Simple Prayers

by Michael Golding

  “It's almost there!”

  “The last was a baby girl. We named her Maria, hoping that maybe the Blessed Virgin would intervene and allow us to keep her, but she was gone before we could lay her in her cradle.”

  “That's it, Miriam! You'e doing it! Here it comes!”

  A silence came over the hovel as the tiny infant sprang out of Miriam's body and into Siora Scabbri's hands. There was a moment of prayer — and then a great, healthy wail filled the room.

  “It's a boy!” cried Maria Luigi. “A beautiful baby boy!”

  “Has he got wings?” whispered Miriam. “Has he got bright blue wings?”

  “No wings, cara,” said the Vedova as she reached down to lift up the slimy newborn to view it. “Just a milky-white caul over his head.”

  “A caul!” said Armida Barbon.

  “That brings luck, Miriam,” said Siora Scabbri.

  The Vedova drew the sticky substance off the infant's head with the heel of her hand; then she lifted him up to Miriam's breast, where he eagerly sought the nipple.

  “No wings,” murmured Miriam. “No wings.”

  Siora Scabbri guided Miriam and the baby back to the bed. The Vedova Stampanini cut the umbilical cord with a sharp knife and placed a pair of sewing clips on the end. Then Maria Luigi took the baby into the other room, where she rubbed him from head to toe with salt, cleansed his palate and gums with acacia honey, and wrapped him tightly in swaddling bandages before returning him to Miriam.

  “Grazie,” Miriam said to the Vedova, her cheeks damp and glistening.

  The Vedova Stampanini said nothing. She merely sat by Miriam's side until both she and the newborn had fallen asleep. Then she went to the hearth and began dropping the studded figs into the kettle of dark wine — where they splashed like bits of sweet hail and then floated, calmly, to the surface.

  Chapter 15

  THROUGH THE COLD gray months of January and February the people of Riva di Pignoli did their best not to think about the spring. They worked on the reconstruction of the new village center, they stumbled through the fog up the Calle Alberi Grandi, they hunkered beside their hearths over bowls of pease pudding and plate after plate of dried baccala. The spring was a fancy — a memory — a dream. After last year's game of hide-and-go-seek, they knew better than to count on its arrival.

  As March eased the chill, however, and licked away the clouds of mist that swirled along the footpaths, they began to hear a faint singing. It started in the lagoon: beneath the surface of the winter waters the sea grass began to chant. The docks along the western shore began to stretch and sigh; if you listened closely in the early morning, or the hour between dusk and dinner, you could hear them creak a dry, plaintive melody upon the salty air. But clearest of all — if you paused beneath a pine tree for a quick rest or happened to wander into one of the sleeping fields, away from the voices of the village — was the low, rolling resonance that rose in a gentle arc from beneath the soil.

  It gave a lilt to Siora Bertinelli's step as she moved about her hovel making pastries in the shape of swans. It caused Anna Rizzardello to do a shin dance as she scraped the salting racks, and it turned Gesmundo Barbon's daily ritual of untangling the fishing nets into an interpretive fisherman's ballet. When people passed on the Calle Alberi Grandi, they linked arms and did a quick jig; Giuseppe Navo sneaked into the Vedova Stampanini's twice a day to do a turn and a low dip before the broth pot. The spring might not arrive with all the whirring and popping and fierce drama with which it had exploded upon the villagers the previous year, but the urge to dance that came over them made it clear that it would come.

  Albertino was determined that it come on schedule. So as the second construction of the campanìl, the campo, and the monument moved toward completion, he suggested to Piero that they arrange a special event to attract the fickle season's attention.

  “Perhaps we could light a bonfire,” he suggested. “Or ring the new bells until at least a blade of grass appears. We can't take the chance that this year it might not find us at all.”

  Piero needed no convincing. The completion of the new village center, after so much difficulty, was a milestone in Riva di Pignoli history. Spring or no spring, he intended to honor it with as lavish a celebration as the island had ever seen.

  Piero had worked hard the past two months. While the village had married itself to the reconstruction of the campanì l and the campo, he'd burrowed himself away in his corner of Beppe Guancio's hovel and devoted himself to resculpting the statue of Miriam. Where the first statue had expressed his passion, however, this one expressed his piety: he carefully fashioned an elegant Madonna and Child, with Miriam and her newborn infant as his models. He had not actually seen the baby, as Miriam was still in her postpartum confinement, but he'd received detailed descriptions from Maria Luigi of the long, slender body, the abundant curls, and the slightly almond-shaped eyes, and he was sure that combined with his careful rendering of Miriam, his intentions would be unmistakable. How could the villagers reject an infant who graced their village center in the image of the Savior? How could Miriam reject a man who commemorated that village by dedicating it to her and her child?

  The people of Riva di Pignoli had no money to pay for entertainment to be brought to the island, so Piero went to Fra Danilo to ask for his usual assistance.

  “I want something the people have never seen before,” he said. “I want music, and storytelling — a real public festival.”

  “Easter's coming,” said the monk. “I'm sure I can arrange for a donation of services with the promise of a few paid engagements throughout the lagoon.”

  “Do you have a particular group in mind?”

  “It depends on what you'e looking for. I know a number of local guilds that provide excellent entertainment. There's a group of goldsmiths in Eraclea who do a splendid Adoration of the Magi. There's a carpenters’guild in Pellestrina that offers a wonderful version of Noah's Ark. And there's a wine merchants’guild in Treviso that tells a riveting Marriage at Canaa.”

  “What about the Story of the Virgin?”

  “The Story of the Virgin …” Fra Danilo pondered. “I believe there are some mummers from Padova who do that. They'e primarily street performers — jugglers, acrobats, that sort, of thing — but I'e heard they do a very good Story of the Virgin.”

  “Perhaps they could do it all,” said Piero. “We'e never had a real festival on Riva di Pignoli. Perhaps they could do a bit of singing and dancing along the Calle Alberi Grandi and then present the Story of the Virgin on the new campo.”

  “I'e never seen you so enthusiastic, Piero! What's come over you?”

  “It's a time for celebration,” said Piero. “After all the troubles we'e weathered this past year, I feel we should acknowledge our good fortune.”

  “You'e perfectly right,” said Fra Danilo. “I'l send word to Padova this afternoon and see what I can arrange for you.”

  Piero returned to Riva di Pignoli and sent word about the village: in celebration of the new village center and the coming of spring, the First Riva di Pignoli Street Festival — to take place on the only Riva di Pignoli street — would be held on the first day of spring.

  Everyone invited. Wear masks. Bring pipes and tambourines.

  That night Piero worked well into the darkness on the last touches of the monument: the folds in Miriam's hood, the curve of her wrist around the infant's belly, the traces of their lips and eyelashes. When he could work no more he laid down his chisel, crept to his bed, and fell asleep.

  A short time after, he was awakened — or so he thought — by the sound of drums. They started in the distance like a heartbeat and grew louder, and more passionate, as they moved across the island toward Beppe Guancio's hovel. There were pipes and psalters, and there was singing, too, and a strange, dry clacking noise that Piero could not identify. When the sounds were just outside his walls there came a loud rapping at the door; Piero could not help but laugh thinking that the mummers ha
d come too soon, that they had not been able to wait until the coming of spring to begin their joyful revels. He rose from his bed and went to the door, trying to formulate what to say to them; when he opened it, however, his words lodged in his throat. For there before him stretched a band of grinning skeletons — dancing wildly in the pitch of night and returning his own bright laughter note for note.

  MIRIAM TOO HEARD MUSIC while she lay in bed at night. It came in through the tiny window that let a bit of air into Gianluca's room at the back of the Vedova Stampanini's hovel. For Miriam, however, there was no need to go to the door to identify the sounds; even in her sleep she knew the searching, tortured-goat quality of Gianluca's singing.

  “Such a terrible voice, Nicolo,” she whispered to her baby, “in such a beautiful man.”

  Miriam had decided to name her baby Nicolo, after the patron saint of the island. He was a serious baby. He hardly ever fussed, and he never cried. The women who attended the birth were quick to report that he resembled neither Piero nor Gianluca, but the truth was he did not even resemble Miriam. He resembled only himself. Nicolo. And even at a few days old he seemed to know it.

  Nicolo delighted Miriam beyond measure — his perfectly shaped nostrils, his inquisitive gaze, his lean and noble toes. But he did not remove her longing. It sat like a sack of peas beside her heart as it always had. It still called for something to quench its fire, it still rolled back its edges and laid itself out in her prayers. And since Miriam now knew she could not expect anyone to take it away, it seemed harmless to allow herself her feelings for Gianluca. They'd barely spoken since that afternoon he'd bolted from Siora Scabbri's hen yard. But Miriam had seen the change that had come over him — how he'd practically chained himself to the Chiesa di Maria del Mare in order to rebuild the village center — and she was delighted to find him once again singing ballads beneath her window.

  Gianluca's ballads soothed Nicolo to sleep. The moment he heard them he would close his eyes and begin a soft, mewling counterpoint that eased him into dreamland. So after a few weeks had passed, and Miriam had regained her strength, she asked the Vedova Stampanini to invite Gianluca in.

  “Tell him Nicolo wants to meet him,” she said. “And tell him — God help us — to bring his lute.”

  The Vedova delivered the message to Gianluca, and Gianluca entered the hovel.

  “Nicolo likes your songs,” said Miriam.

  “I'm glad,” said Gianluca.

  “You must be nearly finished with the reconstruction if you have time for singing.”

  “We should be done any day now. We hoist the bells tomorrow, and spring isn't due for another week yet.”

  “You must be proud of what you'e done.”

  Gianluca shrugged.

  “You should be, Gianluca.”

  Gianluca stepped closer and began to study Nicolo. “He's a fine-looking boy,” he said.

  “He's very strong. He can already lift himself up.”

  “I suppose I'l have to teach him how to use an ax. People say there'l be a lot more building now that we'e finished the campo.”

  Miriam looked up at him and thought about their conversation that day in the hen yard. “I think he can wait a few more months,” she said. “For now I think he'd prefer another song. Do you know any lullabies?”

  “I'l have to write some,” he said. “What do babies like to hear about?”

  “Nicolo would like to hear about the invention of the watermill or the discovery of the compass or the travels of Sior Polo in distant lands. Things which will stir challenge, and adventure, in his heart.”

  Nicolo yipped a little in agreement.

  “I'l take him on a journey, then. To Malabar for pepper. To Tunis for wax and silver. Is tomorrow night all right?”

  “Tomorrow is fine,” said Miriam. “Come whenever you like.”

  Gianluca could not hide the blush that rose to his cheeks, but he bowed, and said, “Bona notte,” before Miriam could see the rising beneath his tunic. Miriam, for her part, was content with the thought that she would see him again the next evening, and that he'd finally offered to care for her child. The only thing that bothered her was that Piero had offered to do the same thing; that she'd asked him to do it; and that he waited across the island for an equal chance to prove his affection.

  ALTHOUGH ERMENEGILDA spent her days at Piarina's side, she made certain each evening to return to the Ca’Torta for supper. She knew her mother's temper; staying away from dawn to dusk might press it to its limits, but staying away for good would send it hurtling over the edge. Yet no matter how much Orsina nagged her, Ermenegilda would not disclose how she was spending her days. The hours she passed at Piarina's bedside were like pieces of another life; once she was back behind the walls of the Ca’Torta, she refused to taint them with discussion.

  The women of the Ca’Torta, however, could hardly complain about the change in Ermenegilda's manner. Her appetite had returned, which relieved Romilda Rosetta; she no longer stamped and quarreled, which delighted Orsina; and she virtually acquiesced to every command of her astonished elder sisters. She would sit at the candlelit table like a painted screen image, neither flinching at the assorted digs that were hurled in her direction nor seeming to even notice when, in contrast, she was ignored. She ate her meals at a patient pace and went eagerly to bed the instant they were finished. The sooner she slept, the sooner she returned to Piarina.

  Orsina was convinced she'd finally given herself to Albertino. She imagined them rolling over the dry fields where the carrots poked their crowns or heaving away in the brush on the eastern shore. The three Marias decided she was going off to Venezia to spend their father's money on potions and charms in order to win herself a suitor. Romilda Rosetta was half-certain she'd found an order of overweight nuns, as the glow she exhibited could only be the result of fanatical spiritual pursuits.

  Romilda Rosetta came closest to the truth. For though Valentina and Piarina's hovel was hardly an abbey for prioresses, Ermenegilda's daily ventures there were softening something inside her. To care for her little friend was unlike anything she'd ever done; to watch her strengthen, to see her smile, was better than a dozen plates of red-deer stew. And though she was hardly aware of it, she even began to bear her loss of Albertino. Only now and then — as she traveled up the Calle Alberi Grandi at dusk or settled into her goose-down quilt before she drifted off to sleep — would his lopsided face appear to remind her that the world was a terrible place.

  ON THE MORNING of the celebration the sun rose slowly into a pure, cloudless sky. As it lifted up above the lip of the lagoon, its light first struck upon the tiny cross on the roof of the completed campanì l and then continued down over the arches of the belfry and the walls of the tower and the shrouded monument at the center of the campo, until it spread in a glinting wash over the finished mosaic. The griffins grinned, the circle of snakes expanded and contracted, the dragons and hell-sprites bristled down their fur as the river of light ran over them.

  In the huts and hovels across the island, the villagers had risen and were preparing for the day's festivities. Most had nothing more than a clean tunic or a slightly less used gown to wear, but they donned them with pride and left their feelings of abandon to their masks. Siora Scabbri pasted chicken feathers to a matte of straw and fastened it to her head with red ribbons. Brunetto Fucci shaped a face from wet plaster and sprinkled it with an array of exotic spices. Maria Luigi wound a series of silk veils into the headgear of an Arabian princess. More than a few of the villagers harbored the secret fantasy that their mask would be so impressive, the mummers would invite them to join their troupe.

  Albertino would have been willing to wear a boar's head if he thought it would help bring the spring, but in his heart he feared that all the fuss was for nothing. When the sun rose up over the east wall of his room, however, and shot across the floor to where he and Gianluca lay sleeping, it brought with it the unmistakable smell of hyacinth — and when he looked out over the
radicchio patch he saw patches of green poking up through the dry March soil. So he quickly gathered some carrots, some pressed figs, and a handful of dried lentils and made the most euphoric piece of vegetable facewear anyone could ever have imagined.

  When the sun had risen a slight head's tilt above the roof of Siora Bertinelli's hovel, the mummers arrived at the docks on the western shore. They poured from a series of large transport vessels dressed in bright masquerade. There were jugglers and fiddlers and acrobats; there were trunks of costumes and baskets of colored ribbons; there were children and monkeys and a few surreptitious rats. Piero met them, in a skeleton mask made from the bones of a dead goat, and led them to the base of the Calle Alberi Grandi. As they started their procession, the people of the island rushed out of their huts to join them: the Vedova Scarpa in a mask of bright coins; Fausto Moretti with his beard painted blue; Maria Patrizia Lunardi with her hair full of grain-stuffed larks. They moved up the rough pathway in a state of exultation. One of the mummers juggled a trio of baked breads while another did a lively horn dance. Silvano Rizzardello tossed handfuls of salt into the air, and Gesmundo Barbon did an elaborate routine that involved slapping a pair of codfish against his shins, his thighs, and his belly.

  When the boisterous procession finally reached the village center, Piero began to look around for Miriam. The Vedova Stampanini had assured him that she would make the celebration her first public appearance since the birth of Nicolo, but Piero couldn't find her anywhere. Just as he was about to give up hope, however, a whisper ran through the crowd — and as a pair of mummers walked the rim of the campo on their hands, the eyes of the villagers turned back toward the Calle Alberi Grandi and from behind the clutch of pine trees she appeared. She was wearing a mask made of seashells and swan feathers, and she was pushing a small cart, which Beppe Guancio had fashioned from an old cod barrel, in which Nicolo sat wrapped in his blanket of seaweed. He too had a mask — a scattering of pignoli on his cheeks and forehead — and together they managed to silence the revelry.