The Thief Lord Read online

Another gray morning was already dawning when the children left Ida Spavento’s house. Scipio joined the others, not saying a word, although it wasn’t as if Riccio and Mosca even tried to talk to him on the way back to the hideout. From time to time Riccio gave Scipio such a threatening look that Prosper decided to walk between the two of them. They had left the wing with Ida Spavento. She wanted to bring it with her when they met the Conte.

  Bo was so sleepy that Prosper had to carry him on his back half the way home. Of course as soon as they reached the movie theater, he was wide-awake again, so they let him capture the Conte’s messenger pigeon.

  Happily, he stood underneath the basket and filled one hand with seeds. Then he held it up in the air, just like Victor had shown him in St. Mark’s Square. The pigeon jerked its head around and peered down at the boy, and finally flew onto his hand. Bo giggled and hunched up his shoulders as the bird walked down his arm. Then, while the pigeon pecked eagerly at the seeds in his hand, Bo carefully carried it to the emergency exit.

  “Take her to the canal before you let her go, Bo!” Mosca whispered, holding the door open for him.

  It was now light and very cold. When Bo stepped outside, the pigeon ruffled up its feathers and blinked, bewildered in the light. She kept her wings folded as long as Bo was still in the narrow alley. As soon as they reached the canal and the wind uncurled her wings, she pushed herself off from Bo’s hand and took to the air. She rose high into the morning sky and flew faster and faster until she disappeared behind the chimneys.

  “When were we supposed to collect the Conte’s reply from Barbarossa?” Prosper asked as they hurried back into the movie theater, shivering. “The day after we sent our message? She can’t be flying far then.”

  “Pigeons can fly hundreds of miles in one day,” Scipio answered. “This evening she could easily be in Paris or London.” When he noticed Hornet looking at him with irritation, he quickly added, “I read that somewhere.” This wasn’t his usual arrogant tone. Today he sounded timid and almost apologetic.

  “The Conte’s not very likely to live in Paris,” Riccio said scornfully. “But who cares? The pigeon is on its way and you’d better go home now.”

  Scipio gave a start. He cast a pleading look at Prosper, who avoided his eyes. Prosper had not forgotten how Scipio acted when the others had been waiting in front of his grand house. Maybe Scipio guessed his thoughts because he turned away again. He didn’t seem sure where else he could look for help. Bo pretended he hadn’t noticed the tense atmosphere and carried on feeding his kittens.

  Hornet bowed her head. “Riccio is right, Scip,” she said. “You have to go back. We can’t afford to have your father turning the whole city upside down because his son has run away. I mean, how long would it take him to think of his old movie theater? He’d get half the police force of Venice out here in no time. We’re in enough trouble as it is.”

  Scipio’s face froze. Prosper could see the old Scipio returning, the stubborn, arrogant Scipio who would fight to get his way. “I see,” he said. “You’re not going to throw out Prosper and Bo, even though it’s completely their fault the detective came sneaking around here in the first place. But I — I’m not allowed to stay. I showed you this place. I gave you money and warm clothes. I even brought you the mattresses — and I nearly drowned in Mosca’s rotten boat doing it. When it got cold, I brought you blankets and heaters. Do you think it was easy to steal all those things from my parents?”

  “Of course it was easy.” Mosca gave Scipio a look of utter contempt. “They probably suspected the maid, or the cook, or another of your thousands of servants.”

  Scipio didn’t answer that. He just turned bright red.

  “Bingo!” Riccio exclaimed. “Got it in one.”

  “Do you mean they suspected someone else?” Hornet asked Scipio in astonishment.

  Scipio buttoned his jacket right up to his neck. “My nanny.”

  “And? Did you at least defend her?”

  “How?” Scipio returned Hornet’s angry glance. “You don’t know my father. If he ever caught me stealing just a single one of his cufflinks, he’d make me walk around with a big sign around my neck saying: I’m a rotten little thief!”

  Bo, despite his efforts not to listen to them, had heard it all. “Did they lock her up? Like, in a real prison?”

  “Of course not!” Scipio shrugged. “They couldn’t prove anything. She was fired, that’s all. If I hadn’t taken those darn sugar tongs, they would never have noticed it. I took most of the stuff from rooms that are never used anyway. So now I don’t have a nanny anymore.” The others looked at Scipio as if he had snakes growing out of his head.

  “Jeez, Scip!” Mosca muttered.

  “I only did it for you!” Scipio shouted. “Have you forgotten how you used to live before I looked after you?”

  “Get lost!” Riccio shouted back at him. He gave Scipio a fierce shove in the chest. “We can do without you. We want nothing to do with you. We should never have let you back in here again.”

  “You shouldn’t have let me in here?” Scipio was now yelling so loudly that Bo put his hands over his ears. “Who do you think you are? All this belongs to my father!”

  “Oh, sure!” Riccio yelled back. “Why don’t you tell him about us then, you little toad?”

  Scipio went for him. The two of them got so entangled that Hornet and Prosper needed Mosca’s help to separate them.

  When Bo saw that Riccio’s nose was bleeding, he let out such an anguished sob that the others turned to comfort him.

  Hornet was there first. She wrapped her arms around Bo and gently stroked his hair, which was already growing blonde at the roots. “Go home, Scip,” she said sadly. “We’ll let you know when we’re meeting the Conte. Perhaps we’ll have a message by tomorrow afternoon. One of us will go to Barbarossa right after breakfast.”

  “You what?” Riccio pushed Mosca away just as he was trying to wipe the blood from his face. “You want to tell Scipio? Why?”

  “Stop it, Riccio!” Prosper interrupted angrily. “I’ve seen Scipio’s father. You wouldn’t dare to steal even a single spoon off him, let alone tell him about it.”

  Riccio just sniffed and pressed the back of his hand against his nose.

  Scipio mumbled, “Thanks, Prop.” His cheeks were striped raw from Riccio’s fingernails. “And you will let me know, right?”

  Prosper nodded.

  But Scipio still hesitated. “The detective …”

  “… has escaped,” Mosca finished.

  “We have his word of honor that he won’t tell on us,” Bo said.

  Scipio shrugged. “If you say so.” He walked slowly past the rows of red chairs, running his fingers along the red velvet and looking intently at the embroidered stars on the curtain. He walked very slowly, as if he was waiting for the others to call him back. But nobody did, not even Bo.

  He’s scared, Prosper thought as he looked after Scipio. Scared to go home.

  29

  Barbarossa’s shop was empty when Prosper pushed open its door the next morning. The bells above the door jangled madly and Bo, fascinated, stopped in the doorway to stare at them. Hornet pulled him into the shop. It had grown very cold overnight.

  “Signor Barbarossa?” Hornet called, looking closely at the painting above the counter. She also knew all about the red-beard’s peephole.

  “Si, si, pazienza! Patience!” they heard him call in a bad-tempered voice.

  Barbarossa poked his head through the curtain in front of his office door. His eyes were bloodshot and he was blowing his nose into a huge handkerchief. “Oh, you brought the little one. Take care he doesn’t break anything. What have you done to his angel hair?”

  With an impatient gesture he waved the children into his office.

  “Winter! What the heck is winter doing here already? Has the whole world gone crazy?” he muttered as he dragged himself back to his desk. “This city’s already hard to bear in the summer, but the winter can
bring even the healthiest man to the verge of his grave. But I forget who I’m talking to. You wouldn’t understand. Children don’t feel the chill. They skip around in the puddles and don’t even get a cold.” Barbarossa slumped into his chair with the sigh of a mortally ill man. “Sore throat, headache, a constantly runny nose!” he moaned. “I feel like a human faucet.” He wrapped his scarf even tighter around his fat neck and peered at his visitors over his handkerchief. “No bag, no backpack? Is the Thief Lord’s loot today small enough for your pockets?”

  Bo reached out his hand and touched a small tin drummer on Barbarossa’s desk.

  “Get your sticky hands off, that’s valuable,” the redbeard barked, tossing a cough drop at Bo.

  “We’re not here to sell anything,” Hornet said. “The Conte said he would leave a letter for us with you.” Bo had unwrapped the cough drop and was sniffing it suspiciously.

  “Ah yes, the Conte’s letter.” Barbarossa blew his nose once more, then stuffed his handkerchief back into his vest pocket. The vest was embroidered with tiny golden gondolas. “His sister, the Contessa, left it here yesterday. He himself only comes to town very rarely.” The redbeard popped another lozenge into his mouth and with another sigh he opened the top drawer of his desk. “There you are!” Keeping a very straight face, he held out the envelope to Hornet. The envelope was blank — no address and no sender. When Hornet reached for it, Barbarossa snatched it back.

  “We’re all friends here,” he purred in a low conspiratorial voice. “Tell me what you had to steal for the Conte. The Thief Lord obviously completed his task in a satisfactory manner, am I right?”

  “Perhaps,” Prosper answered vaguely, before pulling the envelope from Barbarossa’s fingers.

  “Hey!” The redbeard slammed his fists on the desk and pushed himself up. “Aren’t you a cocky one. Did nobody ever teach you to treat adults with respect?” A violent sneezing fit threw him back into his chair.

  Prosper didn’t answer. He silently put the envelope into the inside pocket of his jacket. Bo spat the cough drop into his hand and banged it onto Barbarossa’s desk. “Here, you can have it back, because you shouted at my brother,” he said.

  Incredulous, Barbarossa stared at the sticky lozenge.

  Hornet bent over the desk with her friendliest smile. “How about you, Signor Barbarossa? Did nobody ever teach you how to behave in front of children?”

  The redbeard had to cough so violently that his face actually turned redder than his nose. “All right! By the lion of San Marco, you kids are very touchy!” he spat into his handkerchief. “Well, why don’t we try a little quiz? I’ll start.” He leaned over his desk. “Is what the Conte wants so badly made of gold?”

  “No!” Bo answered, shaking his head with a broad grin.

  “Really?” Barbarossa frowned. “Silver?”

  “Wrong! Wrong!” Bo skipped from one foot to the other. “Guess again!”

  But before the redbeard could venture another guess Prosper had already pushed his brother through the curtain. Hornet followed them.

  “Copper?” Barbarossa called after them. “No, wait! It’s a painting! A sculpture!”

  Prosper opened the shop door. “Out you go, Bo,” he said, but Bo stopped once more. “All wrong!” he shouted into the shop. “It’s made of huuuuge diamonds. And pearls!”

  “You don’t say!” Barbarossa was through the curtain like a shot. “Describe it, boy.”

  Hornet hauled Bo through the door. Outside, she suddenly stopped.

  Snowflakes whirled through the alley. They fell so densely from the off-white sky that Bo squeezed his eyes shut. Suddenly everything was gray and white — as if someone had erased all the colors of the city while they were in the shop.

  “It’s a chain. Or a ring?” Barbarossa excitedly poked his head through the shop door. “Why don’t I take you all for a nice snack over there in the cake shop, hmm? What do you say?”

  But the children just wandered off without paying him anymore attention. They only had eyes for the snow. The cold flakes settled on their faces and their hair. Bo gleefully licked one off his lip. He stretched his arms wide as if he wanted to catch them all. Hornet just looked up at the sky, blinking. It hadn’t snowed in Venice for years. The people they passed looked just as enchanted as the children. Even the shop assistants stepped into the street to look up at the sky.

  Prosper, Hornet, and Bo stopped on one of the bridges and bent over the stone parapet to watch how the gray water swallowed the snowflakes. The snow gently covered the surrounding buildings, the red roofs, the black trellises on the balconies as well as the leaves of the autumn flowers in their pots.

  Prosper could feel the snow in his hair, wet and cold. He remembered a faraway time, and an almost forgotten place. He remembered a hand gently wiping snow from his hair. He stood there, between Hornet and his little brother, and lost himself in this memory for a few precious moments. He realized to his amazement that remembering didn’t hurt so much anymore. Perhaps it was Bo and Hornet standing by his side, warm and familiar.

  “Prop?” Hornet put her arm around his shoulder. “Everything all right?”

  Prosper shook the snow from his hair and nodded.

  “Let’s open the envelope,” Hornet said. “I want to know when we’ll finally get to see the Conte.”

  “How do you know he’ll come himself?” Prosper pulled the envelope from his jacket. It was sealed, just like the one in the confessional. But this seal looked strange. As if someone had dabbed it with red paint.

  Hornet took it from Prosper’s hand. “Someone has already opened it!” She looked at Prosper. “Barbarossa!”

  “Doesn’t matter,” replied Prosper. “That’s why the Conte already told us the meeting place in the confessional. He knew the redbeard would open the message. He seems to know him quite well.”

  Hornet carefully cut open the envelope with her penknife. The Conte’s message was just a few words.

  At the arranged place

  on the water

  look out for a red lantern

  on Tuesday night, 1 A.M.

  “Tomorrow!” Prosper shook his head. “One o’clock. That’s late.” He put the message back in his pocket and ruffled Bo’s hair. “That was quite good, about those diamonds and pearls. Did you see Barbarossa’s eyes?”

  Bo giggled and licked another snowflake off his hand.

  But Hornet glanced over the parapet, looking worried. “On the water?” she asked. “What does he mean? Are we doing the swap on the water?”

  “No problem,” Prosper answered. “Mosca’s boat is big enough for us all.”

  “OK,” said Hornet, “but I still don’t like it. I can’t swim very well and Riccio gets sick from just looking at a boat.”

  “Don’t you like boats?” Prosper teased, pulling Hornet’s braid. “But you were born here. I thought all Venetians love boats.”

  “Well, you thought wrong,” Hornet answered curtly. She turned her back to the water. “Let’s go, the others are waiting for us.”

  The snow seemed to make the city quieter than usual. Hornet and Prosper walked silently next to each other. Bo skipped ahead, humming gently to himself.

  “I don’t want Bo to come along to the handing-over,” he whispered to Hornet.

  “I can understand that,” she whispered back, “but how are you going to tell him without him bursting our eardrums?”

  “I don’t know,” Prosper muttered.

  “I’ve got an idea.” Hornet said. “One that will get me out of the boat trip too. I just won’t get to see the Conte.”

  30

  Victor was late. He’d been sick for two whole days and had only just managed to drag himself out of bed, reluctantly, for his dreaded meeting with the Hartliebs. It was already three o’clock when he finally stepped into the noble lobby of the Hotel Gabrielli Sandwirth. He’d last been there just a month before. He had been following someone, wearing a full black beard and a rather horrendous pair of
glasses. He had hardly recognized himself in the mirror. Today he wore his own face, which always gave him the strange sensation of being smaller.

  “Buonasera,” he said as he approached the reception. A head appeared from behind a massive flower arrangement. “Buonasera,” the receptionist said, “what can I do for you?”

  “My name is Victor Getz. I have an appointment with the Hartliebs,” Victor gave an apologetic smile, “for which I am rather late. Could you please check if they are still in their room?”

  “Of course.” The lady tucked a strand of black hair behind her ear. “What do you think of the snow?” she asked.

  She let the word snow melt on her tongue like a delicious, creamy chocolate. Victor smiled as he noticed how her eyes kept straying toward the large windows and the snowflakes, which drifted past slowly.

  “Hello, Signora Hartlieb,” she said into the telephone, “there’s a Signor Getz here to see you.”

  The Hartliebs had no time for the snow. Outside their window, San Giorgio Maggiore seemed to be floating on the lagoon as if it had just surfaced there. The view was so beautiful that Victor felt his heart ache. Esther and her husband, however, stood side by side with their backs to the window and only had eyes for him. Uneasily, Victor folded his hands behind his back.

  Why hadn’t he at least put on a mustache? That would have made lying so much easier. But the children had stolen all his wonderful beards.

  “I’m glad you received my message. After trying to reach you for so many days, I had my doubts as to your being in Venice at all.”

  “I hardly ever leave the city,” Victor answered. “I miss it too much as soon as I try to leave.”

  “Really!” Esther’s eyebrows moved up and down as rapidly as a bouncing ball.

  Amazing, Victor thought — I could never do that.

  “So, please, Signor Getz,” Mr. Hartlieb was still as big as a house and nearly as white as the snowflakes drifting past outside, “could you tell us about your investigations?”