The Gondola Maker

by Morelli, Laura

  The whole affair has become too complicated, too confusing, the Councillor observes. First, there is the matter of the identity of the boatman. Two witnesses have already attested that the man held in quarantine in the pozzi is not Trevisan’s boatman at all, but the son of a gondola maker from Cannaregio. With two witnesses, under Venetian law the Councillor sees no way to pursue the matter further without involving his colleagues on the Council of Ten, and at all costs, he cannot afford to call any more attention to this case. Let the gondola burn and let everyone think Trevisan’s boatman was exiled to the slave galleys; who will know the difference?

  And as for Signorina Zanchi, quite simply it is time to forget about her, the Councillor thinks. As great as his obsession had grown—and it had grown to uncharted heights for this young woman—she is no longer what he originally perceived. She is no longer the beautiful heiress of one of the richest banking families in Venice. She is no longer an innocent girl. She is probably no longer even a virgin, thanks to that boatman, whoever he is. The Councillor now realizes that he should have trusted his instincts when she first approached him with her proposal; something was bound to go wrong. As he observes the crowd, the Councillor vows never to negotiate directly with a woman again, especially one without a father.

  Moreover, the Councillor decides, he will not accept delivery of the portrait that the artist Trevisan has completed. The artist will not receive payment in exchange for the hours he spent observing the woman’s flesh and replicating it in paint. Instead, the sum the Councillor secretly pays Trevisan will serve as compensation for the artist’s gondola, which must be sacrificed in order to provide a semblance of public justice.

  The Councillor sighs. Yes, the neater this act of justice appears, the sooner the whole affair will disappear from public view. As soon as he returns to his chambers, he must summon the court scribe. The Councillor will dictate an account of today’s act of justice, using a particular type of language he uses for such matters, a sanitized recounting of the facts, no more. The scribe will record the dictated words in a graceful and immaculate script, and the case will be recorded for posterity in the Doge’s archive. After that the matter will be put to rest.

  The Councillor watches a servant approach the boat with a torch. The crowd grows still, and the servant ignites the tender tucked into the bottom of the pyre. With a roar, the wood catches fire, and the flames reach upward toward the keel of the shiny boat. The fire casts the elegant curve of the gondola into silhouette, and dark curls of smoke begin to rise into the air.

  Chapter 43

  Eventually, I lose track of time.

  Has it been days since my arrest? Weeks? My mind struggles to make sense of the seemingly endless cycle of singing, arguing, jeering, moaning, cursing. Water drips relentlessly down one wall of our cell, collecting and slurping into the floor drain. One of the large jailers pushes two bowls of tepid soup through a small opening in the door. I take a spoonful then spit out the disgusting liquid as the bowl rattles to the floor. My stomach rumbles. The relentless nothingness is interrupted only by the serving of inedible food and weak beer diluted with fishy-tasting water, which could only have been drawn from the canal.

  I lie on my wooden plank, my eyes closed. I drift in and out of sleep—what else am I to do—while my mind torments me with visions. I see my mother laughing, my baby brother’s transparent skin. I feel the chisel in my hand as I work in my family boatyard overlooking the canal. I imagine myself loading crates onto a gondola at Giorgio’s traghetto. I see myself sanding the prow of my grandfather’s gondola, varnishing the keel, carving and smoothing the new oarlock. I see Trevisan sitting in his chair with his feet before the fire, contemplating the stream of unreliable boatmen that have darkened his doorway over decades.

  Over and over, I see the image of Giuliana Zanchi in my boat. My mind shuffles through images of her straight teeth, of her walk, of her laughing in a church pew. I imagine burying my face in her neck, feeling her breath against my face, sitting with her in the sand at the Lido. What is real and what is imagined? I no longer know the difference.

  Around me, my fellow inmates chat aimlessly, cursing and annoying one another. They talk about the only thing they share in common: whatever infraction has landed them in the pozzi. A man in the cell next to us says that he is guilty as charged for stealing a small collection of silver implements from the master of the house where he was employed. His master had beaten him repeatedly, he tells us; he would rather stay here in prison than return. His cellmate stands accused of poisoning his parish priest. A man everyone calls Little Lion says he was arrested for allowing the clockmaker’s apprentice into his master’s house for a series of clandestine meetings with the master’s young daughter. When he insists that he’s innocent, his neighbors collapse from laughter.

  My insane cellmate Padia launches into unexpected outbursts, most directed at me: “Don’t you understand, Grimaldi? They are coming after us, those cowards! It’s a conspiracy, don’t you see? Our compatriots—all held for ransom! Upon my life, I swear to you that you and I will be vindicated!”

  Not only do I not wish to participate in these interactions; I no longer care at all. I stare blankly into the darkness, or close my eyes and pray for the abyss of slumber.

  No sooner does the mercy of sleep overtake me that I am haunted by the same dream that has appeared again and again since I landed in prison. In the dream I am a small boy, bracing myself between my father’s knees and reaching my hand high above my head for the oar. From our post on the aft deck of the gondola, I feel my father propel the boat forward, the wind in our faces. The muscles of his thighs tighten and release as he rows, right leg forward, left leg back. I feel the polished wood of the oar slip in my palms as it works hard at the beginning then becomes effortless as the craft gains speed. When the waves chop in the widest part of the canal and the boat bucks, I let go of the oar with my left hand and squeeze my father’s thigh. Even though I lead with my left hand, from my father’s rhythmic rowing I intuit how to push with my right. He places his right hand over my small one, and I feel the callouses on his palm as he presses my hand to steer the boat.

  I awake with a start, drenched in sweat. My linen shirt sticks to my back and turns the wooden planks under my body dark. I open my eyes to see the shiny, reflective eyes of Padia, his face just a finger’s length from my own. I peer into the bottomless pits of his dark irises and notice the ashy lines that streak his teeth.

  “Grimaldi...” His rancid breath spreads across my face as he emits a long, slow hiss. “They have come for you.”

  THE SOUND OF SCRAPING metal rouses me out of my stupor, and someone fumbles with the great lock of our cell. The door opens, and the figures of two hulking men fill the doorway. Unceremoniously, the men enter. Each man grasps me under each arm and thrusts me through the doorway of the cell.

  I know that my punishment is near, and I feel an incongruous sense of relief as I accept my fate. The men drag me down a long hallway past a dozen cells. From them come a stream of catcalls, cursing, and cheering. I do not see their faces because my head hangs so low that I cannot see anything beyond my bound feet. I stumble forward in my shackles, barely able to keep pace with the long strides of the two guards.

  At the end of the hallway, the larger bailiff steps forward to unlock a large wooden door, and we fumble up a short flight of stone stairs. Then, the two, each with a hand under my arms, cast me forward with all their might. I feel myself airborne for a moment, then I crash onto the pavement, my shackles rattling on the great cobblestones outside the prison. My cheek scrapes against their cold, hard dampness. Stark sunlight blinds me, and all I see are the hulking shadows of the men against the white light.

  “What in God’s name?” I gasp, incredulously.

  “You got a second witness—your pass out of here. Now disappear.”

  One of the bailiffs pushes me roughly onto my stomach and u
nlocks my ankle shackles with an iron key. The man spits a wad of saliva at me, then turns back to the prisons and locks the great wooden door behind him.

  There is silence.

  For a moment, I lie still, face down on the cold stones, stunned.

  I turn my head to the side. As my eyes began to adjust to the light, a pair of leather shoes comes into focus within an arm’s reach of my nose. I scramble to a standing position as quickly as I can manage on shaky legs, which feel strangely uncontrollable after being freed from their shackles.

  For the first time nearly a year, I find myself standing face to face with the oarmaker.

  Chapter 44

  I can hardly believe how quickly the oarmaker has wasted away since the last time I saw him, nearly a year ago now.

  The man has been scrawny for as long as I have known him, yet there has always been something solid, strong about him. Now Anton Fumagalli seems little more than a bag of bones. The oarmaker’s kneecaps protrude beneath the thin cover of his stockings. Loose skin hangs from his neck in bags. His eyes have grown dark and sunken into his skull. His walk is unsteady, and he grasps his workbench for support.

  The remero’s poor physical state has taken its toll on his workshop. Dust collects in the corners, and the workbenches stand cluttered and neglected. “Cavolo,” the oarmaker says, scratching his forehead and surveying the mess that his youngest apprentice has left behind. A chisel, two hammers, and the core of a gnawed apple lie strewn across one of the workbenches. A stack of boat plans drawn on parchment lie unfurled across the design table in the back of the room. “I instructed the boy that he was to roll them and tie them neatly, then stack them on the shelves. He was too big of a rush to finish for the day and flee to his mother down the street.” He makes a fist. “It’s not that I expect perfection from my apprentices, especially brand new ones. It’s just that I feel I should not have to supervise every step involved in cleaning my studio.”

  “Remer, please, sit. You are not well.” I lead him to a chair before a crackling fire in the hearth that warms the oarmaker’s workshop. Cool night air rushes in from under the door and swirls around our feet. With a skeletal hand, the oarmaker clutches a woolen blanket tightly around his shoulders. Under a worktable, I spy a pile of wood shavings and sawdust that litter the floor. I find a dustpan and broom hanging on the wall and squat to fill the dustpan with the shavings.

  “I have been a fool, remer,” I say, breaking the silence as I stab at the floor with the broom.

  He looks up at me from his chair and raises his eyebrows. “Luca, you do not owe me explanations. You are young. You make mistakes. I made them too, when I was your age. I have never told you this, but I left my father’s studio as a young man, just like you. I thought I was meant for something else.” He chuckles. “I even served my time as a rower of the galleys.”

  “You? Really?” I struggle to imagine the oarmaker seated on a bench in the belly of a great merchant galley, rowing in unison with several dozen others as the great ship propels them far away from whatever they felt compelled to leave behind in Our Most Serene City.

  The oarmaker shrugs. “Eventually I came back to the house where I was born. It is true that my own father was a more benevolent fellow than yours, but still, what else was I to do? My studio was here waiting for me.” He looks into the fire. “It is no matter. It’s all in the past. I do not have much time left now. This malady takes a little more of me each day.”

  “Don’t say such things, remer. I am more likely to go to my grave before you are.” I lean on my broom handle and smile, but the oarmaker waves his hand at me in a gesture of dismissal.

  “I cannot waste a moment talking about what’s already been done. We have work ahead of us, you and I.” The man who seems to be dying a little more every moment, before my very eyes, is prepared to hand over his workshop to me.

  “Master Fumagalli, I am honored beyond words. I don’t feel worthy, I don’t feel ready to take over your work.”

  He raises both hands now, then slaps them on his knees. “It’s already settled. I have already told you that you are the only one worthy to be my successor. This idea did not just appear in my head yesterday. I started thinking about it even before you left the squero, truth be told. After the fire, well, I saw my opportunity but then you vanished. You had better not even think of doing that again.” He wags a finger at me.

  I continue sweeping, my eyes cast to the floor.

  “At first I tried to find you,” the remero says. “Annalisa Bonfante is the only one of us who laid eyes on you after the morning you left my workshop. We all questioned her at length, of course, but I believe that she was honest about not knowing what became of you. Truth be told, I am not sure that she wanted to find you as much as we did after that anyway, poor girl.”

  I shake my head and continue sweeping.

  “Your father had enough on his hands, I suppose, but your brother and sister pled with me to find where you had gone, and I did my best,” he continues. “I inquired through my contacts at the Arsenale state shipyard and even the docks where the slave galleys embark. I lay in bed wondering about it every night; I just could not understand how you disappeared so completely. Finally, I had to convince everyone that we needed to wait for you to make your own way back. I was beginning to doubt that you would, but I held out hope, trusting that you would reappear one day and that you would be willing to accept the life I have described to you, the life that I myself have lived.”

  I know as well as anyone what it takes to pull the master oarmaker away from his workshop, his place in the world. I feel humbled and ashamed that he has gone to all this trouble for me. I move to where the oarmaker sits before the fire. I sink into the chair beside him, hang my head in my hands and shake it in disbelief.

  “Your training begins first thing tomorrow morning,” he says. “Of course, it’s not something you can learn overnight. But you will learn quickly. I am sure of it. I promise you that I will teach you everything I know until I take my last breath.” His face softens. “And you thought that you were supposed to make gondolas,” the oarmaker teases me, chuckling to himself. For a fleeting moment, I glimpse the man I remember, full of vigor and eager to poke fun at me. “Son, sometimes your destiny turns out to be not precisely what you thought it would be.”

  “Not according to my father,” I say with a hint of sarcasm.

  The oarmaker’s face turns serious, and his voice lowers to nearly a whisper. “Your father accepted it even before you did, my son.” He looks at my face. “You will see.”

  We sit in silence, and I contemplate this possibility as I watch blue veins dance inside the flames that consume the charred wood. I feel a draft across my feet, and I rise to stoke the fire with a long wrought-iron poker that Master Fumagalli has told me was made by Giuseppe Pontarin, the city’s best blacksmith, unfortunately struck down by the last outbreak of plague. I replace the implement in its iron holder next to the hearth, then watch the flames leap anew.

  “Remer, there is one thing I don’t understand,” I say, breaking the silence. “They told me that I was released from the Doge’s prison because I had not one but two witnesses who could vouch for my true identity. Who was the second witness?”

  “I was,” he says.

  “What do you mean?”

  The oarmaker remains silent for a moment while he studies my face. “Bring me that box on the workbench.” I notice a large, black wooden container with a metal latch sitting in the shadows at the back of the workshop. I bring it to the oarmaker and place it on the floor. The old man reaches over to unhook the latch. He lifts out a beautifully carved oarlock. He turns it over in his hands, examining it closely through his round spectacles.

  I stand up with a start, a shock rending its way through my body. It’s the one I made in Master Trevisan’s boathouse with my own hands, the one that I assumed had gone up in flames wit
h the rest of the old gondola. There is no doubt that the oarlock is mine; I would recognize its peculiar curvilinear silhouette anywhere. Indeed, there is not another one like it in the world.

  “Clearly an oarlock made not only for a left-handed rower, but by a left-handed carver, too.” The remero smirks and shakes his head. “I should have known it was you the moment I saw it.”

  I am nearly speechless. “How? How did this get to you?!”

  The oarmaker focuses his gaze on my face. “The first witness delivered it to me: a young woman escorted here in a fine gondola, a striking lady with green eyes and a dog. That is how I learned what became of you.” The remero runs his hand over my oarlock, tracing one of the blond grains in the wood with a crooked finger. “It was she who brought me this box.”

  It is only then that I notice there is more inside the box, a parchment folio with elegant script, and a flat parcel wrapped in blue paper. As I lift the parcel out of the box, I immediately recognize the familiar paper wrapping that the artist Trevisan uses to package his finished paintings, and I feel the hard edge of the rectangular frame. I do not have to tear open the paper to know what’s inside. I feel the heat rise to my face, and I wonder if the remero can see my cheeks turn red.

  The oarmaker peers at me over the top of his spectacles. “I’ve been wondering how long it was going to take you to tell me who she is.”

  MY DEAR LUCA,

  You may find it unusual to receive this package, under the present circumstances.

  When Signorina Zanchi came to me to ask for my help with your situation, I must admit that I was more than a bit surprised, not only by the unexpected turn of events but also, of course, by the fact that I had been completely unaware of your rapport with the banker’s daughter.