Alibi: A Novel (50 page)

I had decided to head right, toward the connecting boatyard, when I heard the shot behind us. Close enough to shoot again. Someone leaned out of one of the tower windows, shouting. Guarded after all. But what were they guarding? In a moment I saw. I made an abrupt turn after the towers, hoping for a clear path to the other boatyard, and instead found myself surrounded by ghost ships. The Arsenale was dotted with yellow fog lights, everything shuttered, the docks lined with rusting, pre-Mussolini warships. A ship graveyard, clotted enough to obscure the opening to the adjoining basin. But now it was too late to head back to the lagoon. I could hear the police boats,
already at the entrance towers. Still, we’d have to try. Nobody would stay in a bottleneck. But that’s what they would think too.

I turned the boat once more. An old warship lay almost listing against the dock, its wide middle close enough to board by jumping but its tapered bow and stern sitting out in the water. I made another quick turn, almost fishtailing, then cut the motor behind the stern, bobbing in a narrow slot of water between the rusting hulk and the stone walls of the dock. The boat rocked, and I grabbed a rope from the dock to hold us steady until our wake had subsided. Then I pulled us farther in, making sure the boat didn’t stick out past the warship’s stern. A hiding hole, dark. Nothing to see but rusting steel.

Everything now was sound—the motors of the police boats shifting gears, idling while they looked around; footsteps running past the workshops, presumably the guard from the tower; shouts out to the water, unintelligible but excited, wanting to know what was going on; the creaking of ships pulling against ropes. I looked up. The warship was secured to keep any movement to a minimum, ropes stretched taut from stern to dock, probably the same at the bow. But that didn’t mean it couldn’t move, the water churned up by the police boats rocking the stern just enough to push it closer to the dock, crushing us. The others were looking at it too, their eyes fixed on the old metal, watching it as if they were waiting to put up their hands to stop it coming closer. No one spoke. Rosa leaned down, putting her head next to Moretti’s, ready to cover his mouth if he made a sound. On the water the boats had come together, their motors in the same place, conferring. But they were running out of time. If they searched the Arsenale and found nothing, they’d lose any advantage on the open water.

I heard the boats shift gears, separating. But which way would we have gone? The northern outlet, toward Murano, or the longer Arsenale basin? The directions were opposite—a wrong guess meant we’d get away. Then one motor got fainter, moving toward the lagoon, and the other seemed almost on top of us, someone yelling one more thing to the guard before it passed by the stern of our ship and then
to the next basin. Finally, Rosa’s reverse play, the police off in all directions except the one I intended to use, back to where I had started.

We waited another minute to make sure the police had really gone, then edged our way out from behind the warship. For a moment I thought of just drifting with the oars, slipping past the guard in silence, the way we’d gone down the Fornace. But we were running out of time too, every second crucial if we wanted to get out before the police realized they were chasing shadows. What could the guard do, call out the navy? Mothballed in Taranto, the last scraps of Mussolini’s war. I started the engine and swung around the big stern.

The guard may have seen the boat, but none of us looked back, just headed straight down the canal to the open water. We had a real chance now. To catch up, the police would have to go all around the tail end of Venice, skirting San Elena, minutes behind. We passed under the bridge and shot across the water toward the channel lights. I peered into the darkness, trying to measure how far I could see past the buoys before everything was swallowed up. Still no moon. We wouldn’t need to hide behind anything—the air itself would do it if we were outside the range of the lights. But it was a fine line; too far and you risked shallows.

“Is he okay?” I said to Rosa. “It gets choppier out here.”

She didn’t say anything, just held him, a cushion.

“Where is the car? The casino?” The big parking lot at the vaporetto landing stage, where it would be easy to be overlooked in the crowd.

“No, at the end. The Excelsior.”

“The Excelsior?”

“It’s not open yet. No one will be at the dock. It’s easy to find.” All worked out, the next link.

“Not in the dark. We’ll have to go to the casino and then follow the lights down.”

“No, go straight across. That was the idea. No one will see us.”

“You can’t cross the lagoon in the dark. That’s why they mark the channels.”

“It’s a shallow boat.”

But the lagoon could be even shallower. That was what had always protected Venice—not water but mud. Sometimes only a few feet under the surface, sometimes less, rising in little underwater islands.

“We can’t go at this speed. If we hit something, we could wreck the boat.”

“If they come for us, they’ll look in the channel,” she said.

I nodded. “All right. But it’ll take more time. Can he wait?”

He was lying still under the tarp, maybe passed out.

“Yes,” she said. “Now.” I looked at her face, suddenly soft. “He’s dead.”

“Oh,” Claudia said, a whimper.

“Are you sure?”

Rosa pulled back the tarp, as if seeing him, his perfectly calm face, would be evidence. “In the Arsenale. I didn’t want to say then.”

We were still moving slowly in a direct line to the far lights of the Lido. I looked around, checking for boats, then back at his face, streaked with blood where he had wiped it, sweating, a kind of camouflage effect in the dark. A boy who’d delivered medicine.

“Better cover him up,” I said, not wanting to look anymore.

“I’m sorry,” Rosa said quietly, and for an odd second I thought she was talking to me, but her face was turned to his, words to a comrade.

Claudia moved forward and helped her with the tarp, folding it around him. “Let’s go back,” she said. “They won’t expect that. We can hide you, get you away somehow tomorrow. It was the wound that was the problem—we couldn’t hide him. He would have died.”

“He did,” Rosa said, but Claudia wasn’t really listening, busy with the tarp, absorbed now in a new plan.

“Do you think they saw our faces?” she said to me. “In that light? The boat could be anyone’s. We could go back. Nobody would know.”

“I can’t stay in Venice,” Rosa said. “They know it was me. Even if they didn’t see,” she said, spreading her hand to take in the boat, “they know it was me. They’ll hunt for me.”

“Not at Ca’ Venti,” Claudia said. “They already did.”

“And what do we do with him?” Rosa said quietly.

“Is there some rope?” Claudia said. “It’s better if it’s tied. The tarp will come loose, even if we roll it.” She was folding it under him, talking to herself. “How can we weight it? Not that it matters. You use those big stones and it’ll come up anyway. Nothing keeps it down. It’s the tides, isn’t that what they said? The tides loosened the tarp.” She turned to me. “We’ll have to explain why this one is missing. There’s nothing over those stones now. Someone might notice.”

I looked up to find Rosa watching her, studying her face.

“You want to put him in the lagoon? This boy?”

“He’s dead, yes?” Claudia said.

Rosa looked out to the dark, then shook her head. “Not to the fishes. I’ll take him.”

“In the car? With a body? Where?”

“He’s Carlo’s son,” she said simply. “I can’t just throw him over the side.”

“Two can do it,” Claudia said, not hearing her. “The boat won’t tip.”

“An expert,” Rosa said, dismissive, then turned to me. “They’ll find the car. Then it’s someone else.”

“They can trace it?”

She shrugged. “You will never get me out of Venice. Not now. This is the best way. Get me there, then it’s my risk.”

“And when they ask how you got there?” Claudia said.

“When they ask?” Rosa said. “They won’t ask me anything. If they can ask, I’ll be dead.”

She said it casually, sure of things. A car punctured with bullet holes, the only way it would be stopped. But it could happen the other way too. An undetected dash to Jesolo, then the whole Veneto to disappear in. Taking the body to friends.

“You’re not turning around,” Claudia said.

“After we drop them,” I said. “We can’t keep her in Venice.” The train station would be swarming with police, the highway bridge guarded. Not even a tarp to hide under.

“Who’s that?” Claudia said, swiveling around. A distant engine, a light shining in front, coming slowly.

“Not police,” Rosa said. “Fishermen, maybe. They go out at night.”

“Have they seen us?”

“Not yet. Soon,” Rosa said. “Pull to the left.”

I turned the boat slightly, on an angle now to the channel markers, stretching across the lagoon like highway lights. The fishing boat would pass without even noticing us, heading for the opening to the Adriatic. The chugging was nearer, a steady hum, then suddenly, as if it had found a road, it sped up, moving its lights right to left to make sure its whole path was clear. On the swing left the light caught us, something unexpected in the dark. A man shouted. The boat came toward us, shining its beam down.

“Where are your lights?” the man yelled in Italian. “What’s wrong?” Just people in distress.

I idled the engine. “Broken,” Rosa yelled back. “It’s all right, we’re fixing it.”

“You’ll get run over. Go back to the channel,” he said, waving his arms. “Someone will pick you up.”

“We’re all right. We’re going to the Lido.”

“Bah,” he said. “In the dark.
Sciocci
.” This to the other fishermen, disgusted by our ineptness. “Then follow us. It’s another channel.”

I turned my head away from the light, looking toward the main channel markers, the string of white, now with a small blue light moving along it.

“Rosa, police. Tell them to go. The police’ll see us.”

I imagined someone with binoculars, scanning, drawn to the spot of light, two boats, one familiar.

Rosa shouted something up, forced and hearty, and the fisherman laughed but turned the boat, moving the light away. It started out again.

“It’s luck for us,” Rosa said. “We can follow them. They know the channels.”

“What did you say to him?”

“I told him to stop looking down my dress.”

I opened the throttle, following the fishing boat but keeping far
enough back to stay in its shadow. We were making better time now, getting closer. I looked left, keeping the blue light in sight. One of the night ferries to Trieste was coming up behind it in the channel, and in the bright lights I could see it clearly now, a police boat, probably the one that had spun off through the Arsenale yard. The ferry passed and the blue light kept following the channel, the only place we could sensibly be.

“Are they still there?” Claudia said, watching me.

“Yes, but they’re heading for the casino.”

And then they weren’t. The blue light swung out into the lagoon, drawn irresistibly to the fishing boat’s light, cutting straight across to it.

“Damn.” I slowed down, letting the fishermen run ahead, watching the police boat race toward them. The fishing boat was making for the end of the Lido, the outlet to the Adriatic, past the big beach hotels. Its path drew the police boat right in front of us, a slice of light that crossed up ahead and then kept going, leaving us alone again in the dark.

“Go faster,” Claudia said. “They’ll come back.”

“We can’t. We don’t know how shallow it is.”

“The Excelsior boats go there,” she said, but I didn’t answer, trying to concentrate on the water ahead in what little light there was. The casino was miles down to our left, the fishing boat trying to leave the lagoon to our right—we should be heading straight for the hotel. In the day we’d see the white turrets poking through the trees. Now there’d be nothing to orient us but a dock light.

“They’ll be back soon,” Rosa said. “They’re almost at the fishing boat. Once they see it’s not us—”

I nodded and opened the throttle again, jerking us faster toward the island. Too late now to worry about shallows. If we didn’t get to the dock, we’d be in the police boat’s return path. Then what? Play hide-and-seek in the lagoon until we ran out of luck.

“The yellow light,” Rosa said. “There. See it? That’s where they unload.”

Down on my right, the police were making a loop around the
fishing boat, probably cursing themselves now for having followed it. They’d head back to the main channel, cutting behind us, hearing our motor unless we were already at the dock, silent and invisible again.

The Excelsior landing area was a dead-end canal, protected from rough open water and at this time of year lighted only by the dock lamp at the entrance. I shot past the light, then cut the motor, so that the boat swerved as if we were skidding on ice. Our swell slapped against the wall, then came back at us, a bathtub effect. I held the boat steady, then pushed us toward the landing stairs.

“Okay, quick,” I said. “Where’s the car?”

“Across the street. Help me carry him.”

“Not that way,” Claudia said, positioning herself at the end of the tarp. “Slide it over the side first. Like this.” She motioned Rosa to the other end, and they pushed the rolled tarp onto the stairs while I held the rocking boat. They both got out, Claudia pulling the body up to the pavement. “Now lift.”

“Wait. I’ll do it,” I said, tying the boat.

But before I could step out I heard the other engine, grinding in neutral out past the dock light, looking around. I turned to see the blue light, then back at Rosa. “Run. There’s no time now.”

“And you?”

“I’ll say you forced us. Something. Just get going.”

“Help me. I can’t leave him.”

“Are you crazy?” Claudia said, her voice hoarse, breathing hard. She had started dragging the body but only managed to pull the tarp away. Now, looking at Moretti, then out toward the blue light, she seemed desperate, gulping air. “He’s dead. Look. What does it matter now? We did this to save him, so he wouldn’t be blamed for us. We could have done nothing, let him take the blame. But we didn’t. And now? Look. It doesn’t matter to him now. Let him be the guilty one. Then it’s over. We have to save ourselves.” She knelt by the body, reaching for the loose tarp. “Look.”