Eric van lustbader, p.27
Eric van Lustbader, page 27
He was so lost in this excruciating line of conjecture that he didn’t notice the two men who came up behind him. Before he understood what was happening, they had pushed him over the side of the bridge. He fell, landing on the deck of a motoscafo. Immediately, a sack was drawn over his head, and the boat took off. His feet were swept out from under him, someone was saying something urgently quite close; he ignored it and fought, but soon his arms were pinioned to his side. Using his forehead as a weapon, he struck out, colliding with one of his captors. He bulled forward, trying to press his advantage, but a precise blow that landed behind his right ear drove him into unconsciousness.
* * *
Chapter 16
Jenny awoke in utter darkness. She groaned. Even touching the back of her neck set off a wave of dizziness and nausea that made her cry out. She held her aching head for some time. What had happened? She had been talking to that priest and then…
Woozily, she stood against a wall. It was cold and damp. She put her hand out, encountered stone. Slowly, she moved along the wall until she came to a door. She tried the wrought-iron handle, but the door was locked. She retreated two steps, took a deep breath and slowly let it out. She repeated the process three times, each inhalation and exhalation deeper than the last. Then, gathering herself, she kicked the door open. She staggered back and almost fell. The effort setting off another bout of vertigo and nausea. This time, she turned her head to one side and retched, vomiting up the contents of her stomach.
Out in the corridor, she was greeted by more blackness. It was then she remembered her pocket flashlight. Digging it out, she switched it on, played the beam this way and that. It took her a moment before she saw the body. At first, she thought it was Bravo, and her heart lurched painfully, the ache at the back of her neck redoubling. As she came closer, she saw the curtainlike drape of a priest’s robes and recognized Father Mosto.
Cautiously, she went toward where his body lay twisted and bloody. A sudden flash caught her eye, metal reflected by the light. Closer still, she found herself staring at a puddle of blood turned black and shiny as oil by the beam of light. In it, glimmering evilly, was a knife that looked—no, it couldn’t be! Checking her pocket, she found her knife gone. She peered more closely at the switchblade on the floor. She picked it up, needing visceral confirmation.
Oh, my God, she thought, it is mine!
Someone had attacked her, stolen her knife and used it to slit Father Mosto’s throat. But how did they know she was carrying a knife? No time and no way to answer those questions now.
“Bravo!” she called. “Bravo!”
Running back toward the rectory, she came upon the side door, which was open enough to allow a narrow triangle of light into the corridor. It seemed logical that whoever had taken him had used this to make their escape. Still, just to be certain, she searched the rectory. There was the armoire, its doors agape, an inner panel removed, but no Bravo. Cursing herself, she flew back down the corridor and out the door into the blazing heat.
Almost immediately, she noticed the commotion on the stone bridge that spanned the canal. People were all too willing to tell her about the man who had been pushed over the side of the bridge into the waiting motoscafo.
An old man dressed in impeccable Venetian fashion was incensed. “The terrorists spirited him off!”
“How do you know they were terrorists?” Jenny said.
“They kidnapped him, didn’t they? What else could they be? And in broad daylight, can you imagine!” He made a rude gesture, his anger at its apex. “When did Venice become America?”
Camille, watching Jenny from the concealment of a shadowed doorway, was still vibrating with the aftermath of the adrenaline rushing through her system. She desperately wanted a cigarette, but the nicotine would calm her, and she didn’t want that just yet. There was nothing like a burst of extreme physical exertion to make you feel alive, she thought. To make you feel vital, to prove that you’re still young.
As she observed the progress of Jenny’s inquiries, she dabbed absently at the corner of her mouth with a folded bit of cloth. The cloth was already stained with her blood. Her body ached where Bravo had struck her, but it was a delicious pain, verging on the erotic, and the breath came hot in her throat. To be in physical contact with first Jenny and then Bravo, to feel Jenny’s warm weight in her arms, to know that she was utterly helpless, and then to move on to Bravo, to know that the two had been lovers, to sense in their musculature the other, like a shadow or an indentation in a pillow with all its intimate scents, stimulated her like nothing else could.
Bravo had not, of course, been as pliant as Jenny. He had fought her, enabling her to assess firsthand the job his father had done with him; it brought him closer to her in a way she found enjoyable. Over the years she had probed and prodded Bravo, mainly through Jordan, in ways he’d never been aware of. It felt good to take the physical measure of him—more than good, it felt right, as if like a sorcerer she had been able to transform an image in a photograph and bring it to life. He was like a beautiful chair she had once coveted, with one leg torn away, tottering, ripe for a fall.
Of Father Mosto she thought not at all. He was of no consequence to her except as an object through which she was separating the lovers, isolating Bravo, revealing the vulnerable spot by which she would at long last destroy him.
Jenny, leaning on the stone parapet of the bridge, was assailed by doubt. She was in the middle of a nightmare, much of it of her own making. She had been so tied up in knots over her growing feelings for Bravo and her guilt in not telling him the truth about herself that she’d allowed her instincts to be dulled. She had forgotten who she was and so had been vulnerable to a clever attack by Knights in priest’s robes, for that was the only logical explanation for what had happened. Now Bravo was in the enemy’s hands—the worst had happened, and she was to blame.
On top of that, she was acutely aware of being under surveillance. She didn’t know by whom. Though only an hour ago she would have assumed it was Michael Berio, now she refused to accede to any such leap of faith. The worst thing she could do was to go by old assumptions. She was in an entirely new game, and if she couldn’t adjust—and quickly—the Order would lose everything.
Much as she hated to do it, she’d have to call Paolo Zorzi and admit her failure. She needed help. Reaching for her cell phone, she braced herself for the shower of invective he would direct at her. Then her blood ran cold; her cell phone was gone, too.
She closed her eyes, trying to will away the pain in her head and neck. Breathing slowly and deeply, she allowed the added oxygen she was drawing in to do its work. First things first. She needed to get out from under the surveillance. In Venice, she knew, she could walk for the entire afternoon and still not feel confident that she had lost her watcher. There were no vehicles to get her away, and the boats were all too open and slow to be of any use to her.
Then she remembered something she’d read while glancing through the Michelin guide. Rising from her position, she looked this way and that, as if unsure of which way to go—not so far from the truth. Crossing to the far side of the bridge, she went through the small campo, turning into a side street. She entered a store selling masks. While the proprietor rang up and wrapped a mask for a customer, she had a look around, examining the rows of leather masks that hung on the walls. As its artisans had done with glassblowing, marbled paper and Fortuny silks, Venice had turned mask making into a high art. Masks depicting characters, many from the commedia dell’arte, were worn during Carnevale, which traditionally began the day after Christmas and went to the day before Ash Wednesday. All laws were suspended during Carnevale, and everyone, high-born and low, mingled together—a practice bom of the doge’s desire to be able to walk the streets of his city and visit those he wished to lie with, in complete anonymity.
A horde of sad eyes, grotesque noses, grinning mouths peered down at her, and such was the skill of the artisans that each mask seemed alive with emotion: ardor, mirth or menace. There were also long cloaks of sumptuous fabric. These were called tabarro, the shopkeeper explained. When celebrants donned this, along with a mask and a bauta, a black silk hood and short lace cape, they were able to pass their own wife or sister without being recognized.
When the proprietor asked how he could help her, she asked for directions to Rio Trovaso, which, as it happened, was closer than she had thought. She quit the store reluctantly, as if leaving a party filled with fascinating new acquaintances.
It was not difficult to find Rio Trovaso, and she followed it until the intersection with Rio Ognissanti. Turning the corner, she came upon the Squero, one of the few remaining shipyards that built and repaired the city’s ubiquitous gondolas. It consisted of three wooden buildings—odd for Venice—and a small dock that fronted the workshop itself.
At once, she went inside. One of the banes of Venice now worked to her advantage. Offering a good deal of money got her an outfit of workman’s clothes. Not a single question was asked by the master shipwright who directed the work at the Squero—all the answer he required was contained in the euros she placed in his extended hand. The outfit included a cap under which she placed her hair. Pulling the bill low on her forehead helped, but for good measure, she took a piece of charcoal from the workshop and streaked her cheeks, rolling it between the palms of her hands to darken them, as well.
For another somewhat smaller sum, she had the shipwright take her by means of an interior passageway into the adjoining building, where the workmen lived. He led her through the ground floor and out a side entrance, walking several blocks with her as if she were one of his staff. They entered a cafe, and he left her there some moments later.
In her new disguise, she left the cafe, walking aimlessly, it seemed, for some time. In fact, she was checking for tags, slowly and painstakingly backtracking, doubling and redoubling through streets that were now as familiar to her as her own hometown, until she was satisfied that she was clean.
Then she returned to the area of the Church of l’Angelo Nicolò in I Mendicoli. She stood for a moment, taking stock of the environment. The street was dominated by police and gawking tourists. Obviously, Father Mosto’s body had been discovered.
She wondering if the Knights still had the area under surveillance. They had lost her, that was for certain; would they keep personnel here? She thought not. They would know that she, having lost Bravo, would have no reason come back here. She had to figure that they would be scouring a circular section of the city with an expanding radius as time passed and they failed to find her. They would, in fact, be moving further and further away from this locus.
Setting off, she bypassed the entrance to the church, which was in any event clogged with police and forensic personnel. Instead, she turned the corner and passed into the next street. At the entrance to Santa Marina Maggiore, she stopped and, using the brass bell set into the stucco wall beside the indigo-painted wooden door, announced herself.
If the first order of business had been to free herself from surveillance, the second was to find succor and aid. She could think of no better place to find it than with the nuns of Santa Marina Maggiore.
The door was thrown open almost at once and she was confronted by a pale oval face riven by fear and suspicion.
“What is it, signore?” The nun was young; the horror next door made her query uncharacteristically abrupt and somewhat hostile.
“I need to see the abbess,” Jenny said.
“My apologies, signore, but today it is impossible.” She could not help glancing up the street toward the side of the church. “The abbess is very busy.”
“Would you turn away a supplicant at your doorstep?”
“I have orders,” the young nun said stubbornly. “The abbess is seeing no one.”
“She must see me.”
“Must she?”
At the sound of this deeper, mote mature voice, the young nun started, and turning, saw another nun standing at her shoulder.
“That will be all, Suor Andriana. Tend to the herb garden now.”
“Yes, Mother.” Suor Andriana made a small genuflection and with a terrified backward glance hurried off.
“Enter, please,” the older nun said. “Excuse Suor Andriana, she is young, as you can see, and she is a converse.” Her voice was deep, indeed, almost masculine in tonality. She was tall and slender, with the narrow hips of a boy, and seemed to glide across the stone flagging by some mysterious means of locomotion. “My name is Suor Maffia di Albori. I am one of the madri di consiglio, the ruling council of Santa Marina Maggiore.”
The moment Jenny stepped across the threshold Suor Maffia di Albori slammed the door shut and threw the huge ancient lock. Without a word, she led Jenny to a stone fount, below which was a basin of cool water.
“Wash your face, please,” Suor Maffia di Albori said.
Obediently, Jenny bent over, cupping the water in her hands, splashing it up over her face, washing off the charcoal. When she turned, Suor Maffia di Albori handed her a square of undyed muslin, which she used to dry her face.
“Take off your cap, please.” As Jenny did so, the nun made a sound deep in her throat. “Now you may properly introduce yourself.”
“My name is Jenny Logan.”
“And who or what are you running from, Jenny Logan?” Suor Maffia di Albori was not a handsome woman. She had no need for beauty, for she was possessed of a powerful face with a strong Roman nose, prominent cheekbones and a thrusting chin like a sword blade.
“The Knights of St. Clement,” Jenny said. “Two or more of their agents infiltrated the church and murdered Father Mosto.”
“Is that so?” Suor Maffia di Albori examined Jenny with the deep-set curious eyes of the intellectual. “Would you hazard a guess as to the method of Father Mosto’s murder?”
“I don’t have to guess, I saw him,” Jenny said. “His throat was slit.”
“The murder weapon?” Suor Maffia di Albori said rather coolly.
“A knife—a pearl-scaled switchblade, to be exact.”
Suor Maffia di Albori took a quick and determined step toward her. “Don’t lie to me, girl!”
“I know because it’s my knife. It was taken from me.” She explained briefly what had happened to her.
The madre di consiglio listened to the account entirely without comment or expression. Jenny might have been explaining how she’d lost the two euros Suor Maffia di Albori had given her to buy a carton of milk.
“And why have you come to Santa Marina Maggiore, Jenny Logan?”
“I need help,” Jenny said.
“What makes you believe that you will find it here?”
“I was told to ask to see the Anchorite.”
A deathly silence now fell between them.
“Who told you that?”
“The Plumber.”
It appeared as if Suor Maffia di Albori’s face had gone chalk white. It took her a moment to recover. “You are that Jenny?”
“Yes.”
Suor Maffia di Albori said, “You will wait here. You will not move or speak to anyone but myself, even if spoken to, is that understood?”
“Yes, Mother,” Jenny said as meekly as Suor Andriana.
“You are neither converse nor monache da cow. You are not obliged to address me as ‘Mother’.”
“Nevertheless, I will, Mother.”
The madre di consiglio nodded. “As you wish.” She turned away, but not before Jenny caught the tiny flicker of pleasure in her eyes.
Jenny, alone in the dark and musty anteroom, stood quite still, waiting as she had been ordered to do. There were no windows, and what little furniture there was—two chairs and a settee—looked as forbidding and uncomfortable as if they had been manufactured for the visiting room of a prison. The floor was a mosaic of the Crucifixion, dimmed now with age and perhaps the waters of the lagoon. Even so, it was clear that only the dullest of colors had been used, because in the convent bright hues were deemed unseemly and to be avoided. On three sides, arches led to an even gloomier interior.
A distant chanting started up, as Sexte, the noon prayer, floated through the nunnery. As always, her mind was filled with Dex. It was he who had told her of Santa Marina Maggiore, who had told her to ask for the Anchorite. Dex was the plumber—it was, he had told her, how the nuns of Santa Marina Maggiore referred to him. When she had asked him why, he had given her that wry, lopsided smile of his that so endeared him to her.
“Like everything else of import, it returns to the Latin, plumb being Latin for lead,” he had said. “In medieval times, roofs were made of lead, so plumbers were roofers. The nuns of Santa Marina Maggiore call me the Plumber because they believe I kept the roof over their heads.”
“Did you?” she had asked.
Again that wry, lopsided smile dented his face. “In a way, I guess, in money… and in my belief in them.”
She wanted to know more, of course, but she hadn’t asked him, and he hadn’t volunteered any more. Now, against all odds, here she was at Santa Marina Maggiore, asking to see the Anchorite, not even knowing who or what the Anchorite was. But, she told herself, that was how it had always been between her and Dex—he said things, and she took them on faith. It was him she had faith in, ever since… But she didn’t want to think about that, and with a violent mental wrench, turned her thoughts in another direction.
She opened her eyes. Below her, Christ’s sorrowful eyes beseeched her. What was He calling for? Faith, of course. For a Catholic with faith, life was simple. The phrase “Have faith, it’s God will” covered every situation, no matter how disastrous. Life, however, was anything but simple, and it seemed to her that the platitudes that escaped from the mouths of priests were like soap bubbles, unable to sustain themselves, collapsing almost as soon as they were spoken.
Sexte was almost done by the time Suor Maffia di Albori returned. Her cheeks were flushed, as if she was in a hurry to return.
