Free Death in the Palazzo by Edward Sklepowich Page A

necessary—unless it be as a warning that even those of us who believe in God and the saints are as weak in the grip of superstition as the most faithless heathen.

PART THREE
    The Brooch

1
    When Urbino finished reading the Conte Alvise’s memoirs, he put down the sheets of paper he had fetched from the library. They were a copy of the originals the Contessa had first read over twenty years ago. For a few moments the only sound was that of the violent rushes of wind against the windows.
    â€œIsn’t Barbara the deceitful little devil?” Sebastian said, breaking the silence. “A locked room! A malevolent painting! Mysterious deaths! A jewel with a dark past! If we had known about all this before, we would have come a long time ago, wouldn’t we, Viola?”
    His sister didn’t share his excitement.
    â€œPoor Barbara,” she said. “Now I understand what she meant when she spoke of bad blood between the families, but surely no one holds anything against her?”
    â€œYou know how these Eye-talian blood feuds are, Viola,” her brother found it necessary to remind her. “No one rests until both sides are destroyed. Barbara is right in the line of fire. Don’t forget she’s an interloper, being a Brit and all, and this Bambina wanted to marry her husband. I say she’s in for it, and maybe we are, too, being her blood.”
    Viola gave him a weary look.
    â€œBut what about the rest of the story, Urbino?” she said. “I mean, what happened after she read the Conte’s letter? By the way, I hope you’re not breaking any confidences.”
    â€œI’m not—and I wouldn’t. Barbara has long given up keeping any of this a secret. She would have told you both under the right circumstances.”
    Urbino freshened their drinks and told them the rest of the story.
    â€œStrange as it might seem, Barbara didn’t immediately examine the room. Not for at least a week. When she did she found a dusty, moldy bedroom with some fine pieces of furniture and, of course, the Caravaggio, which far from having suffered from neglect, seemed to gleam with life. As a subject and composition she didn’t find the Caravaggio in any way pleasing, but Caravaggio has never been one of her favorite painters.
    â€œShe was in a quandary. Should she renovate the room completely? But what would she then do with the Caravaggio? Sell it? Donate it to the Accademia? Put it back in storage? Or should she leave the room just as it was? In the end that’s what she decided. From both fear and the inability to make a decision. Better, she thought, to keep things as they had been since 1938.
    â€œThe only member of the staff who had been here at the time of the house party was Mauro. The others had long since died or left the Da Capo-Zendrini service. Mauro had been only fifteen and had worked in the kitchen. He told her nothing that she didn’t already know from the Conte’s letter—in fact, far less, of course—but she felt that there were things he wasn’t saying. She didn’t press him, however, because she knew his loyalty over the years to the Conte and remembered how the Conte had forbade her to ask questions of any of the staff. She made some tentative inquiries among members of the family but got nowhere.
    â€œShe decided to end her halfhearted attempts to learn more. She felt as if she was betraying the Conte now that he was dead, despite his final wish for her to know the story of the Caravaggio Room.
    â€œAnd so the room was relocked.
    â€œThen I came into the picture. I met Barbara a few years after the Conte died. You know I write biographies, and I got it into my head that it would be interesting to write the biography—a history—of the Ca’ da Capo. I had toyed with the idea of doing the same thing for my Palazzo Uccello but put it aside when I learned that the centenary of the Da Capo-Zendrini family’s