During a break in my statement, while he was bringing me coffee, I watched light as thin as a veil come into the early morning sky, and thought of something Ross Yates had told me about his work: “Some people who don’t know any better think I’m a piece of shit, rooting through the garbage. But you know what? They’re just scared of me, because everyone’s got secrets and I know how to get to them all. In this world, secrets are more valuable than gold.”
Eventually, it all blew over, like an evil wind. That was how Willie had described Eddie, but it also could be said of him. I had done everything perfectly. It was the considered opinion of the police that the two men had quarrelled. The quarrel had escalated, and since both men were armed, the altercation had ended most tragically. Another example for the antigun lobby to use.
In the aftermath, I was reminded of something Willie had told me years ago. He’d come home in a particularly exultant mood, and I’d asked him why. “Dead cat bounce,” he had said, laughing. “Don’t look so appalled, Perse. It’s a Wall Street term. You target a company that looks dead on its feet. The stock’s hovering, say, between one and two because almost everyone’s given up on it. Then somebody like me comes in and starts buying heavily. Word gets around, and the price moves a little, until the greedy people get wind of the price change. There must be a turnaround, they think. The company’s going to be profitable again. So they buy-and others buy-in great quantity. Now the price shoots up to five, six, eight. That’s when I sell, because this company’s as dead as it was the day I bought the stock. The price collapses completely. That blip upward is called a dead cat bounce: the illusion of life.”
That’s what my life had been up until the moment I killed Willie, I thought: an illusion.
My pride at outwitting the police was something Willie would have understood, even applauded. My elation at being free gave vent to rehearsals that left me breathless, swimming in another world. Willie had for so long denied me full entry to this world that I felt drunk after almost every practice session. In fact, I left the piano only to take care of Caro.
How she missed Eddie. How little she understood herself! But there’d be so much time now for self-revelation. For her, nights were the worst. She had terrible bouts of depression, despair, and uncontrollable weeping. At those times, she withdrew completely, and I was once again momentarily reminded of my younger self. I did not pity her, because I knew what hell Eddie would have made of her life. If he’d allowed her to live. But there could be no doubt that the house was stifling her and, itching to get back to performing, I took her to Venice as soon after the investigations were concluded as I dared.
Venice was my favourite city, a place that pierced me clear to my soul. My God, on this trip the sky was so blue! Caro complained of the smell, but to me the air was pungent with new life!
I played three nights at the Teatro della Fenice, the small but magnificent concert and opera house. Throughout my career, critics, while praising my impeccable technique, had now and again carped that my playing lacked true passion. These Venetian concerts were markedly different. For the first time, I lost myself completely in the music. Much to my astonishment, I made many in the audience weep. At the end, the packed house would not let me leave the stage, urging me back for encore upon encore. For these, I very shrewdly chose the nocturnes of Chopin, that most emotional of composers, and now the entire audience wept.
And it was here that Caroline, witness to the flowering of my soul, at last began to return to life. It was as if the complex mathematical patterns of Bach’s music infused her with the innate orderliness of life, banishing the memory of the chaos that had so mercilessly overtaken her. It was as if the florid passion of Chopin had reawakened her heart so that she was reminded what it meant to love and be loved in return.
This metamorphosis, clearly apparent after the first concert, thrilled me to the tips of my fingers. I clutched her to me and kissed her repeatedly. And fell in love as if for the first time with the music of Bach and Chopin, with the people of Venice who fêted me in the cafés that lined the piazza outside the Fenice until dawn-light strayed like a striped cat through the cobbled streets.
The day after the last of the concerts dawned bright and clear. The sky was the colour of the sea, and in between lay all of Venice, sun washed, ancient as time. Riding an unceasing wave of bliss, I hired a motoscafo-a private motor launch-which took us first to Burano, the island of fishermen, whose small row houses painted in lovely pastels looked like the set for La Traviata.
After a leisurely stroll along the narrow, crooked streets, we took the motoscafo farther into the great lagoon to the island of Torcello, where, centuries before, the original Venetians had made their home. I had booked a table for lunch in the flower-strewn garden at the Locanda Cipriani. There, we looked out over a thirteenth-century church whose cracked burnt-sienna facade oozed an aura that seemed barely Christian.
White, puffy clouds dotted the sky like the sailing vessels on the lagoon, and where the Venetian sunlight struck the trellises and vines, the flowers sang a rich and vibrant oratorio. When Caro excused herself to go inside, the man at the next table turned to me and asked in a deep, raspy baritone whether he could buy “the lady and her sister” a drink.
I couldn’t help smiling. “Caroline’s my daughter. We’d be delighted to accept the offer of a fellow American, but only if you join us for lunch. Are you alone?”
“As it happens, I am. Thank you,” he said, as he came and sat opposite Caro’s chair, at my left elbow.
“Are you here on business?” I asked.
“No, pleasure. You know, sightseeing, the usual.” Under his breath, he said, “Right on time.”
“What’s the matter, Ross?” I said in the same hushed tone. “Didn’t you think I’d make it?”
“After the way you put VanDam to sleep, I had no doubt,” Ross Yates whispered. “But last night I dreamt you didn’t come. Christ Almighty, this was the toughest month of my life. The longer I stayed away from you, the more I wanted you.”
He was tall and rangy, like a cowboy, with windblown hair the colour of flax. His face reminded me of a soldier’s: tough, vigilant, competent. Seemingly not the kind of man to make such an admission. I very much liked that he had. That bastard Willie never would have opened up like that.
“You certainly know how to make a woman’s head spin.”
He laughed. “That isn’t all I can make spin.” His gray eyes appeared screwed into the bone of their sockets. They sparked with licentious memory. When I say I’ll do something, they seemed to say, it’s as good as done. “Those early mornings when VanDam was upstairs…” He chuckled. “I bet your kitchen table never saw that kind of action before or since. VanDam may have been a genius at business, but he sure was short on imagination. No way he ever made you sing like I do.”
God, how right he was! And he laughed, seeing it in my eyes.
“It was my lucky day when I showed you the report on Eddie.”
“And even luckier for both of us I made you sit on it until the wedding reception.”
“You really do have a deliciously evil mind.”
“Hush,” I whispered. “Caro’s coming back.” I was flushed and excited and terrified all at once.