She squeezed my arm. “In my profession we have other ways of dealing with the deadbeat problem.”

“You send bravos to cut throats?”

“Not yet. So far a discreet threat has always been enough.”

We reached the landing stage. Tethered boats were nodding gently on the Rio di Cavalleto. A gull standing on one of the brightly-colored posts regarded me seriously, but not without sympathy, I thought. Giorgio had tied up at a mooring several doors along, but he saw us and waved.

“I have friends who have rough friends,” Violetta said seriously. “If you want to learn more about the gang that attacked you, I can ask around. I’m sure the Ten will track them down long before I ever could.”

“And if they belong to some nobleman’s workforce,” I said, “the Ten will forget all about them.” When Giorgio pulled alongside, I said, “Back to the convent, please.”

16

S o now you will go on to Ca’ Tirali?” Sister Chastity inquired as we cuddled once more in the privacy of the felze.

“I do as my master tells me,” I said. “But I am convinced that the procurator was called to the Lord in the normal way. The truth may have to wait for Judgement Day. In mortal terms we have found no real motive, nor opportunity, because Bianca would have seen the crime committed.”

Violetta said, “Mm?”

I pricked up my eyebrows. “What am I missing?”

Minerva pulled loose from my embrace. “I think there is an obvious motive. How much was the supposed Euripides manuscript worth?”

“Perhaps nothing, if it is a modern fake. A handsome sum if it is an ancient fake. But even if it is the only surviving copy of a genuine play by Euripides of Athens from two thousand years ago, it is still just medieval paper or vellum with ink marks on it.” Whichever it was, it now rested in the secret compartment in the chest in my room. I might not get thousands for it, but I would certainly be able to buy some wonderful gift for my love, gold and rubies, the sort of miracle jewelry her patrons gave her. It was a thrilling thought.

“I think you’re wrong,” she said. “A unique item is not a bottle of wine or a loaf of bread, for which the state can decree a fair price. It will fetch whatever someone is willing to pay for it, and that is one ducat more than the second-most determined bidder can afford. The winner might not even be the richest bidder at the auction, just the craziest.”

I followed her trail through the mental forest. “And Procurator Orseolo might have been the craziest, you mean?” In public he had been a Grand Old Man and in private a tyrant; he had been enormously rich and reluctant to pay his tradesmen; but those things were true of many noblemen. “You really think anyone would commit murder just to stop another man outbidding him on a heap of dog-eared paper?”

“I think you should finish the job, my darling Alfeo. Go and ask Pasqual Tirali the same questions you have been asking the others. He’s taking me to Carnival tonight, so he should be at home now, getting ready. I have no idea whether the senator will be there or not.”

“Is Pasqual a suspect?” I asked incredulously. “You were with him. Could he have poisoned the old man without your seeing?”

Giorgio’s voice faded away in the ending of a verse. His oar creaked in the rowlock; other voices picked up the melody in the distance.

“I didn’t notice Pasqual doing anything in the least suspicious,” Aspasia said. “And I can’t imagine he would murder anyone for any reason at all. But I wasn’t watching his father. I don’t know the senator well. He is the most charming man you can ever hope to meet, yet he has the reputation of being ruthless. I know he is a fanatical bibliophile.”

“I shall certainly go by Ca’ Tirali,” I said, wondering if I had just been given a hint. I would try not to murder dear Pasqual in a fit of jealous fury.

The Tirali mansion is a close neighbor of Ca’ Barbolano, situated on the far side of the Rio San Remo, within sight but not hail. Having delivered Violetta safely to 96, I asked Giorgio to take me there and offered to walk home.

“Not on that leg, you won’t,” he said. “I’ll send one of the boys to wait for you. He can run and fetch me when you’re ready.”

Lounging in the gondola I had almost forgotten my wound, but it did hurt when I walked on it, so I agreed. There is much to be said for decadent self-pity. I disembarked and hammered the door knocker. I gave my name and the Maestro’s to the doorman, expecting him to leave me moldering in the entrance hall while he plodded upstairs and returned with orders to drop me in the canal. Then I would have to start dropping careful hints about murder and the Council of Ten.

Wrong. The flunky bowed very low. “You are expected, sier Alfeo. If you would be so good as to follow me?”

I was so good, but I was also scared prickly as a hedgehog. I had claimed no title when I gave my name. And expected? I do not like being surprised when there may be murderers loose. This reception was too reminiscent of that morning, when I had been expected at the church.

I had never spoken with any member of the Tirali family in my life, and would have been both astonished and hurt to hear that Violetta had ever mentioned me to Pasqual. I knew him by sight, though, and he was waiting for me at the top of the stairs.

He was young, rich, and dazzlingly handsome, clad in embroidered silk jerkin and knee britches and a sleeveless robe of blue velvet trimmed with miniver, for he would not wear his formal gown at home. He had been admitted to the Great Council the previous year and was expected to have a notable career in politics, following his father. He could afford the finest, most beautiful courtesan in the Republic and charm stars down from the sky to make her a bracelet. Just looking at him, I wondered why Violetta bothered to share the time of day with me, let alone her pillow.

He came forward smiling a welcome. “Sier Alfeo! I hoped that was you I heard. I am Pasqual Tirali. This is a great pleasure.”

“The honor is mine, clarissimo.” I went to bow and kiss his sleeve, but he caught me in the embrace with which nobles greet their equals.

“Come in and share a glass of wine,” he said. “My parents are as eager to meet you as I am.” He led me across the wide salone whose ceiling was of gilt and stucco, supported by jasper columns. The fireplace was of black marble, the chandeliers were flamboyant multicolored fantasias from the glassblowers of Murano, and the statues were original marbles or bronzes, not copies. I noted several Romans without noses and some antique Greek urns and kraters, no doubt items from the collection Violetta had mentioned. I did not see King Cheops around, but anyone who can afford to buy such ancient junk must have a serious excess of wealth. The rugs beneath our feet were worth kings’ ransoms and the paintings on the walls made me drool like the source of the Nile. I must have gaped at them as we went by; Pasqual noticed.

“You are a lover of art, sier Alfeo?”

“Is that by one of the Bellini family, sier Pasqual?”

He smiled. “It is indeed. Jacobo Bellini. Let me show you them while we still have some light…” Forgetting his parents waiting to meet me, he took me on a tour of the glorious, shining paintings, rattling off the artists and subjects, and several times commenting on the technique, pointing out Tintoretto’s influence showing up in Titian’s later work, and so on. I was impressed by his knowledge. I wanted to hate him and was charmed against my will.

Very rarely I had been flattered like this in the past, and always by people who wanted something I was determined not to give them-but Prejudgment is no judgment, as the Maestro often tells me.

Eventually Pasqual took me into a small but luxurious salotto and there presented me to the senator and his wife, madonna Eva. Giovanni Tirali was a robust man in his fifties, with bright, questing eyes and a winning smile. He looked neither ruthless nor fanatical, but Violetta had also called him charming, and there I could not disagree. He embraced me, bid me welcome, and flawlessly acted the role of a distinguished and gracious nobleman.