‘Did Seraphina?’

‘No, she said not. She had no interest in drugs, or in drinking. She didn’t need it, she said, she was always full of life. Too full of life. To my amazement she continued her education, worked as a scientist, using her brain. She could separate her life into little containers, into pigeon-holes: career, family, husband, lovers.’

‘So she was unfaithful to Tom Morgan?’

‘After the first thrill of marriage wore off, Seraphina started looking around.’ The Contessa caught Nino’s gaze and held it. ‘Venetians close ranks against outsiders, but people here knew her reputation. It was only when she became pregnant that I was hopeful. Maybe, at last, she’d settle down.’

‘What about her husband? Did Tom Morgan have lovers?’

‘Too lazy,’ the Contessa said dismissively. ‘He likes to get “high”, to lounge about. He’s no taste for seduction. To be honest, I imagine he would find it tiring.’

‘But he knew about Seraphina’s lovers?’

‘Isn’t the question “Did he care?”’

‘Did he?’

‘He cared for comfort, for money, for a soft life,’ she replied. ‘He cared for my daughter, but never enough. Do I think he killed her? He could have done …’

Nino took in a breath as she continued.

‘But when I heard about the other deaths, the murders so like Seraphina’s, then I doubted it. It would take planning, cunning and energy – not traits Tom Morgan possesses.’ Her gaze moved downwards to her hands. ‘But then Gaspare told me about the Titian portrait and I started to think again. The painting would be worth a fortune. An easy way for a lazy man to get rich.’

‘But Seraphina never told you about the portrait?’

‘No. But then a wife tells a husband more than a woman tells her mother,’ she replied perceptively. ‘Seraphina could have told Tom Morgan. And he could have been tempted … And if he killed her, I want to know. I have to know.’ She rose to her feet. ‘Read the papers, Mr Bergstrom. Read what Melania di Fattori wrote. She knew The Skin Hunter. She was his lover. If you’re hoping to find Vespucci’s imitator, perhaps you should first learn more about the original.’

45

‘I need your help,’ Nino said, ringing Gaspare from Venice. ‘The Contessa di Fattori has given me some information—’

‘She said she was going to.’

‘Why did you tell her what was going on?’

‘The woman’s lost her daughter, and her marriage has broken up. What reason was there to keep it a secret from her? She deserves to know. If she was still with her husband I wouldn’t have told her, but the Contessa’s smart, she can handle it.’ Gaspare paused. ‘So, what did you want me to do?’

‘Time’s running out. I’ve got to find the last victim. So I want you to trace every woman who’s ever been connected to Angelico Vespucci—’

‘What!’

‘Go on the internet and see what’s been done on The Skin Hunter. We know about the copy of the portrait, and the article. The last victim has to have a link.’

‘It could be anything.’

‘I know!’ Nino snapped back. ‘But what else have we got to go on? I’ll read the stuff I was given, and then talk to Tom Morgan again. Incidentally, Seraphina’s baby wasn’t his.’

‘I don’t believe it.’

‘It’s true. Her mother told me.’ Nino sighed. ‘Every time I turn round there’s another corridor leading off to God knows where. Motives in motives, claims and counterclaims. No one’s what they seem.’ He was thinking aloud. ‘Less than two weeks, Gaspare. That’s all we’ve got. We have to discover the link to the victim. We have to.’

Finishing the call, Nino turned back to the papers the Contessa had given him, drawing them out of the envelope and laying them side by side. There were three pages of handwritten Italian, the writing baroque.

November 1555

He is harvesting and speaks of nothing else. As for Aretino, such a conscience there, he worships Titian like a god and yet thinks nothing of deceiving him. Last night I lay with him again, Angelico Vespucci coming later, when the boar had finished. He watches, like he watches his pet whores, sweats in his excitement, his body wheezing with the thrust of pleasure.

Aretino writes of me in his books, gives me another name, as though I cannot guess the subterfuge. Poor Aretino, so very foolish for a clever man. And yesterday, when the rain stopped for an hour come afternoon, I chose another whore for my Vespucci …

Nino stopped reading, the words staring up at him from the page.

… a little Jewish girl, come from Milan a month ago. She is naive and compliant; I think maybe he will love her. As he did the merchant’s wife.

Claudia Moroni was a whim of mine. A response to a rumour I had heard some months before. I courted her, came to her home, flattered her into a friendship, then brought her to Vespucci.

He loved her within hours. Not for her appearance, which was poor, but for her wickedness.

‘God,’ Nino said softly. Contessa di Fattori, the whore of Venice, the consort of a murderer, was also Vespucci’s procuress.

I watched her plead with him to keep her silence, but he’d have none of it. She lies with her brother – and so Vespucci wants her.

He tells me that he feels her corruption on his skin, that it dries like mud against his fingers. He licks his lips as though he can taste her poison, and calls her to him, time after time.

She comes across St Mark’s, the priest with her. Passes through the bronze archway leading to Vespucci’s room.

The priest sits fingering his rosary outside. He pays no mind to me, and so I watch the merchant’s wife pay for her sins to stay secret.

At first Vespucci thought to make me jealous. Thought I would bay at the moon for him. And so I took the writer as my lover …

Frowning, Nino stared at the words, remembering the portrait of Melania in the palazzo.

Provoked, Vespucci now thinks to take me from Aretino, tells me such tales, but I’ll have none of it. All lovers lie. Until, until …

His wife was found last evening in the Lido, stripped of her skin. He said he keeps it for her, promising to dress her when they meet in Hell. I still thought him a liar. A spinner of tales to court me, a cruel narrator scratching for some alchemy to keep me to his bed. I rolled upon him, begged to be given facts …

He told me, curled the words out with his tongue, spoke of how he peeled the skins away and hid them. He will not tell me where, he taunts me with it, speaks of adding more.

And now Claudia Moroni has been found. Vespucci promised to craft a garment for me, to fashion a chemise from her dead hide. Afraid, I left for the mainland.

I thought Vespucci would follow, but it wasn’t him. Instead came Aretino, begging my return. He said it was a jest, a bed sport, a bragging to make a woman moan …

I knew if I went back I would never leave again. I knew if I lay with Vespucci, felt his hands working my flesh, that he would work my soul.

When I next saw him he was washing himself, and the water that left his skin had blood in it.

Shaken, Nino pushed the notes aside and stood up. Melania, the Contessa di Fattori, had supplied Vespucci with his whores. Seraphina’s ancestor had colluded with a murderer. Willingly.

December 1555

The little Jewish girl I brought him has been found. Dead also … Aretino came to see me, lay against me in my bed, snuffled his girth against my back and pleaded Vespucci’s innocence. He tells me he is not what people say, and I should stand an ally to him. And I, drowsy with guilt, open my legs to him.

The portrait all of Venice talks about is nearly complete. Titian says nothing of it, only that it will be shown in the church where Vespucci worships. He says, come the last Sunday in December, the painting can be seen by any with the will to view it.

What Titian thinks of his sitter is impossible to know. Certainly he turns away from me whenever I approach and people have pinned papers to my door, condemning me.