Constant Tides

by Peter Crawley

  “This is the way the world has always been: we educate our young in the ways of the sea and our traditions. This area used to be the very home of boat building in Sicily: great boatyards, like those of Giuseppe Domenico Galbo, Giacomo Costa, ‘Ntoni Mancuso and many others. In the next–door village of Pace, Peppe Federico and his son built beautiful boats and in Paradiso, in the yard of the Tringali family, they built the feluche. All along the coast, skills passed from father to son,” he nods towards the skiff, “and from grandfather to grandson.”

  “Like Antonio to Enzo?”

  “Yes, exactly like Antonio and Enzo. These are traditions we must fight to preserve.” Beppe draws on his cigarette and peers at her, watching and waiting for her reaction to what he is about to say: “Remember, young lady, it was Jesus who called his disciples to become fishers of men; so, from Our Saviour we learn that to become a fisherman is to gain a nobility few can hope to acquire.”

  Caterina meets his stare. “Yes, Beppe, I am Catholic… or was. Even though I couldn’t tell you when I last went to confession.”

  He draws again, winks through his fog of smoke and smiles. “You should try it, my dear. It helps one balance the soul.” He studies the end of his cigarette, then looks up and studies her face. “Now, the morning is rushing by and I have painting to finish. Go and put your time to good use. Have you seen Guttuso’s painting of Colapesce on the ceiling in the Teatro Vittorio Emanuele in Messina?” He pauses, waiting, then says, “I went to the city once, not so long ago; my nephew took me; he insisted. I tell you I have never seen anything to compare with Guttuso’s work; not even the most beautiful sunrise.”

  *

  “Thank you for leaving me your note,” Angelica says, as she pours a glass of the Prosecco Caterina has brought home with her.

  “That’s all right. I didn’t want you to worry. Thought you might be angry if I hadn’t checked in.”

  “No. Perhaps concerned if you had not come back from wherever you were, but… So, where in Messina did you go?”

  Caterina sighs. “Everywhere: the Teatro, Neptune’s fountain, the Duomo, the Via dei Templari–”

  “Did you see Guttuso’s Colapesce on the ceiling of the theatre?”

  “Yes,” Caterina sighs again, “the theatre was closed for a dance rehearsal, but I persuaded a very kind man, the manager I think he must have been, to let me in and I sat in the stalls, leant my head back and lost myself in the painting. It’s bold, isn’t it? All those lithe bodies, the bare–breasted mermaids, the dolphins. And then there is the improbably perfect form of the naked young Colapesce diving into the waters of the Strait. I thought it quite sensuous in a way, quite surreal and very hypnotic.”

  “So it is,” Angelica agrees. “And did you notice anything interesting about the colour of the water?”

  Caterina grins, an eager, impish curl to her lips. “Yes, I think so; if what you’re asking is what I think you’re asking.”

  “That may be for you to know. Like the painting, art is a matter of personal appreciation. And the Via dei Templari? I don’t know this street; where is it?”

  “Well, the answer to that is I didn’t know either. I was looking for it and stopped for a granita in a café, the Ritrovo Bellini, the café on the corner of Piazza Duomo: there was this old man sitting at a table; he was dozing, leaning against his walking stick and looked about to fall over until the kind lady of the house woke him up. I asked him if he knew the street and he mumbled something about the new Via Templari being up the steps, the Scalinata San Gregorio, whereas the old Via dei Templari used to be a street off the Via Oratorio San Francesco. He told me that after the great earthquake and then the war, they redesigned the city so that nearly all the roads were wider, which meant that some streets were moved and others simply disappeared.”

  “How did you know of it?”

  “It was a street my nonna told me about: Via dei Templari. She said if I was ever in Messina, I was to visit it for her: there, Piazza Cairoli and Villa Mazzini. She never told me why though. I guess I’ll never know now, will I?”

  Chapter 8

  As with the day before, Caterina wakes to a light frame of mind rather than one weighed down by the density of negative thought, and she knows it is early because Alberto has not yet occupied the bathroom.

  The woman behind the counter of the bakery smiles when she asks for biscuits, brioche and water, and wandering through the lanes the village still sleeps but for the cats who flatten their ears, growl and eye each other warily from the bastions of their home steps.

  She breathes deeply through her nose, filling her ribcage with the fresh morning air before exhaling smoothly and evenly through her mouth. Salt, the sea is not far.

  “Good morning witch,” she says, rounding the bend and smiling at the thought that she is talking to a wall.

  Beppe stands at the waterline, deep in conversation with Antonio and the young man she believes to be Enzo.

  Caterina hesitates.

  A wolf–whistle from the feluca makes her look up: one of the crew is pointing at her.

  Antonio, Enzo and Beppe turn, and while Antonio and Enzo stand their ground, the old man strolls up the beach towards her.

  “Good morning signorina.” He wears no protection against the cool air other than the thick matting of white hairs on his chest and his paint–spattered shorts; his legs are spindly thin, his knees knobbly and if he was any more stoop–shouldered and bow–legged he would pass for a junior spinning top.

  “Good morning, Beppe.”

  “Did you see Guttuso’s painting?”

  “Yes, I did, thank you. More beautiful than one could have imagined.”

  He scratches at his ear. “The mermaids? Yes, very beautiful, though even with all my many years on the water I have never seen so much as a lock of hair. Oh well, one day, who knows?”

  “And the colour of the water,” Caterina adds. “How did Guttuso find such blue, eh?”

  Beppe smiles, a conspirator’s smirk, saying everything, saying nothing. He draws out the moment, then, “My friend, Antonio, there, he would like to invite you to pass the day on his feluca.”

  “He would like to, would he?” she replies. “Well, what has happened to his tongue? Have the cats stolen it?”

  Beppe frowns. “No, it is pure self–interest on my part: I wanted to have the privilege of asking you, that is all.” He grins, his teeth gapped, smoke–stained and worn. “Why should he have all the fun, eh?”

  “Fun. Is that how you describe a day out fishing?”

  “For you, yes. For them, no, it is work; it is how they make their living.” He eyes her, a disconcerting appraisal. “It is no small honour to be invited. It will be an experience, a great experience; something I am sure you have never experienced before and may never have the opportunity to experience again.” He shrugs his rounded shoulders, as if to suggest it would be foolish of her to pass up the chance.

  “Oh, Beppe.” Caterina frowns and shakes her head, though not in outright refusal; rather she shakes her head like a gambler shakes his dice, in the hope that when the dice come to rest, they will dictate what happens next. “Me? On a boat? Just me and what… six men. I can’t imagine I… I mean not in my wildest dreams would I…

  He cocks his head to one side and raises an eyebrow. “Then why?”

  “Why what?”

  “Why did you come down here so early this fine morning?”

  “Oh, Beppe,” she says again. “I don’t know. I came down here because Antonio said I should see the feluche.”

  “You saw them yesterday, no?” He grins.

  “Yes, but–”

  “Come signorina, they are waiting.”

  She sighs, dithering and yet perhaps considering. “Look, Beppe, I’m not exactly dressed for fishing. I mean, I haven’t even got shoes on.”

  He looks
down. “Ah, la contessa scalza! Bogart, Ava Gardner.”

  “The barefoot countess?”

  “Before your time, I believe.” He grins again. “And Spain not Sicily, but who cares?”

  Caterina shades her eyes to the dawn sun and studies first Antonio, then the feluca: the crew know, they are watching her, waiting to see her reaction.

  Beppe sniffs the air and glances upward. “The skies will be clear today and the deck will be hot to touch, but… Antonio is not the kind to offer twice and I have always believed it is better to catch fish when you can, not when you have to.”

  “Is that Enzo… with Antonio?”

  “Yes,” he replies. “The son.”

  *

  Caterina sits in the stern and Antonio in the bow, as Enzo stands and rows them out to the feluca. The crew are waiting to welcome her. Welcome her, inspect her or appraise her: perhaps all three? And is a woman welcome on a boat crewed exclusively by men? A boat which looks not to possess the smallest of creature comforts.

  “Enzo, I…”

  “Do not worry, signorina: they might look as if they would eat you, but I can assure you they are all married. Except me, of course, I am single.” His eyes light up with possibility: they are blue, like his father’s, like the deep blue of the sea in Guttuso’s painting on the ceiling of the Teatro.

  Their arrival at the feluca triggers a melee of activity and as soon as their bow knocks against the blue hull, Antonio leaps up and keen hands reach down to lift Caterina, seemingly light as a feather, up onto the deck.

  “I am Pasquale,” a thick set fellow says. “Excuse me.” He turns away and climbs up onto the roof of the cabin.

  “Giuseppe,” another, taller individual says.

  And Enzo, because he has rowed her out to the feluca, believes he has the right to introduce the remaining two: “Ninolino,” a darker–skinned, young man, “and Karl,” a humour–filled, quirky face, a cigarette between his lips.

  “Ninolino, Karl, pleased to meet you both.”

  “We are also pleased to meet you, too,” they reply in perfect union.

  “Thank you. And let’s hope you are not just as pleased to see me leave at the end of the day.”

  Antonio, to whom she has not yet spoken and who, to her surprise, has not yet spoken to her, sits on the step up to the passerelle, poring over a three–pointed spear that looks remarkably similar to the trident from Montorsoli’s giant marble statue of Neptune in Messina.

  She turns and watches as the less than trim figure of Pasquale crosses himself and ascends the slender mast to his platform, twenty meters above. Once there, he unlatches a hatch, climbs up through it and as soon as he has disappeared, Giuseppe starts the climb up after him.

  The engines rumble, the deck vibrates, lines are cast off and Enzo, who has clearly been assigned to watch over her and keep her out of the way, reaches up, pulls a white plastic chair from the roof of the cabin and wiping it with an oily–looking rag, plants it at the base of the mast.

  Caterina sits down, the young man smiles and the feluca Salvazione noses her way out from behind the breakwater into the open waters of the Strait.

  *

  The air smells and tastes clean, perhaps just the faintest of salt, yet not as overwhelming as she had thought it might. Caterina studies the shore of Calabria as though it is a darkly foreign land, not simply a region of the same country little more than a kilometre or so away. Dappled sunlight caresses the terracotta roofs of Villa San Giovanni and behind the town, cotton wool clouds cast their shadows on the green carpet of mountainside.

  Antonio busies himself and in doing so avoids her enquiring looks.

  Caterina, irritated by his indifference, tries to provoke his attention by offering Enzo, Ninolino and Karl her biscuits, which they snap up. Antonio doesn’t though rise to her bait, so she moves her chair into the sun, leans back and allows the breeze to ruffle her hair.

  For the next hour and a half, they motor north through the neck of the Strait, past the great rock of Scylla and on through an even swell towards Capo Vaticano, a dull stain on an otherwise clean horizon.

  Antonio remains seated on the step up to the passerelle, two buckets, one by either foot, a length of blue cloth across his lap and a square metal casing in his hands. He examines it this way and that, before taking a screwdriver, unscrewing the casing and dropping the various pieces into a bucket by his foot. He crouches by the winch–cover, hammers the sides of the casing flat against it and then picks out a pair of broad–bladed clippers with which he cuts the metal into small strips. Every now and then, he pauses in his cutting and hammering to reshape and examine the thickness of the strip, measuring and weighing each in his hand.

  Enzo watches him studiously, glancing at Caterina to satisfy himself that she is doing the same.

  When he is happy with the weight and size of his strips, Antonio selects a pointed angle iron and, with the hammer, punches holes in the top and bottom of the strips. He picks a couple of screws from the bucket, checks their length and nips the ends off using a smaller pair of pliers.

  Caterina watches his hands: for although they are broad and thick, Antonio is dexterous and exacting. He chews his lips in concentration and does not allow the odd buffet of another ship’s wake to distract him or knock him off balance.

  From a second bucket, he picks out a small green wooden fish about as long as his forearm and half as thick. He weighs the fish in one hand while weighing a strip of lead in his other, and when he is content, he nods, takes the hammer and while Enzo holds the shortened nail in place using a pair of pliers, Antonio hammers the strip into the belly of the fish.

  He speaks briefly to his son, who then removes a large coil of rope from a fourth bucket, ties its hooped handle to a line and slings it forward over the side to let it fill with water. As the boat moves, so the bucket draws level with Enzo and he hauls it up and places it beside his father.

  Antonio nods his approval and tosses the wooden fish into the bucket: they both bend to watch it.

  Caterina’s curiosity gets the better of her and she, too, stands to look.

  The fish bobs about, but touches the rim, so Antonio squeezes the sides of the bucket between his ample thighs and, by making the surface of the water broader, the fish floats freely.

  “Good,” he says, putting down the bucket, removing the first fish and repeating the whole process with a second.

  Leaving his father to carry on, Enzo gets on with coiling and recoiling line, first dipping each arm’s length of line in another water–filled bucket. When he sees Caterina watching, he says. “It makes the line easier to coil and makes it quicker and smoother to uncoil. Drink water, signorina, please, eh? Because of the breeze, one does not feel the sun.”

  She does so and, noticing her bottle is nearly empty, wonders what she is supposed to do if she needs the toilet. “It’s easy for you guys,” she mutters.

  The engines slow: they have reached the boundary of their patrol.

  Antonio looks up at the crow’s nest, then out at the water: the even swell has waned, the sea is now flat and almost oily in appearance. To the east, large container ships loiter outside the port behind which storm clouds gather like angry conspirators.

  The feluca runs a box course, extending its easterly and southerly legs by a hundred metres or so each time it turns to cover fresh water. The morning is long, the sun hot, burningly so, and shade at a premium.

  Caterina stands and stretches her arms and legs. “Whoa!” she shrieks and hurriedly sits back down. “The deck, it’s hot.”

  “Yes,” Enzo agrees, “that’s why we wear trainers.” He quickly dips a bucket over the side, rinses her feet with the water and splashes the deck with the rest.

  Antonio is watching her from the corner of his eye.

  She smiles.

  He looks away.

 
; Enzo notices, grins and returns his attention to the sea.

  *

  “Would you like to sit inside in the cabin?”

  Caterina looks up. “Thank you, Enzo, I’m fine. Really. Whenever we change course, I get some shade.” She would happily sit in the deafening noise and the torrid heat of the cabin if it permitted her a moment’s respite from the baking sun; however, there is absolutely no way she is going to give any of them the slightest inkling that she is finding the day at all challenging.

  “You men must have the patience of Job,” she says.

  “It is true.”

  An hour or so earlier, Caterina had been staring out at the blur of the horizon, trying to determine where the sea ended and the sky began; and she had just decided it was impossible when, all of a sudden, she noticed a disturbance in the water some way to the rear on the landward side.

  She’d blinked a few times, wiped the sweat from her eyes and looked again.

  There. Again. Something rising out and splashing into the water.

  “A fish!” she’d screamed, leaping up, pointing, an enormous wave of emotion flooding her body. She was to earn her stripes; she was, after months if not years of feeling completely useless, very suddenly of use.

  Antonio had stood up from his perch on the step, followed the direction of her arm and hollered loud up to Pasquale, who’d instantly gunned the engines and heaved the helm over to starboard.

  Enzo, Ninolino and Karl had begun to check the lines and holding on to the wire guides, Antonio had started his urgent walk up the long passerelle.

  The wooden deck had vibrated as if the whole feluca was beside itself with excitement and as the propeller thrust her through the water, her bow had risen up, lifting Antonio like a trapeze artist high, high up in the air.