The Violinist of Venice

by Alyssa Palombo

  Upon learning of Lucrezia’s love of singing, an idea struck me the very next day that prompted me to send a note asking Vittoria to pay me a visit.

  “I shall get right to the point,” I said, as soon as we were ensconced in my sitting room.

  Vittoria raised one of her delicately arched eyebrows. “What? You mean this is not a visit to gossip about everyone we know?”

  I laughed. “Not today, I am afraid. I have a proposal for you. I was wondering if you might consider taking on my Lucrezia as a voice student.”

  “Truly?” she asked, surprised.

  “Yes. I have noticed her humming to herself often, and she likes to sing. I can think of no one better for her to learn from than you.”

  “Oh, I … I do not know,” Vittoria said, looking stricken. “Please, do not mistake my meaning. I would like nothing better. It is just … I do not know if it would be allowed.”

  “Who is to find out?” I asked. “You could come here, as you do anyway, and give Lucrezia her lessons, and I shall pay you. It need concern no one but ourselves.”

  “Pay me!” she exclaimed. “I could not accept payment for teaching music.”

  “As I said, who is to find out?”

  She vigorously shook her head. “No, no. I could not take payment, not for something I would do gladly.”

  I sighed. “Then I will not pay you. But please at least consider it. I think it will be good for both of you.”

  Vittoria promised to think on it, spending several days soul-searching and, no doubt, praying. Ultimately she agreed to teach Lucrezia, though firmly refused payment.

  “We will start with scales, and sight-reading, but I will need to get some music for her to learn from,” Vittoria mused aloud. “And she must first learn technique, breathing and posture and so on…”

  “I will pay for whatever music you need,” I told her. “Let us see if she has any talent first.”

  “Oh, I am sure she does!” Vittoria said.

  We decided Vittoria would come once a week for an hour to teach Lucrezia. When I told my daughter, she skipped around the nursery in excitement, and I knew I had made a good choice.

  * * *

  As I tended to my children by day, I was more often than not in the company of my friends by night. During such pious seasons as Lent we were forced to forgo our merrymaking; but the rest of the year, Venice offered no shortage of amusements. We frequented a number of the many opera houses—though I carefully avoided seeing any opera written by Vivaldi, which I am certain no one marked, save for Giuseppe. Then there was gambling at the Ridotto, endless parties, playhouses, and the many cafés and restaurants.

  One evening, bored with the opera and impatient for our dinner to arrive, I left the box to get some air and stretch my legs.

  I had not wandered far when I noticed a man clad in a familiar dark green jacket, intimately speaking to someone in a shadowy, curtained corner. It was Giuseppe; his height and broad shoulders just barely concealed the tall Vittoria. I drew in a sharp breath.

  Vittoria saw me before I could speak. She turned a brilliant shade of red and stepped around Giuseppe. “I am sorry to have left you all so rudely,” she said, her voice wavering slightly. “Has our dinner arrived?”

  “No,” I replied, looking from her to my brother curiously. It was plain that they had only been talking, but knowing how modest Vittoria was, I was far more surprised than if I had come upon Giulietta and Mario making love in the same corner. “I merely wished to take a short stroll.”

  “Yes, of course,” Vittoria said. “Well, I should return directly.” She swept past us, disappearing back into our box.

  “Giuseppe,” I began, but he shook his head.

  “I know.” He sighed. “Let us return to the box as well, before our friends become curious about all these comings and goings.”

  I acquiesced and followed him back; as if by unspoken agreement, we moved past the back section, where Vittoria had smoothly joined a very rowdy game of cards, and stepped past the curtain into the front section.

  Giuseppe fixed his gaze on the extravagantly costumed diva parading about the stage before us, but his interest—real or feigned—was not about to distract me from learning what I could, especially now that we had privacy.

  “Giuseppe,” I began again in a whisper.

  He sighed and turned to face me, his handsome face full of anguish. “Please,” he said, “do not judge me too harshly, sorella. I know it looked scandalous, but we were doing nothing but talking. That I swear, upon my honor.”

  “I do not doubt it,” I said. “But you are lucky it was I who came upon you, and not someone who might not have been so discreet.”

  “I know, I know,” he said. “But I just had to have a word alone … had to know if it was possible that she—”

  “Giuseppe,” I admonished him, “she is a married woman.”

  “I know!” he bit out sharply. “I know, and I am in torment! I am all too aware that she is married, and to a powerful nobleman, no less. She is too pious, too good, to violate the sanctity of her marriage vows. Nor would I ever ask her to.” He turned to me, his expression nakedly earnest. “I swear to you, Adriana, I would never ask that of her. Never.”

  “I know you would not, fratello,” I said, staring in wonder at my levelheaded, reasonable brother, who just now seemed to be tearing at all his seams right before my eyes. “But I would not see her reputation harmed by some misunderstanding. Nor would I see you heartbroken.”

  “You need not worry for her reputation,” he said. “I will not again forgo discretion in such a way. But as for my heart…” He smiled ruefully. “That is past saving, dear sister.”

  “Giuseppe,” I whispered. I had not realized his feelings for Vittoria were so strong; had not thought he loved her so deeply, so completely. Yet it was there on his face for me to read.

  Sighing, he rose to his feet. “There is nothing to be done,” he said. “I shall surely burn in hell for coveting another man’s wife, and yet I cannot imagine that Lucifer himself could devise a more painful torment than what I now endure.” He parted the curtain and returned to the back of the box, leaving me alone.

  No doubt I, too, shall know the fires of hell for lying with a priest, and you are not the only one who knows of such torments, I thought. But no one knew better than I how love robs us of all reason, but never completely of all hope.

  60

  THE DANCE

  Tommaso Foscari was married just before I: to Faustina Barberini, daughter of one of Venice’s oldest and most noble families, and whose father was Giuseppe’s former employer. The Foscari family was likely more impressed with her pedigree than her fortune, which was dwindling. She was classically beautiful, with pale skin, blue eyes, and long golden hair. She was also reported to be vain, shallow, and even—so some said—rather stupid. She had borne a strong, healthy daughter perhaps a year after their marriage, followed quickly by a son around the time I gave birth to the twins and, the year after that, another daughter.

  I only came face-to-face with the couple once, while attending the opera during my first Carnevale after being married. As we were making our way to our box, we passed by Tommaso, his pretty new wife on his arm. The rest of my party continued on without a thought, but I started when he saw me. He froze, his jaw tightening. For a moment I thought he would ignore me altogether, yet he nodded briefly and went along his way. Thankfully, none of my friends noticed, so I was spared the need to explain.

  Then, in January of 1720, well into the Carnevale season, my friends and I attended a party being held by Senator Barbo and his wife. I had just begun a dance with Leonardo when someone cut in on him. “I hope I can persuade you to give up the honor, my fine fellow,” said a smooth, deep voice that I recognized well, even though the speaker’s face was hidden by his mask.

  “Of course,” Leonardo said, sounding puzzled. He stepped aside, and the newcomer swept me into the circle of dancers. Suddenly I was a girl of eighte
en again, dancing with Tommaso Foscari in the ballroom of his parents’ palazzo.

  “Donna Baldovino,” he said as we entered the dance. “I should not presume to use your Christian name, I suppose.”

  “I see the mask my maid recommended leaves much to be desired,” I said, “since you knew so easily that it was me.”

  “You have not changed all that much.”

  “I was but a girl then,” I said, unsure of his tone.

  “And now you are a senator’s wife,” he said. “You have done very well for yourself, I see.”

  “Are you mocking me, Tommaso?” I asked, my composure slipping a bit as I used his given name.

  “Not at all,” he said. “To be the wife of a senator of our fair republic is an enviable position.”

  “Yes, well,” I said. “It is not exactly what my father wanted.”

  “And you, Adriana?” he asked. “Is it what you wanted?”

  I was taken aback by his directness, by the venom in his voice. So disarmed was I that I answered honestly. “You must know that it was not,” I said, lowering my voice.

  “Ah, that is right. You wanted to run away with your mysterious lover, and be his wife and bear his children.”

  “How dare you,” I bit out, stopping abruptly in the middle of the dance. Several people looked curiously in our direction. “What gives you the right to accost me on a ballroom floor, and to speak of that about which you know nothing? Is this the behavior of a gentleman, then?”

  He gaped at me in silence, then guided me back into the dance before we attracted any further attention.

  “I am sorry, Adriana,” he said, sounding chastened. “Forgive me. I do not mean to be so bitter. It is just that…” He lowered his voice to a near-whisper and leaned closer to me. “I do not love my wife,” he confessed. “My parents chose her and forced her on me. She is vapid and vain and foolish, and I pray each day that my daughters will not grow up to be like her.” He sighed. “Some days I wake up and rage at the mess my life has become.”

  His bitterness shocked me, but his honesty shocked me more. I could taste the unpleasant burn of guilt in my mouth. How strange, I mused, that a man, too, could end up just as hopelessly trapped as a woman. “I know well enough how you feel,” I said quietly. “It seems neither of our lives went as we might have liked.”

  “Would you go back and undo it all, if you could?”

  His question startled me; it was the question I had danced around but could never bring myself to ask. Now I had no choice but to face it, to dance with it.

  On that night Vivaldi and I first made love, I remember thinking that never would I wish it had not happened, despite what consequences might come. Had that been simply the silly, romantic notion of a girl in love? Or had I known then what perhaps I had forgotten since: that it was worth any cost to love and be loved in return, to choose and be chosen, to make love with the one person in all the world that you wanted, and to carry a piece of them with you forever after?

  And maybe, just maybe, I had been completely wrong this whole time. Maybe fate had not punished me. Maybe I was the luckiest of women: for knowing what it is to be in love, such all-consuming, senseless, heedless love; and now I had three children whom I loved and would not trade for anything or anyone.

  Was it worth the price? My innocence, my faith, my firstborn child?

  “I…” I stuttered. “So much has happened … I no longer know…”

  The music came to an end, and Tommaso executed a perfect bow and kissed my hand. His eyes were sad behind his mask, sad that I had not said that I would have done it all differently, with no regrets, if only to be with him.

  “It is all right,” he said quietly. “I understand.”

  61

  AVE MARIA, GRATIA PLENA

  It was one of those beautiful, early spring days in March, a day completely unfit for the news we received, in the form of a hastily scrawled note delivered by one of the Cassenti servants.

  Giacomo was still abed, as he had grown rather older and wearier of late. This left me as the first one to read the message: Francesco had died the night before, after suffering violent chest pains. The distraught Vittoria begged me to come to her as soon as I could.

  Tears stung my eyes, thinking of Vittoria now a widow at such a young age—she would be only twenty-six this year, two years younger than me—and alone and adrift in a large and boisterous world where she still struggled, sometimes, to feel comfortable.

  “My mistress beseeches you to attend her as soon as possible,” the servant informed me. “She said I am to bring you back in the gondola, if it pleases you.”

  I nodded, taking a deep breath and banishing the tears. “Of course,” I replied. “But first I must take the news to my husband, if you do not mind waiting. Don Cassenti was a good friend of his.”

  I dreaded telling Giacomo. But when I did, he simply remained where he was, silently lying unmoving on the bed, still, not speaking. Then he rolled over, putting his back to me. “Go to her,” he said quietly. “I will remain here.”

  I left without further discussion, knowing that each must handle their grief in their own way, and allowed the servant to take me to my friend.

  Vittoria was much grieved. Despite her occasional disappointment in the life for which she had forsaken music, Francesco had always been so good to her, she said between fits of weeping. He was her protector, her teacher in the ways of the world, her companion.

  It was not until some hours later, when I finally persuaded her to rest and left her palazzo, that I thought of Giuseppe. Had he heard? And what would he do now that the one obstacle to his love was gone?

  Immediately I reproached myself. He would do nothing; Vittoria was a newly made widow, and must go through the requisite period of mourning. Francesco had yet to even be buried.

  * * *

  Giacomo remained in his rooms for days, emerging only to attend the requiem Mass—during which he promptly dissolved in a shower of tears. Perhaps his friend’s death was a dark reminder that his own could not be far to seek. Francesco had been a full year younger than Giacomo, whose own health was not nearly as robust lately. Finding these thoughts disturbing, I pushed them aside.

  Vittoria, though looking pale and wan against the black gown and veil she wore, comported herself remarkably well. She stood tall, and what tears she shed were silent ones. No doubt her faith, as strong as ever, was consoling her a great deal.

  I had been relieved to learn that Francesco—having no other heir—had left everything he had to his wife. It ensured she would want for nothing, and could live comfortably for the rest of her days, even should she choose not to remarry.

  Leaving the church, we encountered Giuseppe, whom I had not seen enter. He bowed. “Don Senatore Baldovino,” he said. He turned to me, a slight smile cracking his otherwise grim face. “Adriana.”

  Giacomo nodded disinterestedly, walking past him to await our gondola.

  “It is a tragedy,” Giuseppe said to me, his voice low.

  “Yes,” I answered, slightly bewildered. Giuseppe had hardly known Francesco, and had obvious reasons to not feel kindly disposed toward the man. “Francesco was a good man; a good friend of Giacomo’s, as you know. He has taken the news ill, indeed.”

  “She is so young, so good,” he said, as if he had not heard me. His eyes followed the funeral gondola that Vittoria had mounted, accompanying her husband’s body to one of the islands in the lagoon for burial. “And so sad. She is bereft, now, of her protector in the world.” He sighed, running his fingers through his dark hair. “I hate to see her in such a state.”

  I nodded. “As do I.”

  “I went to her when I heard. To offer my condolences,” he said, in the hurried tone of one confessing some damning sin. “Just to do that, nothing more, I swear. And she…” He paused. “She cried in my arms, Adriana. And though God will surely punish me for taking such joy in her grief, I have never known a happier moment in my life.”

&n
bsp; I sighed. A newly widowed Vittoria weeping for her husband in the arms of another man, one who loved her and whom she loved … I knew not what to make of that. But in that moment, all impropriety aside, I fervently wished that Vittoria would not spend the rest of her life alone, nor that my brother’s anguish would continue without relief.

  * * *

  I was not privy to whatever arrangements were made between Vittoria and Giuseppe, nor to what promises they made each other, but some months after Francesco’s death, Giuseppe began visiting Vittoria at her palazzo. A year and a half later, the pair announced they were to be married. They brought the news to me themselves, giggling and blushing like a couple of love-struck teenagers.

  The following week, Giuseppe held a dinner at his palazzo, during which they made the news public. Vittoria beamed with a happiness so great her smile could barely contain it, and Giuseppe scarcely took his eyes off his affianced bride all evening.

  “Congratulations again, cara!” I cried during a private moment, embracing her and kissing her cheek. “I must confess I have hoped this day would come, ever since the night you first stepped into Giuseppe’s gondola and he almost fell overboard at the sight of you.”

  She laughed. “Just as they sing of on the opera stages. We have loved each other long, but I confess I had some doubts. After my mourning period was over, I did not want to dishonor Francesco’s memory or to act in haste, but my prayers and my love made up my mind for me. And we did not want to tell anyone immediately, for fear people would talk—they will still talk, I know, but I will not let the wagging tongues of others stop me from wedding the one man I have ever loved.”

  She paused, a thoughtful look coming over her face. “Finally I understand what God intended for me in directing me to leave the Pietà,” she said. “Finally I understand His plan. There were times when I questioned it, and Him. But I should not have. Now I know why. For such love as Giuseppe and I have … it was worth everything. And never again will I wonder, or regret.”

  Tears sprang to my eyes. “You do not know how happy I am that it should be you two, my brother and my dearest friend,” I said. “There are no two people more deserving of love in all the world.”