Venetian Mask

by Rosalind Laker

  Marietta was amused. “You would never go hungry married to a baker!”

  Elena threw back her head to laugh. “No! But I would be sure to end up round as a barrel! Those cakes are extremely good.”

  Chapter Three

  EARLY IN JANUARY IN THE NEW YEAR OF 1780, THE SEVENTEENTH birthdays of Marietta and Elena slipped by. Iseppo and his wife brought Marietta a home-baked cake, as was their custom on her birthday. They sat on one side of the gilded grille in the visitors’ room and she sat on the other, chatting eagerly. Afterward the cake was shared around, but a section with some of the sugar flowers was saved for Marietta to take to the orphans in the nursery section. Among them was five-year-old Bianca, the god-daughter Marietta had acquired soon after her arrival at the Pietà. Adrianna, wanting to help her through the anguish of her recent bereavement, had taken her to see the day-old infant who had been left nameless on the doorstep. Marietta had been drawn immediately to the newborn baby bereft of a mother as she was herself, and had found comfort in holding her.

  “Would you like to be her godmother?” Adrianna had asked. When Marietta had nodded eagerly Adrianna told her to chose the baby’s name.

  “Bianca,” Marietta had replied without hesitation. “It’s such a pretty name and it suits her.”

  When Elena became Marietta’s friend, it was natural that she should share Bianca as they shared a common interest in everything else. When Bianca was old enough, Elena had begun teaching her to play the recorder. Now she and Marietta went together to take the little girl her piece of cake.

  “It’s pink! And for me!” Bianca cried out with glee when she saw them.

  The two girls stayed to play with her and the other little ones and, before leaving, Marietta sang “Columbina,” getting them all to join in.

  At this time of year, evening performances gave Elena her long-awaited chance to see something of the colorful costumes, the music and the laughter of Carnival, and for Marietta to see every kind of mask she had ever worked on in her mother’s workroom.

  Since early childhood she had known all the legends that surrounded the traditional masks. Many were based on characters from the Commedia dell’ Arte, but there were others much older in origin. To her, the most frightening had always been the white bauta mask with its spectral connotations. It took its name from the black mantilla of silk or lace that covered the wearer’s head completely, being fastened under the chin and worn with a tricorne hat by both men and women. She still thought there nothing more eerie than to see people thus clad looming out of the darkness like harbingers of death, or sitting in gondolas illumined by small swinging lanterns. Beneath that useful disguise could be sweethearts who had slipped away together, errant husbands or wives, a criminal leaving the scene of his crime, a senator on a secret mission, a spy, or any other person who wanted to keep his or her identity a secret.

  One particularly cold Carnival night when frost added its own glitter to the city, Marietta and her fellow choristers arrived shivering with the orchestra at the water portico of the Palazzo Manunta on the Grand Canal. Colored lanterns celebrating Carnival shone on them as they entered the great flagged hallway known as the andron. As was usual in these palaces, it was decorated with ancient armor and weapons, many tapestries hanging on the walls, and chandeliers of glittering Murano glass lighting the way to the ornate main staircase. The girls were directed away from the flow of arriving guests and shown into a bedchamber where they could leave their cloaks and tidy themselves. There were also useful chamber pots behind screens set across one corner.

  The girls were all in their black velvet gowns, Marietta’s suiting her coloring particularly well. She finished adjusting the scarlet silk pomegranate spray in her hair and took her place with the other choristers to file into the ballroom where tiered galleries had been erected along one wall specially for them. As the line of girls began to move forward behind the musicians with their instruments, Elena whispered in Marietta’s ear.

  “Another step toward our becoming the Rose and the Flame of the Pietà!”

  Marietta threw her a laughing glance. It was true that they were being called upon to sing solo more than anyone except Adrianna. The Maestro di Coro had completely taken over their training and now personally rehearsed them on a regular basis.

  Thunderous applause greeted the musicians and then the choir as they entered the ballroom. The façades of the galleries were looped this evening in green velvet with clusters of silver braided tassels, and a tall candle, as was customary, stood at each girl’s place. The musicians settled on the lower tiered platform. Huge chandeliers suspended from the gilded ceiling held hundreds of candles whose glittering light enhanced the dazzling masks and rich evening clothes of the audience below. A potpourri of fragrances wafted from both men and women—musk, verbena, lavender, and jasmine. Marietta had never been in a perfumer’s shop, but she knew now how it must be to enter one.

  Even louder applause greeted Adrianna’s entrance, and then an equally warm welcome was given to the Maestro di Coro as he took his place on a podium. When he had bowed acknowledgement of his reception, he faced the tiers of his orchestra and choir, raising his baton. Then the orchestra entered into the joyous first movement of Vivaldi’s “Four Seasons.” Marietta, who had seen the original score, which was written in the priest-composer’s own hand, knew every note. The music seemed to run gloriously through her veins as she let her gaze travel over those faces in the audience that were unmasked. There was a striking-looking young man in his twenties, clad in oyster silk and silver lace, at the right-hand end of the first row. It was obvious that his curly straw-colored hair defied the efforts of any hairdresser to mold it even with pomade into the conventional style of rolled curls over each ear, and it was drawn back into a bow solitaire at the nape of his neck. He was oddly attractive although not in the least handsome, but he had dangerously hooded eyes and he exuded the conceit of the confident charmer. The quick, spontaneous smile that he turned on the woman at his side had the desired effect each time, for she leaned meltingly toward him, whispering behind her fan.

  Marietta summed him up as a man with whom any female should be wary. Then her gaze moved on. An exceptionally beautiful woman had just lowered her silver mask on its ivory stick. At first glance her marvelous rubies and sumptuous gown might suggest she was from the highest ranks of the nobility, but she was as likely to be a nobleman’s courtesan. A few seats further on a portly, florid-looking gentleman was already nodding. No doubt he had dined and wined well before coming. But how could anyone sleep through such lovely music?

  Now and again the double doors opened to admit an occasional late-comer. After the concert was fully under way, the footman in attendance did not take them to their host but conducted them straight to vacant seats. The latest arrivals held Marietta’s attention. The woman was dainty and diminutive, her half-mask sewn with pink pearls, her panniered gown of matching lace, her movements graceful; there was the look of a porcelain figurine about her. The man accompanying her was well over six feet tall, broad-shouldered and straight-backed, dressed handsomely in dove-grey silk. Marietta stiffened in her chair as if she had been turned to ice. He was wearing a golden mask that seemed extraordinarily familiar.

  Reason told her it was highly unlikely to be the one she remembered from her mother’s workshop, for she had seen many other golden masks since coming to Venice, but there was something about this one that struck a distinctive chord of memory in her. The wearer, courteously attentive to the woman, led her by the hand in the wake of the footman, who was showing them to two vacant seats at the left-hand end of the front row. Even from a distance there was something magnetic about this masked man that compelled Marietta to observe him. It could only be that he had revived poignant memories in her. Whether he was dark or fair it was impossible to tell, for he wore his hair formally powdered with a roll over each ear and tied back with a black bow at the nape of his neck like almost every other man present. The charming femin
inity of the woman, complementing his intense masculinity, made them a perfect pair.

  By now the orchestra was into the allegro of summer and Marietta’s concentration on the new arrivals was broken as she realized that nobody in the audience was listening anymore. The arrival of the golden-masked man and his lady had had the effect of a stone thrown violently into a quiet pond. Everyone in the room stirred in their seats, craning their necks and murmuring to one another. Faustina, the soprano at Marietta’s side, whispered while staring straight ahead: “A Torrisi in the same room as a Celano! What a disaster!”

  It had taken half a minute longer for the reaction of the audience to reach the front row where the couple had arrived at their seats. But they did not sit. A loud clatter at the opposite end of the row had resounded like a warning. A chair had shot back and overturned as the young man of the dangerous charm leapt to his feet to face them, his hand flying to the hilt of his dress sword, his whole stance aggressive and alert. Marietta, watching with widening eyes, recalled how she had first heard of this deadly vendetta on Iseppo’s barge, and it was like watching silent actors in a drama set to the music of the Pietà orchestra. The woman had drawn close to her golden-masked escort in fear, but very calmly he was guiding her to a seat, his eyes never leaving his enemy.

  Marietta, overcome by curiosity, broke one of the strictest rules of the choir by turning her head to whisper to Faustina.

  “Who is in the golden mask?”

  Faustina raised her song sheet and replied in a hiss, almost without moving her lips. “That is Signor Domenico Torrisi. He is said to be the only man in Venice in love with his own wife. That is she with him. The other man is Marco Celano and the better-looking in my opinion. But they are well matched. Both the same age, both splendid swordsmen, and if we are in luck we shall see a fine flash of rapier blades. Even a killing!”

  Marietta shuddered. All the time Faustina had been whispering the drama had continued. Both men had stepped into the space that separated the first row from the podium, where the maestro of the Pietà continued to conduct his orchestra. Domenico Torrisi’s hand had gone to the hilt of his sword, and he and Marco Celano faced each other warily. The high-pitched tension in the room had become almost palpable. All but those in the first rows were on their feet and people at the back had clambered onto their chairs to get a better view. Their host, Signor Manunta, had sprung up from his seat to come forward and hover uncertainly, not knowing to which man he should advise caution, being fearful that such interference might act as a spark to tinder.

  Then Signora Torrisi, seeing her husband’s knuckles stand out as his grip tightened for the whipping out of the rapier from its scabbard, snatched off her mask. Her classically beautiful face was torn with anxiety. “No, Domenico!” she cried out in a desperate plea. “No!”

  It was as if all the spectators held their breath. Then slowly his grip relaxed and his hand fell away from the hilt. A kind of sigh went up from all around as people expressed either relief or disappointment. Marietta, held spellbound by the whole scene, watched as Domenico Torrisi turned toward his wife and sat down almost casually in the seat next to her. She leaned her forehead against his shoulder and he ran a hand reassuringly down her arm. Marco Celano was left standing in furious astonishment. Then he shook his head and angrily resumed his seat, the set of his jaw and the tightness of his mouth showing he did not consider the matter settled yet. Marietta saw that Signor Manunta was mopping his brow. She pitied the man who had planned such a splendid occasion for his guests, only to have such a crisis arise. Somehow the guest lists must have been muddled. She guessed he was thinking that the evening was far from over and there was the supper hour still to come.

  The Maestro was puzzled when the last notes of the “Four Seasons” did not bring forth the thunderous applause to which he was accustomed, but as he acknowledged the uneven clapping his sharp glance took in the gilded mask and the presence of a member of the Celano family. He saw their joint presence as a challenge to himself. He would gain mastery over the audience in spite of the unwelcome distraction in the front row. As he raised his baton again, Adrianna stood up in readiness to sing. To him it was like playing a trump card. Not even the dual presence of a Torrisi and a Celano could divert attention from her.

  While Adrianna’s lovely voice captivated the audience, Marietta studied Domenico Torrisi. What was he like behind the gleaming golden shield that covered his face? She could gaze at him freely, for he had eyes only for his wife, who was still obviously distressed. It was five years now since he had ordered that mask—if indeed it was the same one—and she herself had traveled to Venice with it. Her mother had been so certain that it was a conceit fancied by a young man, but that theory was belied by his age, if he was now about twenty-eight, as she judged his enemy also to be. There must have been a reason other than youthful whim for such a specialized order.

  She noted that he had well-shaped hands, a jewelled ring on each, the lace of his cuffs cascading about them. What would it be like to feel such a hand traveling fondly down her arm? Or cupping her face? Or even caressing her in those as yet unexplored realms of love? These speculative thoughts disturbed the regularity of her breathing and she was thankful that Adrianna’s song was giving her some respite before she and her fellow choristers had to sing.

  Then, as Adrianna ended her song, the Torrisis, although applauding, stood to leave. It was clear that Signora Torrisi was in no state to remain any longer. Her husband had made his point in any case, refusing to be intimidated by Celano’s threat. There had even been something taunting in the way he had dismissed the challenge, reminding his enemy, even as his wife had reminded him, that the hospitality of their host was as sacrosanct as that of a church when it came to their vendetta. Still applauding, he came forward, looking up at Adrianna.

  “Well done!” he exclaimed in a strong, deep voice. “Magnificent!”

  His tribute paid, he led his wife to where Signor Manunta was hurrying toward them. Marietta saw that explanations were being given and apologies exchanged as the host escorted the departing guests from the ballroom. It was then that a strange thing happened. In the second or two before the door closed after them Domenico Torrisi looked back over his shoulder. Marietta supposed that it was to ensure that Marco Celano was not following them, but curiously, through a trick of light on his mask, it was as if he looked straight at her.

  With the Torrisis gone, the audience settled down to enjoy the rest of the performance. Even Marco Celano’s expression became amiable again as he took pleasure in letting his gaze dwell on the prettiest among the performers. He passed over Marietta, whose unusual beauty he acknowledged, but when his eyes reached Elena he looked long and hard. She had fine features and full young breasts, round as apples, filling out the black velvet of her bodice, and her hair was the palest gold, a color he much admired on a woman. What a waste that this appealing little virgin should be shut up within the Pietà walls. The seemingly unobtainable was always the most desirable. Who was she? It might be of interest to find out more about her. Why had he not noticed her before?

  During the applause for this song and the following music he conversed with his female companion, but as soon as the choir rose to their feet again he fixed his stare on Elena, who had by now become aware of him. He had seen when she felt his gaze earlier, for without turning her head her eyes had moved to meet his stare with a shock of surprise and then looked quickly away again. Since then she had become a little bolder, meeting and holding his gaze enticingly. When he smiled at her, she allowed the corners of her inviting mouth to twitch slightly. It amused him to have this flirtatious exchange with an innocent of the Pietà, who was ripe for far more than a few glances.

  Elena, who knew that the Maestro saw everything within his range of vision, even if disturbances in the audience had no effect on his concentration, was careful to limit the number of times her eyes strayed in Celano’s direction. She knew his gaze never shifted from her. All the ti
me she and the choir were singing a madrigal he continued to play the same trick on her. It made her feel curiously exposed and caused her heart to hammer with excitement while her cheeks seemed to be permanently on fire. Then suddenly she had something else to think about. When the time came for her friend’s solo, the Maestro shook his head at Marietta and signaled it was not to take place. Instead he took the orchestra into the final piece before the interval. Elena was bewildered, but she was too far from her friend to be able to use their sign language to make an inquiry.

  Marietta had guessed immediately the reason for this cancellation. She felt a sickening sense of dismay. He must have seen her whispering. It was foolish of her to have taken such a risk and she dreaded to think what the consequences might be.

  During the interval, fruit juices were provided for the Pietà girls in an anteroom. But before Marietta could reach the table where the refreshments were being served in crystal goblets, Sister Sylvia came hurrying up to hand her cloak to her.

  “There’s been a message from the Maestro, Marietta. I’m to take you back to the ospedale at once.”

  Marietta did not have to ask why. Elena came darting over to her.

  “Where are you going? Are you not well?”

  “Yes, I am, but I’ll explain later.” Marietta’s voice caught in her throat.

  Elena was anxious. “What is wrong? I must know.” She turned impatiently to the nun. “Why is Marietta so upset?”

  Sister Sylvia shrugged primly. “I’m only obeying the Maestro’s orders. So come along now, Marietta.”

  Faustina watched her leave with a sense of relief that she herself had escaped the Maestro’s eagle eye. Marietta had not yet learned the trick of holding a song sheet in such a way that he could not see when lips were moving other than in song. She herself was getting established as a soloist and considered her own voice equal to Adrianna’s. Sooner or later, she was sure, the Maestro would realize this. Then, as she turned to take a goblet of juice from a footman, she saw Sister Sylvia returning and knew that she had not escaped after all.