getting a wonderful follow-through that snapped Milan’s head back on his neck with a meaty crack. Where it stuck, still and fixed, its skull-to-shoulder angle now slightly wrong. Something inside Milan came flowing out in a rushing gush.
Dalton stepped daintily back, surveyed the scene with the air of a satisfied choreographer, and, turning to address the stunned kids in the cloister, bowed deeply:
the echelon vendetta | 49
“If we shadows have offended, think but this, and all is mended. That you have but slumbered here, while these visions did appear...”
He paused, searching his memory for the line, and then, the Shakespearean spirit coming back in a sudden flow, he continued in a stronger voice that echoed around the piazza: “And so good night unto you all. Give me your hands, if we be friends, and Robin shall restore amends.”
No response from the audience. Everybody’s a critic these days. He bowed again, straightened, pivoted neatly on his right heel, his long coat flaring out, and strode with quiet dignity, stage left, out of the piazzetta, his heels striking hard and his footsteps echoing around the square. Silence, nothing but silence, followed him all the way back to his hotel along the quay.
Reaction set in fast and he was weaving and a little breathless and trying not to throw up by the time he reached the brassbound doors of his hotel. He stopped there, leaning against the entrance, his breath coming in short painful gasps. Beyond the edge of the quay the basin of Saint Mark was a black bowl marked here and there with a flickering sliver of light. Far across the bay, floodlights illuminated the impassive façade of San Giorgio Maggiore. From the eaves of the hotel next door a gargoyle with the face of a lizard stared down at him, cold and unblinking.
AFTER HIS WORLD STOPPED spinning and he got his breathing under control, he pushed his way into the hotel lobby, raised a hand to the old bellman slumped behind the rosewood desk, and rode up in the narrow mirrored elevator to the top floor. He fumbled at the lock and eventually unlocked the door into what had been Naumann’s company suite, a lush and well-appointed room with a wide and inviting carved wooden bed, an antique desk with a Venetian candelabrum on it, and sliding glass doors that led out to a small balcony
50 | david stone
overlooking the basin. The room had been cleaned and dressed, and Naumann’s luggage was still there at the side of his bed. Dalton figured the maid had been in, because there were fresh flowers in a tall clay cylinder standing on the dresser, a towering viny tangle with several huge white flowers, all of them as tightly closed as butterfly cocoons.
Dalton, for whom the land of plants was an undiscovered bourne, ignored them while he poured himself a glass of wine and passed on through to the balcony, where he pulled a wrought-iron stool up to the ledge and sat down on it with his back against the wall, looking out across the basin.
He pulled the pack of cigarillos out of his pocket and, with a hand that trembled only a little, held the case up to the pale light of the balcony lantern. He flipped the lid and pulled out one of the few remaining cigarillos. It looked and felt and smelled in every way wonderful. He put it to his lips, lit it with his Zippo.
The smoke poured down into his lungs and spread a comforting warmth through his body. He leaned on the flower basket—gardenias? lupins? rutabagas?—and looked down at the almost-deserted quay.
A single white-robed figure was wandering past the equestrian statue of Garibaldi. Not a ghost; the mime he had teased earlier in the day, on his way home now, heading for the vaporetto station in front of the hotel. Dalton looked up and saw the stars of the Milky Way like a shell-pink veil waving in a sea breeze blowing in from an infinite black ocean. The city smelled of sea salt and garlic and sewage and damp stone: human corruption and the bittersweet joy of still
Dalton stepped daintily back, surveyed the scene with the air of a satisfied choreographer, and, turning to address the stunned kids in the cloister, bowed deeply:
the echelon vendetta | 49
“If we shadows have offended, think but this, and all is mended. That you have but slumbered here, while these visions did appear...”
He paused, searching his memory for the line, and then, the Shakespearean spirit coming back in a sudden flow, he continued in a stronger voice that echoed around the piazza: “And so good night unto you all. Give me your hands, if we be friends, and Robin shall restore amends.”
No response from the audience. Everybody’s a critic these days. He bowed again, straightened, pivoted neatly on his right heel, his long coat flaring out, and strode with quiet dignity, stage left, out of the piazzetta, his heels striking hard and his footsteps echoing around the square. Silence, nothing but silence, followed him all the way back to his hotel along the quay.
Reaction set in fast and he was weaving and a little breathless and trying not to throw up by the time he reached the brassbound doors of his hotel. He stopped there, leaning against the entrance, his breath coming in short painful gasps. Beyond the edge of the quay the basin of Saint Mark was a black bowl marked here and there with a flickering sliver of light. Far across the bay, floodlights illuminated the impassive façade of San Giorgio Maggiore. From the eaves of the hotel next door a gargoyle with the face of a lizard stared down at him, cold and unblinking.
AFTER HIS WORLD STOPPED spinning and he got his breathing under control, he pushed his way into the hotel lobby, raised a hand to the old bellman slumped behind the rosewood desk, and rode up in the narrow mirrored elevator to the top floor. He fumbled at the lock and eventually unlocked the door into what had been Naumann’s company suite, a lush and well-appointed room with a wide and inviting carved wooden bed, an antique desk with a Venetian candelabrum on it, and sliding glass doors that led out to a small balcony
50 | david stone
overlooking the basin. The room had been cleaned and dressed, and Naumann’s luggage was still there at the side of his bed. Dalton figured the maid had been in, because there were fresh flowers in a tall clay cylinder standing on the dresser, a towering viny tangle with several huge white flowers, all of them as tightly closed as butterfly cocoons.
Dalton, for whom the land of plants was an undiscovered bourne, ignored them while he poured himself a glass of wine and passed on through to the balcony, where he pulled a wrought-iron stool up to the ledge and sat down on it with his back against the wall, looking out across the basin.
He pulled the pack of cigarillos out of his pocket and, with a hand that trembled only a little, held the case up to the pale light of the balcony lantern. He flipped the lid and pulled out one of the few remaining cigarillos. It looked and felt and smelled in every way wonderful. He put it to his lips, lit it with his Zippo.
The smoke poured down into his lungs and spread a comforting warmth through his body. He leaned on the flower basket—gardenias? lupins? rutabagas?—and looked down at the almost-deserted quay.
A single white-robed figure was wandering past the equestrian statue of Garibaldi. Not a ghost; the mime he had teased earlier in the day, on his way home now, heading for the vaporetto station in front of the hotel. Dalton looked up and saw the stars of the Milky Way like a shell-pink veil waving in a sea breeze blowing in from an infinite black ocean. The city smelled of sea salt and garlic and sewage and damp stone: human corruption and the bittersweet joy of still
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