“I was going to send this over to the factory today. The orders are coming in so fast, I think I will need to send them three times each week, instead of twice.”
Sophia gave the list a transitory study.
“Grazie, signore. Perhaps we will need to hire another worker or two.”
“Perhaps,” Balbi crooned with pleasure, rubbing his hands together with fiendish delight. “Perhaps three, if this continues.”
“Bene, molto bene.” Sophia nodded, pleased by the man’s news; the family would not have any monetary concerns for many years—generations—to come if business continued like this. “I…we…that is, my father needs some particular material.” Sophia thrust her blushing nose into her basket, searching for her list, hoping to distract Balbi from her embarrassment and faltering tongue.
The experienced fattori held the inventory at arm’s length, eyes narrowing with strain, the tip of his tongue protruding from his full lips as he read the daintily written lines of text.
“Nonè problema, Sophia, it will be there by the end of the day.”
Sophia sighed with relief. “You are won—”
“Balbi, pronto,” a harried voice from within the booth cried out in obvious agitation.
“Mi scusi, Sophia, business calls.” Balbi pecked another quick kiss in the air by her cheek, ran with a bounce back to his work, and called over his shoulder. “Tell Zeno all is well.”
“I will.” Sophia assured him.
She would tell her father everything, all about the growth of the business, whether he was having a good day or not, whether he comprehended any of what she said, or not.
“What is this special material for?” Damiana asked. She’d caught her friend’s verbal stumble, seen the flush of color march across her face. “More secrets?”
Sophia spun round, a thrusting hand smacking against her forehead.
“Ah, cara mia, not a secret, just…more.”
As they hurried to the end of the Mercerie and crossed the Rialto Bridge into the borough of Santa Croce, Sophia told her confidante all about the visit of signore Sagredo and professore Galileo and the inventive pieces she couldn’t wait to make.
Damiana shook her head in astonishment at the end of the recital, her eyes wide with wonder.
“Your life, it is so…tumultuous, so…turbulent. Who knew?”
Sophia barked a short, cynical laugh. “It is not what I would wish for, I can assure you. All I ever wanted was to make the glass, to continue the traditions of my family.”
“Perhaps you still can, just not in the way that you would have hoped. You will retain ownership, in effect, just through your hu—husband.”
Sophia looked at Damiana with sadness, pale eyes ringed by sooty circles, lids heavy with an aged wisdom so recently acquired.
“What if he doesn’t want the glassworks? What if he wants to sell it? What would become of mi madre? My sisters?” She shook her head with agitation. “I don’t know if I can take that chance.”
“But what can you do?” Damiana insisted. “To turn him down may cause your family terrible problems. The consequences could be dire. The government could take all that you have, all that your family has built.”
“I know,” Sophia groused. “Don’t you think I know?”
“That’s it? You know?”
Sophia shook her head and waved her hand in the air, as if she could brush off her own confusion. “Please, Damiana, ask me no more questions.”
The young women wended their way across the crowded Rialto Bridge and entered the Ruga dei Oresi in the quiet district of San Croce. Their short excursion brought them past the doors of the Church of San Giacomo. Sophia had prayed within the walls of the old house of worship many times. Its distinctive keel-shaped ceiling of larch wood kept the interior cool during the hot summer months and parishioners often found it a place of relief from the heat as they searched for spiritual enlightenment. Just beyond the church campo, a narrow calle branched to the left, an alleyway so constricted, the friends fell into a single line, one behind the other in the dim, sunless lane.
“Sophia? Is that you?”
Sophia looked up to a second floor window and the call of the lilting, warbling voice.
“Sì, Zia Elena, it’s me.”
“How wonderful.” A dimpled arm beckoned to them, a waving, waggling wing of pink flesh thrust out of the open portal. “Come up, come up.”
Within minutes Sophia and Damiana found themselves sitting at a square, ceramic-tile-topped table, with plates of food, and bottles of wine thrust before them in a large, pot-strewn, brightly painted and temptingly redolent kitchen. The two women of the household offered their guests their love and welcome with the first course and the same relish as the food, kisses and hugs which preceded the never-ending refreshments. Pottery bowls clicked against tile, liquid sloshed into receptacles, and excited feminine voices tumbled one upon the other as birdsong filtered in through unsashed shutters along with the afternoon sunshine. Damiana listened in alert silence, sampling the many delectables spread out before her while Elena and her daughter Fatima, a younger version of the round, brown, and dimpled woman, shared family news with Sophia.
Sophia sipped the powerful grappa, enjoying the surprisingly clear, chilled liquid. Made of the grape pomace, the stems, skins, and seeds left over from the wine-making process, her mother’s grappa was usually murky with the pulpy remnants. She studied her relatives over the small, pewter cup, chatting with them, waiting for the right moment, the appropriate opportunity to arise between gossip of the local harlot and Zia Paulina’s wastrel of a husband. She felt the intent regard of Damiana beside her, her friend’s silence a warning to be heeded or ignored—she ignored it.
“How are Zio Manfredi and cousin Alanzo?” Sophia asked of her male relatives, between polite nibbles of her biscuit.
“Ah, molto bene,” her plump aunt said with a nod and shrug, wiping at a few stray crumbs. “They are fit. At work at the squero, of course.”
“My Gerardo is there now too.” Fatima’s big doe-like eyes sparkled in her round chubby face as she spoke of her young husband with pride.
The Squero di San Trovaso had been making gondolas for hundreds of years, and was one of the most famous and most patronized boat builders in all of Venice. As a child, Sophia had visited her uncle there, traveling with her mother to the southern district of Dorsoduro; the pungent, sharp scent of freshly cut wood was still vivid in her memory.
“Zia, I was telling Damiana of our family in Florence.”
Damiana coughed, choking on the bite of wine-soaked pear in her mouth. Sophia thumped her on the back while her gaze begged for complicity.
“Do we still have cousins there?” Sophia rushed on, raising her voice over her friend’s whoops and sputters.
“Oh no, no. That part of the family either moved on or died off years ago.” Elena hefted her large form up, and her pudgy, dimpled hand splayed over the table, caught up a pitcher of water from the sideboard, and poured a small mug of it for the still-sputtering Damiana. “No, there is no one left but your mother and me.”
“Ah, sì. But who would leave the beauty of Florence, I can’t imagine.” Sophia struggled to appear nonchalant but her stilted, singsong tone only sounded contrived—she could hear its false note herself. She stared down at her plate and the flaky cookie she’d crumbled into pieces. “You have no idea where they may have gone?”
Elena shook her head, taking the plate and the decimated cookie from her niece, replacing it, without question, with a fresh one.
“We lost touch ages ago. It was too hard during the war to keep in contact. But why all these questions?” Elena leaned forward, patting Sophia’s slim hand with her own plump one, brows bouncing above sparkling eyes. “Were you hoping to find a husband among our distant relatives?”
Sophia started as if caught with her hand in another woman’s purse, a flush marched across her pale gold cheeks.
“Uh…uh…no…I mean, yes�
��I mean—”
“Do you have any more of these delicious pears, signora?” Damiana nudged her empty bowl toward Elena. “They are amazing. How do you make them?”
“Oh, silly girl, they are so easy.”
As Elena jumped to refill her guest’s small wooden bowl and launched into a spirited recital of the recipe, Sophia offered Damiana a small, loving smile and the gratitude that made it so sweet.
For another half-hour, the girls listened as Elena and Fatima regaled them with details of their favorite dishes. Sophia listened, nodding where appropriate, but heard little. Her mind chewed on her disappointment like the starving stray dog upon the alleyway scraps. The church bells clanged the late afternoon hour and she grasped at their sound and their opportunity.
“My goodness, we must be getting back.” Sophia stood, embracing her relations with sincere if hasty warmth. “Mamma will be wondering where her lace is.”
“Grazie, signora, Fatima, it was so nice to see you again.” Damiana rushed to pay her respects as Sophia took her by the hand and wrested her out of the room, down the narrow stairs and out into the calle.
In the confined pathway, the clack of their wooden heels echoed upon the uneven bricks; the raucous noise climbed the steep, confining walls around them and filled the air. The arrhythmic, anxious beats mimicked the cadence of their fluttering hearts.
“You have been playing the game of secrets for far too long,” Damiana hissed at Sophia from behind, stomping so near to her heels, her skirts flapped against the back of Sophia’s calves, as her breath fluttered the small hairs on the back of Sophia’s neck. “If you are going to weave me into your fabrications, you must tell me first.”
Sophia stopped. Damiana flattened against her back, a grunt of air rushing from her at the collision. Sophia spun and grabbed her friend by the shoulders.
“I didn’t know I would include you. I…I didn’t know what I was going to say until I said it.”
Damiana narrowed her eyes at Sophia. “Was that about what I think it was? Are you thinking of running?”
Sophia veered away from Damiana’s prying glare as if to avoid her words. But Damiana would have no more of her vacillations; she grabbed Sophia by her shoulder and spun her back.
“Are you?”
Sophia gave a curt nod with all the forced determination she could muster.
“It is all I can think to do.”
“Merda!” Damiana barked the profanity from between clenched teeth, her cherubic, bow-shaped mouth tight and frowning. “Do you think it’s possible that any of the men at the fabbrica know you make the glass?”
“It’s…possible, I suppose.”
“And do you think it’s possible that one of them is among those who will do anything to help the government protect the secret of the glass?”
“Sì, yes, maybe, but—”
“Then you are insane. You know there is no running for La Muranese. Have you forgotten already what just happened?”
Sophia closed her eyes against the vivid images of the three flower-strewn coffins as they were carried down the calli to the cemetery and the sobbing families that dragged themselves behind.
“No, of course I haven’t forgotten. But…I thought…we are all women…”
Damiana shook her head, only inches away from her friend’s face. Sophia could see the tiny red threads in the white of her eyes, felt the minute drops of spittle as they flew from her agitated mouth.
“Women, children, it makes no difference. Venetians take what they want. They took the bronze horses from Constantinople. They stole the body of St. Mark, for goodness sake. Taking a girl against her will is nothing, nothing to these men.”
“But…if we go far enough, they won’t both—”
Damiana grabbed Sophia’s hands and squeezed. “No matter where you go, no matter how far, they’ll find you.”
Sophia yanked her hands away. “I don’t care!”
Her screech chased the swallows from their perch on the balcony railings; their frightened chirps and flapping wings rent the air. Sophia jut out her quivering chin. “I don’t care. I’m not afraid.” But her bark faded to a whisper. She jumped as a cold drop of water, loosened from one of the many lines of washing strung from window to window across the narrow calli, landed on her forehead.
“No,” Damiana heaved a deep breath, seeing the small line of perspiration above Sophia’s full top lip. “Of course you’re not.”
Twelve
The women hovered and spun around her, their spirited, excited chatter and laughter billowing about her like the swirl of a wind funnel. Sophia stood quiet and calm in the center of the furor, the vacuous eye of a turbulent storm, as they clasped the tiny buttons along the back of the satin green gown, fluffed at the pleats of the full overskirt, and fastened the emerald jewels at her wrist and throat. Her small, always tidy room of greens and pinks lay besieged by discarded ribbons and lace, intoxicating aromas, and chirping women. Their encouraging words flowed as constantly as the sea through the canals, as if they took her quietude for displeasure and felt compelled to convince her of her beauty.
“This color is perfect for you, Sophi,” Mamma clucked near her ear.
“Your great-grandmother’s jewels match perfectly,” Nonna crooned.
Damiana laughed. “The men will be drooling over you.”
As if from a great distance, Sophia watched their ministrations and heard their words of encouragement, staring, dumbfounded, at the reflection in the milky glass before her. Though enamored of the woman gazing back at her, her own pleasure at her atypical appearance was a discordant note in her mind. Not even for festivals would she dress in such splendor, and she felt as unfamiliar in her own skin as the butterfly when it first emerged from the cocoon. Tight curls curtained her face, parted down the back of her head, thrust forward, and held in place by two combs. The forest green satin bodice hugged her generous curves, as did the matching overskirt, drawn back in an inverted vee to reveal the shimmering seafoam underskirt of silk. She scarcely recognized herself in the relucent replica yet felt a tingle of pleasure coursing through herself at the picture she created.
Nonna tugged the tight bodice farther down her granddaughter’s torso. With a narrow-eyed, sideways look of disgust, Sophia shimmied it back up. She loved every detail of this princess’s gown, every inch of it, save the severely sloping slant of the bejeweled bodice’s edge. Plunging necklines were the rage of the day, allowing the crescents of peach and sandy nipples to peek out above the lace or ribboned gown rims. The trend had flourished ever since the Senate had ordered the city’s courtesans to display their breasts publicly, a desperate attempt to stem the increasing inclination of young men to their own kind. Yet Sophia had no desire to parade herself so wantonly, held no empathy for any woman who did, and she would have no part of it.
The bustling bevy of women continued to fuss and flap at her. Only Oriana stood sullenly remote, looking on from the corner of the room, her blue eyes jaded with envy. She raised the small roll of parchment to her face yet again and read the short message with a condescending whine.
“‘Your escort will arrive promptly at seven-thirty. Ser Pasquale da Fuligna will meet you at the summit of the Staircase of the Giants no later than eight-thirty.’ What, he is too good to call for you himself?”
“Hush, Oriana,” Nonna chided as she worked the string of glass beads through Sophia’s hair, their deep glow like stars twinkling among the shiny strands of dark floss. “Important men like ser da Fuligna have no time for such menial tasks.”
Sophia looked askance at her grandmother, then over at her mamma with whom she shared a bemused half-smile.
“Grazie, Nonna.”
“You’re welcome, cara,” Nonna replied in earnest oblivion.
Sophia laughed and the jocularity felt strange upon her tongue. For a brief moment, the import of tonight’s occasion was forgotten: attending the ball on Pasquale’s arm would symbolize the Fiolarios’ acceptance of the
da Fulignas’ contract and would announce to society the intentions of the two families.
An unfamiliar voice rumbled up from below her bedroom’s open windows, those that gave out onto the canal, and its accompanying fondamenta, and her laughter died in her throat. She rushed to peer out and saw the blue-and gold-liveried servant at the threshold of their door. Her gaze rose to the stars appearing in the magenta dusk sky, watched them sparkle and shimmer, wondering why they looked the same when nothing would ever be the same again. A stirring wind flew in off the canal and she closed her eyes to its caress, felt it stroke her face and flutter the curls at her temples. Sophia longed to fly away on it, to catch and ride its crest to distant shores.
“Sophia?”
Her mother’s gentle nudging broke her reverie. She found the loving and expectant faces staring at her.
“Sì, Mamma, sì.” Sophia gave a curt nod, picked up the long, heavy folds of her skirt, and made for the door. “I’m going.”
The trail of her gown swished across the uneven bricks of the palace’s courtyard. Too long by inches, it swept along behind her like a broom hard at work. In lieu of the fashionable four-inch pattens, Sophia wore incongruous and inconsequential low-heeled slippers. Her bruised ankle was still swollen and wrapped after her first unsuccessful and injurious attempts on the wooden platforms and she had obstinately refused to wear them again. She had been tempted to toss them onto the fire like the logs they were. Instead, they stood in the corner of her room, stalwart reminders of the change in her life’s fate.
She approached the bottom stair as the exhausted traveler approaches the first of many steep hills and looked up. In the glittering light of torch flame, three men peered down at her. The giants of Mars and Neptune—the almost nude, mammoth statues that stood atop the corners of the balustrade and symbolized Venice’s prowess at war and at sea—flanked each side of the small round man who stood on the riser between them. At a perfunctory nod from his master, her escort faded away into the night and back through the courtyard.
The Secret of the Glass Page 13