sound behind him and then a little splash. Most likely a water rat, one of the cityâs nastier realities that he tried to ignore.
He stood looking up at the front of the Caâ da Capo-Zendriniâor rather its humble back, for most of the decorations on the eighteenth-century building were concentrated on the Grand Canal side where it presented a classical facade in Istrian stone with an elaborate attic frieze of lions. Like the Palazzo Labia farther up the Grand Canal, the Caâ da Capo-Zendrini had been designed by Cominelli, but unlike the much more sumptuous building it couldnât boast frescoes by Tiepolo or trompe lâoeil decor and certainly not that notorious palazzoâs reputation for lavish entertainments. Instead there were some passable frescoes by Zugno and Cignaroli and the Contessaâs subdued gatherings as the one this evening was sure to be.
Although the building was now known as the Caâ da Capo-Zendrini, the Contessaâs husbandâs family had owned it for only the past seventy years, after having sold their smaller palazzo in the San Polo quarter near San Cassiano. By the time the Contessaâthen simply Barbara Spencer of Cadogan Placeâhad married Alvise da Capo-Zendrini thirty years ago, the building had been denuded of many of its decorations and severely damaged by the recent war and industrial pollution from the mainland.
The Contessa had made it her missionâat least her first oneâto restore the palazzo to its former glory. She had been so successful that she had received both the praise and the envy of many established Venetian families who had neither the money nor the imagination to do what should be done with their own buildings.
Before he had met the Contessa, Urbino had heard gossip about her hard line with the architects and restorers, her scrounging throughout Italy and Europe for the perfect pieces to fill in the gaps in the Caâ da Capo-Zendriniâs furnishings, her physical and emotional exhaustion afterward and extended stay in a Swiss sanatorium. Although the gossipers had thought they were painting a picture of someone that the young American would never want to meet, their talk had had the opposite effect. His interest in the woman had only increased for he perceived in her passion for her adopted city something very similar to his own. And when they had met at a reception during the Biennale seven years ago they had discovered an instant rapport. Ever since they had been close friends and confidants. With much amusement the Contessa had told him that they were referred to as âthat Anglo-American alliance.â
His thoughts about the Contessa having sharpened his sense of responsibility, he went down the steps of the bridge and along the calle to the iron door and rang the bell. The door was buzzed open and he walked through one of the palazzoâs two gardens, this one small and formal. The inner door was opening as he approached it, giving its view of the impressive staircase sweeping up to the piano nobile . Mauro, the Contessaâs majordomo, bade him good evening and closed the door behind him.
9
IT was proving much easier to talk to Clifford Voyd than he had thought it would be. The stout fellow was downright garrulous.
For half an hour they had been standing at the far end of the salone near the closed doors of the loggia that overlooked the Grand Canal. In front of them in the brightly illuminated room the Contessa and some of the most prominent men and women of the city formed small groups among whom the maid Lucia, Maria Galuppi, and two young men walked with trays of drinks and hors dâoeuvres. Maria looked uncharacteristically stern and severe, a result not only of her crisp black dress and white apron but of the set expression on her face that seemed close to disapproval.
The large room was dominated by several sixteenth-century tapestries of biblical and mythological scenes and an entire corner