Isle of the Dead by Alex Connor Read Free Book Online Page A

everyone’s imagination than by copying the murder method of the infamous sitter?’
    â€˜
What?
’
    â€˜You’ve often said that to raise the interest and value of a picture you need publicity—’
    â€˜Not murder.’
    â€˜It wouldn’t work for you or me, but for some it would. You said yourself, people collect sick stuff. And this portrait is a Titian. It could be that the murder was an accident and the killer made use of the Vespucci legend to reignite the story.’
    Nino could see Gaspare shift in his seat, and pressed him. ‘You still have it, don’t you?’
    â€˜I—’
    â€˜Don’t bother denying it, Gaspare, but think about it. Perhaps having the portrait puts
you
in danger.’
    â€˜I’m an old man. Why should I care what happens to me?’
    â€˜
I
care. I care about Seraphina too. She didn’t deserve to die.’ Nino paused, thinking. ‘You should back off. You’re too old. I need your brain – the brawn I can supply.’
    Puzzled, the dealer stared at him. ‘What the hell are you talking about?’
    â€˜I know about the painting
and
Vespucci – probably as much as anyone else does now. I speak three languages, including Italian. I’ve been all over the world, travel comes easy, and people talk to me. Let me try to find out what happened.’
    Immediately, Gaspare put up his hands.
    â€˜Let the police handle it—’
    â€˜I’m not going to interfere with the Italian police. I just want to ask around a bit.’
    â€˜You’ve been seriously ill—’
    â€˜I’m fit now,’ Nino persisted.
    â€˜It’s dangerous.’
    â€˜Is it? Maybe so, maybe not. There might be no connection between Seraphina’s death and the portrait. But if there is, we need to find out what.’
    â€˜Leave it to the experts—’
    â€˜
There are no experts in this!
It’s about Seraphina, her death, a painting and Angelico Vespucci.’ He put down his glass, turning to the dealer. ‘I’m fit again and I need to work. You won’t let me pay for my keep – or repay you for what you’ve done for me – so let me repay you this way.’ He pulled his chair closer to the old man. ‘I’m a quick learner, you know that. I’m used to dealing with people and I don’t scare easily. That picture came
here.
You can’t undo that. It came to you – and now Seraphina’s dead. I want to know why.’ He held the dealer’s gaze. ‘Tell me you don’t want the same.’
    Â 
    Venice, 1555
    There was a rumour that the plague was returning to Venice, but this time we were spared, the merchants and the rich leaving their palaces and strutting about the piazzas like cockerels spared the knife. There is a fashion here for the men: at night the cloth covering their genitals is transparent, and some hang bells and tie ribbons on their appendages.
    Meanwhile the industrious Titian is working on his latest portrait: a sitter known to Aretino, as licentious a man as any in Venice. Angelico Vespucci. When the contract was first signed Vespucci was respected, known to the Church, a giver of alms, a man loved by his servants for his kindness. They say he was gentle. They say he was generous. They say he loved his wife as no man had ever loved a woman before. Such was the noble merchant Aretino brought to the studio of Titian. Such was the sitter whose likeness was drawn out in red chalk.
    The plague never came to Venice. Some other sickness came in its stead. On the night of November 11th the corpse I had seendragged from the Lido was finally identified as Larissa Vespucci. When the news spilt over the city Venice talked of little else. And while her lover fled to Rome, she was buried in the Vespucci crypt on the Island of St Michael. Skinned like a fish, like a rabbit, a dog, like vermin. Skinned, relieved of the beauty