Thief of Venice

by Jane Langton

  They had begun to meet regularly in the Ducal Palace in the Hall of the Council of Ten, a fabulous chamber with a melancholy history and a painted ceiling writhing with gold moldings. This morning the regular members of the Piazza Council were joined by the mayor of Venice, representing the Venice City Council, and by employees of AMAV—the Venetian Environmental Multiservices Corporation—as well as by others from the Consorzio Venezia Nuova, a consortium of private contractors.

  The deliberations of the Piazza Council were perhaps doomed from the start, because there was bad feeling between the city council and the rich and powerful Consorzio Venezia Nuova.

  But the problem of high water in the piazza was a severe one, and it called for heroic efforts by somebody, somehow, and as soon as possible.

  The mayor laid it out in plain words. “As you all know, the piazza is at the lowest point in Venice. It is also the busiest part of the city. The dangerous month of November is nearly here, and the lagoon is already spilling over the Molo twice a day, in spite of the fact that this is the time of neap tide. Let us not forget that the moon”—the mayor lowered his voice to a deep throb and looked grimly around the table—“the moon will be full again in only seven days.”

  They looked at each other solemnly, feeling the weight of the earth’s dangerous satellite hovering over their heads. The mayor held up a calendar and tapped it with his finger. “This is the date of the highest autumn spring tide. The meteorologists are warning that the stormy forecast and the probability of high winds in the near future may create the worst problem in years.”

  “And we all know what that means,” sighed Father Urbano. “Sixty centimeters of water in the piazza.”

  “The fact is,” said the man from AMAV, looking dolefully at Father Urbano, “we’re afraid of a return of the inundation of 1966.”

  At this gloomy prediction the director of the Correr started out of his chair. “Nineteen sixty-six! You can’t mean it, not again! But the water was one hundred twenty-five centimeters deep in the piazza in 1966!”

  The mayor seemed to take pleasure in apocalyptic pronouncements. His voice became even more sepulchral as he drew forth another chart showing the distribution of high water throughout the city. “This map has been provided by our friends in AMAV,” he said, smiling at their representative. “These areas in yellow remain relatively dry, whereas these in light blue”—he tapped the chart—“are inundated, and this one in dark blue—” He pointed at the piazza and fell silent. There was no need to finish the sentence.

  “If only,” said the man from the Consorzio Venezia Nuova, “we had been permitted to install our floodgates at the three points of entry of the Adriatic into the lagoon, this problem would never again arise. As you are all well aware, our scale model has been working perfectly. We are ready to go.”

  It was a sore point. The mayor started to say something, then controlled himself.

  Sam Bell looked up at the ceiling painting of two beautiful fat women by Veronese, Venice Receiving the Ducal Cap from Juno, and wished the gods and goddesses hovering over the city were interested in more important matters.

  He spoke up. “Aren’t we the lucky ones! It’s our privilege to be flooded the deepest.” He looked around the table. “But we’ve all been through it before. I think we’ve all learned how to protect our buildings from acqua alta. In the Marciana, per esempio, we have a system of four teams. They are trained to go to work at once in cases of flood emergency. But of course I’ll talk to the director and see what else we can do. Thank you for the warning.”

  “As an acting procurator of San Marco,” said a stranger in a loud voice, “I will also take whatever steps may be necessary.”

  Sam glanced down the table and realized that the man was not a total stranger. Lucia Costanza had introduced him as her assistant, Signor Bernardi. Then, later, on the day after her disappearance, quest’ idiota had intimated that she was a thief. Was this upstart pretending to take her place? Sam sank back in his chair as Bernardi talked interminably, managing to be imprecise and vague while enumerating all the measures that they in the Palazzo Patriarcale were going to take against high water, namely measures 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, and 6.

  Sam stopped listening. It occurred to him that Bernardi deserved a place in his Society of Bores. The more the man droned on, the higher Sam raised him in the hierarchy, inventing dazzling upper reaches. When Bernardi sat down he had achieved the level of Knight Errant Bore in the Thirty-third Degree.

  CHAPTER 22

  Ursula had a doll. It was an anorexic platinum blond Barbie doll. To the child it was another self, a friend, something to cherish.

  Her grandmother loathed the doll, and refused to give Ursula pieces of fabric for the making of doll dresses. “Really, Ursula, that creature is a piece of outrageous commercial exploitation. I can’t bear to look at it.”

  One day Mary Kelly found Ursula making the doll a dress. “Oh, Ursula, what a pretty doll. What’s her name?”

  Ursula looked at her warily. “It’s Ursula.”

  “Ursula? The same as yours? Well, I like the two Ursulas.” Mary sat down and watched the child pull down over the doll’s head a bunchy outfit of gauzy blue cloth. The side seams had not been stitched. The dress was held together with big X’s sewn into the corners.

  Mary reached out and touched it. “What lovely material. If you have more of it, I could help you make something else.”

  Ursula’s face broke into a wide smile. Without a word she jumped up and ran to her room. When she came back she was dragging one of her own dresses, a flouncy pale blue article with ruffles. It looked expensive. A large piece had been hacked out of the skirt.

  Mary guessed that the little girl would soon be in terrible trouble. “I’ll tell you what, why don’t you and I go shopping and buy a few pieces of pretty stuff? You know, a little velveteen, and some ribbon and lace edging?”

  “Oh, yes,” breathed Ursula.

  “But first—may I?” Mary took the doll. “Look, if you made some darts, the dress would fit better.” With Ursula’s permission she took the dress off the doll and explained. The little girl grasped the idea at once, and bounced up to find a paper of pins.

  They were hard at work, teacher and pupil, when Mrs. Wellesley burst in, her painting materials under her arm, and complained bitterly about the weather. “I had to stop in the middle,” she said, showing Mary a sheet of blotched watercolor paper. “I couldn’t finish.” Then suddenly her attention sharpened, and she stared at the vandalized dress.

  At once there was an uncomfortable scene. It appeared that the dress had been a birthday present from Mrs. Wellesley. And then she began on the doll. “Oh, that horrible creature! Ursula, where’s that really beautiful doll I bought you on Via Madonetta Meloni? Oh, Mrs. Kelly, it’s the loveliest doll. Go get it, dear. I want to show it to Mrs. Kelly.”

  Ursula got up slowly and retreated to her room. She did not come back. It was soon evident that another crisis was impending, and Mary excused herself. As she headed for the stairs she heard the brazen voice of Mrs. Wellesley shrieking at her granddaughter, “Ursula? Where are you? What on earth are you doing?”

  CHAPTER 23

  Mary no longer wandered alone around the city of Venice. These days her explorations were often accompanied by the good-looking doctor she had met in front of the house of Tintoretto. They met again the day after, to climb the spiral staircase of the Palazzo Contarini del Bovolo. At the top of the winding stairs there was a broad view of the city. Bulky in the foreground rose the framework for the new walls of the concert hall of La Fenice, which had been destroyed by fire.

  Henchard stood beside her, identifying landmarks, pointing out church towers.

  “Doctor Visconti,” said Mary, looking dreamily at the bulbous domes of San Marco, “are you sure you have time for this? I should think your schedule would be too full of—what?—surgery and appointments with patients, and—”

  “No, no, I have plenty of time. Surgery
’s first thing in the morning. Ordinary appointments are in the afternoon, but there aren’t very many right now. At the moment my fellow citizens seem to be fairly healthy. Except, of course, for a few sad cases. There are always some of those.” Henchard was standing close to Mary, his shoulder against hers. He turned and said gently, “Please call me Richard.”

  Again he took her to lunch, this time at a famous place, the Osteria ai Assassini.

  “What a horrible name,” said Mary. “Where does it come from?”

  “I don’t have the faintest idea.” Henchard lifted his glass. “To the assassins!”

  She touched her glass against his. “To their victims!”

  They made other journeys around the city, exploring the Naval Museum and the Arsenal and a couple of palaces where famous people had died, Ca’ Rezzonico (Browning) and Vendramin-Calergi (Verdi). Next week, promised Henchard, they would go by vaporetto to the island of Murano to see the blowing of glass.

  It was all perfectly innocent. It hardly seemed worthwhile to say anything to Homer about it, and Mary didn’t.

  For the days when Richard was too busy to join her, Mary set herself a new project, making friends with Sam Bell’s daughter, Ursula. The poor child seemed so bereft. Her closed little face was sadder than ever. “Tell you what,” said Mary, “let’s go find those pretty pieces of fabric. I discovered a shop near Piazza San Marco. Would you like that?”

  The little girl’s face brightened. “Can we feed the pigeons?”

  Mary hated the pigeons in Piazza San Marco. “Why, of course. We’ll buy them some popcorn.”

  The vast square teemed with people. It was a lovely day. Tour guides conducted their flocks around the square. There were travelers from Munich—Siehe den löwen mit flügel? Es ist der löwe des Heiligen Mark—and a group of senior citizens from Paris—La Basilique Saint Marc est la plus célèbre eglise d’Europe. Admirez les quatre chevaux!—and schoolchildren from Verona—Questa chiesa è la Basilica di San Marco, costruita nel nono secolo per ospitare il corpo del santo. OK, ragazzi, avanti!

  Mary poured popcorn into Ursula’s hands and she held them out for the pigeons.

  They came at once, with a loud flapping of wings, landing on her hands, her arms and shoulders, pecking each other, snatching her popcorn. The little girl was ecstatic. Her laughing face was rosy and chubby.

  Mary tried to restrain her dislike for the pigeons, but they were so ugly, so greedy, so spoiled, so fat with the offerings of thousands of tourists. “Ready, Ursula? Shall we go into the church?”

  But Ursula hung back, remembering the priest who had said she was too young to kneel and whisper through the curtain. “No, grazie.”

  They moved away, followed by clouds of pigeons, and escaped into the crowded shopping lane called the Mercerie, looking for a place to buy gelato.

  “You’ve got a pretty feather in your hair,” said Mary, plucking it off. Ursula took the feather, smiling, and put it back on the top of her head.

  A blessing from above, thought Mary sentimentally, remembering the sign that had fallen from the sky like a sign of divine favor on the future emperor, the child Claudius. Why wasn’t a pigeon feather a lucky omen? Ursula needed all the help she could get.

  Next day after school Ursula stopped again at her favorite shop, because Mrs. Kelly had given her money to pay for pretty ribbons and flower-patterned calico and pink velveteen, and then she wouldn’t take back the leftover coins.

  “Which is it to be today, little one?” said the man behind the counter.

  Ursula considered. She had so many of them now. Only the less attractive ones were left. “Well, that one’s okay, I guess,” she said at last. “Grazie.”

  CHAPTER 24

  Sam had learned another damning fact about the fragments of wood from the Treasury of San Marco. After consulting a couple of sources in the library of the university—a silly book in English, The Trees Jesus Loved, and an exhaustive German treatise, Den Baumen des Biblischen Landes—he had come to the only possible conclusion. None of the little pieces came from trees that grew within a thousand miles of Jerusalem in the first century of the Christian era.

  There was no necessity for carbon dating. And there was no need to say anything yet to Father Urbano about the results of his examination, not until all the other relics had been looked at. Among them there might be one or two that were at least plausible.

  So these could go back to the Treasury, and he could ask for more. Sam called the number he had been given by Father Urbano. The phone buzzed and paused and buzzed. Somewhere in the depths of San Marco it was ringing and ringing. Sam had a vision of the telephone shrilling right there under the Ascension dome, setting up a clamor throughout all the glittering volumes of golden air. Answer that! one of the mosaic angels would shout, opening its tessellated mouth, and another would cry, It’s your turn, and then Saint Mark would have to rear up out of his sarcophagus and say, Pronto?

  “Pronto?” said the telephone, but it was only Father Urbano.

  Sam explained that he was finished with the first relics and would like to exchange them for more.

  “Tell me,” said Father Urbano eagerly, “what did you find out?”His voice trembled a little, and Sam guessed how much it mattered.

  “I’ll tell you when I come. You’ll send a guard to come with me?”

  “Certamente. At once.”

  But when the carabiniere arrived, Sam wasn’t ready. He had to rush back from the Marciana, apologize to the waiting officer, lead him upstairs into his study and gather up the relics in a hurry. Then they marched together along the Riva to the Piazzetta and the basilica, the carabiniere carrying the relics in a cardboard box sealed with mailing tape, holding it delicately in front of his stomach with both hands.

  The north entry into the basilica was sloppy with water, but the sacristy was up several steps and perfectly dry. Here Sam and the young officer watched Father Urbano open the tissue-paper packets of Sacro Legno and count, “Uno, due, tre, quattro.” He looked up at Sam. “Only four?”

  “But there should be five,” said the officer. “I brought you five last month, remember?”

  “You must have left one at home,” said Father Urbano, smiling doubtfully at Sam.

  Sam was dumbfounded. “I don’t think so.” They were looking at him with questioning faces. “But, good Lord, I must have.”

  “And there are only nine pieces of bone,” said Father Urbano, opening another packet and counting. “Didn’t I give you ten?”

  “Of course you did.” Sam gazed at the pitiful little bones. “I don’t know what to say. They must be still at home.”

  “Bene,” said the officer. “We’ll go and see.” His voice was pleasant, but Sam knew there’d be hell to pay if the lost relics were not returned.

  The journey was fruitless. Sam ransacked his study, but no other bone was to be found, nor any other fragment of sacred wood.

  “I will make a report to Father Urbano,” said the officer, his face expressionless.

  But then, to Sam’s astonishment, the priest was magnanimous. He called to say, “My dear Sam, I trust you. And to prove it, I have a surprise. The curator of the treasures in the Scuola di San Giovanni Evangelista has agreed to send me their reliquary. You know, the famous one containing their own piece of the True Cross.”

  “You mean the one in the cycle of paintings in the Accademia, that reliquary? The one that performed all those miracles?”

  “That’s the one.”

  Sam was flabbergasted. “Oh, thank you, Father. Of course I’ll be more careful than ever. Did you tell them I’ve lost some of your relics?”

  “No, no, that’s just between us for the moment. The officer has been sworn to secrecy. Once again, Sam, the loan is only for a month.”

  “But aren’t you putting yourself in danger of—forgive me, Father—burning at the stake, or at least excommunication? I mean, if anything should happen to their glorious reliquary?”

  Father Ur
bano’s voice turned solemn. “I’m not doing this for you, my dear Sam. Nor even for the sake of the truth. I can’t help thinking of my friend Dottoressa Costanza, who made the original request. I honor it for her sake.”

  In the Scuola di San Giovanni Evangelista a famous reliquary contains a fragment of the True Cross. Its miracles are celebrated in a cycle of paintings in the Gallerie dell’Accademia.

  CHAPTER 25

  Next day Sam took the afternoon off to visit the Accademia. He wanted to refresh his memory about the painted miracles of the relic of the True Cross, the one he was about to examine.

  He took Mary Kelly along. She met him in his office, and together they boarded the vaporetto near the foot of the Piazzetta. That is, they boarded it after Sam missed his footing and nearly fell off the floating dock.

  Mary grabbed him, and so did a couple of passengers, and so did the girl with the rope in her hand. “Are you all right, Sam?” said Mary, looking at him with concern.

  He was embarrassed. “Of course I’m all right.” Balancing himself with his legs spread wide apart, he gripped the railing as the vaporetto shuddered away from the dock.

  It was only a few stops to the small square in front of the Accademia. When they disembarked, Sam bought a Gazzettino at the kiosk and glanced at it quickly for any scrap of information about Dottoressa Costanza.

  “Any news?” said Mary, who had lost track of what was going on in the world.

  “Nothing important,” said Sam, folding the paper and stuffing it in his pocket.

  The little square was busy with tourists. They were buying postcards and souvenirs and taking pictures of the gondoliers who stood there idly, smoking and waiting for customers.

  “Quanto costa?” said a boy, egged on by his girlfriend. They were part of a crowd of kids on holiday from Naples.