The Gondola Maker (10 page)

Chapter
15

I grasp the wrought-iron gates with my hands and push my head between the bars to get a closer look at the old gondola made in my family
squero
, now stored upside down in the shadows of the artist Trevisan’s boat slip. I cannot help myself. The old, dusty boat is from the Vianello workshop, of that I am certain. I would recognize it anywhere. The boat is at least seventy years old, I judge, probably turned out by my grandfather. An image of my father and brother working in the
squero
crosses my mind. I feel a pang in my gut and turn away.

I propel the Nerina by walking my hands along the wrought-iron gate, then bump against a mooring post nearest the canal-side door to the artist’s studio. Stay focused, I tell myself. I do not want to make a bad move; I cannot afford to lose my position at the
traghetto
. I moor the Nerina, ascend the stairs from the canal with the first crate, and rap loudly on the studio door. One of Trevisan’s assistants opens the door for me, and I bring in the crates from the boat.

Each time I enter the artist’s studio, my eyes are drawn instinctively to Trevisan’s easel in front of the window. I crane my neck to catch a glimpse of the picture of the woman that so captivated me. It is as if the image of her face has seared itself into my mind, and it will not disappear. I see the back of the frame; but the picture is turned toward the wall, and I can see nothing of the canvas.

The artist enters the studio from another part of the house. “Boatman Fabris,” he greets me. I manage a bow toward him.

I turn to leave, then hesitate. “Magnificence,” I say haltingly. “May I ask you a question?”

“Of course,” replies the artist, surprised.

“The boat you have in dry dock in your boat slip...” I begin. “The old one. Is it yours?”

“Yes. Well, actually I inherited it from my father. It’s damaged and probably should be converted to firewood, I’m afraid.” He chuckles. “Too bad, for it’s a beauty, a work of real craftsmanship. I’ve never had time to restore it. I use my newer boat instead. Why do you ask?”

“Well, if I may, Magnificence, it would not be too difficult to restore it. You would need the proper materials of course.” I seem to forget that I am merely making a delivery to the artist’s studio. “But, properly returned to service, it could be not only a means of transportation but also a work of great beauty.”

Trevisan cocks his head and looks at me curiously. “My son, are you one of Master Giorgio’s boatmen or are you independent?”

“I’m neither, sir. I’m just a dock boy at the
traghetto
. I’m taking the place of one of Master Giorgio’s boatmen today.”

“I see,” says the artist. “I thought you looked too young to be a boatman. But you obviously know how to handle a boat.”

“Yes, very well.”

“How long have you been with Master Giorgio?”

“Just a short time.”

“Are you a member of the guild?” asks the artist.

“No,” I answer haltingly. “Not yet.”

“Hmm.” The artist presses five cool coins into my palm. “Signor Fabris, thank you for your service.”

I AWAKE TO FIND THE
traghetto
coated in white. I emerge from the humble building where I sleep, pull my vest snugly around me to ward off the chill, and shuffle into the snow that has fallen silently to the ground during the night. Normally the prows of the black boats buck against the gentle wake that laps against the quayside, but they now stand motionless and silent under a white coating. The water appears like a giant mirror, and I marvel at the stillness of the air, the unusual reflective quality of the light, and the remarkable glassy surface of the canal. It is early, and the
traghetto
remains silent. Giorgio’s hut is dark and quiet. A few stray flakes fall from an eerie gray sky tinged with pink. I loosen the tarps covering the gondolas and fluff them like bed sheets, sending showers of snow into the canal.

Then, she catches my eye—the Blessed Mother. Sculpted into the side of a building flanking the
traghetto
stands a stone tabernacle depicting the Virgin holding the Christ Child. Of course, it has been there since my arrival, and I have already taken note of the shrine, but in the purity of the snow, it is if I am seeing the image for the first time. I fetch a stepladder and a pair of gloves from the boathouse and prop the ladder against the building. I climb up so that I stand eye to eye with the image. It was sculpted long ago, I surmise, for the stone is already eroded in the spots where it is exposed to the elements. Below the image stands a stone container for flowers. The flowers that were last put there now amount to no more than wilted twigs. I remove them and toss them to the white ground below, making a note to collect some fresh ones to place in the box.

Snow collects in the crevices that were etched out years ago by some now-forgotten carver. With a gloved hand, I remove the fluff to expose the cold relief of the stone. Below the Mother and Child stands the familiar image of gondolas, and I understand that the
traghetto
probably commissioned this tabernacle long ago to protect this particular brotherhood of gondoliers. For a moment I look into the eyes of the Christ Child. His face holds an expression that could be read as serenity or boredom, but which, I am not certain. The Virgin, though, is exquisite, with even features and an expression of eternal peace. She is painfully beautiful, and the image of a mother and her baby touches me somewhere deep inside.

Suddenly something icy hits the back of my neck, sending freezing droplets down my back.

Alvise has returned.

I turn just in time to catch sight of my mentor winding up to launch another snowball at me from the quayside with his tongue between his lips. I scramble down off the ladder and prepare to retaliate by gathering snow into my palms, but the sight of Giorgio, who appears from around the corner, makes me think twice. Without a word, I move to the boathouse and begin my work.

Behind me comes a sudden stream of cursing. Giorgio shouts at the top of his lungs, a fearsome outburst about Alvise’s unexplained absence that travels all the way to the boathouse. I cringe and smile simultaneously, visualizing Alvise’s reaction: the shrugging shoulders and the sheepish yet confident dismissal of authority that only Alvise can pull off and still manage to keep his position. I do not dare to emerge from the boathouse to see for myself, for fear that I would make an easy target for Giorgio just by virtue of showing my face.

With my master’s tirade as background noise, I busy myself with a boat in need of repair. One of the wooden seats that spans the center of the gondola they call Vecchina has split down the middle. I don’t know what happened but imagine that someone put a load on it that was too heavy. I wish for some of the wood glue that my father and I used to mix in our shop just to repair such damage, but I improvise by mixing a concoction of gum arabic and turpentine from discarded supplies I find on a cluttered table in the shadows of the boathouse. I secure the mended piece with another slat recovered from a heap of scrap wood and nail it with two forged nails I retrieve from a pile of hardware collected in a glass jar nearby.

Finally, Giorgio’s words begin to fade, and the tirade ceases. I look up from my work to see Alvise entering the boathouse with a strange expression on his face, a smirk and a look in his eye that I am not sure whether to read as embarrassment or amusement. When he catches sight of me, Alvise lifts his eyebrows sarcastically. “So, Fabris, I understand you can row a boat on your own after all.”

“What makes you say that?” I feign ignorance. I pick up a broom and begin to stab at the stones.

“Because Old Marchese has an important errand, and he’s dispatching you instead of me.” Alvise flashes his incongruously rotted yet chivalrous smile. Giorgio enters the boathouse, and both Alvise and I cast our eyes to the floor.

“Wash up at the fountain,
figliolo
,” Giorgio says. I shake out my broom over the canal waters, then prop it against the wall.

“Your man Trevisan’s got another errand, and he asked specifically for you.” He sizes me up once again, and I feel the skin on the back of my neck tingle. “Seems you made quite an impression on that painter.”

Chapter
16

I
recognize Signora Baldi’s costume-rental shop from Master Giorgio’s description. As I maneuver the Nerina into the narrow canal, I spy racks of colorful fabrics fluttering in the breeze along a long stretch of the quayside. The frocks are organized by color from light to dark, a rainbow palette of silks, satins, and velvets of every shade: indigo, saffron, crimson, emerald, and rose.

Before leaving the
traghetto
, Master Giorgio informed me that Signora Baldi operates the best costume-rental shop in the city, providing an ever-changing supply of fashionable costumes, party frocks, and masks to some of the finest families in Our Most Serene Republic. She single-handedly supplies costumes for the Doge’s ball at carnival time.

Signora Baldi stands alongside stacks of wicker crates staged near a stone stairway that disappears under the level of the canal waters. She is a tall, elegant woman with an aristocratic countenance. Signora Baldi wears her hair in a fashionable coif with curls framing her face, the rest pulled into a tightly braided knot, studded with pearls, at the back of her head.

Signora Baldi seems to recognize the
traghetto
gondola as I approach the quayside. “Are you here for Master Trevisan’s costumes?”

“Yes, Madam.”

“Patrizia!” she calls. “Please show Master Trevisan’s boatman where the crates are for the Carnival party.” A girl around my age, a younger version of her mother, emerges from the shop. She catches my eye and smiles. Her mother looks on warily. I load two crates onto the gondola.

“Please tell the artist that I personally hand-selected these choices from my best stock,” Signora Baldi says. “The ones in the top crate are for the artist—wide enough around the middle to accommodate his girth, yet tailored to suit his tall frame. I know he prefers the hats with the wider brims, not the newer, more tight-fitting ones. I’ve also included a new royal-blue waistcoat with the cords and buttons. The bottom crate has some choices for Master Trevisan’s young journeyman.”

Leaving the costume-rental shop behind, I row out into the Grand Canal, then into a narrow waterway that leads to Trevisan’s studio. As I make the sharp turn into the canal alongside the artist’s house, out of the corner of my eye, I catch sight of another gondola careening toward me. Alarmed at its speed, I instinctively grip the sides of the gondola and prepare for a crash. Surprisingly, the brawny gondolier masterfully oars his craft from a steady clip to an instantaneous halt, and I breathe a sigh of relief. Its boatman greets me curtly with a nod, then ties the gondola to the mooring before the artist’s house. He jogs up the stairs to Trevisan’s studio door and rings the brass bell. The boat is fantastic, I note, covered in carving, paint, and gilding from prow to aft deck. It’s the kind of gondola I would expect two men to row, but I only see the one boatman at Trevisan’s door.

The artist’s studio door opens, and a woman with a gentle expression appears. She wears a simple, elegant silk gown the color of sparkling white wine, trimmed with delicate embroidery around the neckline. A black cloak is draped across her shoulders. The gondolier reaches out his hand to her to help her climb into the boat,
and she remains standing in the gondola, her hands clasped before her, as if waiting for something to happen.

Then, a second, younger woman emerges from Trevisan’s studio. I hear the clomping sound of what I know to be platform clogs—their heels as high as a pig’s back—that are fashionable among patrician women. The woman is covered from head to toe in a black cloak with a hood trimmed in weasel fur. Delicate hands emerge from the fur-trimmed sleeves, and I spot at least five gold bands with large colored gems. In her arms she cradles a small brown dog, only his trembling head emerging from her voluminous sleeves.

The gondolier extends his hand to help this grand lady into the gondola. The woman waiting there—I judge her now to be the lady’s maid—extends her hand to help her mistress toward her seat. As the woman climbs into the boat, she pushes her fur-trimmed hood back from her head, then turns her face toward me, as if startled by my presence in the gondola next to her. For a moment that passes ever so slowly, the woman fixes a pair of clear green eyes on me. A thin veil covers her hair, but a few brown curls emerge, twisting around her face and entwining the small drops of pearls at her earlobes. Her cheeks are flushed pink, her lips parted. She carries a slightly surprised expression on her face.

I watch as the two women seat themselves on the bench under the
felze
, whose curtains are tied to the side to allow air into the compartment. The gondolier leans his weight into the oarlock to power the craft away from Trevisan’s house. I watch as the two women grow smaller and out of focus as they glide away from me. Finally, their gondola turns the corner into the adjacent canal, and they disappear from view.

A collage of images sears through my mind, and my thoughts race to make sense of images so foreign and yet strangely familiar: the green eyes, the gaze, the parted lips. Then, I feel as if someone has punched me in the stomach. A sudden ache spreads just below my ribs.

It’s the girl in the painting.