Alibi: A Novel (30 page)

“But not everyone is. Whoever killed him isn’t.”

“Not a partisan,” she said slowly.

“No. And if I find him,” I said, nodding at the file, “then you’re back in business. So it’s worth a chance.”

She had leaned forward, her whole body listening. “Back in business?”

“Well, there’s always somebody else, isn’t there? Always. But nothing ever came out. Then all of a sudden you’re investigating Gianni—you know something, you’re getting close. So if you were the somebody else, it might be a good time to get rid of Gianni,” I said, rushing now, believing it myself, the way it should have happened.

“Another collaborator.”

“Who set up the raid.” I opened my palm, an offering. “Your trial.” And then, before she could say anything, “Could you get me a list of everyone you talked to, who knew you were doing this?”

Because there had to be someone who knew about Gianni, who could tell me.

“Besides you and Lieutenant Sullivan?”

“Everyone. At the hospital, whoever you talked to. It had to be someone who knew this was happening, that you were opening the case.”

“But they might have talked to others.”

“I know. We’ll follow it as far as we can.”

“Oh,
we
. I told you—”

“
I
. You just work on the Germans. I’ll take care of that,” I said, reaching over for the file.

“You know I can’t. It’s Allied property.”

“Joe would do it for me.”

“And me? When they ask me?”

“Files get lost. Misplaced. Even the Germans lost files,” I said. “It happens. And then they turn up again. You want to know what happened too, don’t you?” She raised her hand, letting the file slide away,
then pushed up her sleeve and scratched the white skin on her arm. “We both want to know.” I kept looking at her as I pulled the folder toward me.

“And you’re going to do this all by yourself? One man. Talk to all these people, in Italian. How? I can’t take the time.”

“I know. We made a deal. Just work the German side.”

“But you can’t—”

I glanced over her shoulder again. The one man he could trust. Not even an idea, an impulse, grabbing at anything, unable to stop now, the eddy in control. “Yes, I can. I’m going to get the police to help.”

We had to pass Cavallini’s table to leave the dining room, so there was no avoiding a meeting. He sprang up when we got near, as if he’d been waiting.

“Ah, Signora Soriano. They said you would be here.” He took her hand. Waiting for Rosa, not me.

“You know each other?” I said.

“Who said I would be here?”

“I telephoned your office.”

“Ah, looking for the Communists,” she said, pointing to the paper in front of him, mischievous. “You know I can’t help you with that. I don’t know any.”

“No one does,” Cavallini said, smiling back. “Sometimes, you know, I think we make them up.”

Rosa looked at him. “Sometimes you do. But they’re useful, no?” She nodded to the paper.

“Some coffee? You can join me?” He offered a seat.

“No, it’s impossible. I’m late. If I’d known—it’s important? You came here to see me?”

“I don’t like to interrupt,” he said, motioning toward the table where we’d been.

“What is it?” Rosa said, direct.

“Not the Communists,” he said, picking up the paper. “The victim. You have so much information about our Venetian citizens. I
thought perhaps—you know, we have to look everywhere in a murder case.”

“Ha, so this is your help?” she said to me. “
Come due gocce d’acqua
. What’s the English? Not drops of water—peas.”

“Two peas in a pod,” I said, not really following.

“Both of you, so interested in Maglione,” she said to Cavallini, then pointed her thumb at me. “Talk to him. You know I’m not allowed. Only if Lieutenant Sullivan—”

“But you can tell me—is there a file?”

She kept her eyes on him, away from the folder in the newspaper under my arm.

“A murder case, signora.”

“All right. I’ll look,” she said evenly. “But now I should go. You’re finished with me?”

“It’s not an interrogation,” Cavallini said, smiling.

“There’s a difference, with police?” she said, but pleasantly, easing her way out. “I’ll call you,” she said to me. “Good luck.” This with a move of her eyes to Cavallini.

“So you know the famous Rosa,” Cavallini said as she left.

“She works for a friend of mine. Why famous?”

“During the war, in the resistance. Brave, like a man. The Germans never got her. A Communist, you know.”

“She says not.”

He shrugged. “They all say not. So, why good luck? The peas in a pod?”

“We both asked her about Gianni.”

“Ah,” he said, noncommittal.

“Look, you said on San Michele that I could help. Maybe I can. This is what I did in Germany, with her boss. The army’s not going to talk to you—they like to keep things to themselves. But he’ll talk to me. I can find out what they have.”

“So there is a file.”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

But maybe he already knew. “Because I asked them to start one.”

He looked at me for a moment, then at the waiter gathering up cups. “I must get back. But it’s so nice today. Perhaps you’d walk with me? Part of the way?”

Outside, we stopped in front of San Moise, the rococo stone dark with grit even in the bright sun.

“You asked for this investigation?”

“Yes. Didn’t you know?” I said, probing.

“Your mother mentioned something,” he said casually. Known all along. Take nothing for granted.

“Then you also know why.”

He nodded. “The incident with Signorina Grassini, I think. Several have mentioned this.” Why? I felt warm, a rush of blood. Had he been asking about her? Running through his checklist, rumors and times I left the hotel and who had seen what? But the engagement party had been bound to come up. It had happened. And so had the ball, when we’d spent the evening with him, having our pictures taken. Just move the party off his checklist, away from Claudia. “An embarrassment for you.”

“And for her now,” I said, starting to walk, the narrow calle feeling suddenly like a tightrope. Keep your balance and don’t look down. “You know, when something terrible happens, you look for someone to blame. Anybody. And Gianni was there when they were taken. You don’t always think, you just—then later you realize it’s a mistake. You can’t blame someone personally. Of course, Gianni was nice about it. I suppose for my sake. So they made a truce.” The same word he’d used when he lied to me on the fondamenta, maybe a word that was always a lie. “In the end they were both relieved, I think.”

“But you asked your friend—Lieutenant Sullivan?—to investigate him.”

“I wanted to reassure her that Gianni was all right. That she’d made a mistake.”

“And did it? Reassure her?”

“Yes,” I said, looking at him, “because I didn’t tell her what they found.”

He was quiet for a minute, thinking, then stopped. We were near the turnoff for Harry’s, standing next to one of the stores. Shoes and handbags and cashmere, with Harry’s at the end of the calle, my mother’s Venice.

“But you want to tell me?” he said, a question, not a request, his eyes slightly apprehensive. I remembered the broad smile that first night at Harry’s, pleased to see Gianni.

“Yes. But only you. It wouldn’t be fair to his daughter. To my mother, for that matter. Nobody has to know. Not yet. They’re only suggestions. Not proof, suggestions.”

“What suggestions?” he said calmly.

“That he was working with the Germans. That he betrayed partisans.”

“You believe this?”

“I don’t know what to believe. People have to do things in wartime—it’s hard to judge. So maybe yes. But the point is that if he
did
, then there’s a motive. Why would anyone want to kill Gianni? But if he betrayed them, or if they thought he did—”

He was nodding to himself. “Yes, there were such cases. Rosa knows this. And yet she runs away when I ask.”

“She doesn’t want it to be a partisan.”

“That’s your idea, that it was a partisan?”

We started walking again, past the jewelry stores and into the deep shadow of the arcades.

“You know, Signor Miller, everyone worked for the Germans. We don’t like to say now, but what could we do? This was an occupied country. Even the police worked for them.”

“Not like this.”

“Like this,” he repeated, waiting. “There was a suggestion—”

“That he was an informer for the SS. There was a raid, an atrocity.”

“A fire.”

“So you know about it.”

“I thought it must be that. With Rosa.”

Just then we came out of the arcades into the bright open piazza,
that exhilarating first moment when the space of San Marco dazzles. Even Cavallini stopped, looking across at the campanile and the domes of the basilica.

“It seems impossible, doesn’t it, that such things could happen,” he said, “where it’s so beautiful.” I glanced at him, surprised. “Look at this,” he said, genuinely moved. And in fact the piazza was spectacular, flooded with spring light, the sun flashing off the gold mosaics, the pigeons swooping up and around in the soft air. “Imagine,” he said, “to be a Maglione in this city.” He turned to me. “I hope you’re wrong, Signor Miller. So many years, and then a disgrace like this on the name.”

“I hope I’m wrong too. For my mother’s sake.”

“Yes, forgive me,” he said. We started to walk across the piazza. “I forgot what this would mean to her. I was thinking of my wife’s family. An indulgence. Do such things happen? Who knows better than a policeman? Of course you’re right—we must know. I’m grateful to you for your help.”

“Maybe we can help each other.”

“Yes?”

“I can find out what Joe Sullivan has—well, Rosa, really. But if we want to take this any further, there are hospital records to check, and I’d need your authority for that.”

“My authority? But the Allies have all the authority you need.”

“For war crimes. But now he’s dead. They’re not interested in trying a dead man. What would be the point? So it’s a police matter. Your case.”

“My case,” he said to himself, as if he were trying out the phrase. He looked up at me, a faint grin under the mustache. “And you want to be the Dr. Watson? The partner? It’s not usual, such an offer.”

“Just an assistant. If it would help.”

“Oh, I accept, I accept. An experienced investigator? For you it’s like old times, maybe. More Germans.”

“No, no trials this time. I just want to know whether he did it.” I looked at Cavallini. “And then we’ll know why he was killed.”

Unexpectedly, he extended his hand. “I am so grateful for your
help. At the Questura, do they want this? To know why? With you, it’s a family matter, they say to me. You see, you can understand that. But the others? They just want it to go away. For everything to be normal. The tourists will be here soon.”

Around us, as a kind of live illustration, the waiters were putting out more tables at Florian’s, even one day’s sun an excuse to start the season. In a few days the musicians would be back, playing waltzes, and everything would be the same. I watched for a second, uneasy, even the white-jacketed waiters carrying chairs suddenly surreal. I was supposed to be one of the people sitting down for coffee, reading an English newspaper, writing postcards. Not lying to policemen, who were grateful for my help.

“Will you come back to the Questura?”

“I can’t now,” I said. “Anyway, I’d better call Joe. Get you the file.” After I’d read it first, decided what to pass on. “So we can start.”

“Yes, thank you,” he said, but the idea seemed to darken his mood again, a reminder. “I remember the incident of the house very well. Those were the worst times, near the end. I don’t know why.”

I shrugged. “The losers are desperate and the winners aren’t accountable yet. So it’s open season. It was the same in Germany. At the War Crimes Commission, most of the cases were recent.”

“War crimes,” he said. “Sometimes I think everything in the war was a crime.”

I looked at him, surprised again. “And nothing. That’s the problem. It’s war, so it doesn’t count.”

“Well, now it’s over,” he said, taking one last look at the piazza, still filling with chairs. “Now it counts.”

A
re you crazy?” Claudia said.

“Maybe. But this way we know everything they’re doing.”

“Help them. What are you going to do? Help them catch us?”

“The closer I get, the more they look somewhere else. I’m
making
them look somewhere else.”

“No, digging a grave. Two. Not just yours.” Pacing now, drawing smoke in tight gulps, as if she were angry at the cigarette too.

“We
want
them to look somewhere else. You don’t want them coming back to that party.”

“Back to me, you mean.”

“Back to either of us,” I said, looking at her. “Either of us.”

“And now they won’t—because you’re there? Maybe they ask themselves, why does he do this?”

“Look, I was a kind of cop. Something like this happens in my family, they expect me to take an interest.”

“Not your family.”

“Close to me, then. They expect me to help. Cavallini asked me. Giulia asked me.”

“Oh, Giulia. The pretty sister. Now, not a sister. So there’s a convenience.”

“Stop.”

“What do you want to do, make it up to her? ‘I’ll find out who did it.’ Ha. Not as difficult as she thinks.”

“Claudia.”

“Maybe you want to show her what he was like. ‘Here’s your father. SS.’ You think she’ll thank you for that, your little sister?”

“Are you finished?”

She turned her back to me. “You said we would leave Venice.”

“We will.”

“Oh, but not yet. Not until it’s too late.”

I put my hands on her and turned her around. “Listen. This is how it works. I show Cavallini what Gianni did. I prove it. So it’s the logical answer, the
only
place he looks. Not here, not at you, not at me. Some partisan, someone Gianni betrayed.”

“And when there is no partisan?”

“But they’ll think there is. Maybe dead, maybe still out there—they don’t know exactly, we never find out, but we know who it has to be. The kind of crime. So they’re satisfied—it couldn’t be anyone else. And maybe it’s just as well they can’t get him. That way nothing has to come out about Gianni. No scandal. No disgrace. All covered up. Like his brother. All they want is an answer to what happened, something plausible. They don’t want to open anything up. Nobody wants to know.”