A Very Venetian Murder Read online

  “I’m sorry I couldn’t afford lunch,” Abbott said, smiling, as they walked back to the boat. “But thank you anyway. This has been an eye-opener for me.”

  Reuben smiled back and did not say anything. He would have liked to say, “Me, too,” but he was not quite sure to what it was his eyes had been opened.

  CHAPTER

  15

  Tabita and Tony

  Reuben had been surprised when Valier had told him, in a telephone conversation Sunday night, that Monday was his day off and that he could not be reached, except in an emergency, until Tuesday.

  “I spend the day with my older sister,” Valier explained. “She’s a spinster, and I’m a bachelor, so we keep each other company once a week. For better or for worse, she’s the only family I have, and vice-versa.”

  Frost reasoned that if the officer in charge could take the day off he, as a put-upon vacationer, could do the same. This left him free to go to the barbershop Monday morning, to fend off increasingly strident pleas from Cynthia that he get a haircut.

  “At least I’ve got my own hair, not like Dan Abbott,” he had grumbled before setting out for the shop in the Mercerie recommended by Gigi.

  Returning later, Reuben was satisfied that the result had not been too disastrous; he had remembered to say a firm “no, grazie” to each strange nostrum and novel styling technique his barber had proposed. It was almost noon when he reached the Cipriani dock, where there were four others waiting, including Tabita. She was wearing tight-fitting blue slacks, a red silk shirt and a wide straw hat with a red silk band, not unlike a gondolier’s. She was carrying several shopping bags, including ones from Fendi and Krizia.

  Reuben greeted her affably as she said “hi” and smiled. “Buying out the competition, I see,” he said.

  “No, only some extras to perk up the clothes I’ve got. Even though I’m a prisoner, I want to look good.”

  “You bought some fancy paper,” Reuben said, pointing at a bag with a marble pattern from Alberto Valese-Ebrû.

  “Yes! It’s the most beautiful stationery I’ve ever seen. It’s fabulous!”

  Lowering his voice, Reuben asked if she could talk with him for a minute, “to clear up a couple of things.”

  “Sure,” was the reply.

  “How about back there, where we can sit down?” Frost asked, pointing to the Giardinetti Reali behind them.

  “Suits me,” she said, as Reuben walked with her to a faded bench in an alcove at one side of the gardens.

  “’Tabita, I’d like to go over with you some details about what went on Thursday night,” Reuben said.

  “You mean about Gregg’s death?”

  “No, before that. You and Tony Garrison had dinner with him, then left suddenly. Do you recall the time?”

  “It was about nine forty-five.”

  “You’re certain of that?”

  “Yes.”

  “How did you know? Did you look at your watch?”

  Tabita shifted uncomfortably. “I just knew,” she said, pouting slightly.

  Reuben dropped the subject and continued, “Now, the police have learned, and I have also, that there were some pretty harsh words exchanged, including a belligerent announcement by Baxter that he was HIV-positive. Is that correct?”

  “Yes,” she said, without elaboration.

  “Yet neither you nor Garrison told the police—or me—about any row taking place. Why was that?”

  “It wasn’t relevant. It had nothing to do with anything. It just would have been embarrassing.”

  Reuben was getting provoked by everyone’s attempt to decide “relevance.” His impatience showed as he looked hard at Tabita. Again she squirmed edgily, perhaps because of the hard bench on which she was sitting, perhaps not.

  “Had Baxter ever mentioned HIV before?”

  “No.”

  “So what he said to you was a surprise.”

  “Not especially, given how he led his life.”

  “But it was the first time he’d ever referred to his condition, was it not?”

  “Yes.”

  “And if he were HIV-positive, wasn’t that a matter of concern to you and Garrison?”

  “It’s a matter of concern when anyone is HIV-positive, when anyone gets AIDS, Mr. Frost.”

  “Fair enough. But let’s be blunt about it—Tony Garrison and Baxter had sex. And, unless my sources have been gossiping irresponsibly, Garrison has had sex with you. So weren’t you and he at least a trifle worried, a trifle disturbed, at what Baxter said?”

  “You seem to take a lot about our private lives for granted,” Tabita said crossly. “Of course what Gregg said disturbed us. A lot. Even if we’d gotten sort of numb to his abuse.” She paused, then continued in a very quiet voice. “You see, it blew Gregg’s mind when Tony began seeing me. Then Tony warned Gregg that he’d gone straight and sex was over between them and, wow, I can’t even describe Gregg’s reaction.”

  “When did this happen?”

  “Three months ago. We all got along professionally—it was to everybody’s advantage to do that—but privately Gregg was real bitter.”

  “Let me ask you something else. When you left the restaurant Thursday night, where did you two go?”

  “You know, Mr. Frost, you sound like a D.A.,” Tabita said, not without resentment. “I thought you were supposed to be our friend, supposed to be helping us.”

  “I am trying to help. It’s only that I can’t do much unless I know the facts. So, I repeat, where did you go?”

  “I made Tony take a long walk, to try to calm him down. We were both upset, but he was really upset. So we walked and walked, and he gradually cooled off.”

  “Where did you walk?”

  “My geography’s not so good. But I remember we went by the back door of the Guggenheim Collection and eventually came to that church right across over there.”

  “The Salute.”

  “We took the boat from there and then the other one back to the hotel. Like we said the other day.”

  “And you didn’t see or hear Abbott that night, after you left the restaurant, except hearing his television?”

  “You’ve got it.”

  “Shall we go back?” Reuben asked. Tabita followed him out to the Cipriani dock. While they waited, he asked her where he could find Garrison.

  “He’s down at Ceil’s studio,” she said.

  “Will he be there later, do you think? She’s invited Cynthia and me for cocktails this evening.”

  “It’s not just you. There’ll be others, though she did decide not to do a big party so soon after Gregg’s death.”

  “Will you be speaking with Garrison this afternoon?”

  “Maybe.”

  Reuben explained that he would like to talk to him before the party and Tabita said she’d give him the message.

  Once the motoscafo headed out, Reuben tried to point out some of the sights. Tabita could not have been less interested.

  Reuben, seated at his usual table with Cynthia, could not decide what to order for lunch. Finally they both settled on the Cipriani’s elaborate buffet—“the Cipriani’s blue-plate special,” he had once said to a friend, “all you can eat for seventy-five dollars.” There was some justification for the atrocious cost: the two dozen platters contained an exceptional selection of delectable items, ranging from a variety of mushrooms to three types of shrimp.

  He told Cynthia that he was convinced Gregg Baxter’s colleagues were coordinating their stories about what had taken place on Thursday. She expressed surprise at his surprise that they were doing this.

  “My dear, if you had five lawyers from Chase & Ward here, and one of them was murdered, don’t you think the other four would try to get their act together? Before facing the police of a foreign country? Not to speak of an inquisitive old party poking about for information.”

  “Inquisitive old party. That’s me, I suppose.”

  “Just kidding.”

  Before Cynthia coul
d defend herself further, a porter rushed up and presented Reuben with an envelope.

  “Fax for you.”

  Frost opened the envelope and took out four shiny pages.

  “It’s from Ted Demetrios,” Reuben explained. “He worked fast.” He stopped eating and quickly read the text. “Very interesting. All about the House of Werth, just as I requested. It has sales of roughly $1.5 billion a year—”

  “—that’s a lot of perfume,” Cynthia said.

  “It says here perfume, cologne, hair-care products, skin-care products, lipstick, et cetera. It’s not as big as Revlon or Estée Lauder, which have sales over two billion. But listen. Ted says that the analysts on Wall Street who cover the fragrance and cosmetics industries think Werth is stagnating. Competitors’ sales are growing but Werth is standing still. A recent market letter said quote The House of Werth badly needs a new high-end, designer fragrance to anchor its line unquote.”

  “That sounds to me like one with Gregg Baxter’s name on it,” Cynthia said.

  “Yes. Except he never would have allowed it.”

  “But don’t we think Dan Abbott would have?”

  “What do you conclude from that?” Reuben asked. “That Eric Werth killed Baxter, or more plausibly had Jim Cavanaugh or someone else kill him, so that he could make a deal with the survivors?”

  “Stranger things have happened, dear.”

  “That would be terrific. All of us stewing around here while the murderer is safe in New York, where Commissario Valier can’t even question him.” He sighed. “I guess all I can do is pursue the leads that are here. And speak to Tony Garrison this afternoon. I figure I’ll go down to Ceil’s around five-thirty and talk to him. I’ll meet you there.”

  La marchesa Scamozzi lived and worked in a converted warehouse on the Giudecca Canal, at Fondamenta di Ponte Piccolo. After a brisk walk, Reuben came to the bright green door of the building and rang the bell. It was opened promptly by Tony Garrison, who admitted him to the ground floor where la marchesa had her workshops and dyed her fabrics.

  “Rubes! Come in. We just knocked off for the day and Ceil went upstairs to get ready for the party. Let’s go up and eyeball the sunset.”

  Frost followed Garrison upstairs and the two men sat down opposite each other on facing sofas of cracked leather. The room was a jumble of antiques of uncertain age and drab fabrics that bore no resemblance to the bright ones Ceil produced for sale; The Aspern Papers came to mind.

  The living quarters did have large windows overlooking the Giudecca Canal and the Zattere on the other side. They appeared new, though stains from old leaks remained around the frames; perhaps la marchesa’s improvement funds had run out before she was able to replace the streaked wallpaper.

  “Want a drink, Rubes?” Garrison asked.

  “Not yet, thanks,” Frost replied.

  “Spoken to the police today?”

  “No. Commissario Valier has the day off.”

  “Pretty casual.”

  “I’ll second that.”

  “So you’re the only guy working on the case.”

  “At the moment, that may be right. Of course Valier probably has some of his minions out asking questions. He seems to have an ample supply of ispettori, sovrintendenti, assistenti and what have you. I take it no one’s been to see you?”

  “Nope.”

  “I’m glad for this chance to talk,” Reuben said. “I apologize for going over old ground. I know you’ve made a statement to the P.S., but there are one or two details that I’d like to confirm. As I get the story from others, Gregg Baxter had some pretty rough words for you at dinner last Thursday. So rough that you and Tabita got up and left. Words about Baxter’s health, about his being HIV-positive. Is that a fair statement?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Yet you didn’t mention this to the police when you made your statement to them. Your deposizione, as they call it.”

  “Sí, sí, la mia deposizione l’ho fatto alla Pubblica Sicurezza.”

  “I’m sorry. I forgot you speak Italian.”

  “The only wop-speaking spade in captivity.”

  “Try Ethiopia,” Reuben shot back. He did not like racist cracks, even when it was the putative victim talking.

  “Anyway, Tabita warned me you were leaked off that I didn’t tell anybody about our, um, misunderstanding.”

  “My feelings have very little to do with it. What’s important, to me and to the police, is knowing exactly what happened. But if you want to know my feelings, I’ll tell you. I believe any reasonable man, to use an old lawyer’s term, would think that what Baxter said to you the night he died was relevant.” He could use the magic word, too.

  “So that means I was an unreasonable man, right?”

  “That’s your conclusion.”

  “Gregg mentioned AIDS, right? That’s not cool. Not cool if it gives the police the idea that I might have AIDS. I don’t need to be deported before I finish my business with Ceil, because some dumb Eye-tie cop thinks I might be infected. Nor do I need to be put in quarantine somewhere. Whether Gregg had AIDS or not had nothing to do with his being killed. Neither did his attempt to pick a fight with me at dinner.”

  “My reasonable man might differ with that conclusion.”

  “Then your reasonable man is an asshole.”

  “Let me shift the focus a little bit. I also understand that Baxter and Dan Abbott were also quarreling before the murder. Why didn’t anyone tell us that?”

  “Look, man, nobody mentions that the sun comes up in the morning, either. Dan’s fights with Gregg were as regular as the sunrise. Part of the atmosphere, like oxygen. Okay? Their arguments didn’t matter. Just like his firing Doris didn’t mean anything. Uproars like that flared up all the time. It never occurred to me to mention them, and I doubt that it did to anyone else.”

  “Abbott told me that his arguments with Baxter concerned a difference in philosophy about the future of the business,” Reuben pressed. “Which side were you on?”

  “I was for bigger and better, like Dan. If you’ve got a good thing and can grow it, I say do it.”

  “Now you’ll have your chance, won’t you?”

  “I sure hope so. Thank the Risen Christ Dan made Fashions get that key-man insurance on Gregg. We can work things out smooth and not go crazy.”

  “Did you ever tell Baxter your views about bigger and better?”

  “Endlessly. But he didn’t listen—to me, to Dan, to anybody. He was set on keeping the business as it was. No Baxter jockey shorts, no Baxter underarm deodorants, no Baxter anything. Dan and I even had the idea for a line of pet clothing. Don’t laugh—with all the animal-rights freaks around you could do it. Poor Gregg. You gotta understand his oddball ideas about money. He was actually afraid—and this is the truth, man—that he’d become too rich. He talked all the time about Ralph Lauren, who he said had made so much money he had an adviser to tell him how to spend it! Not how to invest it, man, but how to spend it!

  “The screwy part was, if he’d been left alone, Gregg wouldn’t have made any money. He had no commercial sense. None. Why, hell, if he were in charge, the rich bitches who bought his clothes would be sent a bill a year later—which they’d take another year to pay. If they paid at all. Dan finally changed that—those chicks couldn’t get out the door with their new threads unless they paid first.”

  “There must have been much tension.”

  “Tension? Nah. Most of the time it was only talk and if it escalated, it cooled off right away. Look, Gregg Baxter was the goose and if he wanted to lay a little tiny golden egg, instead of a nice big fat one, there wasn’t one damn thing Dan or Doris or I could do about it.”

  Except kill him, Reuben thought.

  CHAPTER

  16

  Cocktails

  Frost’s conversation with Tony Garrison was cut short when Luigi Regillo came into the room carrying several bottles. He had what Reuben believed was called a “boyish” figure; though he looked a
good forty, he was still thin as a rail, without a hint of paunch. But if the figure was youthful, the manner was fussy.

  “Now I can shake hands,” he said as he approached Reuben after putting bottles down on a dark wooden table at the side of the room. “You’ll have to excuse me while I get this place tidied up.” He went out and returned with a bouquet of flowers—not a grand florists’ spread but a modest assortment bought from a street vendor—and a small bucket of ice cubes. Based on experience with Venetian entertaining, Reuben knew, with a sinking heart, that he was looking at the evening’s ice supply.

  The doorbell rang and Regillo ran down to answer it. He came back with Dan Abbott and Tabita before disappearing again. When he returned, he had put on a double-breasted blazer but not a necktie. As he busied himself about the room, plumping a cushion here, straightening a picture there, the others were drawn to the front window. The sun was setting out of sight to the left, but they could look across the water and see the changing light on the facades along the Zattere. The effect was mesmerizing to the visitors, and they stood and watched without speaking.

  La marchesa Scamozzi broke the silence when she entered, wearing a royal-red silk caftan. She ignored Regillo, nodded to the others and greeted Reuben emphatically, receiving kisses on both cheeks in return.

  “I tried to chase you at Gregg’s dinner but I never could get through the mob,” she explained, pushing back her cropped jet-black hair. “I’m so glad you’re here. With all the trouble, I haven’t even had a chance to call you. Is Cynthia coming?”

  “Yes. She should be here any minute.”

  “It’s wonderful to see you. And you look so healthy! You know, Reuben, you haven’t changed in the—what? fifteen years?—I’ve known you.”

  Reuben remembered well the first time he had been introduced to Cecilia Scamozzi by mutual acquaintances from London and realized that, yes, it had been fifteen years ago. They were not fast friends, but usually managed at least one outing during the Frosts’ annual visit.

  The Frosts had never met Cecilia’s former husband, Gianpietro Camboni. That font of information Gussie Morrison had once filled them in on the missing spouse. “Camboni is a banker in Milan,” Gussie had said. “He’s rich and married Ceil for her title. God knows she and her family didn’t have any money. He had a girlfriend in Milan right from day one. The floozie put her foot down a few years ago and demanded that they get married, so Gianpietro divorced Ceil and married her. Ceil got that house and studio she’s in, but she gets a pittance from Camboni. Hardly enough to keep her, let alone the gigolo. That’s why the poor thing’s been trying to get into the fabric business.” The “gigolo” had been a relatively recent acquisition, Reuben recalled; at least he and Cynthia had become aware of Luigi Regillo only within the last couple of years.