I wondered briefly how far those two old friends had lied to each other about the presumed Euripides, and if even my master’s evaluation had been completely honest. Collectors can be as ruthless as hyenas. Yet the doge had withdrawn his bid after that, or so he had said. Had he been dissuaded, or had he decided to let his old friend have the treasure? Or had he lied to me?
“Madonna, can you recollect where everyone was standing?”
“That is a ridiculous question!” her brother snarled. “Bianca, you don’t have to endure this.”
“I am anxious to help sier Alfeo, Bene. They did keep moving around. They all wanted to see the books, understand, but none of them wanted to show too much interest in the ones they thought special, in case they alerted the others to their interest.” Bianca was sharp, obviously. “So they walked back and forth along the table, picking them up and putting them down. The Greek man trotted along beside them, chattering all the time. Lustrissimo Imer came in a few times. And then another man I did not know, a younger man, and spoke with Senator Tirali. He had a lady with him.”
Despite the downcast eyes and carefully flat tone, I realized instantly that Bianca knew perfectly well who Sister Maddalena was. Bianca was a very observant young woman. Whether Violetta’s nun disguise had failed to deceive her the previous day, or Violetta had deceived me, Bianca was now deceiving her pompous brother and enjoying the joke. Maybe San Giovanni Evangelista di Torcello was the place for her after all.
“That was sier Pasqual, the senator’s son. Anyone else?”
“Two footmen came in a few times, offering more wine.” She gave excellent descriptions of both Benzon and Pulaki Guarana. The outing had been exciting for her, and she had observed details that the older witnesses had missed or forgotten. “I refused more, having drunk very little. Grandfather allowed them to top up his glass once. I did not see how much he had drunk, messer. ” She was clever enough to know what I needed to hear.
The workmen were now wrapping the pictures in canvas and rope. At least they had not started sawing and hammering.
“When you all went off to join the other guests,” I asked. “Did people take their wineglasses with them?”
For the first time Bianca turned her eyes full on me. Had circumstances permitted, I could have melted on the spot very realistically.
“I do not know what the others did, messer Alfeo. I laid mine down so I could assist my grandfather. He drained his glass and handed it to me in exchange for his cane, which I had been holding. And he pulled a face.”
“What sort of face?” Benedetto demanded.
Bianca lowered her eyes again. “A grimace. As if he had not liked the taste. He did not say anything. I did not ask him. Sier Alfeo, would it have made any difference if-”
I said, “None at all. There is no known antidote. You could have done nothing. Had you realized he had been poisoned, then a finger down the throat to induce vomiting might have helped at that early stage, but even that could be dangerous to an old man. He might well have choked. You had no reason to suspect foul play. He did not, obviously. Who has not unexpectedly found bitter lees in the bottom of a wineglass? And perhaps that was all it was.”
I doubt she believed me, but she whispered, “Thank you.”
“The wine was poisoned?” her brother said furiously. “The waiters have been questioned?”
“Other people drank from the same bottle,” I said. “Did the procurator set his glass down while he was looking at the books, madonna?”
She nodded. “And when he moved to another, I sometimes picked it up and carried it for him, but usually he did that himself. I am certain I never picked up the wrong glass, and almost certain he never did, either. I was watching, because he was getting forgetful. That was why I was there, to help him.”
Bianca had been the best-positioned witness, yet even she had not seen the killer strike. Had there even been a killer? My hopes of exposing a murderer sank to the bottom of the Adriatic Sea.
“Do not distress yourself with such thoughts!” I said. “Very few people were drinking retsina. He would have known if he had accidentally taken some other person’s drink-would have known by the smell before his first sip. His death was not your fault and it was not an accident. Either his glass was deliberately poisoned or it was switched with one that had been.”
“No, messer! If anyone had tampered with his drink I would have seen.”
“Bianca!” snapped her brother. “Be careful what you say.”
“She is only trying to help,” I said. “Nobody suspects her.” I could not imagine that angelic face belonging to a sinner guilty of anything. “She would not have made that statement if she had poisoned the wine herself! Did your grandfather have anything else to eat or drink? Antipasto?”
She shook her head. “We joined the other guests in the salone, but he refused more wine. At the table he took ill before the antipasto was served.”
The mystery now looked more impossible than insoluble. The Maestro had been mistaken, the procurator had died of natural causes.
“You have been extremely helpful, madonna,” I said. “Did anything else happen in the book room that we should know?”
She smiled. “There was a fight! Well, an argument. Our host discovered the two foreigners and asked them their names. Then he told them to leave, politely at first. The man became offensive and said he had been invited. The illustrious Karagounis was brought into the argument. Maestro Nostradamus had to translate back and forth. At one point the foreign man took out a purse and shook it in Attorney Imer’s face.”
Before I could ask anything more, I heard steps and looked around at the trouble approaching, Great Minister Enrico Orseolo, who had tried to beat me down from ten ducats to three for work already delivered while he was standing under a Tintoretto painting as big as the Piazzetta.
Whenever noblemen over the age of twenty-five appear in public, they wear floor-length robes, a tippet over one shoulder, and a flat, round bonnet like a cake. Magistrates wear color, all others black. As a great minister, sier Enrico Orseolo would wear violet instead of black, but now mourning had put him back in black, a trailing gown like his son’s. Alessa had described him as cold on the outside, warm inside, but I thought of him as cold-blooded. My private name for him was Lizard, because his eyes were protuberant, heavy-lidded, creepily unblinking, while the rest of his face was gaunt and fleshless. He was said to be a politician’s politician, a conciliator, a maker of deals, and I knew he was the sort of man to value agreement for its own sake, not caring whether its terms are honorable-anything was negotiable. His offers to settle the Maestro’s bill had gone up one ducat at a time.
I got the full amount in the end, though.
Enrico Orseolo, the procurator’s son, last survivor of the family group I had inspected earlier, Alessa’s sometime patron, possible future member of the Council of Ten, came to a halt and looked us over with glassy indifference. He did not quite flicker a forked tongue at us, but I imagined it. Today he was not in a mood to compromise.
“Who are these people, Benedetto? What are they doing here?” His gaze fixed on me. “Don’t I know you?”
I bent to kiss his sleeve. “Alfeo Zeno, Your Excellency, apprentice to Doctor Nostradamus, the physician who-”
“The astrologer. Yes, I remember. He took advantage of an old man’s gullibility, and you were an insolent pest. What are you doing here? You, cover your face!” That last remark was directed at Bianca and the next to Benedetto. “You are supposed to be supervising the servants.”