Frail Barrier

by Edward Sklepowich

  ‘He’s such a good boy,’ she said. ‘Like the best of sons. Last October he took Giulietta and me to see Così Fan Tutte. It was at the Scuola Grande dei Carmini.’ She inclined her head in the general direction of the guildhall originally associated with the Church of the Carmini. Decorated by Tiepolo and located right off of the Campo Santa Margherita, it was sometimes used these days as a venue for innovative opera productions. ‘I thought it was very funny, but Giulietta just sat there like a statue. And she kept criticizing the costumes.’

  They turned into a calle that led away from the square and that eventually, after connecting and intersecting with other alleys, would have brought them to Ca’ Foscari and near the Grand Canal. But they didn’t go that far. They took a few turnings down empty alleys where plastic bags of refuse were set on the stones in front of the building entrances.

  They entered an alley with a sottoportico at the end. A footstep scraped the pavement behind them. In order to give the person more room in the narrow passageway, Urbino drew Albina closer to one side. They were now moving slowly. Albina seemed to have lost whatever remaining energy she had had as they approached her building.

  When Urbino glanced over his shoulder, he saw no one. A television started to blare from an open window above them, drowning out any other sounds.

  They passed through the sottoportico and turned right. Albina’s apartment building was at the end of a cul-de-sac a short distance away. The light fixed to the side of her building was not working.

  ‘Here we are, Signor Urbino. Thank you so much. Let me get my key and I—’

  She broke off.

  ‘How stupid of me!’ she said, looking up at him. ‘I forgot my house keys at the café!’

  ‘It’s my fault.’ A wave of anger at himself swept over Urbino. ‘I interfered with your usual routine.’

  ‘I forgot because I’m becoming an old woman. But it doesn’t matter. Giulietta is home. And this old door can be pushed in by a child – probably our apartment door too!’

  ‘That’s not safe.’

  ‘Safe enough. And Giulietta can protect us. I don’t like it, but she has—’ She broke off. ‘She has a very bad temper,’ she continued. ‘I suppose I shouldn’t say it. But she can scare anyone!’

  Albina gave a nervous laugh, and looked up at the second floor. Lights showed behind the curtains of an open window. She pushed one of the bell buttons beside the door. She paused before pushing it again. The curtains at the window were thrust aside. A head with curly, short-cut blonde hair appeared.

  ‘What’s the matter with you ringing the bell like that?’ Giulietta’s harsh voice spewed out in almost impenetrable Venetian dialect. ‘Oh, it’s you as well, Signor Urbino,’ Albina’s sister added in more gentle tones. ‘Good evening!’

  ‘Good evening, Signorina Giulietta. Excuse us for disturbing you. Because of me Albina forgot her key at Da Valdo.’

  ‘Do you think this is the first time she’s forgotten something? It’s been happening for years now. Just a minute.’

  They waited until Giulietta’s head reappeared at the window.

  ‘Here, you!’ she shouted. She threw the key down to the ground. It barely missed hitting Albina. Giulietta pulled the curtains back in place.

  Urbino picked the key up and fit it in the door. He noted that the door was damaged, as if from repeated attempts – successful or not – to push it in. Even the key didn’t fit easily into the lock, but needed some maneuvering.

  ‘You should speak to the owner and get this door repaired.’ He held the door open for her and handed her the key.

  ‘A lot of good that will do! Good night, Signor Urbino. Thank you for your care. Sleep well and give my best wishes to the contessa.’

  She gave him a bright smile as she closed the door behind her.

  Urbino walked down the deserted calle and back through the covered passageway. The wind, which had been strong only a short time before, had completely abated, but the air was heavy and dank. He looked up at the sky above the buildings. Stars were brightly visible.

  By one of those strange weather patterns characteristic of Venice the storm that had been about to descend on the city had moved away. But Urbino knew that it would fulfill its threat sooner rather than later, and before the coming of the dawn.

  He reached the Campo Santa Margherita. A group of young Venetians was gathered around a gelateria. One of them, a history student, called out to Urbino. Urbino waved but didn’t stop.

  He went over a bridge and past the Church of San Pantalon. Soon he was on the Crosera. Noisy groups of young people stood outside the cafés, leaving only a small space for others to get by. Tourists, most of them probably from the small hotels in the area, walked slowly along, looking in shop windows.

  Urbino quickened his step. He was eager to get home now. It had been a long day. The San Tomà boat landing was only a few minutes away. From there a vaporetto, after only two stops, would bring him to Cannaregio.

  As he was about to enter the Calle della Madonna, three black women stopped him to ask directions to the train station. They spoke in French and carried large cloth bags. They needed to catch a train for Bologna.

  Urbino consulted his watch. It was a few minutes past eleven. The last train for Bologna, or for anywhere else, left in an hour. If the women missed it, they would have to wait until about five in the morning. He began to give them directions for walking to the station, but feared they would lose their way. He advised them to take the vaporetto with him. The stop for the station was the one after his. They would get to Santa Lucia in plenty of time to catch the last train.

  ‘The landing is near here,’ he told them. ‘But follow me. It’s easy to miss.’

  As they neared the calle to the boat landing, Urbino recognized the lone figure of Claudio walking toward them from the direction of the Campo San Tomà.

  ‘Salve, Claudio!’ he called out.

  Claudio seemed startled. He took in Urbino and the three women.

  ‘Buona sera,’ he said.

  ‘Out for a walk?’

  Claudio lived only a short distance away near the Campo San Tomà.

  ‘Yes, a walk. The storm has decided not to come.’

  ‘We’ll have to see about that. How are you enjoying the Callas?’

  ‘I was listening to it before I left the apartment. I’ll play it again when I get back. It soothes me. So do my walks.’

  Claudio appeared on edge. It was understandable, considering that tomorrow, the day of the final qualifying competitions, would be an important day for him and Gildo.

  ‘Don’t worry. I’m sure you and Gildo will do fine tomorrow. And you know my philosophy. The essential thing is making the effort. By the way, I just saw Romolo Beato. He said you’re doing well with your singing. Congratulations.’

  ‘When did you see him?’

  ‘An hour or so ago. With Perla. He was on his way to Padua. But excuse me.’ The women were looking at him nervously. ‘I’d talk to you longer, but these ladies are on their way to Bologna. I want to be sure to get them to the station. Enjoy your walk. Good luck tomorrow. I’ll be there to cheer you on.’

  An hour later the storm broke. Urbino was dry in the Palazzo Uccello and the three women had caught their train to Bologna.

  But the city was exposed. This storm, coming so soon after the one of only three days ago, put the vulnerable city in great danger again.

  The rain was torrential. It poured off roofs, ran through alleys like rivers, and spread in sheets across squares. Rubbish, from plastic bags that burst and overturned bins, was swept into the canals and washed into the drains, which were soon choked. In some areas the stench was overpowering from the backed-up sewers. Many boats, unwisely left uncovered, sank. Even most of those covered with plastic and tarpaulin couldn’t bear the volume of water, which pulled loose the protective coverings and flooded the boats. People living in ground-floor apartments regretted that they had been seduced by the much lower rent, for t
hey spent the whole night moving furniture and bailing out their rooms. The gondolas and motorboats moored along the Molo rocked violently, and the Molo itself was a deep sheet of water. At one point visibility became so poor at the tormented mouth of the Grand Canal that a water taxi almost collided with a vaporetto, crammed with passengers and riding dangerously low in the water.

  Once again the city, built as it was on thousands of sand and clay islets of the lagoon, was being destabilized.

  It would survive this storm, and the next, and the next, but it couldn’t go on forever exposing its frailties to the forces of nature.

  Two French tourists suffered through it. Blessedly, the most vicious salvos were now over. The man and the woman, trapped in Dorsoduro, were soaked to the skin and desperate to reach the train station. They thought that the last train of the night, the one that would take them across the causeway to Mestre where they were lodging, left at one fifteen, but it had pulled out of Santa Lucia almost an hour ago.

  ‘If you didn’t want to save a measly twenty euros a night, we’d be in our beds by now,’ the wife said. She pulled up against a building.

  ‘And if you didn’t want another drink, we’d have got to the station before this storm,’ her husband shot back.

  ‘Do you know where we are?’

  ‘You have the map.’

  ‘This pathetic thing?’

  She held up the map. It was falling apart at the folds. She thrust it into her husband’s hands.

  ‘It’s useless,’ she said. ‘No, don’t throw it on the ground!’

  ‘As if another piece of rubbish is going to make a difference!’

  Some of the plastic bags that had stood beside the buildings only a short time ago had been tossed around by the wind and split open. Refuse littered the calle.

  ‘Let’s try this way.’ The husband indicated the entrance of a sottoportico. He threw the map on top of a plastic rubbish bag. ‘Maybe we’ll find a sign.’

  ‘And maybe it’ll be pointing in two different directions like the ones we saw on the other side of the Grand Canal!’

  They entered the covered passageway. No light showed.

  ‘Watch yourself,’ the husband said. ‘Give me your arm.’

  ‘It’s so dark in here.’

  They groped their way slowly. Fifteen feet ahead a sheet of rain marked the end of the sottoportico. The husband took out a small flashlight attached to his keychain and directed its small but strong beam on the pavement.

  ‘This puddle is almost a foot deep,’ the husband cried. ‘Don’t they have sewers that work in this city? Watch out. You—’

  He stopped short.

  ‘What’s that?’ he said more quietly.

  He redirected the flashlight beam to illuminate a dark form in front of them.

  It was an unmoving figure. It was sprawled on the flooded stones, face down in the puddle. One arm reached toward the head. The other was twisted beneath the body.

  Two sodden, half-smoked cigarettes floated on the water near the body. Each of the cigarettes was smeared with bright red lipstick, which had the appearance of blood.

  The French couple had no doubt that the person was dead. Why should they have? This was Venice, wasn’t it?

  Part Two

  Into the Maze

  Three

  Urbino spent part of the next day at the final qualifying competition for the regatta in Malamocco. Since the Lido town wasn’t easy to get to, he had arranged for Pasquale to bring him in the contessa’s motorboat. The contessa was still up in Asolo.

  Back in Venice the evidence of the ravages of the monstrous storm was all too evident. Even the Palazzo Uccello, which was protected because it stood almost midway between the Grand Canal and the lagoon, had suffered broken windows and damage to the supports of the altana. A flowerpot on the altana railing had become dislodged by the wind and crashed down near the water landing, narrowly missing the gondola. Fortunately, Gildo had secured the gondola well to the mooring and tightly covered it.

  As soon as Urbino had awakened, he had called Vitale, the contessa’s major-domo. He was relieved to learn that the Ca’ da Capo-Zendrini had received only minor damage, mainly to the plantings in its garden and to a mooring pole that had been splintered when a water taxi had hit it.

  Malamocco had escaped the major brunt of the storm, however, even though it was at one of the three points on the Lido where there was an opening into the Adriatic. The opening was the site of one of the ingenious – and controversial – dikes that were under construction to protect Venice from the devastating floods that threatened the city, and of which they had just got a disturbing preview.

  Malamocco had put on a festive air for the competition. Perhaps because of the storm the usually sleepy town wanted to celebrate even more, and the residents seemed particularly spirited. Malamocco, which had once been the capital of the lagoon government before it was moved to the area of the Rialto, might not have seen much devastation from last night’s storm, but it had a history of destruction from the sea, though not recent. A tidal wave had obliterated the original settlement a thousand years ago.

  Urbino was part of the large crowd gathered along the waterfront in the sunshine. He cheered on Gildo and Claudio as they rowed their gondolino past in the shallow waters. The two men were in fine form, and although they were evidently not the best among the competitors, they weren’t among the weakest.

  The chronometer that made the eliminations was in their favor. Gildo and Claudio were selected as one of the final nine teams. Barring some unforeseen disqualification or illness, they would run in the gondolino regatta.

  Urbino made his apologies to the two men when they invited him to celebrate with them and their supporters in Venice. He wanted to wander around the Lido.

  Before having Pasquale take him to the Piazzale Santa Maria Elisabetta, Urbino had a panino and a glass of chilled white wine in a garden trattoria. From his table under a grape arbor he had a good view of the expanse of water in which the competition had taken place. The lagoon off Malamocco was still lively with boats. Many of them were private craft – motorboats, sandolos, rowboats, and gondolas – most of them staying close to shore and filled with merrymakers. People strolled along the wooden pier or sat on the grass and benches.

  The waters immediately off of Malamocco were notoriously dangerous because of mudflats and currents. Wooden poles in the water marked the safe boat routes. Supposedly when Pepin asked an old local woman the way to Rivo Alto, the high bank of the Venetian islands that became known as the Rialto, she pointed across the exact point of the lagoon where she knew there were treacherous waters. ‘Sempre dritto,’ she said, ‘Straight ahead,’ directing him and his men to their destruction by the Venetian forces when his fleet became mired. Today you could hear Venetians offering the same directions without any malevolence as they pointed out the way to some building or square or bridge. The irony, of course, was that in the confusing maze of Venice nothing could ever be ‘straight ahead.’

  When Pasquale brought him to the busy Piazzale Santa Maria Elisabetta where the boats came in from Venice, Urbino walked down the Gran Viale toward the Adriatic. Although he loved Venice, he sometimes enjoyed escaping from it for a few hours on the Lido and taking in what seemed to him to be, after months in Venice, the distinct anomalies of bicycles, Vespas, cars, and buses. But August was not the time to do it, for it was crammed with tourists, bicycles, and cars. He was jostled by the crowd, most of them in shorts and bathing suits although some of them – these he suspected being early arrivals for the film festival – were dressed in the height of fashion and sometimes quite outlandishly. A child ran into him with a cone of chocolate gelato that made a stain on his trouser leg. He was almost run down by two teenagers pedaling furiously on a tandem.

  After stopping for a mineral water in a café, for the day had become increasingly hot, he eventually reached the Old Jewish Cemetery, where he knew he would be able to find some peace and quiet. Other
than himself, there was only an elderly couple, who returned his greeting politely and continued their slow circuit of the cemetery.

  The cemetery was a small area that had recently been restored, although not to the best effect. Many of the old tombstones had been moved and regrouped together, and the place had lost some of that melancholy charm that appealed to Urbino, especially in cemeteries.

  After walking around and examining the inscription on the obelisk that proclaimed the cemetery to be the ‘House of the Living,’ he sat on the ground near a cypress tree. It seemed an appropriate place to take out his Goethe, which he had slipped in his pocket before leaving the Palazzo Uccello.

  For the next half-hour, surrounded by the tombstones with their images of upraised hands, urns pouring water, lions, and coats of arms, Urbino lost himself in Goethe’s impressions.

  The next afternoon Urbino, on his way to meet Nick Hollander at the Gritti Palace, sat in the stern of a vaporetto as it passed down the Grand Canal. This was his preferred place in the boats, with his back to the prow. He enjoyed looking out at the scene after the vaporetto had already passed it.

  What has been called the finest street in the world was also one of the busiest. To an eye less practiced than Urbino’s it would also have seemed to be one of the most chaotic, but not because of any ravages of the recent storm.

  Wasn’t his vaporetto about to capsize the rocking gondola only a short distance away? From the look of alarm on the faces of the tourists in the black craft, they certainly seemed to think so. And how could the fireboat, speeding from the station near Ca’ Foscari, possibly make its way among all the water traffic without a collision? Surely stretches of the Grand Canal would soon be filled with sinking crates of wine and mineral water, plastic bags of refuse, and splinters of sleek, polished wood?