Read Online 5 - Her Deadly Mischief by Beverle Graves Myers - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Beverle Graves Myers
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the molding where wall met floor. Long, thin, and rounded at one tip, they looked as if they belonged backstage. Levers or some other component of the elaborate scene machines, no doubt. Biagio evidently agreed. He gathered them up and announced his intention to carry them down to the wings.
I laid a hand on his arm. “One more question.”
“ Si ?”
“Around the time the woman fell from the box, did you see anyone who didn’t belong here? Anything at all suspicious?”
The workman surprised me with a hearty chuckle. Pressing a finger against the side of his nose, he gave me a conspiratorial wink. “I know what you’re doing. You’re trying to find out who killed her.”
Was I so transparent? I’d hoped he would think I was merely asking a few idle questions—a more interesting way of passing time than gossiping with the rest of the cast. I shrugged. “Well, then?”
“I’ll tell you what I told Messer Grande’s men, but I wager you’ll make more of it.”
“Yes?”
“Some time before the singing began, I spied a man going up and down the corridor, asking after Alessio Pino’s box.”
“A tall man in a bauta ?”
“No.” Biagio gave me a bewildered look. “Who would notice a man in a bauta ? Half the gentlemen on this level were wearing one. No, this man didn’t have a mask of any sort. Though his suit was silk, he moved like a rough cob. A sailor, I’ll be bound.”
“A sailor?” I demanded sharply, then modulated my tone. “What made you think he was a sailor?”
My informant shrugged. “They just have a look about them, you know. When a fellow spends his days on a rolling deck with salt spray in his face, it marks him.”
Try as I might, I could wring no further details from Biagio. He headed off downstairs carrying his broom and sticks of wood, and I strolled in the opposite direction, not thinking of what I’d just learned, but wondering how Liya was getting along in the ghetto. Of late, I’d noticed increasing signs that my wife was having second thoughts about severing ties with her family. If Zulietta Giardino’s murder could provide an excuse for Liya to approach her sister or her father, at least one small, extraordinary blessing would come out of the tragedy.
Rounding the bend in the corridor, I came upon box D-17. The door’s thin wood had been reduced to splinters by the constables’ boots. It sagged inward from one hinge, affording me a narrow entrance. I passed through the miniature vestibule and stepped down into the Pino family’s private box.
Unfortunately, its scarlet interior had little to reveal. Messer Grande’s men had removed every stick of furniture and anything else that might have provided a clue to Zulietta’s killer. Only the draperies and silk-covered walls remained. As I moved to the front of the box, an odd sensation rippled along my backbone.
Dark smears cut across the grain of the wooden box railing, three narrow smudges just where Zulietta would have struggled to gain a last handhold. I scraped at one with a fingernail. Blood almost certainly. Had her killer pried her bloody fingers from the railing? I felt my heart pounding in my ears. How I would love to expose such a brute. I could cheerfully deliver him to the hangman myself.
My vengeful thoughts were interrupted by a trilling run of notes from Emilio. I glanced toward the stage. This was a vantage point I rarely occupied. How near the painted ceiling I hovered, and how small and far away Emilio and Maestro Torani looked as they moved about. Is that how I had seemed to the murderer after he’d completed his awful work? A doll-like figure, wide-eyed and horrified, pinned by his malevolent gaze?
Moving several steps to one side, I focused my gaze directly below, at the exact spot where Zulietta had crashed to the floor. A gentleman in a dark suit stood there, head bowed, walking stick firmly planted, the brim of his tricorne hiding his features.
Ordinarily, the lobby doors would be
I laid a hand on his arm. “One more question.”
“ Si ?”
“Around the time the woman fell from the box, did you see anyone who didn’t belong here? Anything at all suspicious?”
The workman surprised me with a hearty chuckle. Pressing a finger against the side of his nose, he gave me a conspiratorial wink. “I know what you’re doing. You’re trying to find out who killed her.”
Was I so transparent? I’d hoped he would think I was merely asking a few idle questions—a more interesting way of passing time than gossiping with the rest of the cast. I shrugged. “Well, then?”
“I’ll tell you what I told Messer Grande’s men, but I wager you’ll make more of it.”
“Yes?”
“Some time before the singing began, I spied a man going up and down the corridor, asking after Alessio Pino’s box.”
“A tall man in a bauta ?”
“No.” Biagio gave me a bewildered look. “Who would notice a man in a bauta ? Half the gentlemen on this level were wearing one. No, this man didn’t have a mask of any sort. Though his suit was silk, he moved like a rough cob. A sailor, I’ll be bound.”
“A sailor?” I demanded sharply, then modulated my tone. “What made you think he was a sailor?”
My informant shrugged. “They just have a look about them, you know. When a fellow spends his days on a rolling deck with salt spray in his face, it marks him.”
Try as I might, I could wring no further details from Biagio. He headed off downstairs carrying his broom and sticks of wood, and I strolled in the opposite direction, not thinking of what I’d just learned, but wondering how Liya was getting along in the ghetto. Of late, I’d noticed increasing signs that my wife was having second thoughts about severing ties with her family. If Zulietta Giardino’s murder could provide an excuse for Liya to approach her sister or her father, at least one small, extraordinary blessing would come out of the tragedy.
Rounding the bend in the corridor, I came upon box D-17. The door’s thin wood had been reduced to splinters by the constables’ boots. It sagged inward from one hinge, affording me a narrow entrance. I passed through the miniature vestibule and stepped down into the Pino family’s private box.
Unfortunately, its scarlet interior had little to reveal. Messer Grande’s men had removed every stick of furniture and anything else that might have provided a clue to Zulietta’s killer. Only the draperies and silk-covered walls remained. As I moved to the front of the box, an odd sensation rippled along my backbone.
Dark smears cut across the grain of the wooden box railing, three narrow smudges just where Zulietta would have struggled to gain a last handhold. I scraped at one with a fingernail. Blood almost certainly. Had her killer pried her bloody fingers from the railing? I felt my heart pounding in my ears. How I would love to expose such a brute. I could cheerfully deliver him to the hangman myself.
My vengeful thoughts were interrupted by a trilling run of notes from Emilio. I glanced toward the stage. This was a vantage point I rarely occupied. How near the painted ceiling I hovered, and how small and far away Emilio and Maestro Torani looked as they moved about. Is that how I had seemed to the murderer after he’d completed his awful work? A doll-like figure, wide-eyed and horrified, pinned by his malevolent gaze?
Moving several steps to one side, I focused my gaze directly below, at the exact spot where Zulietta had crashed to the floor. A gentleman in a dark suit stood there, head bowed, walking stick firmly planted, the brim of his tricorne hiding his features.
Ordinarily, the lobby doors would be
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