[Mark Twain Mysteries 05] - The Mysterious Strangler

by Peter J. Heck

  “Thank you, miss.” I said. “That fellow was beginning to be a nuisance.”

  “Yes. that's more or less what I told him.” she said, smiling. Her hair was strawberry-blond, and her eyes light blue—a color echoed in her dress. “These photographers are as thick as mosquitos.” she continued, “and just as hungry. This place doesn’t usually let them pester customers, though—you saw how he scurried off when Pietro came. He only tried to sell to you because he saw you were new here.”

  “And you are evidently not.” I said, standing and removing my hat. “Thank you again. Miss—I'm afraid I don’t know your name.”

  “Virginia Fleetwood, of Greenwich. Connecticut,” she said, with a little laugh. “I suppose it is most improper for me to introduce myself to a strange man in a cafe, but the customs here aren’t quite the same as at home. Besides. I couldn’t let a fellow American be taken advantage of. so I suppose it’s all right. And you are?”

  “Wentworth Cabot.” I said, bowing. “I’m a Connecticut man myself, from New London—and Yale College. So we are in a sense neighbors. A great pleasure to make your acquaintance—and again. I am in your debt. Miss Fleet- wood.”

  “Think nothing of it. Mr. Cabot,” she said, but she smiled as if pleased at my thanks. Her eyes met mine, and she asked. “Have you been in Florence very long?”

  “Not at all.” I said. “My employer and I arrived a little while ago. but he means to spend the winter here, he and his family.”

  “Ah. then perhaps we shall see each other again.” she said. “My sister and I—and her husband. Mr. Stephens— expect to be here for some time to come. But I am keeping you from your luncheon. A pleasure meeting you. Mr. Cabot!”

  “Very much my pleasure.” I replied, making another little bow to her. She smiled again, looking back over her shoulder at me as she returned to her friends. For myself, I tackled my luncheon, which was excellent—during my travels with Mr. Clemens I had come to appreciate spicier cooking than I'd gotten at home. The sausage was a special treat—the best I'd had since leaving America (especially compared to what passed for sausage in British kitchens). As I ate. I couldn't help but overhear conversation from the nearby table occupied by Miss Fleetwood and her friends. Several of them apparently were art students, and the man with the Boston accent (whom I took to be the brother-in-law she had mentioned) seemed to be an art dealer. After a while, the group got up and left in a body. Miss Fleetwood turning and waving cheerily to me as she went.

  The waiter came by again, noticing my clean platter and half-empty wineglass. “Signore, do you need anything more? The wine, is it good?”

  “Yes. grazie, Pietro, it is very good,” I said. I was glad Miss Fleetwood had mentioned the waiter’s name—I had discovered from watching my employer that learning and using the names of people one meets is a quick way to make friends when one is visiting a place for the first time. I looked at the empty flask, considered a moment, and said. “I think I will have a coffee—and the reckoning, please.”

  “Si, signore.” said the waiter. He cleared the table and bustled off. A short while later he was back with the coffee.

  “Ah. thank you, Pietro.” I said. Then, curious about the establishment I found myself in. I added. “This is a very nice cafe to be named after Old Scratch.”

  He looked puzzled. “Scratch, signore? I do not know the name.”

  “Oh. that's our name for him in New England.” I said, remembering that our American slang might not be current here in Italy. “The devil. I mean—that is what Cafe Diabelli means, is it not?”

  “Oh, no, no,” he said, laughing. “We call the evil one diavolo. not diabelli. This place takes its name for the man who start it, long time ago—Signore Diabelli, a very nice man. He wanted to make this a place where artists and scholars and musicians come to cat and talk. And so you see—your English friends here, all artists. Inside, full of poets, critics, chess players. Best place in town for talk and argument.”

  “Well, the food is first-rate, too.” I said, patting my belly. “And this coffee is excellent. Give Signore Diabelli my compliments.”

  “Thank you,” said Pietro, nodding, “but Signore Diabelli sell the place, oh, maybe fifteen years ago. Signore Negri. the new owner, he keep the old name because everybody knows it. Any artist or writer, anywhere in Europa. they come to Firenze, they come to Cafe Diabelli.”

  “Well. I will come again myself,” I said. “The food is very fine, and I like the people I’ve met. Tell Signore Negri that he has a fine establishment, and I mean to tell my employer to stop here when he comes into town.”

  “Ah. your employer is the artist?” said Pietro.

  “No, a writer.” I said. “He is well known in America, but I don’t know if his works have been translated into Italian yet. He writes under the name Mark Twain.”

  Pietro’s smile remained on his face, but there was a harder expression around his eyes. “Yes. we have heard of your Mark Twain in Firenze—everybody here knows about his book. I am surprised he has come back.”

  “Well, he has come back.” I said, somewhat on my guard now. I did not know what Mr. Clemens had said about Florence in his books, but the waiter’s reaction gave me the impression that it had not been favorable. Mr. Clemens was rarely diplomatic in expressing his opinions. So I smiled at Pietro and said. “I will tell him about the food in Cafe Diabelli—I have no doubt he will like it, and the atmosphere, a great deal. It is one of the best places I have found in my travels.”

  I meant every word of it. I later had ample opportunity to wonder whether I’d have been happier if I’d walked right past Cafe Diabelli and never set foot inside the place. It probably would not have changed what happened afterwards. but perhaps it would not have changed me quite so much, either.

  2

  Mr. Clemens did not express great enthusiasm about visiting Cafe Diabelli. This reaction should not have surprised me. “Well, I'm glad you found a place you enjoy,” he told me. after I had described the cafe to him at the dinner table. “I suppose I’ll find the time to stick my nose in there, sooner or later—but my guess is it’ll be later. I’ve got a couple of books going great guns, and plenty of other work to keep me here.” He said this in a tone that reminded me that I, too. was in Florence to work—and that my days in the city would have to be paid for by evenings with my nose to the grindstone, tending to my employer’s accumulated paperwork.

  “I thought it would be an interesting place for you to meet the local writers, who I understand make it a regular meeting place,” I said, between bites of dinner—an excellent chicken baked in a spicy tomato sauce and served with rice, made by our Italian chef, who was beginning to prove himself a treasure.

  “It might be, if I were a young fellow just making my way in the world.” said Mr. Clemens, wiping the sauce off his mustache with a napkin. “Nowadays, if I walk into a place like that, everybody knows it within three minutes, and I’ve got about as much chance of a normal conversation as I do of flying to the moon. Less, in fact—if you believe Jules Verne. I have some chance of getting to the moon, if I don't mind being shot out of a cannon.” He leaned back in his chair and took another sip of wine.

  ”I’m sure there are lots of people who'd like to see you shot out of a cannon.” said his daughter Clara. “Especially some of the other writers.” Clara was somewhat younger than I. and would be the last person on earth to show proper deference to her father's fame and accomplishments.

  “You see what I mean. Wentworth?” said Mr. Clemens, with a lugubrious expression. I think he took as much pleasure in pretending to be injured by his daughter's “sass” as she did in inventing gibes. “I can’t get any respect from my own flesh and blood. What kind of treatment can I expect from a pack of hungry writers in some local cafe? Odds are, the minute I step through the door, they’ll all start trying to prove they're quicker-witted than the famous foreigner, and kill everybody in the place with boredom. The most humane thing I can do is to stay home,
so as not to expose them to the temptation.” Both the younger girls giggled at this comeback, and my employer reached for a second—or was it a third?—helping of chicken.

  “It also spares you facing the possibility that someone there might be wittier than you are,” said Clara, after a moment. “Let alone the effort of learning Italian, so as to meet them on equal ground.” Jean, at age fourteen the youngest sister, gasped at this audacious reply, and elbowed Clara, who smirked at having gotten off this sally at their famous father.

  “Young Miss Sass-pot. I'll have you know I speak Italian perfectly,” said Mr. Clemens—a statement I found incredible. not having heard him get through even one sentence in that language without resorting to English or German—or wild gesticulations—to supply his deficiency in vocabulary.

  All three of his children were taken aback by this bald assertion, but it was little Jean who took up the challenge, saying. “Scommetto que tu no capisce que dico.”

  Mr. Clemens would not rise to such obvious bait. “Now, there you go, trying to catch me out,” he said, rolling his eyes. “You’d lose that bet, young lady. Shame on you, not trusting your poor old father. Why. I’ll have you know I visited Italy before you were born—before I even met your dear mother…”

  “I remember when you came back from that trip. Youth, and I don’t believe you’ve changed one bit.” said Mrs. Clemens, smiling fondly at her husband and addressing him by his pet name. Then, before he could spot her twinkling eyes and guess her intention, she added, “You didn’t speak a word of Italian back then, and you still don’t.” She winked at her three daughters, who erupted in gales of laughter.

  Mr. Clemens had just taken a sip of wine, and it says a great deal for his self-control that, while his face turned red. he managed to swallow that wine without a single sputter. At last, he looked around the table and said, “I can see I'm outnumbered.” He pushed his chair back and rose from the table. “Livy, by your leave.” His wife nodded cordially, still smiling, as he folded his napkin and placed it by his plate. Then he turned to me and said, “Wentworth, let’s go up to the office and get some work done. At least I can hope you haven’t been studying up your Italian on purpose to make your boss look bad.”

  “Sir, I fear that languages are not my strong suit,” I replied, quite truthfully, as I pushed back my own chair. “One could best characterize my command of Italian as rudimentary.” I smiled ruefully. The two younger children giggled again, and nodded their heads. They had tried to help me with my lessons, and knew too well that I was speaking the truth.

  “Well, don’t let it prey on your mind,” said Mr. Clemens. “Just watch out for the grammar—that’s the very devil of this language business, in my experience. Just when you think you’ve got your mind wrapped around a sentence, the grammar up and runs away from you. and then you find yourself holding just an empty clause or two, with a few useless words scattered nearby. But Italian’s not so bad—not compared to German. Between you and me. maybe we can knock it down and make it say Uncle.”

  “I hope so, sir,” I said, conscious of the three Clemens girls* superior grins. I was nowhere near as confident as he.

  As usual while traveling. I had made arrangements to have Mr. Clemens’s mail forwarded, but as yet deliveries had not begun. Until they did, there would be less work than usual for me. We spent an hour or so after dinner on a few letters to his publishers in New York and London, and on other business matters. Then my employer sat down to write a long letter about our new domicile to friends in Elmira, New York, where he had once lived. I finished up my own paperwork, and went to bed at a sensible hour. The next morning. I was up early, and after a light breakfast. on my way into Florence for another visit to the museums—and Cafe Diabelli.

  Villa Viviani was perhaps five miles from Florence itself, not a difficult walk in good weather, but far enough to stretch the legs. The Baedeker mentioned a tramway somewhere in our suburb, with cars into town every half-hour or so, but I hadn't yet found the stop. I didn’t think it necessary to enlist Mr. Clemens’s driver to take me into town; he would be needed if Mrs. Clemens (whose heart was weak) needed to go someplace. I was young and healthy, and had the time to spare—even though I would rather have had extra time to spend in the Uffizi galleries, my destination today, than to wear out my shoe leather between Scttignano and the city.

  These ideas were swirling through my head when I stepped into the mouth of a narrow side street and was nearly bowled over by a bicycle rushing out between the buildings. I leapt back with a shout, but the cyclist pedaled onward, waving a fist with two fingers extended and bawling something I probably could not have understood even had it been in English. I could guess the overall thrust of it, though. My first reaction was fury; then I thought to myself. There’s the perfect way to get around town. I would have to find out what bicycles cost here in Florence…

  These thoughts occupied me until my feet brought me to Palazzo degli Uffizi, where I spent an enthralled morning sampling the treasures of Florentine art. But my attention was drawn away from the masterpieces of Fra Angelico and Botticelli by mounting hunger—in my haste to get into town and view the galleries. I had taken only a light breakfast. So when I became apprehensive that the growls of my stomach might distract my fellow art lovers from enjoying the paintings. I made my way outside and went looking for luncheon.

  At first I intended to try a new place, but during my hours indoors, the sky had clouded over and it had begun to drizzle. Thus, when the rain began to fall harder just as I found myself passing the open door of Cafe Diabelli. I said to myself Why not? and stepped inside again.

  The rain had driven indoors those patrons who normally frequented the terrace, and the glass doors leading outside were closed. This made the place seem smaller, noisier, and more crowded—although in fact, there were no more customers than on my previous visit. But the overall effect was to make it more attractive, not less—the smell of good food and coffee was more concentrated, as was the buzz of conversation.

  I paused just inside the door to scan the room for an empty table. There was another chess match underway at the tables to my left; this time the fair-haired player I had seen on my previous visit was an onlooker as his former opponent sat opposite a man in round-rimmed glasses who frowned owlishly at the position on the board. In another comer, the large bearded man again held court, with his stack of manuscripts and his circle of disciples. And at a table—rather, two tables pushed together—just inside the terrace doors, sat the young woman I had met yesterday. Virginia Fleetwood, with a group of companions.

  Miss Fleetwood glanced my way and smiled, then leaned over and said something to the man sitting next to her. He looked up at me. then rose from his seat and approached me. “Hello, my name’s Frank Stephens.” he said in an accent that marked him as a Bostonian. He was a good-looking fellow, with smooth dark hair and an aristocratic profile—slim and energetic at perhaps thirty-five years old. I could imagine him on a tennis court, or sculling down the Charles.

  I told him my name and we shook hands. He gestured toward his table and continued: “There's a whole crowd of Americans over here, and my sister-in-law. Miss Fleetwood. thought you’d like to join us for lunch. We've just ordered, so if you come on over and tell Pietro what you want, we can all eat together.”

  “Thank you,” I said. “If it won't be an imposition on you or your friends. I would be delighted.” I added, bowing again. Here was a stroke of luck—a group of Americans wintering in Florence. As much as I enjoyed spending time with Mr. Clemens and his family, he and his wife were of an older generation, and had more in common with my parents than with myself. I found it hard to relax in their presence. Even with his daughters, who were near to my own age. I felt an inevitable distance—as one ought to with the family of one's employer.

  I followed Stephens back to the table. Virginia Fleetwood I had already met. of course. “Hello. Mr. Cabot.” she said. “How pleasant to see you here again. I hope you’
re enjoying your stay in Florence.”

  “Very much so far, thank you,” I said. “I’m doing my best to see the city before I have to go to work, which I fear will be soon enough. My employer has just moved into Villa Viviani, east of town, and he’s given me a bit of free time until he gets settled in.”

  “Ah. that’s always the way of things, isn’t it?’ said Stephens with a wry grin, pointing to a vacant chair at the next table. I appropriated it and sat down as he continued: “I’m here as much on business as pleasure myself, though I can’t say my work is all that oppressive—buying art and antiques for a few clients back home. At least, when I walk around the galleries. I can tell myself I’m earning my keep. But here comes Pietro—why don’t you tell him what you want?’

  I ordered luncheon, a soup with chicken and rice that the waiter recommended. Then Frank Stephens introduced me to the rest of the party. Bob Danvers and Eddie Freeman were Americans, two big fellows who could have been football players gone to seed, both somewhat tipsy despite the early hour. Jonathan Wilson was an Englishman, perhaps forty years old, and an avid art collector. There were two Englishwomen, as well: Penelope Atwater, the middle-aged widow of a British Army officer, and her boarder, Sarah Woods, a plump young woman with a comically serious expression. Miss Woods and Eddie Freeman were both art students, and their easels and paint boxes were stacked against the wall next to the table. Danvers appeared to have no fixed occupation—I sized him up for the vagabond son of a well-to-do family, a sort I'd seen before. Indeed. I reflected, except for my employment with Mr. Clemens, there were some who might with justification apply that description to me.