Alibi: A Novel (18 page)

“The partisans find their own proof.”

Afterward I crossed back to the Dorsoduro side, uneasy, feeling things spinning out of control. All I’d wanted was to get my mother out of a mistake. Now it was something else. How could I testify against him? It would be terrible for everyone and justice for whom? Rosa was right about that, anyway. He had already gotten away with it.

A little past San Ivo a canal was being dredged, a dirty job saved for winter, when no visitors were here to see. Wooden planks dammed each end so big rubber hoses could pump out the water, leaving a floor of mud, just a few feet down, where workmen in boots were shoveling muck and debris into carts. The mud covered everything, spattering the workers’ blue coveralls, hanging in clots on the canal walls, just below the line of moss. Gianni’s great fear: mud would stick if someone dredged it up. I thought of him on the terrace at Lake Garda, having drinks with the men who’d ordered the trains. I’d met them in Germany, men still unsure why they were being accused. But those were the ones in cells, worn and frightened, out of their protective uniforms, awaiting judgment. The others, in the street, just went about their business, so ordinary there was no way to know, no haunted looks, no furtive tremor from unwanted memories. The crime hadn’t stuck to them. They had gotten away with it, free to walk around, even marry a rich woman. They smiled over the dinner table. Nobody knew. And that they won’t get away with, Rosa had said, asking for help.

But a trial. I imagined the courtroom, me on the stand, Claudia on the stand, and I knew my mother would—what, break? No, she was more resilient than that. But a body blow leaves a bruise. You survive, but not quite the same. She had survived my father’s death, with a stray look of sadness that never quite left her now. Those first years,
bright for my sake, she worked hard at making us happy, putting part of herself aside, as if it were something she could stow away in a closet for later. But of course it was gone, spent on me. And now there’d be another blow, leaving her bruised and reeling again, harder this time to come back, already weakened, never expecting it to come from me. She’d get over Gianni, but not that, not a trial.

But then he’d get away with it again. I watched the workmen sliding in the wet muck. In a few days they’d be finished, the garbage and the smell gone, and the water would flood back, the surface a mirror again, dazzling, so that when you came to it, around the corner, you felt you were stepping into a painting. I stared down at the mud, unable to move, as if my feet had actually sunk into it, still trying to find a way out.

M
imi was lucky in everything but the weather.
Il Gazzettino
was already calling the ball the first important social event since the war, the one that would restore Venice “to her place in international society.” People were coming from London. There had been a gratifying squabble over invitations—our marchesa upstairs, not one of the lucky ones, went to visit her sister in Vicenza. Peggy Guggenheim said she was coming from New York and then didn’t, which allowed Mimi to use her name in the columns without having to put up with her. A generator was found to keep the palazzo blazing with light if there was a power failure. The food arrived on time. And then it rained.

She had planned on a spring evening, one of those first mild days softer in Venice than anywhere else, but the air stayed cold and it rained off and on all day. The special torches at the water entrance on the Grand Canal had to be covered, an awning set up. Footmen with umbrellas would help guests from their boats to the door, but inevitably clothes would get wet. The photographers had to be moved indoors, away from the entrance shots with San Marco in the background. All this my mother learned in a series of phone calls that got more frantic as the afternoon wore on. Finally Mimi insisted that my mother go there to dress.

“Like bridesmaids,” my mother said. “She says my hair will be a
mess otherwise. Can you imagine? A little rain.” But she was helping Angelina with the garment bag, carefully smoothing out any folds in the long skirt.

“She’s nervous,” I said. “She wants company.”

“Mimi doesn’t have nerves. She just can’t stand anyone making an entrance. Easier to have them already there. Well, I don’t mind. To tell you the truth, it
does
frizz up when it’s like this,” she said, touching her hair. “Anyway, I’d rather see everything. Gianni’s always late, and you can’t say a word because it’s always medical. At least this way I won’t miss anything. Darling, would you call the hospital and tell him to meet me there, at Mimi’s? I couldn’t get through before. He’ll probably be pleased—now he can be as late as he likes without someone harping at him. But not too late. I can’t dance by myself. Would you?”

“All right,” I said. We were still living in the temporary peace of pretending nothing had happened.

“I’m taking Angelina, but you can fend for yourself, can’t you?” Mimi had already borrowed the rest of the staff for the day.

“It doesn’t matter. I’m going out.”

“I wish you’d change your mind. Everyone in Venice is dying to be there and you go to the movies.”

“We’re not going to the movies.”

“Well, wherever you’re going. I can’t imagine wanting to miss this. You know Mimi, if there’s one thing she—” She stopped midstream, asked Angelina to take the garment bag away, then turned to me. “It’s that girl, isn’t it?”

“You don’t want me to bring her to Mimi’s, do you?”

“Well, not if—but I thought all that business was over and done with. Gianni said it was. He said you’d talked.”

I looked away. “She doesn’t have a dress.”

“Well, you can
borrow
a dress. That’s not a problem.”

“Some other time.”

“What other time? A thing like this? She’d probably enjoy it, you know. Anybody would.”

“I don’t think Gianni would.”

“Ask him. If he doesn’t mind, then—” She looked up at me. “I’m so glad things are better. I knew if you would just—Well, I’m off. She’ll be calling again. Funny how
her
lines never go down. Don’t forget the hospital. And I’d ask him about the girl. He might surprise you.”

“All right.”

“Oh, look, it’s starting up again. Poor Mimi.” She giggled. “Well, it is unfair. You know, we used to come to Venice for the
beach
. You never saw a drop one week to the next. And now look.”

An hour later the phones were clear and I reached Gianni in his office, but I didn’t ask him about Claudia and I didn’t tell him to go to Mimi’s. Instead I said my mother wanted him to come for her earlier than they’d planned. And where was she now? At the hairdresser’s. Of course. Easy lies. After another twenty minutes of busy signals and scratchy connections I got the hotel where I’d moved Claudia and left a message that I’d be a little late. Then there was nothing to do but wait, the house growing quiet around me, not even the faint sound of maids’ slippers in the back rooms.

The rain stopped, then started again, a light drizzle that covered the Giudecca across the channel like a scrim. I stood at the window looking at the Redentore and thinking what to say. I wanted it clear in my mind so that it would come out as easily as a white lie about the hairdresser. One chance to make him believe me, finally put an end to it. Be careful about everything, even eye contact. Still, what choice would he have?

It was a while before I realized the room was getting darker. No more umbrellas on the Zattere, just people hurrying home with packages. A few calles away, Mimi and my mother would be looking into mirrors, finishing their makeup while the maids stood by with their pressed gowns. Mimi’s palazzo was just up from the Dario, so the vaporettos stopping at Salute would see the lights coming on, the chandeliers in the great front rooms reflecting out on the canal. You could walk there from anywhere in Dorsoduro in minutes, but everyone would want to go by water and be seen. It occurred to me that Gianni would probably have a boat too, and I went downstairs to open the
water gate and turn on the lights in the murky entrance where Claudia and I had kissed that night. Same gondola up on its storage rack, the pile of paving stones under a tarp, the utility boat bobbing outside near the mossy steps. If we’d followed the kiss, just left the house instead of climbing the stairs—but we hadn’t.

I left the connecting door open and put on the lights in the hall, once a single room that ran the length of the house, water to calle. Off it were some smaller rooms we never used, presumably old offices or receiving rooms, now just extra work for the maids. Good enough, however, for a conversation. It was already dark upstairs. Why bother with the chandeliers if I was about to leave too? No need to be polite—a few minutes, not even a drink.

I lit a cigarette and sat waiting in one of the chilly side parlors. Where was he? Now that I’d decided what to do, even convinced myself it was right, any delay seemed to stretch out the time, make it seem even longer than it was. I looked at my watch. Always late, my mother had said. I began to fidget, impatient, picking at the fraying upholstery on the arm of the chair. Maybe she’d called him after all, told him to go to Mimi’s. And maybe he was just late. I got up and walked toward the water entrance again, moving to keep warm. No sound of rain outside. Mimi might be lucky after all.

The street bell made me jump, the sound bouncing off the marble floors, jarring in the quiet house. Another ring, insistent, to make Angelina run for it. He had his finger up to ring again when I opened the door.

“Adam,” he said, surprised. He looked toward the dark stairs. “Where’s your mother? Am I so late?” He glanced down at his watch.

“No, she went over earlier to hold Mimi’s hand.”

“But you said—”

“I wanted to talk to you.”

“Ah,” he said, noncommittal, still at the door.

I opened it wider. He was dressed formally, white tie, everything crisp and shiny. Even in the halfhearted hall light the shirtfront glowed. I had never thought of him as handsome before, but formal clothes brought out the best in him. The slicked-back silver hair,
bright eyes, smooth-shaven skin—everything looked dressed up, stage romantic. When he reached into his breast pocket, I almost expected to see a silver cigarette case, but it was only a pack, not yet opened.

“So I’m not in the doghouse,” he said, pulling off the cellophane. “She says it’s terrible how I’m late. You’re expecting someone by boat?” He looked toward the water entrance, the dark canal beyond.

“I thought you might hire a gondola—for Mimi’s.”

“I don’t hire gondolas. I have a gondola. Anyway, I prefer to walk.” He lit a cigarette, peering at me as he closed the lighter. “What did you want to talk about?”

“I want to make a truce.”

“I thought we had a truce.”

“A new one. Different.”

“Ah,” he said, marking time. He gestured to the staircase. “You want to talk here?”

“It won’t take long. Anyway, you don’t want to crease your tails.”

“All right,” he said, displeased. “So?”

“Here’s the way this one works. You’re going to leave my mother, end it. I’ll take her away—home, if she’ll go. Anyway, not here. You won’t see us again.”

He sighed. “What a nuisance you’ve become. Like a child.”

“I can get her away in a week. Maybe two.”

“And when am I supposed to do this? Tonight, at the ball?” he said, toying. “Another scene? Will your friend be there? For the drama?”

“This week,” I said steadily. “Tomorrow, why not? Maybe you realized tonight, it can never be. Two different worlds—you figure out what to say. It wouldn’t be the first time, would it?”

He looked away, not rising to this, and started walking slowly toward the water entrance. “And why would I do this?”

“Because I’m going to do something for you.”

He turned. “Don’t do anything for me. I don’t want anything from you.”

“You’ll want this. I’m going to save your life.”

He stopped, staring at me. “What are you talking about?”

“Your trial.”

“My trial,” he said, toneless, waiting.

I moved toward him. “You know, none of this would have happened if you hadn’t started with the first lie. Your old friend Grassini. You didn’t expect it—it was all of a sudden, her coming at you, so of course you’d deny it. Anybody’s first instinct. But then you kept lying about it. Now why was that? Strictly speaking, it wasn’t even illegal. And you wouldn’t have been the only one. But here you are, just her word against yours and everybody happy to sweep it under the carpet, and still you get all excited. Ride it out? No. You try to get rid of her, make her go away. At the time, I didn’t think. I was ashamed for you. I thought this is how anyone would feel, to have this known. But you were never ashamed of that. Your reputation would have survived it. Others’ have. But you had to get rid of her. Now why was that?”

“This is so hard for you to understand? Talk like that.”

“No, that’s not it. You didn’t want people talking at all. Looking into it. Grassini meant nothing to you. But think what else they might find, once they started looking into things. That you had to stop.”

He picked up an ashtray from the hall table and rubbed out his cigarette. “Really,” he said finally. “What makes you think so?”

“Because I did look into it.”

“You did.”

I nodded. “With some friends in the AMG. They do fieldwork for war crimes trials. You scoop up a German, you’d be surprised what else swims into the net.”

His eyes widened. “What else?”

“A brother who ran errands for the SS and got bumped off by partisans. A whole series of cozy dinners at Villa Raspelli—no stethoscopes, just you and the boys in black. They have records. They also have the Germans. Can’t stop talking, it seems. Don’t care a bit what happens to their old Italian buddies. Happy to help out. See, once you start looking into things—”

“Why are you doing this?” he said, his voice quiet, stunned, the earlier smooth polish gone.

“To make a truce,” I said. “To get rid of you.”

“You hate me so much.”

“All of you. Look at you. Fucking Fred Astaire, and a year ago you were putting people on trains. Ever see what happened to them? I’d take you down in a minute if I could, but I’m not going to let you take my mother with you. So you get a break. Which is a lot more than you gave Claudia’s father, and who knows who else. Your famous partisan.”