London – surely one of them would have told him about the notorious find?

  ‘I was expecting to see you in New York,’ she said blithely. ‘Although it’s not a great sale. Not the kind of pieces you usually go for.’

  ‘Maybe it’s time to expand my interests.’

  ‘Or catch up?’

  His eyes were steady. ‘On what, Farina?’

  ‘Any rumours, gossip.’

  ‘About what?’

  She waved her hand around in the air. ‘Anything. Nothing. Who knows?’

  You do, Jobo thought to himself. You’ve heard about the Titian, and you’re trying to pump me for information. His gaze rested for an instant on the table in front of them, then he looked back to her.

  ‘I think you’re having a little game with me, Farina.’

  ‘Never,’ she replied, smiling enigmatically.

  ‘So you’ve heard nothing of interest lately?’

  ‘About what?’

  ‘A painting?’

  ‘I didn’t think it would be about a second-hand Ford, Jobo,’ she replied smartly. ‘Why don’t you ask me straight out?’

  ‘Ask you what?’

  ‘What you want to know!’ she snapped impatiently.

  He was too wily to be caught out. ‘I really don’t know what you’re talking about.’

  ‘Fine,’ she replied, rising to her feet. ‘Good to see you again, Jobo. No doubt we’ll bump into each other at the auction.’

  No doubt we will, Jobo Kido thought, watching as she moved across the hotel lobby. His instincts told him what she wouldn’t – Farina Ahmadi knew about the Titian. Which meant that she would want it for her husband, using her money as a grappling hook to haul Angelico Vespucci to a new home in Turkey.

  The hell she was, Jobo thought. If anyone was going to get the Titian, he was.

  Leaning back in his seat, the dealer scanned the foyer, nodding to several people he knew and ordering some tea. From such a vantage point he could see who was arriving and should – by the end of the afternoon – know who was in New York for the sale. Of course there were easier, more discreet ways to find out, but Jobo wanted to be seen. Wanted everyone to know that he was in town. And in the running.

  What he didn’t realise was that he too was being watched. By a tall African-American who was – at that moment – talking to Gaspare Reni on his mobile.

  ‘How are you?’ Triumph asked pleasantly. ‘Keeping well, I hope?’

  Across the Atlantic Gaspare grimaced. So Triumph Jones was going to be the first, was he? And how many more dealers would be calling him in the days to come? How many people who had ignored him for a decade would suddenly remember his phone number? Gaspare had hoped that no one would have heard about the Titian. Had prayed it would stay a secret, hidden in his gallery’s eaves. But as soon as Gaspare heard from Triumph he knew the news was out.

  ‘I keep busy,’ Gaspare replied, answering the American’s question. ‘And you?’

  ‘Very busy. Look, Gaspare, I won’t lie to you – I’ve a reason for making this call.’ He tone was all lazy indifference. ‘I’ve heard about a painting. The Titian portrait of Angelico Vespucci.’

  ‘What about it?’

  ‘I heard that it’s in your possession.’

  Some thought Gaspare Reni was past his best. In many ways, he was. Slower, certainly. Not as ruthless, as energetic as he had once been. But Gaspare had lost nothing of his basic cunning. And that, allied to the news of Seraphina’s murder, made him wily.

  ‘I admit I had the picture—’

  ‘Had it?’ Triumph echoed. ‘You don’t have it any more?’

  Pausing, Gaspare pretended to be confused. ‘It was … it has a terrible reputation … I was … oh, maybe I acted without thinking.’

  ‘What are you talking about?’

  ‘I destroyed it.’

  There was silence on the phone connection from London to New York. A thumping, disabling silence as Triumph took a moment to rally.

  ‘I don’t believe you,’ he said at last. ‘Gaspare, old friend, you don’t need to lie to me. We can keep all this between ourselves. I certainly don’t want anyone else to know about the Titian—’

  ‘That painting was evil.’

  The voice was slow. Soothing. ‘It’s a picture, nothing more. Remember Shakespeare? It is the eye of childhood that fears a painted devil … It’s just a portrait—’

  ‘Of a killer.’

  Calmly, Triumph glanced down from the mezzanine into the foyer below, where Jobo Kido was sipping his tea.

  ‘Gaspare, I know you. And I know that you couldn’t destroy a masterpiece.’

  ‘You don’t know me at all, Triumph. We’ve bumped into each other over the years, competed for lots, but you were climbing to the top when I was winding down. You know nothing of me. We had no shared friends, nor interests. If you hadn’t wanted to know about this bloody portrait I’d never have heard from you. So don’t insult me, don’t treat me like an old fool.’ His tone was contemptuous. ‘When I tell you I got rid of that painting, I’m telling you the truth. I destroyed it.’

  ‘But why would you?’ the American asked, his usual composure wavering. ‘How could you?’

  ‘Have you heard about Seraphina Morgan?’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘She used to be Seraphina di Fattori. She was a daughter of a customer of mine, a friend. It was Seraphina who found the Titian and brought it to me.’

  ‘Where did she find it?’

  ‘You don’t know?’

  ‘How would I know?’ Triumph countered. ‘I was only told that you had the work, nothing else.’

  ‘She found it washed up by the Thames,’ Gaspare continued. ‘She brought the Titian to me and then returned to Venice. Where she was murdered two days ago.’

  There was a long, uncomfortable silence between the men, Triumph so shocked that it took him a while to recover.

  ‘Murdered?’

  ‘Yes. In exactly the same way Angelico Vespucci killed his victims centuries ago.’ Gaspare paused, exasperated. ‘And you’re asking me why I destroyed that painting? It would have been madness to keep it—’

  ‘But what’s the connection between a sixteenth-century portrait and Seraphina di Fattori’s death?’

  ‘Tha
t’s what I’d like to know,’ Gaspare replied curtly. ‘Look, it’s pointless talking any more. It’s over. I destroyed the painting—’

  ‘You can’t have!’

  ‘But I did.’

  ‘How did you destroy it?’

  ‘I burnt it. In the furnace in the basement.’ The old dealer had rehearsed his speech repeatedly, until it was wholly convincing. ‘I watched it until there was nothing left but ash. There is no portrait of Angelico Vespucci. Titian painted one, that’s true, but it no longer exists. And thank God for it.’

  10

  ‘He’s lying! He must be!’ Farina snapped, walking into Triumph’s gallery and marching into his office. Slamming the door behind her, she carried on. ‘I tell you, the old bastard’s lying!’

  ‘I don’t think so,’ Triumph replied, gazing out of the window into the New York street twenty-seven floors below. ‘I think he was telling the truth—’

  ‘For a clever man, you can be fucking stupid!’ she hissed. ‘What better way to put all the dealers off the scent than by saying the Titian no longer exists?’

  ‘It wasn’t just the painting,’ Triumph replied, his tone slow, measured. ‘Apparently there was a murder after it was found—’

  ‘So what?

  He looked back at her. ‘It was the daughter of an old friend of Gaspare Reni’s—’

  ‘Again, so what?’

  ‘She was killed in exactly the same way as Angelico Vespucci killed his victims,’ Triumph replied. ‘What if there’s a connection?’

  ‘What the hell are you talking about?’ Farina demanded, surprised.

  Triumph Jones, successful and sleek as a water vole, sounded unusually subdued, pausing between words. ‘It’s such a coincidence.’

  ‘That a girl was killed in Venice?’

  ‘She was skinned.’

  ‘Skinned, fried, diced, roasted on a spit – so what? The portrait’s all I care about, not some girl.’ Farina leaned towards Triumph, dismissing his unease. ‘Gaspare Reni is lying. He still has that portrait – I can feel it, I know it. We have to get it off him.’

  The American wasn’t listening to her, just repeating a name to himself. ‘Di Fattori … di Fattori …’

  ‘What?’

  Rising to his feet, Triumph walked over to a row of bookshelves. Taking a moment to scan the titles, he finally pulled down a battered, unbound volume. Carefully turning the pages, he began to read:

  Angelico Vespucci, known as The Skin Hunter, was believed to have murdered his wife, and then killed and flayed three other female victims.

  He paused, turning over several pages before he began to read aloud again.

  One of the victims of The Skin Hunter was the Contessa di Fattori.

  ‘I knew that name was familiar to me,’ he said, closing the book. ‘What if the murdered girl was related to the Contessa?’

  Farina was exasperated. ‘What has this to do with anything?’

  He slammed the book down on his desk and leaned towards her.

  ‘Doesn’t it seem – even to you, my dear – something of a coincidence that the painting turns up, and then the descendant of one of the sitter’s victims gets killed?’ Triumph regained his seat behind the desk, pointing to the volume. ‘You see that? It’s over four hundred years old. Vespucci was notorious in his time, but virtually everything written about him disappeared, just as he did. It was pure chance that I came across that book in Berlin.’

  ‘So?’

  ‘It’s one of the few references to Vespucci that still exists.’

  She shrugged, irritated. ‘I’m not following.’

  ‘Doesn’t it seem a little strange that everyone apparently forgot about such a notorious killer?’

  ‘Maybe, maybe not.’

  ‘That everyone was so afraid of the Vespucci legend that they tried to wipe him from history?’

  She shrugged again. ‘I’m not interested in coincidences, spooky goings-on, or any of that fucking rubbish. So Vespucci was a murderer – so what? Maybe his wife deserved to get skinned. God knows she wouldn’t be the only one to get fleeced in this business.’ Her expression was callous as she rose to her feet. ‘I want the portrait for my husband and I know Gaspare Reni still has it. You give up on it if you want to, Triumph, but I’m not convinced. That painting’s out there – and I’m going to get it.’

  11

  Venice

  As good as his word, Nino left London, making for Venice, the place of Seraphina’s murder and the home of Angelico Vespucci. Gaspare had prepared the way for him, but when Nino visited the di Fattori home, he found Seraphina’s parents remote. It wasn’t just the shock of their daughter’s murder, but the details of her death that had felled them.

  Subdued, Nino Bergstrom left their home and moved out into the murky November afternoon. It seemed as though he carried their grief with him, the echoing stillness of their house a reminder of a loved one having gone. All around them there were pictures of Seraphina. From babyhood to the full power of her adult beauty, each photographic image underlining the waste and cruelty of a stolen life.

  Automatically reaching into his pocket, Nino reminded himself that he no longer smoked. This time Nino Bergstrom wasn’t dealing with ego, but grief. He wasn’t having to be charming, but sympathetic. There was no director to mollify, no location to secure. It was all different. He was different.

  Crossing a humped bridge, Nino dipped his head under an arch, then moved into a narrow alleyway, checking the address he had been given – 176, Via Mazzerotti, a house tucked between two others, its door knocker in the shape of a Medusa’s head. Beside the knocker were several pieces of faded paper, with names on them, the third being Morgan, Tom and Seraphina.

  Pushing the buzzer, Nino waited, hearing footsteps approaching, a voice coming over the intercom.

  ‘Who’s there?’

  ‘Nino Bergstrom.’

  ‘Oh, yes …’ the man said, opening the door and letting Nino enter.

  The hall was vaulted, several suitcases piled on top of one another, a florid opera poster hanging over an ornate iron table. Without a word, Tom Morgan beckoned Nino to follow him into the main room. Low chamber music was playing, a photograph of Seraphina stood on the mantelpiece, and an orchid lay dying on a paint-cracked windowsill. Then, as the rain began outside, Tom flicked on some lamps.

  ‘Seraphina’s parents asked me to talk to you,’ he said easily enough, although he was jumpy and Nino could just catch a faint scent of marijuana in the room. Fair-haired, over six feet in height, Tom Morgan was dressed in jeans and an open-necked shirt. But his feet were bare – surprising on a cold afternoon.

  ‘So, what d’you want to know?’

  ‘I’m so sorry about your wife—’

  ‘Sorry,’ Tom repeated, as though the word was an insult, ‘sorry … yeah, I’m sorry too. I saw her, you see, in the morgue. The Venetians aren’t very good with death. Apparently I wasn’t supposed to see her body, but there was a mix-up …’ He rubbed his eyes as though he could erase the memory. ‘She was … Christ, it was terrible. She was everything to me. And then the fucking police asked me all those questions, making me feel like a suspect.’ He turned to Nino, suddenly angry. ‘Who are you really?’

  ‘I’m asking questions about Seraphina’s death.’

  ‘And her parents hired you?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘So who did?’ Tom countered, walking over to a cabinet and taking out a joint. He lit it and inhaled, smoke juddering from his lips, his manner veering between confusion and hostility.

  ‘I’m working for an old friend of Seraphina’s.’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘Gaspare Reni.’

  ‘Never heard of him,’ Tom replied, sitting down and flinging one arm along the back of the sofa. ‘I know all Seraphina’s friends, and I’ve never heard of him.’

  ‘Gaspare’s an art dealer. I met Seraphina through him. He knew her parents well,’ Nino replied. ‘Seraphina knew him when she was a
girl, although he wasn’t a close friend—’

  ‘So why’s he so interested in her death?’ Tom put his head on one side. ‘If my wife only knew this dealer when she was younger, why does her death matter so much to him?’

  The hostility caught Nino off guard. ‘Gaspare took Seraphina’s death hard. He sent me over here to find out if there’s anything which might lead us to her killer.’

  Without being invited, Nino sat down. The action surprised Tom Morgan as he inhaled again on the joint, his narrow fingers shaking. Was it guilt? Nino wondered. Was he involved in his wife’s death? Or just jumpy after seeing her body? Looking away, Tom closed his eyes, and Nino took the chance to study his surroundings. Although it wasn’t situated in the most expensive area of the city, the apartment was sumptuous, well furnished with antiques and the ubiquitous modern additions of TV and computer.

  Obviously Tom Morgan was successful.

  ‘What do you do for a living?’

  ‘Interior designer.’

  ‘But Seraphina was a scientist?’

  ‘Yeah,’ Tom replied, ‘scientists can marry artists.’

  ‘So you think of yourself as an artist?’

  ‘What the fuck!’ Tom snapped, putting down his joint and leaning towards Nino. ‘Look, I’m only talking to you because Seraphina’s parents asked me to. It’s a favour to them. But I don’t have to answer your questions – the police have asked me plenty already.’

  There was a sullen pause, Tom leaning back in the sofa and crossing his legs. His expression was unreadable. At times belligerent, at times emotional – it was, Nino thought, like trying to talk to a firework.

  ‘Did you know Seraphina?’

  ‘Yes,’ Nino replied. ‘I only met her once, but I liked her.’

  ‘Where did you meet her?’

  ‘In London.’

  ‘And this Gaspare Reni, is he based in London?’

  ‘Yes.’

  Recrossing his legs, Tom blinked several times, then inhaled deeply. ‘Seraphina was visiting London on a short trip. She’d been there before with her parents and with me. She wanted to see the sights.’