by David Hewson
When he came back down they were seated in front of the unlit fire, already pretending he didn’t exist. Flo was sobbing into a tissue.
‘The sheer ingratitude of it,’ she sniffled as he walked past. ‘Our Jason. Our flesh and blood.’
Arthur looked up and couldn’t stop himself. He was on his feet, roaring, his rough and ugly face turning puce with rage.
‘Don’t ever darken our door again, boy,’ he screamed, waving his big, clumsy fist. ‘Don’t ever . . .’
‘I won’t,’ Jason said quietly and walked outside, wondering how much a taxi to the airport cost. He was determined to take the first flight out, wherever it went. Anywhere had to be better than this.
It amazed him he could remember every word, every gesture, every angry moment of this encounter almost a week later, seated on the Zattere waterfront watching the exotic vessels go by, ferries with cars, little boats carrying household goods, detergent and toilet paper and furniture, burly serious men at the tiller looking back at him as he sat there eating a sandwich – panini, they called them – with his gloved hands.
His dad, dying in hospital, had said something about pain. It stuck to you like flour. You thought you could wash it all away, out of your clothes, out of your hair. But some stray grain always persisted, slyly avoiding your well-meant attentions and the drugs the doctors had. Life was like that. The only thing to do, he said, was your best. Be a good man. There wasn’t anything else.
Jason felt down remembering this. Then he thought about the funny white house on the water that looked as if it used to be a church. Flo was right about one thing. Blood was thicker than water. Helping out like that was a decent thing to do. He could use the money again too.
The lines and arrows on Marco’s map meant it was easy to find the place once he walked down a few narrow, winding alleys through the area known as Castello, heading in the direction of Murano. Half an hour after he set off Jason strode across the little bridge over the lagoon feeling no concern whatsoever about meeting the needle again.
The sign was gone. There was nothing there at all except the ancient bell pull. His heart fell. He experienced a mild panic about cash and wondered where, in this foreign country, he could possibly find work. Then the door opened and Marco was there, smiling.
‘Jason! How pleasant to see you again. Is this a social call? Or do you have a . . . gift?’
‘You don’t have your sign up.’
‘I said you could come back any time, didn’t I?’
‘Yeah, but . . .’
There must have been a video surveillance camera somewhere. Posh houses had them, not that he could see a lens on the wall.
‘You do want to give blood, don’t you?’
He stayed on the doorstep. Something seemed funny about this place. Perhaps he should have noticed before, except the first time he was confused and a little desperate.
‘I thought you said it wasn’t blood.’
‘It is when you donate it. I was not being literal when I used the word “gift”. There will still be a hundred euros and the voucher for the hostel. As to the museums . . . I imagine you have seen most of them by now. Would some free meals in a few restaurants I can recommend be of any interest? I know a place that does fried fish. Similar to your own fish and chips only better. If you want . . .’
Jason licked his lips. He was starting to like the food here. A lot.
‘You bet,’ he said and marched in.
The blinds were still closed, blocking out entirely the persistent sharp afternoon sunlight. The fluorescent tubes seemed even brighter. Beneath the window the machine sat silent, waiting. Jason was both pleased and alarmed to see that Camilla was in the same bed as before, asleep with a fresh plaster on her left arm. She seemed dreadfully pale.
‘Do not disturb her, please,’ Marco whispered. ‘The poor girl is very tired and needs the rest. The young. The lives they lead . . .’
The way he said that last part made it sound as if Camilla had been out at a disco or something, which didn’t seem right at all.
‘Are we the only two who give you . . .?’
‘Quickly now,’ Marco insisted, getting the equipment ready and almost pushing him onto the bed. ‘Even doctors go home sometimes, you know.’
It all seemed to happen much more rapidly this time. He watched too as his blood trickled into the machine, got whirled around inside a glass jar then returned to his arm.
Camilla didn’t stir at all. She looked sick, he thought.
Marco went outside. Jason coughed loudly. The girl began to wake, rubbing her eyes with the back of her hands, the way a toddler did. She was wearing a different tee-shirt, one that was a little tight over her ample chest. The emblem of the winged Venetian lion was on it this time. He was aware that his heart was fluttering at her presence, that he’d been waiting for this meeting to happen for days and hiding the desire by burying himself in the city.
‘Jason?’ she asked blearily. ‘Is that really you? You came back?’
‘Yeah.’ Her lovely skin seemed so translucent he could imagine it tearing at the slightest touch. ‘Not the only one who comes here, am I? Are you all right, Camilla? No offence but you look terrible.’
‘This is English flattery, I think,’ she said with a weak laugh.
‘No. I mean it. I know . . .’ He glanced at the door, wondering if Marco was listening, and then realized he didn’t care. ‘I know he says we can keep on doing this time after time. But looking at you I’m not so sure.’
She yawned, stretched her arms and got herself more upright. His breathing stopped for a few seconds as he watched.
‘Marco is a good and kind doctor,’ she told him. ‘What he does is called apheresis. This machine here separates the blood, and takes out the part he needs. The rest goes back . . .’
‘So he said. If you could see yourself in a mirror . . .’
She laughed again and he could not take his eyes off her.
‘I don’t want to see myself in a mirror.’
‘Why not? You’re beautiful. But very, very pale if you ask me.’
‘Don’t worry,’ Camilla said. Then she leaned back on the pillow and placed her hands behind her head, staring at the ceiling. He had to fight hard not to stare. ‘Tell me about these cakes you bake.’
That’s what women do, he thought. Change the subject.
‘Well, I do bake them. Eccles cakes. Bakewell tarts. Bread-and-butter pudding. Curd tarts. Custard tarts. But they’re pastries really and I’m not a pastry chef. I’m a baker.’
She turned and looked at him. Her eyes didn’t seem as young as the rest of her.
‘The difference being . . .?’
‘You don’t need yeast for cakes, not usually. Bread’s different. Water and flour and yeast.’
He stole a glance at her.
‘Milk loaf’s my favourite. Not everyone can make that. You have to treat the milk first or the crumb’s all wrong. If you don’t get the temperature right it can turn out as flat as a pancake.’
‘You make this bread come alive?’
‘It’s a gift.’
The young girl on the bed placed a thin white finger to her cheek and said, ‘A power, surely?’
‘A power. I suppose. Want a cup of tea and a sandwich after? I’d quite like to get out of this place. Gives me the creeps a bit, to be honest.’
She shook her head and said, ‘No. Sorry. I need to talk to Marco.’
‘Don’t you let him take any more from you.’
‘More what?’ the doctor asked. He was almost by the bed already, and began unhooking the needle from Jason’s arm. In his jacket pocket was a wad of cash and some vouchers. He’d got there without making the slightest noise.
‘Scared the life out of me, you did,’ Jason complained as the spike came out of his flesh.
He got up and rubbed his arm. He felt a little woozy which was odd, as if this time round was more of a strain.
‘I apologize. What is it I shouldn’t do?’
/> ‘Take too much blood from her. That’s what.’
Marco’s gaze grew stony.
‘I had no idea you possessed medical knowledge.’
‘I’ve got a pair of eyes, haven’t I?’
‘Jason.’
He felt something touch his arm. It was Camilla, standing next to him, peering into his face, concerned. She seemed a little unsteady on her feet and he felt sure she was holding onto him for support. Her face was that of an adult, wise, kind, yet sad somehow. It made her even more beautiful. He wished he were better with words, with emotions, because the sight of her did something to his heart which was new to him, something he couldn’t quite control or comprehend.
‘Please . . .’ she murmured. ‘I appreciate your concern but it’s not necessary.’
‘I would like to have a cup of tea some time though,’ he pleaded.
‘Of course. Soon. But not now . . .’ She glanced at Marco. ‘I can’t talk.’
The doctor led him to the front door by the wonky little bridge then said, rather frostily, ‘Ciao.’
‘I’m sorry, Marco,’ Jason said, stopping as he stepped outside. ‘I didn’t mean anything. She looked so poorly. I made a fool of myself.’
‘These things happen.’ The Italian shrugged. ‘If it helps I believe she’s staying at a little pensione in Cannaregio. Near Misericordia. Perhaps if you are around there tomorrow in the afternoon . . . Camilla rises late.’ He winked. ‘Who knows?’
‘Good man!’ Jason said cheerily, and nudged him with an elbow. ‘Tell her I’ll be looking out for her, will you?’
‘I promise. Good evening,’ he said, and closed the door.
Fondamenta della Misericordia was a long straight street by a canal, not far from a place called the ghetto. A few Jewish people wandered round there in dark clothes, some with skullcaps and what Jason thought had to be dreadlocks of some kind. By the time he got that far he noticed the street had changed its name to something entirely different, and did so again not much further on. Venice tried to get you lost even when everything looked dead simple. So he retraced his tracks and worked out where Misericordia ended, realizing the place wasn’t quite as extensive as he first believed.
There were three or four cafés, some restaurants and a few bars. He had his first cappuccino around two – he didn’t really know what Marco meant when he said Camilla got up ‘late’. Four hours and three coffees passed and the area was still pretty much empty. He talked to one of the waiters who spoke good English and asked, exactly, what counted as afternoon in Venice. The answer didn’t make much sense, something about how ‘buon giorno’, good day, could turn into ‘buona sera’, good evening, any time around three o’clock, or even earlier, without any intervening period for afternoon at all. Jason felt even more lost after that and decided upon a practical plan, one he wished he’d thought of earlier.
Marco said that Camilla was staying in a pensione in Misericordia. All he had to do was find it.
He walked up and down then checked to make sure there really was no other street with the same name. He couldn’t find a pensione. No hotel. Anywhere to stay. When he went back to the café the friendly waiter confirmed this.
Jason stood outside by the canal, thinking. Three jazz musicians in heavy winter coats were starting to play on a little boat moored on the water: bass, electric piano and sax, fast and noisy. This wasn’t the sort of area someone like Camilla would live in at all. It was too noisy, too public somehow. She liked quiet places. And for some reason he felt she didn’t like to be seen.
Marco had lied.
He didn’t like being angry but sometimes it was impossible to avoid.
‘ . . .make a parson bloody swear,’ he muttered as he marched across the rickety little bridge, so forcefully the structure seemed to shake beneath his feet.
The stars and the moon were out again, bright and distant. He yanked on the bell then, for good luck, started pounding on the door with his fists.
It was all lies. About Camilla being in a pensione in Misericordia. About Marco having to go home at night. Jason had watched the way he walked round this big old house, set on its own over the water, a place apart. Somewhere you could get away with anything. Marco was familiar with it, every last step, every turn, every floorboard. He lived here. It was his home. His clinic. His . . .
Jason didn’t want to think too much about anything else. The familiar, birdlike face opened the door, smiling, looking a little puzzled.
Jason pushed his way in.
‘I know she’s here,’ he said without fear. ‘I know what your game is. I may be English but I’m not stupid.’
Marco was making soft noises of protest but did nothing to stop him as he stormed into the room with the machine and the needles and the two broad beds.
The blinds were closed as ever. No wonder, Jason thought. Camilla lay on the bed on the left, the usual one. This time she wore some kind of nightdress, the sleeve rolled up to her pale, thin shoulder. A pipe red with blood ran into the faint blue line of a vein at her elbow.
‘You take that thing out of her now,’ Jason roared, and felt he heard the angry voice of his Uncle Arthur egging him on from somewhere. ‘I want to see that needle gone. I want you nowhere near the lass. After that I’m calling the police. After that . . .’
He could feel his face going red. He wasn’t scared. Not one bit of it.
Camilla stirred with all the noise, woke up, her big, dark eyes rolling around, looking at the room, at him, at Marco, trying to make sense of what she saw.
Jason dragged up a seat, sat by her and took her free hand. Her skin felt clammy the way his father’s had.
‘Don’t you worry.’ He tried to look into her eyes, but she seemed more interested in Marco at that moment, perhaps out of fear. ‘He’s not taking any more blood out of you. I’m getting you out of here.’ He turned and stared at the doctor. ‘I said I wanted that thing out of her.’
The Italian didn’t seem angry or threatening or anything but sad, in a way that made Jason feel decidedly uncomfortable.
‘Marco, I said . . .’ he repeated.
Camilla’s cold hand closed on his, clutching at Jason’s fingers tenderly, squeezing, with the same delicate weakness he’d felt in his father’s grasp towards the end.
‘He can’t take it out,’ she whispered.
The doctor pulled up a chair and shrugged.
‘If I remove the line she will die,’ Marco said in the same resigned, matter-of-fact manner Jason recalled the hospital people using back in Wakefield. ‘Don’t you understand? Camilla isn’t the donor here, Jason. That was you.’
‘You mean . . .?’
He wondered why he was so thick sometimes. Why he couldn’t have worked this out for himself.
‘Camilla is the patient,’ Marco went on. ‘My only one. I thought I’d lost her. Then you came along and . . .’ Another shrug. He looked baffled too. ‘I don’t know. I thought we had some hope finally. Not that I understand how.’
Jason felt her shuffle along the bed, squeeze his hand once more, then, very carefully, kiss him once on the cheek, the way foreign people did.
‘Thank you,’ she whispered.
Marco stood up.
‘Shall I make some tea?’ he asked.
‘That would be nice,’ Jason said automatically.
‘What kind of illness?’ Jason asked, sipping at what he now knew, from his earlier visits, to be Earl Grey, something that had never found its way to Garibaldi Street. ‘Is it catching?’
Camilla and the doctor exchanged worried glances.
‘Not infectious in a normal way,’ Marco said finally.
She placed her hand on Jason’s arm and looked into his eyes.
‘I wouldn’t harm anyone intentionally,’ Camilla told him. ‘Ever. I couldn’t. I inherited this disease. It’s not my choice. But I can keep myself like this, in quarantine. With Marco trying to find a cure.’
Her concern for others explained why she was here,
Marco said, repeating a point he’d made earlier. Why she’d come for help in the first place. There were what he called ‘potential side effects’ to her illness. But with the treatment these could be kept in check. Stabilized.
Jason felt bold enough to take her hand, to hold her pale, slender fingers in his.
‘You look as weak as a kitten. As weak as . . .’ My dad, the night he died, Jason almost said. ‘I want to know what’s going on here. I’m not a kid.’
She turned to Marco and said, ‘Please tell him.’
The doctor issued a long, agonized sigh.
‘Camilla’s not getting better, I’m afraid. With the technique I came up with – the transfusions of AB-positive plasma – I’ve managed to keep her alive. But I feel I’ve been fighting a losing battle. Something in this . . . condition defies me. I’ve consulted all the experts I dare confide in. We’re all baffled.’
‘You should never give up,’ Jason insisted. ‘Never.’
The doctor’s eyes met Jason’s. They were thoughtful and reticent too, as if there was something Marco wished to say.
‘And then you come along,’ the doctor said, scratching his chin.
‘I’ve got the right blood,’ Jason told him. ‘You can have as much as you want. I can stay here forever. Move in if you like. Just take it. I want to help.’
Camilla’s fingers moved inside his.
‘It’s not just the right blood,’ she said, and placed another soft, warm kiss on his cheek. ‘It’s . . .’
She fell silent.
Marco filled in.
‘It’s special somehow,’ the doctor said. ‘Don’t ask me to explain. I can’t see any difference between your AB-positive blood and any we’ve used before. But something’s not the same.’ His face became more fixed, almost fierce with indignation. ‘Had you not stepped through these doors I believe Camilla would have died this week. Nothing I could do seemed to arrest the illness. Then . . .’ The faintest of embarrassed smiles crossed his face. ‘You arrive and . . . I don’t know.’
‘There’s a little bit of magic in me,’ Jason said eagerly, smiling, waving his fingers in the air. ‘My dad always reckoned that. You said it yourself, Camilla. There’s life.’