Free Death in the Palazzo by Edward Sklepowich Page B

possession of the building was coming up in a few years. It would make a nice gift to Barbara and could be presented to the state archives and the Marciana Library. I detected that she was less than eager but thought it was because she felt it was an imposition on me.
    â€œIn the course of my research I came up against the locked room. At first Barbara was evasive, said it was closed off because it was in severe need of repair. I persisted, however, and eventually gained access to the room and its history, at least what Barbara knew from the Conte’s letter. Needless to say I was intrigued, and with her reluctant permission began to make inquiries to learn more about the painting and the room itself. I promised that nothing detrimental to Alvise or the family would find its way into the monograph I was putting together.
    â€œI had very little success learning any more than was already known. The family was even less willing to speak with me than they had been with Barbara. The only contact I ever had with the Zenos was a brief note from the signora in response to my detailed letter. It said that she, her daughter, Bambina, and her granddaughter, Gemma, had no wish to review an episode of the past that was so disturbing to them all. Understandable, under the circumstances.
    â€œI decided to contact Gemma directly. She was living in London, where she had acquired a reputation as a portrait painter. Barbara had met her several times, both before and after the Conte died, but they had never progressed beyond the state of acquaintanceship.
    â€œI had little hope of learning much from Gemma since she had been only eight at the time of her mother’s death. As it turned out, I was right. The few memories she had, she found difficult to sort out from what she had overheard or was told by her family over the years. The main thing she conveyed was a pathetic sense of the confusion and fright she felt that weekend. After all these years she’s still bitter about the death of her mother. It changed the direction of her life, although she certainly has turned out well. But inside she still seems to be the little girl abandoned by her mother when she died so suddenly.
    â€œI had more success with the provenance of the painting. The family of Signor Ugo Rigon, from whom the Conte’s father bought the house, was given the painting by a dissolute nobleman who lost heavily at the Ridotto gaming tables to a Rigon in the middle of the eighteenth century. How the nobleman came to have the painting and who owned it before he did I don’t know, but it appears to be one of the paintings commissioned by Cardinal Francesco del Monte, a highly cultured but somewhat dissolute ecclesiastic who took Caravaggio under his wing. I didn’t come across anything that associated the painting with bad luck or violence, but the fact that it was consigned to a lumber room in the palazzo and never mentioned to the Da Capo-Zendrini family when they bought the building a hundred years ago might indicate that it wasn’t considered a desirable object. Of course, there’s the possibility that the painting was forgotten by the former owner, who seems to have been a bit of an eccentric.
    â€œThat’s about it. I wrote the history of the building, but never felt happy with it because I had so many unanswered questions about that room. I admit I’d become somewhat obsessed with it and felt that all the mystery had to be brought to an end. I prevailed upon Barbara to have the room restored, not to change anything in it, and to treat it just like any other room. She eventually agreed and the room was fixed up a year ago, but she’s never used it. She saw no need to make a point of having guests stay in it when there were more desirable rooms available—more desirable, that is, even apart from the history of the Caravaggio Room.”
    Viola had a pensive look on her face when he finished.
    â€œYou have a lot of