A Rich Full Death

by Michael Dibdin

  ‘Who knows? Perhaps the old lady really did fall downstairs. I wish you could have helped me with the message we found in her hand, though. Nevertheless, we have had an interesting talk, Signor Boot. Please do not make the mistake of attributing to me any of the things which I have said, or I shall be obliged to deny ever having said anything of the kind-which, as I shall be believed, will have the effect of making you look foolish. Good day!’

  And with that he left the room, and a few minutes later the same surly constable who had fetched me led me back to the gate, and vouched for me to the sentry. A moment later I was at liberty!

  I am not in the habit of drinking spirits in the morning, but the first thing I did was to enter a cafe and order a large glass of brandy. Just try to imagine for a moment how you would feel if you were unceremoniously roused from sleep one morning by the police, hauled off to a mediaeval dungeon, and interrogated for an hour about the mysterious death of a ‘medium’ with whom you had spent the previous evening-whose spirit-show, which had so profoundly affected you at the time, you now learned to have been all sham. And imagine then that you further discovered that the new friend you so admired, and of whom you had hoped to make a high Ideal and a beacon for the future, had been systematically lying to you about his relations with a married woman with whom you had once been in love yourself, and had used his influential connections to foil a police enquiry into the circumstances of her death! Yes, I felt I deserved my glass of brandy.

  It was this last, more than anything else that had happened, which struck me with a cruel piquancy. I had been duped, no question about it! By Miss Chauncey, certainly-but she was a professional, and that was to be expected. What was far more disturbing was to find that I had been duped by Robert Browning.

  Here was a man whom I had taken to be a very pillar of integrity: one truly great, from whom I had thought to catch-like one in a valley looking longingly up at the far gleaming peaks he no longer aspires to-a little reflected radiance from that sun which had set for ever on my own life. And now not only had this man brutally rejected me once, when he thought my utility was at an end, but I found that in other ways too he was no better than anyone else: another trimmer and drifter whose life was crammed with compromises and secrets-and apparently up to his neck in this whole murky business, into the bargain!

  I finished my brandy and wandered back out into the streets, where some sunlight had now contrived to break feebly through the glower overhead, making ghostly shadows on the huge flagstones of the street. As I passed the Badia-an old monastery whose bell-tower is one of the landmarks of the city-I realised with a start that the street on whose corner I was standing was none other than Via Dante Aligheri. Already I could see the house where Browning had called on our way out to Maurice Purdy’s-and in another moment I was on my way towards it, determined to find out once and for all the truth behind Browning’s lies and evasions.

  The building was three tall storeys high, the ground floor being given over in the Italian fashion to stables and storage. I represented myself as being in search of my friend Signor Browning, and uncertain as to which suite he occupied, and by this means I soon discovered that the piano nobile was inhabited by a decaying countess, all chattels and no cash, and by various of her relatives-none of whom, clearly, had ever heard the name Browning, or knew any Englishmen, or had any idea what I was talking about.

  On the next floor I found three servants of the countess, two squinting seamstresses, a consumptive singing teacher, a German student of art, a bookbinder, and a crazy old man who appeared at his door draped in the flag of the Guelph party. He watched me attentively as I knocked at the one remaining door.

  ‘Non c’e!’ he cackled-which might have meant either ‘he is not there’ or ‘she is not there’.

  ‘Who lives here?’ I asked.

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘When will (he or she) return?’

  ‘Late. (He or she) works.’

  ‘What work does (he or she) do?’

  ‘I don’t know.’

  ‘Very well. I shall return this evening.’

  ‘Gregory returned from Avignon,’ the old man responded. ‘It is as God wills.’

  Thus foiled for the moment, but with high hopes of imminent success, I returned home-where I went back to bed for a few hours. I awoke at four o’clock feeling properly refreshed at last, had a bath, and then read a few cantos of Dante while Piero prepared me a light meal. I was not sure what the evening would hold in store, and I wanted to be ready for anything.

  Shortly before seven o’clock, while completing my toilet before leaving, I was informed that Robert Browning was at the door. I had never thought to see the day when this event would find me wishing that I had told Piero to say I was not at home, but such was now the case. After what I had learned that morning I had not the slightest desire to see Browning until I had returned to the house on Via Dante Aligheri and had a clearer idea just exactly what was afoot. His arrival just as I was preparing to go there was therefore extremely awkward.

  There he was, however, and I could not very well send him away-although I made the point that I had an important engagement and could spare only a few minutes. Fortunately he was in the same position, which made matters considerably easier.

  I gave him a brief account of what had happened the previous evening at the Chaunceys’, and its sequel that morning at police headquarters. The point which Browning seized upon was the inscription on the paper found in Edith Chauncey’s hand.

  ‘That of course proves that her death was no accident, but the latest in this series of murderous outrages. This time, however, we may at least console ourselves with the thought that the wretched woman brought it upon herself. She had learned the truth about how Mrs Eakin and DeVere died from my wife-who most unfortunately permits herself to be imposed upon by these foul creatures. I had of course told Elizabeth, as I tell her everything.’

  Oh, really? I thought. Not quite everything, surely!

  ‘Miss Chauncey immediately saw a way to increase her standing in the spiritualist world-to thrust herself up amongst the celebrities of her rotten trade, beside that dung-ball Home. Sooner or later, she must have calculated, the truth about the murders would be revealed-and then everyone would remember how the spirits of Isabel Eakin and Cecil DeVere had said as much, long ago, at one of her “seances”! What an advertisement for the spiritualist movement, and for Miss Chauncey in particular! How the number of her followers would have increased, and with it the fees she might command and the donations she might expect! Remember, all this was bread and butter to her-she lived on the vomit she peddled, and would have lived like a queen if this scheme had worked! Instead she is justly hoist with her own petard-which in French, remember, means “to break wind”. Miss Muck the “medium” wanted to extinguish the feeble light our reason gives us, like blowing out candles with a breech-blast-only instead she blew herself up!’

  This violent and immoderate language surprises, shocks you? But it is thus he ever talks of the spiritualist fraternity. His emotion soon spent itself, however, and was replaced by a calmer musing on the problems posed by this new abomination.

  ‘He frightens me, this murderer,’ Browning commented. ‘He is so clever-so terribly clever!’

  ‘He does not seem very clever to me,’ I retorted. ‘On the contrary, I believe he has made a mistake which may well prove fatal to him. For by killing Edith Chauncey-evidently to prevent her contacting the spirits of his earlier victims, and thus exposing his identity-he has identified himself in two ways: we know that he must believe in spiritualism and have been present at last night’s “seance”. That much, surely, is certain!’

  ‘It is just that which terrifies me,’ Browning replied quietly. ‘As you say, it appears certain-too certain! And the more I consider the matter, the more I am tempted to look for our killer in precisely the opposite direction, and figure him to myself as a confirmed sceptic who was nowhere near the Chaunceys’ rooms l
ast night.’

  ‘Someone like yourself, in fact!’ I quipped.

  Browning, to my astonishment, shot me a look of scorn.

  ‘Well as a matter of fact I was hard at hand, visiting a friend who lives on the floor below the Chaunceys’ suite-so you are quite wrong about that.’

  I could by no means see the logic behind this pronouncement, but I said nothing, for I was impatient to be gone, and said as much to my visitor. We walked downstairs together, and Browning then strode off towards the Cathedral-whilst I cut across Florence to the street where her most famous son, himself an exile, once lived.

  I walked quickly, impatient at the thought that this mystery was at last to be resolved, and by the time I reached the house and had run up the four flights of dark stairs I was quite out of breath. When I reached the landing I saw with an indescribable thrill a thin line of yellow light under the door at which I had knocked in vain that morning!

  I paused until I had a little recovered my breath before knocking. My heart was thumping madly.

  In the event I did not have long to wait. Almost immediately there was a quick scurry of footsteps, and the door was opened by a child I took to be a maid of some sort, dressed in a sort of loose shift, her long raven hair all undone, and on her face as was a look of wonder.

  Nevertheless, she recovered her wits first, for she recognised me before I knew that it was Beatrice Ruffini, Isabel’s maid, that I was looking at.

  We gazed at each other in silence for a long moment. Then she said, ‘Ah, you’ve come.’

  ‘Yes,’ I said-I did not know what else to say. Another long moment passed-or so it seemed, although strangely enough I did not feel in the least embarrassed by this bizarre scene.

  ‘I’m glad,’ she said at last. ‘But I can’t see you now.’

  ‘When can I come?’ I asked.

  ‘Tomorrow. At the same time. Ill be expecting you.’

  She cocked her head slightly on one side. Far below I heard footsteps reverberating in the hallway.

  ‘Go now!’ breathed Beatrice. ‘I shall expect you tomorrow. Go quickly!’

  The door closed, leaving me blinded by the darkness. The footsteps sounded much nearer now, leaping up the shallow steps three at a time towards the first floor. There was no escape that way. I backed into the nearest corner and flattened myself as best I could against the wall, trying to melt into the stone. I felt horribly visible, nevertheless.

  The footsteps came up the final flight of steps, and a stocky figure appeared and walked over to the door which had just closed. There was a knock, and a moment later Beatrice opened the door once more. I realised now why I had not immediately recognised her the first time, for she was deliberately ‘got up’ to seem younger than she was, with a simple one-piece garment, loose hair and face innocent of any paint.

  However, I had no difficulty in recognising the dark hair, silvery beard, broad shoulders and strident voice of the caller who stood on the threshold, even though he had his back to me-but then I had parted from him not fifteen minutes earlier.

  ‘Good evening, my dear,’ he said. ‘And how are you this evening?’

  ‘Very well, thank you,’ replied Beatrice sweetly. ‘And you?’

  ‘Very well indeed, thank you. May I come in?’

  ‘Of course.’

  She moved aside to admit him-and then I saw her start as she caught sight of me crouching there against the wall, plainly exposed. Browning had only to catch her expression, and turn round, and all would have been lost. But the next instant he had walked in, and she had closed the door, leaving me in the darkness again.

  There is much I could say-how many notions, fancies, questions and answers fill my teeming brain! But why spin idle words tonight, when tomorrow I will know?

  Affect, yours

  Booth

  BOOK THREE

  The Worst of It

  17

  Ash Wednesday

  29th February

  My dear Prescott,

  This business grows more desperate with every day that passes. All may yet be well, however. True, the murderer has struck again; but the authorities are now involved, despite all Mr Browning’s efforts to keep them in ignorance-and I, at least, have managed to get myself clear of the whole foul entangling affair. Before telling you the how and the why of that, however, I must beg your indulgence to touch a more personal note for a moment or two.

  You will remember with what keen anticipation I had looked forward to the Saturday evening when I was to call on Beatrice, Isabel’s maid, at the house where Browning was such a regular visitor. It was an oppressively warm evening. The day had been airless and overcast, as though the stone walls of Florence had grown upwards to form a grey dome sealing us off completely from the outside world. Night came as a welcome respite, the darkness falling like silence on the eyes. In marked contrast to the previous evening, I was now not in the slightest hurry, and savoured to the full the pleasure of walking slowly through the streets towards my goal.

  These Florentine streets, at best narrow, are made to seem narrower still by the overhanging pent-roofs of the tall houses, to which extra storeys are continually being added as the population grows. Because of this, it is a keen pleasure to emerge into one of the great squares-like drawing a deep breath! One of the great joys of Florence is the manner in which one’s perception of the space about one is continually being modified by infinite imperceptible touches as the buildings press in or fall back, urge their attentions or gracefully withhold them; so that for richness and subtlety of impression there is really nothing quite like it in the world.

  Nor was the human element missing. Indeed, the entire populace seemed to have quit the dim wretched rooms and dilapidated hovels which appear so quaint to a tourist’s eye, and had sallied out into the streets and squares and alleys and courtyards, where every man, woman and child was busily swanking and singing and flirting and talking. An ominous stillness, however, spoke of a storm crouched somewhere in the offing, and thus the gaiety was a little forced.

  And so, for the third time, I entered the plain green-shuttered palazzo on Via Dante Aligheri. On the first occasion I had knocked at a door where no one was at home; on the second the door had opened, but I had not been admitted. But this time I was greeted, and ushered into a small parlour furnished in a fashion so classically Florentine in every detail that it proclaimed itself quite plainly to be the product of a foreign hand.

  Beatrice was wearing a black skirt, a black shawl about her shoulders, and a severe starchy blouse fastened with a plain metalwork brooch; her hair was pinned tightly up. The contrast with her appearance the previous evening was so complete that it was clearly intentional, and I could only assume that in the twenty-four hours since our last meeting she had learned something, presumably from Browning, which had caused her to change her opinion of me.

  On the other hand, there I was, visiting her alone in her house at night-surely, if my case had been as bad as all that, she would just have left me standing on the threshold. Instead of which I was invited to take a seat on the divan, while she chose a small and rather uncomfortable-looking stool opposite. On a low table near at hand stood a flask of vin santo and a plate of little dry biscuits, hard as rocks, to soak up the delicious honey-tasting wine. This was better, as was Beatrice’s manner and way of looking at me-the way I have had occasion to speak of before. I began to feel that I must have misread the portent of her severe appearance.

  ‘You have been lied to,’ she said at last, in a low voice, without looking at me. ‘I shall not lie to you. You may not believe me-that would be too much to ask, no doubt. Nevertheless, what I tell you will be the truth.’

  ‘Of course I shall believe you!’ I cried warmly.

  She held up her hands.

  ‘You must not say that yet.’

  ‘Is it so very bad, then?’ I asked, half-humorously, for I was in a forgiving vein. Indeed, I rather hoped it was bad-I did not want my magnanimity to go to wast
e.

  ‘No, it is not!’ she replied defiantly. ‘It is not bad at all. But you won’t believe that. It is not your fault. No one could believe it.’

  I said nothing. After a moment she went on-speaking very slowly, as though forming each phrase entire in her mind before uttering it. The first thing she said was a blow, although I had already guessed it: the apartment in which we were sitting was paid for by Robert Browning. It was he-the hypocrite! the whited sepulchre! — who had chosen the old books and pictures and hangings and pots and bric-a-brac. And it was he-the respectable and venerated Mr Robert Browning, who has made his marriage into one of the wonders of the world, a modern miracle to whose well-publicised shrine pilgrims flock from every corner of the civilised world-it was he who used to come thither every week, whenever the fancy took him, to visit his protegee.

  And what, I enquired coldly, was the purpose of these visits? How exactly did the ageing man of letters and the young maid-servant spend their time together?

  Beatrice gazed at me imploringly. In her eyes I read a desperate plea for comprehension, coupled with a very lively apprehension as to whether it would be forthcoming. But her reply, when it came, just served to make matters worse-for it was confused and evasive, all shrugs and mumbles and unfinished phrases.

  I was merciless. I wanted to know-had to! Then I could walk out of there, search Browning out, and fling his filthy secret in his face. And so I pressed her. Had she not engaged to tell me the truth? Well, now I was calling in that note.

  ‘It’s no use-you won’t believe me,’ the girl repeated bitterly.

  Now this intrigued me mightily. Improper or unedifying her revelations might no doubt be-but unbelievable? Surely, on the contrary, they promised to be all too drearily predictable! And yet Beatrice apparently remained convinced that I would not believe her. Why, in heaven’s name? What hideous tale had she to unfold?