The Shoemaker's Wife

by Adriana Trigiani

  Marco slowly reached into his pocket and removed an envelope. He placed the envelope on the table and rested his hand upon it. He looked at Ciro. “For Enza.”

  “This is not necessary,” Ciro said.

  “It is to me. I am giving you permission to marry my firstborn daughter. Men hope for sons, but I will tell you that there was never a son who brought a father more joy than my Enza did for me. There are daughters and daughters, but there is only one Enza. I entrust you with my own flesh and blood. I expect you to honor that trust.”

  “I will, sir.”

  “Our home on the mountain was completed nearly one year ago. I could have gone home then. Instead, I stayed on to make this purse for my daughter’s dowry. It brings me contentment to know that this small sacrifice will make it easier for my daughter as she starts her new life. One year of my forty-six on this earth is a pittance compared to what she means to me.”

  “I thank you, Signore. And I won’t forget how hard you worked to provide this for Enza.”

  Marco rose from his chair. Ciro stood. Enza pushed the door open and peeked into the room.

  “It’s all settled, Enza,” Marco said.

  Enza ran to her father and put her arms around him. “Your happiness is mine,” he whispered in his daughter’s ear. “Be happy, Enza.”

  Later that same night, Enza slipped down to the library in the Milbank House, striking a match to light a small work lamp on the writing table. She pulled a clean sheet of linen paper out of the desk drawer, along with a fountain pen.

  November 30, 1918

  Dear Signora Ramunni,

  It is with a heavy heart that I resign my position as seamstress in the costume shop of the Metropolitan Opera House. I have loved every moment of my job, even when the hours were long and it seemed we might not finish a project in time for the opening night curtain. I will never forget the privilege of standing in the wings and watching as costumes we created by the labor of our own hands delight the audience through color, line, shape, drape, and form, the essential elements you taught me.

  Laura and I often reminisce about the day you hired us. We thought then, as we do today, that no greater lady ever graced the opera. In every way, you made our work sing, which was always the point.

  As I leave you, the staff, my coworkers, and the great singers, please know you will always be in my heart, and when I think of you, I will say a prayer of gratitude. I wish you the best in all aspects of your life, as I know no one is more deserving of happiness than you. Your generosity to me will hopefully be repaid tenfold in the years to come. Mille grazie, Signora. Auguri! Auguri!

  Sincerely yours,

  Enza Ravanelli

  Station 3, Singer machine 17

  Enza carefully placed the letter on the blotter. As the ink dried, her eyes filled with tears. This was the true meaning of sacrifice. Ciro had made a plan to start their life together in Minnesota, and Enza had agreed. Ciro had laid out the plan like a cartographer, explaining where in Minnesota they would go, and how he and Luigi planned to start their business. Enza had liked Pappina from the first moment she met her at the Zanetti’s shop so many years ago, so she knew that she would begin this journey with a good friend who would be there for her.

  She had no regrets about her choice to go to Minnesota, or about marriage to Ciro, but she knew she would always pine for the Metropolitan Opera. Enza remembered sitting at this very desk and writing a letter seeking employment at the opera house. She smiled when she thought about the silly samples she had placed in the envelope, showing off her technique with beadwork and embroidery, along with Laura’s effortless stitchwork. Serafina Ramunni had overlooked Enza’s insouciance and hired them anyway. And what a glorious career path had ensued, in service to great singers and actors, who relied on the costumes they built to tell the timeless stories in song of the great operas. It was a small thing, Enza knew, and yet, it wasn’t. Their garments were part of the spectacle, and the show had been spectacular.

  Enza knew what it was to stand in the pale blue edge of the spotlight, to serve the Great Voice, and now, hopeful she had made the right decision, she was more than ready to serve another, this time around: the man she loved.

  Ciro Augustus Lazzari and Vincenza Ravanelli were married at Holy Rosary Church on Pearl Street in lower Manhattan on December 7, 1918. Luigi Latini served as best man, while Laura Heery was maid of honor.

  Colin Chapin read the scripture. Pappina Latini laid a bouquet at the feet of the shrine of the Blessed Lady, unable to walk behind the communion rail because she was with child. Enza wore blue and carried the black leather-bound prayer book that Eduardo had given to Ciro, over which she placed a bouquet of red roses.

  After the ceremony, they brought Marco to Pier 43 to board the SS Taormina for Naples. After the nine-day crossing, he would take the train north to Bergamo, where he would be reunited with his wife and children, who could not wait to show him the house he and Enza had made possible.

  Enza stood at the foot of the gangplank to say good-bye to her father. She pulled a red rose from her bouquet, snapped off the stem, and placed it in the buttonhole of her father’s coat.

  Marco remembered standing on this pier years ago, afraid that Enza had died and he would never see her again. He also remembered putting his hand in the pocket of his old boiled-wool coat and feeling a small patch of fine silk where Enza had lined the inside. This was a girl who sought in every way she could to make the world beautiful, to give comfort when it was least expected and joy where it was most needed. His heart was breaking that he could not take her home, but he knew that a good father would support her desire to build her own house and a new life with the man she loved. And so he did.

  “Papa, write to me.”

  “I will. And you must write to me,” he said through his tears.

  “I will,” she promised, reaching into her pocket for the wedding handkerchief that Laura had made, with her initials and Ciro’s intertwined.

  Marco put his arms around his daughter. She took in the scent of the tobacco and clean lemon that she had come to know as his, and held on just a moment longer until the horn sounded aboard the ship. Marco turned and went up the gangplank. As the aisle of metal was lifted and secured, Enza didn’t move from her spot on the pier. She stood and searched the layers of the decks, until she found her father and the red rose. He took off his hat and waved it in her direction. She waved good-bye to him and smiled, and knew that from this great distance, he would not be able to see her tears. And she couldn’t see his either, but she knew for sure he would not stop weeping for the loss of her for the rest of his life.

  Enza joined her new husband and friends behind the fishing net that separated the pier from the docks. Ciro put his arms around Enza and held her for a long time. To her relief and delight, his embrace helped her endure what she had just lost.

  Afterward, Laura, Colin, Luigi, Pappina, Enza, and Ciro celebrated their nuptials with a breakfast feast in the atrium of the Plaza Hotel under the Tiffany skylight. Ciro outlined his business plan, while Colin offered suggestions. Laura looked over at Enza, who smiled blissfully at the ring on her finger, a glistening gold signet ring with a C engraved upon it, which Ciro had worn since he was a boy.

  There were many toasts at their table, wishes for long lives and many years of happiness. But there was one very special toast in honor of Enza’s new citizenship. Ciro’s citizenship had been awarded to him on the day he received his honorable discharge from the U.S. Army. Now, his legal wife shared in that gift. The sacrament, the vows, the ring, and the license made Enza an American at last.

  The entrance to the Plaza Hotel was heated by small cast-iron ovens tucked discreetly behind velvet ropes along the red-carpeted stairs of the entry. A soft snow had begun to fall. Colin pulled Ciro, Luigi, and Pappina aside so Laura would be able to say good-bye to Enza.

  “Are you happy?” Laura asked. “Don’t answer that. You’d better be, and I know you are.” Her voice bro
ke.

  “Please don’t cry.” Enza tried to reassure her. “I swear. This is not the end of anything.”

  “But we had our beginning together. And I can’t imagine my life without you.” Laura fished in her purse for her handkerchief. “I don’t want you to go. It’s so selfish of me.”

  “There is no way I could ever thank you for all you’ve done for me. You made me the most beautiful hats I’ll ever wear. You always split your pie with me at the Automat, even when you were very hungry. You almost killed a man for my honor with a pair of factory scissors. You gave me words. I couldn’t read or write English until I met you.”

  “And I wouldn’t have been able to speak to Enrico Caruso without the Italian you taught me. So you see, we’re even.”

  “Are we?” Enza cried.

  “All right, maybe I pictured us together forever, and maybe someday, we will be. But I want you to know, if you need me, any time, you write to me and I’ll run to Minnesota. On foot. You understand?”

  “And the same goes for me. I’ll come back when you need me,” Enza promised.

  “And start writing me a letter first thing in the morning on the train. You can mail it in Chicago.”

  “Come on, girls, we have to make the train,” Colin said. He loaded everyone into his Ardsley. There were a lot of laughs in the ride between Fifty-ninth Street and Penn Station—not enough to last a lifetime, but enough to have made this wedding-day departure end on a joyous and gay note.

  At three o’clock that afternoon under a gray sky the color of old velvet, the Latinis and the Lazzaris arrived at Penn Station, bought four one-way tickets on the Broadway Limited, and boarded the train for Chicago, where they would transfer trains to take them to Minneapolis, Minnesota. Colin and Laura saw them off, watching until the silver train disappeared like a sewing needle into thick wool.

  Ciro and Luigi were business partners. They would make shoes and repair them, just as they had on Mulberry Street, except this time, the purse would be theirs to keep.

  The Caterina Shoe Company was born.

  The dining car on the Broadway Limited was elegant, with polished walnut walls and leather banquettes, like a sophisticated Manhattan restaurant on wheels. The tables were dressed in starched white linen, crystal glasses, white china trimmed in green, and silverware buffed to a sparkling sheen.

  Small vases with white roses were clipped to the window sashes. A series of eight booths, four on either side, with an aisle down the center, were connected to the kitchen car. The leather seats in the booths were forest green to match the china.

  “I can barely fit in the booth,” Pappina said, laughing. “How long is this ride?”

  “Twenty hours,” Luigi said as he adjusted the cushion on the seat to make his wife more comfortable.

  Enza and Ciro slipped into the booth across from them.

  “They just got married,” Luigi said to the Negro waiter.

  “Congratulations,” the waiter said to Enza and Ciro. His crisp black uniform with a gold bar on the chest made him look like a general. “I’ll see you have some cake.”

  Ciro kissed Enza on her cheek.

  “Okay, boys. You’ve got us where you want us. We know what you’re going to do in Minnesota, but what about us? You’ll be busy very soon”—Enza smiled at Pappina, happy for the new baby—“but what am I going to do?”

  “Be my wife,” Ciro said.

  “I like to work. There’s no opera company in Hibbing, but I could sew for a living. After all, we’ve been living in New York City, and I could keep track of the latest fashions before they go west. I could sew some lovely dresses and coats with a Paris flair for the girls on the Iron Range.”

  “I sew a little,” Pappina offered. “But nothing fancy.”

  “Well, we’ll sew clothes, curtains, layettes—whatever they need, we’ll make,” Enza said warmly.

  Ciro took Enza’s hand and kissed it.

  Enza was surprised that she was filled with anticipation for their new life together in a new place. New York City had meant everything to her. She had reveled in the excitement, glamour, and sophistication of the port city, and she couldn’t, before Ciro returned, have imagined living anywhere else in the United States.

  But she was beginning to understand that her great love for Ciro transcended every other desire. She had heard of the power of this kind of love, but was certain it would never happen to her. Now she understood why her father could leave the mountain and the woman he loved for so many years. It was only to serve her that he could leave her. And now Enza was in the same position. Building a new life meant sacrifice, but it also meant that fulfillment and surprise would be hers, and she would have a wonderful husband to share it with. She couldn’t imagine a better reason to start over again.

  Enza trusted Ciro with her future. This did not mean a vow of obedience like the one the priest intoned at their wedding. Enza had long ago rejected second-class status for women; she’d left those notions behind when she earned her first paycheck. Her plans for sewing on the Iron Range weren’t about busywork, or keeping up with her craft, or earning pocket money. In fact, she intended to contribute to their home life and be a full and equal partner in the young marriage that they had yet to define.

  Ciro had made a bet in proposing to her, and on that same day, Enza made a bet of her own. She was putting her money, effort, and future into a partnership that she believed could not fail. She was going to pour all of herself into her marriage: love would sustain them, and trust would see them through. That was her belief, and that’s how she was raised. When she spun the gold ring on her finger, it was as though it was made for her, but it meant even more that her husband had worn it since he was a boy. She was a part of his history now.

  Ciro held Enza in his arms in the top berth of the sleeping car. He pushed the curtains over the window aside. The countryside of Pennsylvania, with its low rolling hills, was purple in the moonlight as they sped through it.

  Occasionally a flicker of light from the lamp of a distant barn or the glimmer from the flame of a candle in a window lit up the dark briefly like the dance of a firefly. But mostly, the world rolled away from them as they pressed forward to their future.

  They had celebrated their wedding with cake and champagne, and a silver dish filled with small chocolates dusted in powdered sugar and dressed with small candy violets. They laughed and told stories in Italian, immersed in the rhythms of the language of their birth.

  When they returned to the sleeping cars, Enza changed into a peignoir set that Laura had made for her, a floor-length white satin gown with a ruched bed jacket. Enza thought it too fancy for the train, but she knew Laura would be upset if she didn’t wear it. Plus, she felt like Mae Murray in the arms of Rudolph Valentino.

  The steady purr of the engine and the smooth coasting of the wheels made a kind of music as the train moved through the night. As they made love for the first time, Enza thought it was like flying, and love felt like a dream state, where she was safe, in a place and time she hoped never to leave. She understood at long last why this act, at once so natural and so universal, was also considered sacred.

  Ciro was experienced in these matters, but he felt enveloped by Enza and treasured each of her kisses. Her expression of love for him meant even more in reality than it had in his imagination. His body wasn’t his own anymore, but hers, and there was nothing he would deny her; whatever she wanted, whatever small happiness he could provide, he would search the world to bring it to her. Ciro knew Enza had sacrificed for him; she had given up a good life on the gamble that he could build one. He held her trust in the highest regard, and he knew it was on loan.

  Enza responded to him without restraint. Her love filled the deepest places in his heart, healing the loneliness that had followed him since he left Eduardo at the train station in Bergamo. In Enza’s arms, Ciro felt whole. He could feel the possibilities of what they could become together, the thing he had reached for, and hoped for, a family of
his own.

  La famiglia.

  Ciro slid his hand up Enza’s hip to her waist and pulled her close. “When you love someone, you think you know everything about them. Tell me one thing I don’t know about you.” Ciro kissed her neck.

  “I have one hundred and six dollars in my purse.”

  Ciro laughed. “Good for you.”

  “It’s yours to open the shoe shop.”

  “Ours, you mean,” he corrected her.

  “Ours.” She laughed.

  “Have I taken you away from a life you loved?” Ciro asked her.

  “I’ll miss Laura and the opera. And the candied peanuts on the corner of Fortieth Street and Broadway.”

  “I’ll make sure you have your peanuts.”

  “Thank you, husband.”

  “How about Signor Caruso?”

  “Yes, I’ll miss him, too. But I guess I understood the words in the arias he sang. A happy life is about love—every note he sang reinforced it. I’ll miss how he made every person he met feel special. He made us all laugh. I’ve come to appreciate a good joke and the conversation of intelligent people. But I have that with you.”

  “Are you afraid?”

  “Why would I be afraid?”

  “We might get to Hibbing, and you won’t like it.”

  “Well, if I don’t like it, we’ll have to move.”

  Ciro laughed. “Va bene.”

  “It wasn’t at all like I thought it would be,” Enza said.

  “Getting married?”

  “Making love. It’s really a blessing, you know. To be that close. It has a certain beauty to it.”

  “Like you,” he said. “You know, my father said something to my brother, and I never realized what it meant until now. He said, ‘Beware the things of this world that can mean everything or nothing.’ But now I know it’s better when it means everything.” Ciro kissed her. He traced the small scar over her eye. It was barely discernible, the width of a thread and as long as an eyelash. “Where did you get this scar?”

  “In Hoboken.”

  “Did you fall?”