1 - Interrupted Aria (13 page)

I thought I detected a ray of hope. “So you didn’t actually see him put anything in the decanter?”

“I know what he did well enough,” she retorted. “Messer Grande told me. They found a glass vial in his pocket. Dark amber glass like the apothecaries use for poisons and acids and such.”

“But you still don’t know that he poisoned the wine, not really. Maybe the wine was bad. Maybe someone else put something in it,” I sputtered, letting my fears for Felice take over and provoke Susannah’s ire.

She jumped up and threw my handkerchief in my face. “You don’t care what he did to my mistress. You are just trying to get your friend out of trouble, but it won’t work. I pulled the cork on the wine and put it in the empty decanter as soon as we got to the theater. She’d had a glass while I pressed her first costume and another before she went down for Act One. She was fine, fine as she ever was until that
Felice
put his poison in the decanter. She took a glass before Act Two and it wasn’t five minutes until she started feeling queer. I thought she was just overheated. That bodice with all those metal circles was so heavy. I gave her another glass….God save me, I wouldn’t have hurt her for anything.”

I tried to calm her distress, but the maid was determined to vent her anger. “You saw how she suffered. You held her as she died. How can you defend that murderer?”

“I hate what happened to Adelina as much as you do. I know it looks bad, but I don’t believe that Felice is responsible.”

“Bah!” She made a gesture that could have been a curse or an obscenity. “He did it, all right. I just hope the executioner tightens the wire around his throat with a slow hand. I want him to suffer…to suffer as badly as my mistress.”

With a last venomous look, Susannah turned and hailed a passing gondola. I wondered what would happen to her; there were more ladies’ maids in Venice than ladies. I hoped she had family who could take her in until she could find another position. Or perhaps Adelina had provided for her. There was a thought. Had Adelina made a will?

Chapter 13

With the sun rapidly sinking behind the rooftops, I ascended the steps leading to the theater’s entrance and pushed through the heavy doors into the dark foyer. An elongated triangle of light stretched from the half-open door of the box office. Muffled voices came from inside.

“…won’t hurt the take. We had to turn people away last night. Too bad we can’t extend the run.”

“Impossible.” This was Torani’s voice. He must be going over the receipts with the business manager. “All theaters must shut down on December 16 and remain so until the day after Christmas. That’s the law of the Republic and even Signor Viviani cannot bend that rule.”

“Has His Excellency chosen an opera for the new year?”

“He will go along with my suggestion. The man is a cretin where music is concerned and he knows it. He concentrates on the marketplace where his true talent resides and lets me run the show here.”

“Same cast?”

“Tito will stay, of course. He’s our big draw. Viviani wants him in the lead. It’s time to put Crivelli out to pasture. And Caterina is out.”

“Not a crowd favorite, is she?”

“No. She warbles well enough but they just don’t like her. Too serious, no spark.”

“And not much here either.” The low rumble of male laughter hinted at the descriptive gesture that must have accompanied the words.

I shivered, but not from the chill of the dark theater. How lightly they discussed our futures, as if we singers were no more than pieces on a game board. I had my hand on the door to the auditorium when a murmured name stopped me.

“…Ravello, the violinist. His Excellency wants the matter cleared up swiftly. He doesn’t want Messer Grande and his thugs poking around the theater any longer.”

“But what made the fellow do Adelina in?”

“Who knows?” Torani’s voice held a shrug. “Maybe she rejected his offers of love. She has refused many a man, and none too gently either.”

“But he is a
castrato
.”

“That doesn’t always stop them. Remember that capon we had several years ago? He couldn’t keep his hands out from under the dancers’ skirts.”

“Still, it’s odd. So senseless.”

“It will all be forgotten after the holiday. Tito and La Grande Marguerite will be the talk of Venice, and La Belluna’s demise will fade into a barely remembered scandal.”

“Marguerite is not La Belluna.”

“No, but she’ll have to do.” Torani groaned like a convict sentenced to ten years at the oars of a state galley. “I’ll coax a good performance out of her somehow.”

The creak of a chair and the slamming of a drawer told me it was time to move. I tapped the door to the auditorium to make it swing back and forth and turned on my heel as if I had just come from the pit. The ticket manager came out of the office and began to light the wall lamps with a long taper. Plaster cherubs holding garlands sprang out from the shadowed walls of the richly ornamented foyer.

Torani greeted me. “Tito, how is the voice tonight?”

“It’s fine, Maestro, but my mind is troubled. The police have arrested the wrong man. It grieves me to think of Felice being held in the guardhouse unjustly.”

Torani cast his eyes upward as if beseeching the plaster angels to smite this latest source of irritation. “I’ve already lost one of my best singers. I’ve got ballet girls having hysterics if someone merely taps one of them on the shoulder. I’ve got seamstresses ready to walk out at the slightest hint that a murderer is still at large.” He stopped to wipe his brow. “I beg you, Tito, don’t stir up trouble. It’s a tragedy that Adelina was taken from us, but
Juno
must go on without further disturbance.”

We were walking across the pit. Soft yellow light shone from under the half-raised curtain. On the stage, disembodied legs moved this way and that in a seemingly aimless dance. It was getting late. Several servants were already dusting chairs and lighting candles in their masters’ boxes.

“Signor Torani, you have also lost a violinist, a man who helped you out when you were short of musicians.”

“Felice Ravello was easily replaced. There are scores of mediocre violinists looking for work. Whenever I go in a tavern, they cluster around me like flies on an uncovered dish of
gelato
.”

I bit my lip. “Isn’t it possible that Adelina’s death is related to the other problems that have plagued this production? Felice could not have had anything to do with the falling platform that killed Beppo. Just think. It would be the ultimate act of sabotage…murdering the prima donna on opening night.”

Torani frowned and looked behind us. “That would place the blame on the Albrimani family.”

“Perhaps. Why not?”

“To start with, the difficulties ceased when Signor Viviani posted his bravos at every door and throughout the theater.”

“What about scaring the original orchestra musicians away?”

“I’m not so sure that wasn’t simply a few vagabond violinists looking for better wages elsewhere. If it was the Albrimani, it was done from outside. To poison Adelina, one of them would have had to get inside the theater and up to her dressing room. Messer Grande has questioned everyone on that point. There were no strangers backstage that night.”

We had reached the stage door. Torani put his hands on my shoulders. He was smiling, showing his yellow teeth, and nodding encouragingly. “Just let it be, Tito. You were meant to sing, not to do Messer Grande’s work for him. Put all this unfortunate business out of your mind. Just go out there and give me the best Arcas I have ever heard.”

As I headed for the stairs to the dressing rooms, a lonely figure caught my attention. Caterina was perched on part of the set for Act One, a low stone wall fashioned of canvas and wood. Her feet were planted on the floor and her back slumped in a dejected curve. She stared at the activity on the stage, but made no reaction until one of the scene shifters practically pushed her from her seat so he could maneuver the bulky set piece onto the stage.

Madame Dumas bustled past with her scissors and thread. “Monsieur Amato, you should be dressed. They will call for places in a few minutes.”

I glanced back toward Caterina, but the soprano had disappeared. I ended up chasing her all evening. If I stationed myself where she was supposed to exit, she ignored the staging and darted around a different flat of scenery. If I tried to corner her in her dressing room, the door was slammed in my face. My only chance to have Caterina to myself without a handy escape route was at the end of the opera when we made our ascent on the starry chariot that carried Arcas and Callisto up to their final destination among the whirling constellations.

Caterina wouldn’t look at me as we sang our last duet. When the song called for us to face each other, she stared fixedly at a spot somewhere above my right shoulder. As I took her arm to escort her onto our flying chariot, she discreetly shook me off and settled herself at the very edge of our platform.

I slipped one arm around her waist and made my choreographed gesture to salute the singing nymphs and courtiers on the stage.

Smiling, I whispered between my teeth, “Get over to the center of the platform. You are going to make this thing tip over.”

She refused to move, except to grip the silver-painted railing more tightly. Only when the chariot began to rise with the floor at a definite angle did she shuffle a few steps toward the center.

“Why are you avoiding me?” I asked in an attempt at a soothing tone. “I need to talk to you.”

“Why should I talk with you?” she shot back.

“Why should you not?”

She glared at me and flared her nostrils. If the audience was paying any attention to the actors in this spectacular ascent, they must be wondering what Arcas had done to make his mother so angry. Caterina said, “I know what you want to say, but I don’t have to listen to it.”

I paused to choose my words carefully. “I’m only asking for your help…help that could save an innocent man from a gruesome death.”

“And put me right in his place,” she replied in a harsh whisper. “That young face of yours hides nothing, Tito. When Susannah declared that Adelina had been poisoned, your eyes snapped right to me. You have been following me with that brooding, accusing look ever since.”

“No, Caterina, you misunderstand. I don’t suspect you. I just want to ask you a few questions about the time you spent with Adelina on opening night.”

“Liar! You want to throw me to the wolves and rescue Felice. You are just like everyone else. You think I am a throwaway orphan of no account. Wouldn’t you be surprised to learn the truth about me.”

“Oh? What truth is that?”

Her mouth softened, but the smiling form it took was as unpleasant as her words. “Why should I help you? You
castrati
are everyone’s darlings. You have no idea how hard the rest of us have to work to gain the audience’s attention. I think I’ll make you work hard for once.”

“Adelina didn’t seem to have any trouble holding the public’s attention.” The words were out before I could stop them. Wonderful, I thought, another inquiry halted by my careless tongue.

The result was not what I expected. Instead of more angry words, the bitter mask dropped from Caterina’s face to reveal honest, deeply felt pain. With a sudden, sweet vulnerability, she twisted around to face me and said, “You have never spoken truer words, Tito.”

After the curtain calls, I climbed the stairs with an armful of flowers and a heavy heart. I had looked for Crivelli backstage, but he was nowhere to be seen. I had found Torani and Bondini huddled in a quiet recess by the stage door. The director gave me a nod and a quick word complimenting my performance, then resumed his conversation with the ubiquitous Bondini. Viviani’s chief steward must be getting the latest business report. His master would no doubt be pleased. The crowd that night had been as plentiful and as enthusiastic as ever.

When I threw myself down before my dressing table, my mirror mocked me. It didn’t show the acclaimed singer who had just been cheered into three encores, but a discouraged wretch pulling off his wig and slowly removing his greasepaint.

Crivelli called from his dressing room, voice brimming with curiosity. “Tito, have you come up? Did you talk to Caterina?”

“I wouldn’t call it a talk,” I answered. “It was more like the sport of the English ‘milords.’ I pursued her as they do the fox. When I had her cornered, she bared her teeth and slipped away.”

A disgusted sigh floated over the partition.

“She hinted at a secret she is keeping,” I continued, “something about her background. She brought it up on her own and almost dared me to discover what it is.”

“Why don’t you let me try to tame our little fox. She doesn’t envy my voice as she does yours, so I can sidestep all the jealousy that you arouse in her ambitious breast.”

“Good idea. If Caterina did poison Adelina she would never admit it, but she would be less guarded with you. She might disclose a bit of information that could help us.”

“Ah, you used the word
if
.”

I grunted at my reflection in the mirror. My own hair was flat and damp from the wig I wore on stage, and my face still bore smudges of paint. “I confess that I’m finding it difficult to picture Caterina as a cold-blooded murderer. She seems genuinely shocked by Adelina’s death. But you can’t blame me for leaping to the obvious conclusion.”

“You’re speaking of the rivalry between the two sopranos?”

“Of course. Nearly half my life has been spent competing with other singers. I’ve known many a
castrato
that would practically kill to get a certain role. I don’t see why our female counterparts should be any different.”

“
Practically
, that’s the important word. I, too, have witnessed bitter rivalries. Even been the object of some in my younger days. But there is a fathom of difference between wishing your fellow singer would drop dead in the middle of his cadenza and poisoning his wine.”

“Yes. The risk is great and the rewards fleeting after all.” I splashed cool water over my face and chest and pushed the dividing screen aside as I toweled off.

Crivelli sat at his dressing table in his shirtsleeves. “Besides,” he said, “I don’t see Caterina as that devious. Her emotions are clearly readable in her face. I have watched her struggle to conceal them, but she is unable to mask her feelings. Anger makes her cheeks flush and her lips compress. Frustration makes her move her shoulders in tight little shrugs. Have you not noticed?”

“I know that when she dislikes you, you can feel it across the room.”

“We’ve all felt that at one time or another.”

“What if she is in love?” I asked. “What does she do then?”

He considered the question as he rose and pulled on his breeches and finally said, “Now that’s an emotion I have never witnessed in Caterina.”

Crivelli looked around for his neckband. Without it, his old throat resembled a thick drape of wrinkled cloth. I found the cravat on a pile of white stockings. His hands shook as he fastened the hooks. Perhaps Torani was right. My fellow
castrato
had enjoyed a long, successful career. He should be ready for a more restful existence.

I helped him on with his coat of faded blue silk. “I talked with Susannah, also.”

“Yes?”

“When Felice was arrested, he did have a vial that could have contained poison in his pocket, but I think he could explain that.”

Crivelli cocked an inquisitive eyebrow.

“Felice was taking small amounts of belladonna for his throat,” I told him. “Someone gave him the idea that it could help him regain his voice.”

The old
castrato
clucked his tongue. “A dangerous and useless practice. A drop of belladonna might help a singer with a sore throat get through a performance but not someone with Felice’s problem. I’m afraid his vocal cords have toughened and there’s no way to reverse that.”

“Right now I’m more worried about the lifespan of his neck than the noises it makes.”

“Naturally,” he said, reaching for his silver-knobbed walking stick. “But do try to get some rest, Tito. You look quite done in. I’m going to see if I can catch our foxy soprano. We’ll compare notes tomorrow.”