The Wolves of Venice

by Alex Connor

  “Do I wait for him?”

  Cara stared into the dull face. “If you do not wait for him, how can he follow you back here?”

  Half running, half walking, the servant made his reluctant way to the ghetto in the Cannaregio, the wealth of the Gianetti estate and gardens fading as he entered the industrial and utilitarian part of the city. The Cannaregio was situated an area of foundries, the fusing of metal being called ‘getto’, the term which was later bastardised into ‘ghetto’ when the area was segregated off from the rest of Venice in 1512. That was what the servant had heard, but what did it matter? If he was honest, the Republic was populated by every race and colour of man - merchants from Europe; traders from the Far East and slaves from Africa - no one was strange, no one was an outsider in a city of outsiders.

  It was dark when he reached the iron gates of the ghetto, locked and bolted, a lamp lit above in the archway. Timidly he took hold of the chain and rang the bell, the sound resonating in the alleyway behind. No one came, the servant peering through the railings and catching sight of a square, flanked by cramped, high rising buildings; flat faced, blank, without charm.

  “Hela?”

  The servant jumped as a man appeared suddenly before him. His was bearded, but not like a Venetian, this was a full beard with ear locks. “Kenen ikh helfn ir?” the man paused, then spoke in Italian. “Can I assist you?”

  “My master is ill. I’ve been sent for the medico.”

  “We have many doctors here. Do you have a name?”

  The servant shook his head, confused. “I just need a doctor!”

  “I understand.” The man replied, “Ira Tabat is here —”

  The servant nodded hurriedly. “Then fetch him, fetch Ira Tabat.”

  Chapter Nine

  With the servant holding the candelabra high above his head, Ira followed the man up the echoing Carerra marble staircase towards the first floor of the palazzo. On the first landing a silk sofa languished under a Titian portrait of a nude, and on either side of the doors to the master suite were blackamoors holding torcheres aloft, the candlelight reflected on the black marble floor. The silence was depressing, only the sound of muted voices providing a solemn chorus below.

  Aware of his shabbiness, Ira moved into a bedroom which could have housed five Jewish families in the ghetto, a fire banked high up the stone chimney, the curtains like closed eyes against the night outside. Placing his medical bag on the chair next to the bed, Ira stared at his patient, not for the first time wondering at the loss of power which came with sickness.

  Jacopo Gianetti was breathing irregularly, his eyes moving under the lids, his hands clasping and unclasping rhythmically.

  “Who found him like this?”

  “I did, signor” Cara stammered, staring at the dark haired, bearded man wearing a coarse woven tunic and breeches, his boots matt with dust. “He was rambling.”

  “I see.”

  “How long ago was this?”

  “No more than an hour.”

  “I need some water and a bowl, please.”

  She nodded, bringing it over to Ira and laying it beside the bed. “Anything else you need, dottore?”

  “I would like to speak to his relatives. Are his family here?”

  A pause passed between them, Cara pulling an uncomfortable face. “Only his son, Marco.”

  “Then please bring him to me.”

  “He can’t come here.”

  Ira paused. “Why not?”

  “Signor Gianetti requested it.”

  “But you said the patient was rambling, delirious. He must not have meant to banish his son.”

  She folded her fleshy arms. “Oh, he will have meant it.” Glancing over to check that her master was unconscious and could not hear what she was about to divulge, Cara continued. “They are apart… separate.”

  “Estranged?”

  She nodded. “Si, estraniato.”

  “For how long?”

  “Forever.”

  “Forever?”

  “Since Marco was born. Since then.”

  Surprised, Ira looked back to the patient, checked his pulse and temperature, examined his skin, eyes and limbs, all of it overlooked by the stout maid. Ten minutes passed, then another, before Ira wiped Jacopo’s face and then smelt the cloth.

  “Good God!” Cara exclaimed, crossing herself.

  “Some disease has a scent, signora, which will help me to make a diagnosis.” he explained. “But there is no scent or odour on the cloth.” He dropped it beside the basin, washed his hands and dried them on a towel. Finally, he shrugged. “If the mountain will not come to Mohammed, Mohammed must go to the mountain.”

  Later, when he thought back, Ira would remember his first impression of Marco Gianetti. Shown into a library on the ground floor, he found Jacopo’s estranged heir feeding a macaw a sliver of black chocolate. He was so intent on the task that he had not heard Ira’s entry and remained cooing like a child at the factitious bird.

  “Signor Gianetti?”

  Marco turned, smiled with all the humour of the world, and nodded. “Si, and you are Dottore Tabat?”

  “Si.” Ira agreed.

  “How is my father?”

  “He does not eat enough. He is malnourished, underweight and dry, he does not have enough liquid in his body.” Ira watched Marco slide into a winged chair by the fire, his legs outstretched as Ira continued. “Does he have a poor appetite?”

  “We do not eat together, I would not know.”

  The reply bewildered Ira. In Jewish families, however large, however small, meal times were communal, an opportunity to bond, to converse, sometimes to disagree. Conditions in the ghetto were cramped, but in summer time meals were eaten outdoors, long tables employed to handle the numbers as the women served the food. No one ate alone, unless they chose to, instead everyone was included, the breaking of bread sacrosanct. And yet, in the cadaverous Gianetti palazzo, two men ate apart, with a multitude of angry, empty rooms between them.

  “Who cooks for you?”

  “Cara cooks for me, has done since I was a child, but my father has a few chefs. And of course he often attends functions elsewhere in the city... I never suspected he would starve to death.”

  “Malnutrition is not the same as starvation.” Ira replied, but he knew about both. “If you will allow me, I will write up a diet for him and maybe I should give it to your cook, Cara?”

  Marco nodded, “She will help. She is a good cook, all good cooks are fat. The Doge says that no one should trust a thin cook... Why was my father confused?”

  “Lack of fluid affects the brain, and the heat —”

  “It’s not hot!”

  “—it is in his room,” Ira replied, “I would advice you to have the fire dampened down, sweating causes more loss of fluid.”

  “So you don’t intend to bleed my father?”

  “Why would I bleed him?” Ira replied.

  “Isn’t that what medicos do?”

  “Bleeding your father would only weaken him further.”

  “Oh, I see,” Marco replied, thinking for a long instant. “Where did you train to become a doctor?”

  “In Florence.”

  “Not Venice?”

  “No,” Ira replied, knowing that more information was wanted. “We fled that city and came to Venice, to the ghetto. The Republic is tolerant of Jews.”

  “But they still lock you in at night.”

  Ira shrugged. “And yet here I am, I am free.”

  “Because you are a doctor, only because of that. You are not a free man.” Marco replied, immediately flushing. “I had no intention of being rude, forgive me! I have never been to the ghetto or seen how you live.” He was genuinely remorseful. “Is life... pleasant there?”

  “We are safe.”

  “We are safe...’” Marco repeated, his expression shocked. “Were your lives in danger before?”

  “Many countries fear the Jews. It has been this way for centuries. And
for centuries we have settled in a city and then been moved on because of persecution. European Jewry is transient.”

  “My God, how little I know...” Marco remarked, then changed the subject. “They say that Jews make the best doctors.”

  “And the worst patients.”

  “But you,” Marco paused, then carried on. “you are not like the usual Jewish doctors that have attended this family in the past. My grandparents favoured Isaac Schulman —”

  “Who is now dead.”

  “I didn’t know that,” Marco replied, his eyebrows raised. “Are you replacing him?”

  Ira shrugged. “I doubt it. There are many preferred doctors that would be favoured before me.”

  “Is that why you are……“

  “Poor?”

  Marco pulled a face. “Poor, but also much younger than they are! And besides, many of them have come here with reputations, Venetians who will recommend them, advance their careers in the city.”

  “But they will still be Jews.”

  “And still richer than you.”

  Despite himself, Ira smiled. “I am not a politician. I cannot court people, I never could. I find socialising difficult. Not the work, I never find a moment of my work boring or tedious - but the flattery, the obsequious, the sycophantic cringing that takes place...I couldn’t do that.”

  “It is a stiff neck that will not bend.” Marco replied wryly, changing the subject. “Are you hungry?”

  “I am working.”

  “I know, but are you hungry?” Marco repeated, “one thing does not exclude the other, does it? Dine with me, dottore, and be my guest.” He urged him. “We cannot have another starving man on our hands.”

  Whether he was lonely or curious Ira wasn’t sure, but Marco was a gracious host. Pressed into service, the weighty Cara prepared a light meal of sea food, the hard shelled and soft shelled crabs of the Lagoon cooked in butter, a dozen of the tiny octopus fried, their legs curled inwards, sepia brown. The scent was not like the fish in the ghetto; this sea food had an ozone taste and a sweet aroma, sea fresh, the Adriatic only giving up her spoils hours earlier.

  Several times whilst his host was eating, Ira had snatched quick glances, judging Marco to be around twenty five, his face clean shaven, his mouth upturned at the corners. Good humour was evident from his open expression and soft eyes, and he spoke as a child would, without censoring himself. Ira imagined how attractive he would be to women, how his warmth would pull in admirers likes a tree pulls in the sun.

  “That was excellent.” Ira said, tearing into his bread and then wiping his plate clean, Marco watching.

  “You enjoyed your meal?”

  “How could I not?”

  “Aren’t Jews usually allowed to eat fish?”

  He laughed. “We can eat fish, but we cannot afford delicacies like these.” Embarrassed, Ira reached for his glass, Marco pushing away the water pitcher and holding out the wine carafe to him. “Water is for fish. Wine is for men.”

  “I do not drink.”

  “Everyone drinks in Venice.”

  “Except me.”

  “Because you are a Jew?”

  “No. Because I chose not to drink.”

  “Sacrilegio!” Marco teased him. “You drink water, wine is only water from a grape.”

  Ira shook his head. “You make a very convincing argument.”

  “So you will have some wine?”

  “No.”

  Laughing, Marco leaned back in his seat, the flames flaring up in the fire grate, a quick white curl of smoke leaping upwards like a dancer.

  “Is the weather very different in Florence?”

  “We have been here for a while now, I don’t remember much about the weather where we lived before.”

  “But here the city can be cold in winter, and damp. Foggy.”

  Silently Marco gazed into his glass, watching Ira through the wine, his dark face infused with unnatural colour. A Jew, Marco thought, he had never met a Jew before. He had known about the ghetto, but never been there, and had heard so many rumours that the residents were strange. Uncommunicative, taciturn. Foreign.

  But then virtually everyone in Venice was a foreigner, unless you were born in the city. As he had been. As had all the Gianetti before him, generations going back centuries, powerful, prosperous, the friends and confidantes of the Doges. Just as his father was. Naturally with his inherited wealth Jacopo had had no need to work, but money was always a great enticement to a avaricious man, and for decades he had assiduously added to his portfolio of premises. In Venice and beyond.

  “And yet he is starving.” Marco said out loud.

  Ira raised his eyebrows. “What?”

  “I was thinking it seems strange that for all my father’s wealth, for all his deals and schemes and riches, he is hungry. Perhaps it is not his body that is hungry, but his greed.” Marco leaned over the supper table towards Ira. “Do you think there is an organ for greed? A little mean organ tucked behind the stomach? Perhaps it gurgles when it isn’t fed, or farts when it’s bloated.” he pointed to his gut and put his head on one side. “An organ some men can never satisfy.”

  “You have a wondrous imagination.” Ira replied, amused. “You should be a writer.”

  “No, no! I” he said with a flourish, “am a painter...”

  Ira was caught by surprise. He had thought that the offspring of such a wealthy family would not have to work, especially as painters were regarded with little respect.

  “… well, not a painter in reality. I am an eternal apprentice” Marco continued. “A little old to be one, I grant you, but although I entered my master’s studio ten years ago it would seem I have advanced little. He allows me to paint a tree in the background and now and then a cloud!” He pretended to be dismayed then drained his glass, smiling at his own limitations. “My master is paid very well to keep me in permanent occupation and besides, he likes me, I amuse him, and so he has found other work for me to do. I have become un cavallo da lavoro veneziano.”

  “A what?”

  “We are a very elegant breed of steed. We carry and fetch for our masters and wear the livery of the Gianetti household.” He could see that Ira was still puzzled and explained. “I am a Venetian workhorse! I am not, nor ever will be, like the great bronze horses of St Marks.”

  Shaking his head, Ira laughed. “I never know when you are telling the truth or lying.”

  “You will learn to know.” Marco replied, “Friends learn things from one another as their friendship progresses.” He could see Ira’s back straighten in the chair, a coolness emanating from him. “It seems that now I have insulted you —”

  “On the contrary I have insulted you. You have given me a fine meal and I have —”

  “Reacted like a bear poked with a needle.” Marco replied bluntly. “But I said what I thought, as I always do. If you are truly discomforted, please make your leave. I offered friendship, but if the offer is rejected I bear you no malice.”

  Ira hesitated. “Your father would not like an association between his heir and a Jew.”

  “My father likes nothing I do, so it would make little difference. Before long he will find some girl for me to marry – she will, of necessity, have a fortune to feed that needy greed organ of his, but it will be merely a matter for politics, not love. Love I find elsewhere.” He winked at Ira. “Have you ever been in love?”

  He faltered, caught off guard. “I should see to your father —”

  “You saw him only an hour ago and Cara is sitting with him, together with the nurse you sent for.” Marco shrugged. “But if you wish to go, please do. I do not mean to detain you or make you uncomfortable —”

  Wrong footed, Ira was on the defensive.

  “Why are you speaking to me like this? Why the questions? Why the familiarity? Do you want to know something in particular? If so, please ask me, I will answer you as best I can, but we are not equals and that much we both know.” He straightened up, anger barely contro
lled. Confusion made him irrational, hostile. “Seafood from the lagoon, finest wine, conversations that would be more in place between confidantes, why?”

  “I am not a sodomite.”

  “Did I accuse you of such!”

  Marco was imperturbable. “I thought perhaps you misread my actions. I merely wanted you to know that I like you - but not as a bedfellow.” He put his head on one side. “Look how you scowl at me, suspecting manipulation where there is none.”

  But Ira was still wary.

  “Maybe I am misjudging you. Or perhaps, like so many rich Venetians, you want to know more about the poor Jews that you lock up at night? Does the Republic enjoy its human zoo? Do we amuse you like Pucchinello from the Commedia del Arte? With our ear locks, funny little hats and yellow patches on our clothes? Perhaps you are gathering details from me to pass on to your friends later? Poking fun at the ant hill of Jews in their midst —”

  “I have no friends.”

  Ira paused, shaking his head. “I… I apologise. I was rude —”

  “Yes, you were,” Marco agreed, “and you were wrong. You will not believe me, but I will tell you again - I am not a man that plans. Plotting is alien to my nature, I merely respond. My father would say that is the mark of stupidity.”

  “Your father would be wrong.”

  “My father is never wrong. He is descended from a line of perfect Men, every one of them more cultured and more perfect than the last. Until myself,” he smiled, Ira relaxing. “I did lie un po when I said I had no friends. I have many acquaintances and some beautiful female company when I need, but you are of particular interest to me. You and I are outcasts —”

  “An outcast in a palace?”

  “An outcast is an outcast despite his living quarters. Do not be surly, Ira, you have no enemy here.”

  For a moment Ira made no response, then moved to the door. “I will call tomorrow to see how your father is progressing. Please send for me if he worsens.” He turned to go, then turned back. “You said you were a painter, who is your master? In whose studio do you work?”

  Marco made a mock salute. “I am the brush washer and chief carrier of Tintoretto. Il Furioso, the glory of Venice.”