Death In Bagheria (A Serafina Florio Mystery)

by Susan Russo Anderson

After they settled into the nun’s office, Serafina began. “I know your mother was poisoned. I know who did it. I’ll be able to prove it within the week.”

  That stopped her. She looked at Serafina, and her eyes filled with the horror of it. Burying her face in her hands, the poor woman sobbed.

  Serafina was not prepared for the nun’s reaction. She handed her a linen and waited what seemed like five minutes. “I’m very sorry. I wish I could have said you were wrong.”

  She nodded, drying her eyes and choking out her words. “Thank you … for telling me. Most grateful. So I was right, a pyrrhic victory.” A fresh set of tears flowed, and Serafina rose and hugged her.

  “So horrible to think … that I could have …”

  “Hush, now. Don’t blame yourself.”

  “And my father, he believes?”

  “Yes, in so far as he is capable of holding with hard truths. And I believe he loved his wife very much. When we spoke of her, he was stricken with sorrow. Those were the few times he seemed human to me.”

  She blew her nose. “How did it happen?”

  Serafina gave her a brief outline of the theft of her mother’s journal before she left, of the retrieval and subsequent theft of additional volumes of her diary and other events at Villa Caterina, a description of the people involved, and what she’d discovered so far, admitting that she had loose ends to tie up before she could ask the commissioner of Bagheria for his assistance in making arrests. “From her notebooks, the ones we found in the final hour hidden in Doucette’s trunk, she wrote about someone, a shadowy figure, acting as a priest appearing repeatedly at her bedside. We believe he gave her a host that was laced with a toxic substance. We found the reference in your mother’s diary to an obscure figure in black, a priest she’d never seen. She wrote that her lady’s maid reassured her that he was the local curate. And we found a vial of toxic salt last night in a tin hidden near the chapel’s tabernacle. Dr. Loffredo, who joined my investigation along with others, believes it was used by her killer, and he is testing it now to determine its exact nature.”

  She dried her eyes. “I want the poisoner put away. Promise me that. And anyone else involved.”

  “There are several.”

  That surprised her. “But why?”

  “The short answer, to secure a fortune. At least two people, perhaps more, are involved in smuggling opium to ports in North America using your father’s ships.”

  “But why smuggle opium? It’s legal, a medicine. I’m sure my mother was given opium in a tonic toward the end; in fact, I know she was.”

  “To avoid besmirching your father’s reputation. There is a growing movement against some of the ill effects of the drug, especially on children; smuggling leaves no paper trail, and the stuff can be sold to whomever the seller wishes. And then there is the greater gain: smugglers pay no tariff, and they sell at a greater gain to whomever they wish and for nonmedical purposes.”

  “Surely you’re not suggesting that my mother had anything to do with this.”

  Serafina shook her head. “Just the opposite. She found out about the smuggling and threatened to stop it. She may not have known the exact substance smuggled, but she knew, she felt the horror of it. She had words with your father.”

  “But she always disliked his commerce.”

  “Yes, but in one of her journals, she mentioned the almost obsessive increase of secretive, protective business activity. She resented it, thought it destroyed their life.”

  “And she was right.” The nun folded her arms. “My father?”

  “Unless he is the cleverest actor I’ve met, your father doesn’t know about the smuggling.”

  “I would have to agree. My father is the most willfully ignorant person I know, blinded by antiquated preconceptions.” She squinted at Serafina. “And my brother?”

  “He might be. I don’t want to accuse him until I’m sure, but some of the facts point to him. If he is involved, he had help—after all, he was in a different country for the duration of your mother’s illness.”

  Serafina paused, considering, before she continued. “I don’t have a sense of you and your brother as being very close. Were you?”

  Genoveffa took a long time to answer. “I think we were once. Since you know the story of the accident, you know about Ernesto. Naldo introduced us. But he, Naldo, and I …” She hesitated, lost in her thought. “Yes, at one time, we were close, but we grew apart, that’s the best I can do. There wasn’t any one incident, but I think it was his … what’s the word … his disregard of my mother that separated us. I couldn’t understand that. Naldo never got over being sent away to school as a child. It sounds like a lame answer, I know, but we never became enemies, we just became …” Again, she searched for a word. “I guess I destroyed the notion of him. Rather than hating him, he is dead for me.”

  Serafina winced. She had not expected this much time with Genoveffa.

  “And of course, he was focused, very focused on his work.”

  Serafina nodded slowly, as if she understood. “I should be able to answer your question of just how much Naldo is involved in the smuggling and the conspiracy to kill your mother. But she found out or at least sensed that something sinister was going on. Illegal activity has a way of eating lives; it is a dark presence, and the baroness felt this. I think that the conspirators realized it was only a matter of time before she realized the facts, and this was why they hastened her death. Didn’t she confide any of her suspicions to you?”

  Genoveffa shook her head. “Don’t forget, when I was with her, she was terribly ill until I nursed her back to health. When she was lucid, she was buoyant, almost unnaturally so, filled with great plans, devoid of any fear or suspicion of her death, and she never mentioned any strange priest appearing by her bedside, not to me. I wheeled her to her favorite spot on the lawn, and we talked and laughed, remembering happy moments.”

  “I’m so glad you have that memory. Of course, this makes sense—the shadowy priest with the bogus host wouldn’t dare to appear when you were present. But over time, the poison destroyed her internally.”

  “Then Doucette must have known. When I was not there, she was by her bedside, her constant companion.”

  Serafina nodded. “And finally, my suspicions were confirmed by something your mother wrote in one of her diaries. Last night I confronted Doucette, and she denied having either suspicion or actual knowledge of someone trying to poison the baroness. Her fear, however, gave her away. When I first met her, she told me she had taken two apartments in France and was planning to leave next week.”

  Genoveffa’s eyes filled with tears. “And to think I never suspected until it was too late.”

  “Did you know Doucette?”

  “Briefly. She’d say hello and then leave on holiday.” She slipped to the edge of her chair, hands on knees in her bird-like gesture. “But tell me again, why am I in danger?” Genoveffa asked, quickly dismissing her own query with a wave of her hand. “Never mind, a useless question. Don’t bother answering. I won’t believe you, anyway.”

  “I have a question for you.”

  “If it’s only one,” the nun said, rising from her chair and untying her apron.

  “When you entered the convent, did you provide a dowry?”

  Genoveffa seemed baffled, shook her head several times as if trying to unfold a memory. “Instead of giving money outright at the time I entered, as is customary when women of means enter a religious order, my father struck a bargain with the mother superior. You see, he thought this convent business was a whim on my part, and that I’d leave in a month or two.”

  “And so he arranged to have your dowry deferred?”

  She nodded. “At the time I entered, a large sum representing my inheritance was put into trust, accruing interest of course, the whole sum to
be given to the Order on my thirty-fifth birthday, provided I was still a member.” Serafina heard the nun’s quick intake of breath. “And you think the trust is in jeopardy?”

  “Not the trust. Your life.”

  It was as if Serafina had punched her. “That is absurd, a wild idea born of your vivid imagination. Who would want to kill me?”

  “I think some people will do whatever they need to do.” Should she tell her of her suspicions regarding the death of her betrothed? Hadn’t the poor woman had enough for one day? But if the telling of it would deepen the nun’s belief in her own danger, then she must. “And I think Ernesto’s death was not an accident.”

  Sister Genoveffa shook her head, closing her eyes. “He fell.”

  “I don’t think so. Someone told me Ernesto arrived at the party a little tipsy.”

  She gazed at Serafina, not seeing her but looking back over the years.

  “Did he have a habit of drinking too much?”

  “Not that I’d ever seen before that day. It was a shock.” She slumped down in her chair. “You mean he was given something?”

  Serafina nodded slowly.

  Genoveffa was still for a long time, tears making rivulets down her cheeks while Serafina sat beside her, saying nothing. The light of understanding deepened the lines in Genoveffa’s face, and she walked to the window, fingering her beads and staring at the campanile with its great bronze bells, so near she could have opened the sash and touched them. Drawn to the tower as well, Serafina stood beside her client. The world below them was shadowless in the brash sun. Without warning, the bells pealed the angelus in a timeless, syncopated rhythm she’d known since childhood, shaking the walls and floorboards, the vibrations traveling through her bones like the voice of God. When Genoveffa turned to face Serafina, it seemed as if the nun had aged twenty years.

  “One more question.”

  A flash of the real Genoveffa returned. “Haven’t you taken enough from me? I have no more to give.”

  “What is the date of your birth?”

  “31 March.”

  Serafina told her about the attack on the roof during a brief but heavy rainstorm yesterday afternoon and described her assailant. “I was lucky. If he had been armed, I would have been killed. You might not be so lucky. Today I remembered where I’d seen him: here in the piazza helping to stuff the statue’s hands with blossoms, shortly before your mother’s journal was seized from my hands; so given the fact that the terms of the trust would be breached if you were to die before your thirty-fifth birthday, and given the fact that this conspiracy has men and arms that reach at least to Oltramari, I’d say you are in grave danger.”

  Her concern seemed to disappear. In fact, she smiled. “I will take that into consideration. I am unafraid of death and somehow I welcome it, now that you’ve given me the truth.”

  “Not all of it.”

  “But you will. And tomorrow, as you know, we have an important Mass with five new altar boys participating. There is a rehearsal this afternoon.” She looked at her watch. “A scant four hours from now, and I am here to put them through their paces, believe me. You, for instance, how embarrassed would you be if your son did not know his Latin words?”

  Serafina thought of poor Totò.

  The nun continued. “My life cannot stop because of danger. If that were the case, all of Sicily would have been cowering in a locked room for thousands of years.” She smiled. “Until Wednesday. You do not disappoint, and I will pay you the rest of your fee.”

  “Thank you, but your father gave me a note this morning.”

  The nun smirked. “Most people would consider that a bribe, not a fee. So do I—I’m sure he was glad to see the back of you—but I know you will not let it sway your conclusions or stop you from returning to apprehend the right person, no matter what his title.”

  Wrapped Together

  Serafina glanced at the stone angel over the doorway and smiled as she entered, smelling the heady mix of Renata’s cuisine—she was starved for it. In the corner of the sitting room, three heads bowed together over a prayer book, hands folded in supplication. Tessa had joined Teo to help Totò learn his Latin. Despite the frightful morning she’d had, Serafina smiled until she discovered that Totò hadn’t learned all of his responses, so she suggested they go into the parlor and study for the next three hours.

  When Vicenzu and Loffredo returned, they looked grim and told Serafina about the results of their tests. The package turned out to contain pure opium, as Loffredo had suspected; the bottle held laudanum; the tin found in the tabernacle contained arsenic trioxide. But someone put table salt instead of sugar into Mima’s tea, “so I expect she will be healthy and cooking the next time we visit the baron,” Loffredo said.

  “It figures,” Rosa said, entering the room. “She can’t cook, so she’ll live forever. I wish Umbrello were here.” She took her place at the table.

  Serafina smiled. “He’ll be here tomorrow, and I have a feeling we’ll be seeing more of him.”

  After dinner, Serafina, Loffredo, Rosa, and Vicenzu lingered over strong coffee and dessert, discussing what they needed to do with the results of the tests while they waited for Teo and Totò to return from practice. Serafina told them about her meeting with Genoveffa and about the provisions of her trust. “I gave her a full account of our visit, and still she is not concerned with the danger to her person.”

  “Of course not, she’s a nun,” Rosa said.

  “But she wants her mother’s killer brought to justice.” Serafina told them about the passage she’d read in one of the journals, the ailing woman’s fear that something “dark and sinister” was happening onboard her husband’s ship. “I found what I wanted, proof that the baroness’s death and the smuggling are wrapped together.”

  Rosa frowned. “But I still don’t understand how she was poisoned. Yes, she saw the shadowy form, a priest, but how do we know he poisoned her?”

  “We don’t know for sure that she was poisoned,” Loffredo said. “The baroness has been dead for over eighteen months, and the only one who knows for sure, Doucette, is not talking.”

  “She’s not the only one who knows. The killer knows, but for now, we must make a leap.”

  “You and your leaps!”

  “Well, not a leap, exactly, more like a skip,” Serafina said. “Consider what we have: the baroness’s symptoms, exactly like arsenic poisoning; her alarm, apparent in some of her journal entries, at seeing the shadowy figure of a priest, someone she did not recognize; the theft of journals in my possession; Doucette’s stash of stolen journals and her strange demeanor when I accused her of knowing that the baroness was poisoned. Added to all this is the fact that we found a tin of arsenic next to a receptacle for consecrated hosts, so it is highly likely that someone posing as a priest repeatedly fed the baroness a wafer tainted with arsenic.”

  “Could her body be exhumed?” Rosa asked.

  Loffredo shrugged. “Yes, if a judge ordered it done, but arsenic poisoning is almost impossible to prove.”

  “Getting back to the poison, perhaps the salt was sprinkled onto a piece of bread?”

  “More than likely, the wafer, unconsecrated, was dipped into tainted wine and given to the baroness by someone posing as a priest,” Vicenzu said.

  “We don’t dip the host in wine,” Rosa said.

  Serafina shot her a look. Since when was the madam an expert in church rubrics?

  “Don’t forget the presence at dinner of a prominent mafia figure. I wonder what his involvement is in all of this?” Loffredo asked.

  Serafina froze for a second. “My guess is that he is not involved, not yet, but he longs to be. Remember his reaction at dinner on Thursday when I asked the son about the strange crates?”

  Rosa shook her head. “I was stuck at the other end of th
e table entertaining the bishop, and I didn’t hear your conversation. Another disastrous meal.”

  “When I asked Naldo about the strange crates on the pier, Don Tigro was surprised. I think he realized for the first time that there was illegal activity going on, but hid his chagrin at being left out.” Serafina felt the cold creep into her fingers and toes. It was a strange feeling, indescribable, as if she were shrinking into herself. Yes, she was afraid of Don Tigro: he could snuff out her entire family in a blink. “Tigro slid his eyes in Naldo’s direction, as if someone had violated a pact they’d had, and I could feel something pass between them.”

  “She’s a wizard, you know,” Rosa said to Loffredo.

  He smiled.

  Serafina continued. “So I spoke with Don Tigro this morning after I checked on Betta to assure myself that he knew nothing about the contraband. At this point, it’s a feeling, nothing more, but I think he was upset when I told him what we’d found in one of the ship’s holds.”

  “And since a mafia capo does not like to be surprised, his son should expect repercussions,” Loffredo said.

  They weighed his words for a while until Serafina said, “Don Tigro told me that he protects the wharfs in Bagheria, not in North America, but if he were financially involved in the smuggling, something tells me he’d insist on protecting the ship at both ports. No, I don’t think he’s involved.” She rankled at the use of the word protection, and the thought pierced her that she might well be protecting the don far more than he ever protected anyone.

  “North America is a gift to the mafia, a pristine land ready for them to rape, and believe me, Don Tigro lies in wait,” Vicenzu said. “It won’t be long now. I see them every morning on my way to the shop, whole families and their belongings crammed into a cart, raising the dust and heading for the station. Used to be the peasants, but now the artisans flee. They leave their homes and whatever else they cannot carry. If it gets worse, we’ll lose the whole town. That’s what the don is waiting for, a mass of his people in a new land, cold, lonely, fearful, in need of a friend and with the ability to pay for his help.”