Dead Lagoon - 4 (14 page)

Normally a political gathering on this scale would have attracted a highly visible police presence, squads in riot gear massed in the streets all around, not so much in anticipation of any real trouble as to convey the none-too-subtle message that whatever the featured speakers might propose, neither they nor their supporters should forget that it was the State and its agents alone who disposed.

In this case, however, Zen himself was the only policeman present, as far as he could see. Perhaps after all the revelations of recent months the State was finally losing its nerve, or perhaps it had more dangerous opponents to impress with its shows of force. For the people who had come to hear Ferdinando Dal Maschio were no angry students or striking workers. Their advanced age and undemonstrative demeanour marked them out as ordinary, law-abiding residents of the Dorsoduro quarter, not given to breaches of the peace or violent excesses of any kind.

They were packed most densely at the far end, where a temporary podium had been erected. At the back of the stage, beneath a banner showing a lion rampant and the name of the party, four men sat listening to a fifth who stood haranguing the crowd through the loudspeakers mounted to either side. On the fringes of these core supporters a second crowd had gathered, less committed but hovering there, looking about them or moving aimlessly back and forth, sampling the speeches, not yet convinced but letting themselves be wooed.

It was here that Zen took his place, as of right, amongst the waverers and spectators. He had spent the first part of the afternoon trying to get Ada Zulian to accept the idea of having a police guard in her house during the hours of darkness. Zen had supposed that the old lady would have been comforted by such conspicuous protection, instead of which she had protested vehemently against this ‘gross invasion of privacy’. Zen had not been helped in his efforts to soothe her by the rough-and-ready manners of Bettino Todesco, the policeman who would be on duty that night, or by the fact that he had to take Ada’s fingerprints in order to compare them with those which might be found on the knife.

In the end, Ada had insisted on phoning her nephews. Nanni and Vincenzo Ardit had driven over from their home in Verona as soon as they heard that their aunt was in hospital and were spending the afternoon in the city, where they had the use of one of the family’s properties not far from Palazzo Zulian. It was thus only a matter of moments before one of them turned up to lend his aunt moral support.

Vincenzo Ardit turned out to be a pleasant surprise from Zen’s point of view. He was a fit, strong man in his early twenties, with the cropped hair and wary eyes of one who has recently concluded his military service. Quietly spoken and evidently used to dealing with Ada, he calmly explained to her the benefits of having an official presence in the house for a limited period ‘to prove that you aren’t simply imagining these terrible things’. Ada held up her bandaged wrists and demanded to know if this wasn’t real enough, but this display of pique showed that she knew she had given way on the major issue.

Zen and her nephew spent a further hour soothing Ada’s ruffled feelings before they could leave her alone with the uncouth Todesco, who was confined to a small room leading off the main landing, with strict orders to venture no further unless summoned. When Zen left, Ardit walked with him to the end of the alley, evidently with the purpose of being able to talk freely.

‘My aunt is a very sick woman. What she needs is extended hospitalization and medical attention, but unfortunately her last experience was so horrific … It was back in the dark ages of psychiatric treatment, in the early fifties. They shot her full of drugs and gave her electric shocks. The result is that she’ll do anything to avoid going back.’

He sighed deeply.

‘So far Nanni and I have gone along with her wishes. But if this suicide attempt is repeated, we’ll have no choice but to insist on getting her the treatment she so desperately needs.’

Zen left Ardit to his family duties and made his way home, feeling totally exhausted. Having showered, he made the mistake of lying down on the bed for a moment. When he opened his eyes again the room was in darkness and the bells of San Giobbe were striking eight o’clock. As a result, the NRV rally was more than half over by the time Zen got there. The present speaker was holding forth on the need to encourage a revival of small shops and businesses by curbing ‘bureaucratic busybodies’ and relaxing the ‘intolerable and unjust tax burdens’ under which they presently laboured.

A glance at the faces all around revealed the expediency of adopting this political line. Almost without exception, the people attending the rally were the
pic-cola
borghesia
incarnate. The wilder rhetoric of separatism might appeal to the romantics among them, but in the end it would be the bread-and-butter issues which would sway the majority. None of them liked having some politician in Rome tell them what they could or couldn’t do, particularly now that Judge Antonio Di Pietro and his colleagues had confirmed their long-held suspicions that those very same politicians had themselves been doing exactly as they pleased all along.

The speaker was loudly cheered as he returned to his seat and one of the men seated at the back stood up. Even through the veil of mist, Zen recognized Tommaso Saoner as he stepped forward to introduce the evening’s star speaker. After a lengthy pause, during which the clapping and shouting grew ever more intense and rhythmic, the leader of the
Nuova Repubblica Veneta
emerged dramatically from the crowd itself and leapt up on the platform.

Ferdinando Dal Maschio was only superficially the man whom Zen had glimpsed in the wine bar the previous day. The physical outline was the same – the wiry build, of medium height, with sharp, angular features and an unruly mop of light brown hair – but the overall effect was completely different. In the
osteria
, Dal Maschio had appeared an unremarkable individual with a slightly dopey air, someone you might go drinking or hunting with but whom you wouldn’t trust to post an important letter. Now he was transformed. As he strode across the stage and grasped the microphone, he seemed to radiate authority, vitality and utter conviction.

Almost as soon as Dal Maschio started speaking, Zen realized that he was listening to one of life’s natural orators. Part of the fascination was that his voice did not fit his boyish looks. Deep and gravelly, with a rasping edge he must have picked up during his childhood in Lombardy, it was the perfect vehicle for the savagely mocking assault on the ‘elected Mafia’ in Rome with which he started. There were roars of approval from the crowd as Dal Maschio excoriated the vices of the political class which had run the country since the war.

‘We might forgive them their inefficiency if they weren’t arrogant as well. We might be prepared to overlook their arrogance if they weren’t also corrupt. And their corruption wouldn’t stink quite so much if they hadn’t spent the last fifty years preaching about the need for high moral standards and the rule of law. But inefficiency combined with arrogance plus corruption times hypocrisy? Heh! No, my friends, that’s too much for them to try and shove up our arses!’

This sudden lapse into vulgarity brought a storm of cheers. Dal Maschio had won their minds, now he had conquered their hearts, revealing himself to be one of them, a plain man who used plain words. But he was also astute enough to know that attacking the easy targets in Rome, however popular it might be, was not enough. He had warmed up the crowd with his opening tirade. Now it was time to move closer to home, and to prepare his vision of an alternative future.

‘Ecologists speak of a species “at risk”. Much fuss has been made about the fate of whales and elephants, of rhinos, tigers and porpoises.’

He paused abruptly, giving his audience time to wonder what any of this had to do with their concerns.

‘But there is a species far more important than those, and far closer to our hearts, which is equally endangered, and yet no one lifts a finger to save it. That species, my friends, is the Venetians!’

Dal Maschio stood back, allowing the storm of cheers to subside.

‘Already it is late, very late!’ he cried passionately. ‘In the fifty years since the war, we have lost no less than half our entire population, and those that do remain have the highest average age of any European city. And do not let us forget that those official figures in no way reflect the real dimensions of the problem, since they include all the foreigners who have moved here and forced the price of property through the roof, outsiders who share nothing of our common heritage yet make it impossible for many of us to live in our own city!’

This brought more cheers.

‘It’s not just a question of numbers,’ Dal Maschio went on, his face suddenly grave. ‘Repopulating Venice is not the only issue at stake. Even more vital is the preservation of our distinctively Venetian culture, and for that the time is desperately short! We have literally only a few more years to repatriate the thousands of our citizens who have been forced to emigrate and for the older generation to pass on its skills, tradition and language to the young. After that the chain will be broken beyond any possibility of repair, and one and a half thousand years of Venetian history will be over. If the city survives at all, it will be as a theme park for rich tourists, as Veniceland, a wholly-owned Disney subsidiary with actors dressed up as the Doge and the Council of Ten and catering by McDonald’s.’

Dal Maschio paused, giving his audience time to appreciate this dire prospect. When he spoke again, it was in a low, matter-of-fact tone in dramatic contrast to his previous delivery.

‘But that need not happen. It will not happen. We shall not let it happen.’

He broke off, gazing blankly before him as though lost for words. When it finally came, his next phrase had the hushed intensity of a revelation, of a great truth communicated for the first time.  

‘We Venetians must take control of our own destiny.’
 

He nodded, as though working out the logic of this insight he had just been granted.  

‘For over a century we have let ourselves be beguiled by the chimera of nationalism. We freed ourselves from the shackles of the Austrian empire only to hand ourselves over to the hegemony of Rome. And now that regime has been exposed for the rotten sham it is, there are those who urge us to deliver ourselves meekly into the power of Milan!’  

A surge of murmurs from the crowd greeted this reference to the rival Northern Leagues.  

‘That may make sense for others,’ Dal Maschio went on, the aggressive edge returning to his voice, ‘for those regions which have historically acknowledged the supremacy of the Lombards, or those who have insufficient resources to support pretensions to independence.’

A pause, then he switched back into his declamatory mode.  

‘But we are different! Venice has always been different! Istria and the Dalmatian coast have always been closer to us than Verona, Corfu and the Aegean more familiar than Milan, Constantinople no more foreign than Rome. Where others look inward, we have always looked outward. That difference is our heritage and our glory. The New Venetian Republic will revive both! We shall make the city a free port, renew our historic relationship with the newly emergent republics along the Dalmatian coast, and offer significant commercial and financial advantages to businesses, all with a view to making Venice once again the leading interface between the Eastern Mediterranean littoral and Northern Europe.’

Dal Maschio took a drink from the glass of water on the stand beside him. He smiled broadly, one of the boys again.

‘But besides all that, we have one great advantage over other folk. It’s also our great scourge. I’m talking about the tourists, of course.’

He nodded approvingly as a chorus of laughter went up from the crowd.

‘As we know all too well, there is no one on this planet who wouldn’t like to visit our city if they could, and no one who has done so who wouldn’t like to return. Over twenty million such “guests” come to call on us every single year, and what do we see for it? Next to nothing! Most of them spend less than a day in the city, and the few who stay longer are serviced by international hotel chains whose profits end up in Paris or London or New York. Such tourism is like the
aqua
alta
, flooding the whole city, making normal life impossible and leaving nothing but shit behind!’

A loud burst of applause greeted this sally. Dal Maschio raised his hand for silence.

‘But if we dam that flood, my friends, it will generate enough hard cash to provide the basis of a vigorous and stable economy! Tourists pay an average of fifty dollars a head to visit the Disney theme park outside Paris. How much would they be willing to pay for the privilege of visiting the most famous and beautiful city in the world? At present they walk in free, as if they owned the place! Anyone intending to visit the New Venetian Republic would require a visa, for which we would charge … What shall we say? A hundred thousand lire? That would ensure the New Republic an immediate, guaranteed annual income of two thousand billion lire!’

There were gasps from the audience. Dal Maschio shrugged coyly.

‘That’s not bad, is it? In fact it’s well in excess of the gross national product of several emergent nations. But for us it’s only the beginning. Far from being an idle dream, independence is the only policy which can realize the unlimited potential of our unique city. But we must not fall into the trap of complacency, my friends. Do not waste your votes just because you believe – absolutely correctly, mind you – that our victory is a foregone conclusion. Let us not merely win these municipal elections, but win them massively, decisively, with an overwhelming landslide which sends a clear signal to the morally and economically bankrupt regime in Rome! Let’s force them to call elections at a national level in the immediate future, so that we can liberate ourselves once and for all from the burdens which have weighed us down for so long, and begin at last to forge our own destiny in this unique and incomparable city state!’