Everything now was sound—the motors of the police boats shifting gears, idling while they looked around; footsteps running past the workshops, presumably the guard from the tower; shouts out to the water, unintelligible but excited, wanting to know what was going on; the creaking of ships pulling against ropes. I looked up. The warship was secured to keep any movement to a minimum, ropes stretched taut from stern to dock, probably the same at the bow. But that didn’t mean it couldn’t move, the water churned up by the police boats rocking the stern just enough to push it closer to the dock, crushing us. The others were looking at it too, their eyes fixed on the old metal, watching it as if they were waiting to put up their hands to stop it coming closer. No one spoke. Rosa leaned down, putting her head next to Moretti’s, ready to cover his mouth if he made a sound. On the water the boats had come together, their motors in the same place, conferring. But they were running out of time. If they searched the Arsenale and found nothing, they’d lose any advantage on the open water.

I heard the boats shift gears, separating. But which way would we have gone? The northern outlet, toward Murano, or the longer Arsenale basin? The directions were opposite—a wrong guess meant we’d get away. Then one motor got fainter, moving toward the lagoon, and the other seemed almost on top of us, someone yelling one more thing to the guard before it passed by the stern of our ship and then to the next basin. Finally, Rosa’s reverse play, the police off in all directions except the one I intended to use, back to where I had started.

We waited another minute to make sure the police had really gone, then edged our way out from behind the warship. For a moment I thought of just drifting with the oars, slipping past the guard in silence, the way we’d gone down the Fornace. But we were running out of time too, every second crucial if we wanted to get out before the police realized they were chasing shadows. What could the guard do, call out the navy? Mothballed in Taranto, the last scraps of Mussolini’s war. I started the engine and swung around the big stern.

The guard may have seen the boat, but none of us looked back, just headed straight down the canal to the open water. We had a real chance now. To catch up, the police would have to go all around the tail end of Venice, skirting San Elena, minutes behind. We passed under the bridge and shot across the water toward the channel lights. I peered into the darkness, trying to measure how far I could see past the buoys before everything was swallowed up. Still no moon. We wouldn’t need to hide behind anything—the air itself would do it if we were outside the range of the lights. But it was a fine line; too far and you risked shallows.

“Is he okay?” I said to Rosa. “It gets choppier out here.”

She didn’t say anything, just held him, a cushion.

“Where is the car? The casino?” The big parking lot at the vaporetto landing stage, where it would be easy to be overlooked in the crowd.

“No, at the end. The Excelsior.”

“The Excelsior?”

“It’s not open yet. No one will be at the dock. It’s easy to find.” All worked out, the next link.

“Not in the dark. We’ll have to go to the casino and then follow the lights down.”

“No, go straight across. That was the idea. No one will see us.”

“You can’t cross the lagoon in the dark. That’s why they mark the channels.”

“It’s a shallow boat.”

But the lagoon could be even shallower. That was what had always protected Venice—not water but mud. Sometimes only a few feet under the surface, sometimes less, rising in little underwater islands.

“We can’t go at this speed. If we hit something, we could wreck the boat.”

“If they come for us, they’ll look in the channel,” she said.

I nodded. “All right. But it’ll take more time. Can he wait?”

He was lying still under the tarp, maybe passed out.

“Yes,” she said. “Now.” I looked at her face, suddenly soft. “He’s dead.”

“Oh,” Claudia said, a whimper.

“Are you sure?”

Rosa pulled back the tarp, as if seeing him, his perfectly calm face, would be evidence. “In the Arsenale. I didn’t want to say then.”

We were still moving slowly in a direct line to the far lights of the Lido. I looked around, checking for boats, then back at his face, streaked with blood where he had wiped it, sweating, a kind of camouflage effect in the dark. A boy who’d delivered medicine.

“Better cover him up,” I said, not wanting to look anymore.

“I’m sorry,” Rosa said quietly, and for an odd second I thought she was talking to me, but her face was turned to his, words to a comrade.

Claudia moved forward and helped her with the tarp, folding it around him. “Let’s go back,” she said. “They won’t expect that. We can hide you, get you away somehow tomorrow. It was the wound that was the problem—we couldn’t hide him. He would have died.”

“He did,” Rosa said, but Claudia wasn’t really listening, busy with the tarp, absorbed now in a new plan.

“Do you think they saw our faces?” she said to me. “In that light? The boat could be anyone’s. We could go back. Nobody would know.”

“I can’t stay in Venice,” Rosa said. “They know it was me. Even if they didn’t see,” she said, spreading her hand to take in the boat, “they know it was me. They’ll hunt for me.”

“Not at Ca’ Venti,” Claudia said. “They already did.”

“And what do we do with him?” Rosa said quietly.

“Is there some rope?” Claudia said. “It’s better if it’s tied. The tarp will come loose, even if we roll it.” She was folding it under him, talking to herself. “How can we weight it? Not that it matters. You use those big stones and it’ll come up anyway. Nothing keeps it down. It’s the tides, isn’t that what they said? The tides loosened the tarp.” She turned to me. “We’ll have to explain why this one is missing. There’s nothing over those stones now. Someone might notice.”

I looked up to find Rosa watching her, studying her face.

“You want to put him in the lagoon? This boy?”

“He’s dead, yes?” Claudia said.

Rosa looked out to the dark, then shook her head. “Not to the fishes. I’ll take him.”

“In the car? With a body? Where?”

“He’s Carlo’s son,” she said simply. “I can’t just throw him over the side.”

“Two can do it,” Claudia said, not hearing her. “The boat won’t tip.”

“An expert,” Rosa said, dismissive, then turned to me. “They’ll find the car. Then it’s someone else.”

“They can trace it?”

She shrugged. “You will never get me out of Venice. Not now. This is the best way. Get me there, then it’s my risk.”

“And when they ask how you got there?” Claudia said.

“When they ask?” Rosa said. “They won’t ask me anything. If they can ask, I’ll be dead.”

She said it casually, sure of things. A car punctured with bullet holes, the only way it would be stopped. But it could happen the other way too. An undetected dash to Jesolo, then the whole Veneto to disappear in. Taking the body to friends.

“You’re not turning around,” Claudia said.

“After we drop them,” I said. “We can’t keep her in Venice.” The train station would be swarming with police, the highway bridge guarded. Not even a tarp to hide under.

“Who’s that?” Claudia said, swiveling around. A distant engine, a light shining in front, coming slowly.

“Not police,” Rosa said. “Fishermen, maybe. They go out at night.”

“Have they seen us?”

“Not yet. Soon,” Rosa said. “Pull to the left.”

I turned the boat slightly, on an angle now to the channel markers, stretching across the lagoon like highway lights. The fishing boat would pass without even noticing us, heading for the opening to the Adriatic. The chugging was nearer, a steady hum, then suddenly, as if it had found a road, it sped up, moving its lights right to left to make sure its whole path was clear. On the swing left the light caught us, something unexpected in the dark. A man shouted. The boat came toward us, shining its beam down.