Carnival for the Dead

by David Hewson

  She put on her heavy jacket, stashed the knife in the right-hand pocket, and returned to Ruskin’s floor.

  The door had three locks, all of them heavy mortise mechanisms, fully turned. It took her five minutes to get them all open. The handle felt stiff, as if it was little used, but with some force she got it open.

  Her right hand fell instinctively on the light switch, pressed it, then reached for the knife.

  There was one vast room, the same shape as those on the floors below. But this one was tidier, with a single table, a sofa and flats-creen TV, and more modern windows giving out onto the lagoon.

  Every apartment in this block was so different. Strozzi’s with its grand piano and the careful arrangement of furniture to allow him to move around in the wheelchair. Camilla’s, more a mask workshop than a home. Sofia’s a confused mess of clothes and belongings, scattered everywhere as if she’d never found the time to call the place home.

  And this. Michael Ruskin’s apartment. Teresa walked into the extension. An extra bathroom, two bedrooms and a small office that led to the outside staircase. Like the main rooms in the older part they were totally without character. Tidy, with the minimum of modern furniture, a little dusty. No cleaner had been here lately, though the place had surely been occupied. Two of the bedrooms had clearly not been used for some time. The largest, at the back, away from the main building, had a double bed that looked as if it had been made that very day.

  The position meant that no one below could hear. She realized now that he could have been here all along.

  Something nagged her about the office. She went back and looked at the desk. There were two screens. One was for a computer. It was locked with a password. No time to waste there. The second was connected to what she now realized was a closed-circuit TV control board.

  She looked at the labels on it. They listed every floor except the present one. She pressed the power button and the default view came up. It was Sofia’s apartment, the messy living room. The bedroom. Teresa chose another view. Camilla’s floor was in darkness. When she flicked the switch again she saw Filippo Strozzi seated at the grand piano. She hit the controls and zoomed in. He was making a phone call, listening, as if hearing his call ring out unanswered. He looked anxious.

  A light appeared on the monitor. A bell sounded. She pressed another button and saw Alberto Tosi at the front door. He wore his usual old-fashioned hat which he took off to smooth his hair. Always the dapper gentleman.

  She changed the camera, found the hall, watched Strozzi let him in. The two shook hands and then went into the ground-floor flat.

  ‘Wonderful,’ she murmured. ‘You saw everything.’

  There was a volume control on the unit. She turned it up. Strozzi and Tosi were making puzzled small talk.

  So he heard everything too.

  A heavy cable ran from the back of the control desk to a web router by the PC. He had net access even if no one else in the building did. The entire surveillance system was hooked into a private connection. The man could spy on the people here from anywhere. He could be in Cambridge or Kathmandu but he still had the occupants of this crooked little palazzo in his sights.

  She reached round the back of the router for the wire to remove it. She hated these things. There were too many already, legitimate ones, spying on ordinary people as they walked down the street. To her surprise the jack had been removed already. Any connection to the web was broken for some reason. She couldn’t imagine why.

  A tiny metal safe sat next to the desk, built into the wall. It had a conventional lock, not a combination. There was a small, short key on the ring Strozzi gave her that seemed out of place, too small to open any important door.

  People who owned a string of properties around the world appalled her. How many places could a man or woman occupy at any one time? They never knew these so-called homes, not properly. They never looked after them well, made them personal, gave them character. And sometimes they became careless. They handed over the keys – all of them – to a trusted person nearby, asking them to become proxy owners, someone who could call the plumber when water started to run through the ceiling.

  She tried the little key and it turned.

  There were three envelopes inside the safe. She took out the first and knew from the feel what it was. Photographs. A tidy bundle of them, twenty or more.

  Teresa went through them and felt her heart begin to ache. Every one was of a younger Sofia, a time when she was even more beautiful and a touch slimmer. Sofia by the lagoon, close to the Zattere vaporetto fermata. Out on the islands, by Torcello, eating fish on the terrace at what looked like the Locanda Cipriani, staring into the camera lens, bright-eyed, mouth open, fork full of spaghetti. In San Marco. By the Rialto. Wearing a skimpy bikini on the private beach of the Hotel Des Bains on the Lido, fanning out a set of fortunetelling cards, not tarot this time, but old-fashioned ones covered with the signs of the zodiac, like the pictures she’d painted for the doors here. All part of the same nonsensical game she tried to play with Teresa when she was young until the child, for once, rebelled.

  Then, a change. This was Venice still, a bench seat on the Zattere promenade with Redentore across the canal in the background. Teresa could sense the shift in the seasons. The colours had leached from the bright, loud pigments of summer to the softer, washed-out shades of autumn.

  Sofia was different too. Her face was more strained, her eyes had lost their vivacity. There were lines by her mouth. Her smile for the camera became ever more forced with each picture.

  The last were around carnival. There were street lights and, in a shot by the Rialto, the same gigantic blue snowflakes that still ran down from the bridge into the arcades, towards the markets and Il Gobbo.

  One photograph remained, beneath the shot she was staring at. She could guess it was bad somehow and she didn’t want to see it.

  Teresa blinked then forced herself, flicking away the penultimate picture.

  The last was of Sofia inside the apartment where Teresa now sat. The main room, the one at the front. That was obvious from the windows and the view beyond them. She wasn’t smiling. She was staring straight into the camera lens with a mixed expression, part fear, part resentment. And despair too. That was something Teresa had never seen in her.

  This must have been days before she terminated the child. The last moment before her world fell apart, and that of the man behind the lens.

  She flicked back through all the shots again. He wasn’t in any of them. Just Sofia. An obsessive, intimate record of her journey from bright happiness, the kind that can only have stemmed from love, to some desperate form of misery.

  The second envelope contained a bundle of passports from around the world: British, American, Canadian, Australian, French, German, Italian, Mexican. Different names. Michael Ruskin. Jonathan Archer. Miguel Mañara. Hugo Massiter.

  The identity pages were still loose. None contained a photograph. The seal was unfixed. A new image could be inserted as required. Forging passports was not easy. This was just the raw material. Each would be recreated at will, probably elsewhere using a specialist. A man with money could buy anything. A man with money needn’t even exist, if that was what he wanted.

  At the bottom was a loose passport photograph, old and used. She stared at it and recognized the face from the industry newsletter she’d found the day before. This, she felt sure, was a portrait of the real Jerome Aitchison, the man pictured when he appeared at the actuarial convention in Amsterdam. He seemed very unremarkable.

  She picked up the envelope with the photos, made some notes then took out her phone and called her deputy, Silvio Di Capua, in Rome.

  He listened to her greet him as if nothing had happened.

  Then he said, ‘Finally!’

  ‘I’ve been busy, boy. Don’t you start. I’ve got a job for you.’

  ‘Busy? Busy? Firstly, I’m thirty years old. Not a boy. Also, you quit, didn’t you? Secondly . . . I forget what the s
econd part is. But given the first it doesn’t really matter. You’re history.’

  He always made her laugh.

  ‘Oh come on, Silvio. I resigned. That’s not the same as quitting. Everyone knows that. Do you honestly think I can’t deal with a bunch of penny-pinching bean counters in suits when I get back? I’ve handled worse than this. Good grief . . . I am handling worse than this now. Roll with it, kid. I’m nearly there. Once I’m in Rome I’ll smile at a few people and handbag the rest. When did that not work?’

  ‘You’re delusional!’ he yelled.

  So would you be in my place, she thought. All she needed to do was find Sofia. Or Michael Ruskin. Or Jerome Aitchison. One of them was surely getting closer.

  ‘Are you going to help me or not?’ she asked.

  ‘No.’

  ‘Fine,’ she barked. ‘Ring off then.’

  ‘You ring off!’

  ‘Oh for God’s sake. One small favour. That’s all I ask. You read about that murder in Venice last night?’

  ‘Yes,’ he said more quietly. ‘This has something to do with you?’

  ‘Well, I found it. While our Venetian colleagues were busy stuffing their faces with frittelle. So I imagine the answer is yes.’

  He was silent for a long moment then he said, ‘They never mentioned that in the newspapers.’

  ‘They never want to hand anyone else the credit, do they? Trust me. That was my murder.’

  ‘You’re supposed to be there looking for an aunt who’s gone bananas or something.’

  Don’t tell me why I’m here. Even I don’t know that any more. I found that murder. The bastard who committed it wanted that dead woman to be Sofia. She’s escaped him somehow. So far. Until I find her – or him – I’m stuck here. This is my problem. Now are you going to help me with it or not?’

  Silvio Di Capua ummed and aahed. Then finally, he said, ‘We’ve a general call out on the network for information on this Englishman Aitchison. If you’ve a lead I can chase . . .’

  She gave him the address of the crooked little palazzo and told him to look up the ownership details. The Questura had these online, ready for instant access. A few seconds later Di Capua came back and said, ‘It’s a company. Name of Schütze Enterprises. Registered in Monaco.’

  ‘Schütze?’

  ‘German, I guess. No way can I see anything in Monaco for a day or so. You know that.’

  Wonderful, she thought.

  ‘Anything else registered to the same company that you can see?’

  The distant keyboard clacked.

  ‘Someone’s got money,’ Di Capua said. ‘Apartment in Florence. House in Orvieto. Place in Bologna . . .’

  ‘Venice?’

  ‘Nothing. Sorry. Wait. I’m trying Aitchison. That is why we’re doing this, isn’t it?’

  Waste of time. As if that was a surprise.

  ‘Keep looking,’ she said. ‘See if you can work out who’s behind this Schütze company. Whoever owns this place has other property in Venice. Don’t ask me what kind. Find it.’

  Another pause.

  ‘That’s it?’ he asked.

  ‘If this was easy I’d be giving it to the locals, genius.’

  ‘True. I’ll call if I get something.’

  She put away the phone and walked round the apartment again. Bare. Without any sense of identity, just like the man himself. A temporary home, nothing more. So why were the photos here, not somewhere else?

  Because Sofia stayed here too, sixteen years ago. In the downstairs apartment possibly. To begin with anyway.

  Another detail from the stories came back. When Saint-Germain asked her what the root of this was she’d said, ‘True love.’

  In a way, she guessed, the man who wrote those things had got that right. Not that she was any clearer how.

  She returned to the hall and locked the door behind her. It was time to talk to Tosi and Strozzi, and Camilla too if she was back.

  The phone in her pocket rang as she walked down the stairs. She stopped on her own landing, grabbed at it anxiously, wondering about Paola Boscolo’s reaction when she gave her this lead, and said, ‘That was quick!’

  ‘What was?’ said a flat male voice she didn’t recognize.

  ‘Who is this?’ she asked.

  He laughed as if the question were stupid. Then he said, ‘Who do you want me to be?’

  ‘Look at the phone.’

  Teresa stood on the cold stone landing and stared at the handset as he ordered. He wasn’t there. Camilla was, in a white carnival dress, frills around her neck, a gag around her mouth, red lipstick smeared across her face, a cheap crown on her head. She gazed into the lens, wide-eyed with terror. A hand came and ripped the gag from her mouth. The picture was live. He wanted to prove that. So he shouted at her, slapped her, and held the phone closer as she cried.

  ‘Stop it,’ Teresa yelled and heard her voice echoing up and down the stairs.

  The video disappeared before she could see his face.

  ‘You’re as smart as she said. Is it enough?’

  ‘Probably not.’

  ‘That’s a shame. Bad for the Croatian kid. Bad for you. Bad for me too.’

  ‘What am I supposed to say?’

  ‘You really don’t know?’

  ‘No,’ she told him.

  ‘You’re supposed to say, “Here she is. Here’s Sofia. The cheating, lying, murdering bitch. Take her. She’s yours.”’

  There was a sound and she felt sure he’d done something to Camilla.

  ‘Don’t hurt the girl,’ she said. ‘It’s not her fault.’

  ‘Whose is it?’

  ‘No one’s. Sometimes things just happen.’

  ‘No they don’t. People . . . do this.’

  It was like talking to a child.

  ‘People don’t always mean things. They get confused. Events change them. They meet . . .’ She tried so hard to remember the stories. ‘Triggers.’

  ‘Here’s a trigger,’ he said. ‘Bang!’

  His voice was so loud she had to take her ear from the phone.

  ‘What do you want?’ she asked.

  ‘I told you. Sofia.’

  ‘I don’t know where she is.’

  ‘Liar.’

  Camilla shrieked again.

  ‘I’m telling you the truth,’ Teresa insisted.

  He whooped down the line.

  ‘Liar, liar! Lie to me again and she’s dead right now.’

  Teresa didn’t know what to say. What might make a difference.

  He went quiet as if he was listening to something. She heard it too. Bells. Not the kind of peal you got to mark the hour. A practice. He didn’t say a word till they were over.

  ‘You’re her favourite little girl,’ he said. ‘The smart one. She told me. Couldn’t stop. Night and day. The kid she envied. The strong one who made good. The oh-so-bright genius who always finds the answer.’

  No, she thought. I envied her. Not the other way round.

  ‘I’m not that bright.’

  ‘You found that place last night, didn’t you?’ His voice sounded cold and dead. ‘What you did was so . . . unspeakable. Sticking your sharp nose where it doesn’t belong. Prying.’

  I didn’t put a camera in anyone’s bedroom, she nearly said.

  Instead she murmured, ‘Sorry.’

  ‘You should be.’

  ‘Tell me what to do.’

  He sighed, a long, jaded sound then ordered, ‘Look at the phone.’

  Camilla had a noose round her neck now and a folded piece of fabric over her eyes. The rope was taut as if held somewhere.

  An arm came into the image from the left. Blue material, not carnival this time, not the colour of the Ursula figure in the Accademia either. Everyday. Industrial. Overalls maybe.

  He shook the chair and Camilla screamed, desperate to stay upright.

  Teresa watched, aghast, trying to think.

  He stopped. Camilla stood there sobbing, head bowed.

 
‘Tell me where she is,’ he said.

  ‘I can’t.’

  The picture wobbled. He was shaking the chair more violently. Camilla was shrieking with terror.

  ‘I can’t because I don’t know!’ Teresa yelled.

  The dress was unusual. Archaic somehow. There were items around her. Mannequins possibly. Mirrors. The kind used in tailors’ shops, only these seemed to have ornate ormolu frames.

  The picture disappeared. She put the phone back to her ear.

  Silence.

  ‘If you don’t know,’ he said, ‘I might as well deal with this pretty little thing right now. Don’t you think?’

  ‘I don’t know because she keeps moving. It seemed safest. Give me time.’

  It was so desperate, so invented. She wondered whether he’d believe her.

  ‘Time doesn’t work around here any more. You’ve got to do better than that.’

  ‘I don’t know. I can’t reach her by phone. This evening . . .’

  ‘Hear that?’ he asked.

  The church bells again. They were marking the hour. Tolling six o’clock.

  ‘When I hear eight of those I will call you,’ he said. ‘If you’ve no news for me, nothing I can find and touch for myself, the girl is dead and I am gone for good. No prize to take home then. Just one more body.’

  The last peal struck.

  He laughed then added, ‘If you want to know how to find me ask Sofia. Tell her to give you a sign.’

  The line went dead.

  She turned off the record button. It had been running almost since the moment he began speaking. Capturing everything, words and pictures.

  Downstairs, at the table next to Filippo Strozzi’s grand piano, the three of them watched and listened as Teresa replayed the conversation. When it was over the big bearded man in the wheelchair buried his head in his hands.

  ‘We’ve got to call that young policewoman now,’ Tosi insisted. ‘After what happened last night . . .’

  He’d already had his say about the Casino degli Spiriti, scolding her like a cross parent for going back there after he’d left.

  He took out his very old mobile phone and asked, ‘What better time than now?’