‘What if I came with you?’ Bianca says.
It just pops out, without thought. But it feels right. It is the only possible decision. Innes looks at her, somewhat worried.
‘All of Nanny’s darkest fears would come true,’ he says with a smile.
‘Yes, you’re right,’ says Bianca, returning the gesture weakly. She sighs wearily and continues. ‘I’m expecting a child.’
She cannot read Innes’s expression in the half-light, but she can imagine it: lips pursed together, frowning. The questions, the conjectures. She is about to offer an explanation, but is defeated by her humiliation. This is the time for honesty. She waits. He is quiet. The sound of the horses’ hooves grows excessively loud and then distant, as if she is underwater. She will have to say something, explain things, explain herself. Answer questions. Shame herself. But she is better off holding her breath. His voice brings her back to the surface.
‘Then we shall get married.’
Bianca struggles. She no longer knows where she is. She wants to go under again. She tries to but cannot. It is as if her body is telling her to stay afloat, life grasping life.
‘Do not fear,’ Innes continues. ‘I shall only ask you to be my friend. And I will be your friend. It will be our pact. You will like London. I realize that you know it a little, but the London I am thinking of is a completely different city. We’ll have to settle down, grow accustomed to the fog, and forget the sun and this blessed land. And we’ll have to work. Seriously, I fear that we’ve been spoiled here. It won’t be easy in the beginning. But we’ll make it. We know how to do things and there are two of us. And soon there will be three.’ He takes her hand, opens it, and gives her palm a quick, dry kiss, after which he clasps it gently and places it back on her lap. ‘And perhaps, over time, there might be more.’
Bianca does not dare look at him. She allows herself to be jostled by the rhythm of the coach. That small kiss burns her skin. She would like to rub it out but she cannot. She doesn’t want him to misunderstand. She doesn’t know if it is burning from torment or because it feels confusingly joyful. Is it the poor elation of relief or is it something else? Enough questions. Whatever the answer, at this point it doesn’t matter.
When it comes time to pack their cases, Bianca agonizes. She feels caught between being gone and having not yet arrived. She doesn’t know what to do with her time. Her gloves don’t match and her things are in disorder. She thinks about how messy her hair will be during the journey. This is not a holiday; she should feel contrite and oppressed. But amid the feelings of guilt, fear and melancholia, she also feels the flutter of a bird taking flight. Somewhere inside; not in her heart, though. Her heart is unfeeling, petrified, or perhaps just absent. It has been crushed and has disappeared into her veins through a flow of blood.
She thinks back to the sycamore tree she saw with her father in Padua. She pictures the great tree clearly – the black fissure at its centre, and yet the branches laden with leaves that were shady, fresh, alive. In the same way, she feels alive and yet heartless. But it is her head that is fogged up with worry. This is what guides her through her final hours as she collects her things. She takes the essentials, the items that make us who we are, or who we’d like to think we are. Things she cannot leave behind: a box of coloured pencils, her brushes, a stack of sketches. She takes her precious keepsakes: her mother’s earrings, her letters, miniatures, a diary. She takes the money, hard earned and in satchels, so that the wheels of their coach will slide across tracks of gold. She doesn’t take the gifts: the white stone egg, the shawl, the pomegranate, the box of seeds. She leaves them on her vacant desk to be dispersed among people to whom they mean nothing.
‘I’m coming with you,’ Pia says calmly.
Bianca notices a bundle at the girl’s feet: a raggedy, red blanket that likely contains her few things.
‘But Pia, you have a home here. A family,’ Bianca says.
‘He . . .’ She bites her lip in silence. ‘He is sick, he is going to die soon, he told me. And then I will have no one. The others, they don’t need me. But you do. And when the baby is born . . .’
The baby. Pia knows. Without realizing it, Bianca glances down at her stomach. It is the same as it has always been, the fabric of her dress covers it and holds it in. So how did Pia find out? Maybe everyone knows. It is better not to ask. It is better to believe that the young girl who looks at her so patiently and assuredly from top to bottom possesses the intimate gaze of a Cassandra. The baby. Bianca can no longer hold her stare. She buries her head in her hands and hates herself because she cannot think of anything else to do. How much do I detest him?
As if reading her mind, Pia takes a step forward and places her hand on Bianca’s arm. ‘The child will need to be loved. He isn’t the one to blame. Children should never carry the blame.’
You, of all people, know this, Bianca thinks. She is overcome by a wave of tenderness that allows her to forget herself. You, of all people. Bianca rests her hand on Pia’s arm. It is all set.
The last trunk is shut. She glances around the room at its orderly emptiness. There is the sound of rapid footsteps on the gravel. The window is half open. It is very early. There are voices: subdued but crystal clear.
‘Take it. It’s the least I can do.’
‘About time.’
‘Oh, come now, don’t judge me. I can do that on my own. I cannot change my life; I’ve never been capable of it. Allow me at least to contribute to changing the life of another.’
‘Your quasi-divine omnipotence is too much.’
‘Do I appear arrogant? I apologize. For once, I assure you, it isn’t arrogance that moves me to act this way. Enough, stop being difficult, you cannot afford to. You know very well that you will need it, all of you. Don’t worry. It’s nothing personal. You won’t have to think of my august profile each time you spend some of it. And when you settle down, send me your address.’
‘What if I direct her towards an improper profession and use your money for myself? For gambling or opiates or any other form of degradation available to us?’
‘Come now! I know and trust you, Innes. In any case, this money is also for the cause. I cannot say it is “our” cause, for I give it no honour. I deny it every day with what I am and my inability to act. But this way, from afar, in silence . . . I can make a contribution.’
‘So, basically, I have to leave with a burden – a debt to you. That’s not light luggage, you know.’ Innes’s voice is sarcastic but his tone is serious.
‘Not even all my money can make good what I am contracting with you today.’
‘So handle your fortune with caution, because we will need it. Goodbye . . . and thank you.’
She hears footsteps on the stairs. Outside there is silence. And then she hears Young Count Bernocchi walk back down the gravel path, slowly and heavily. Not young any more.
It is a torment to say goodbye. Things go unsaid, the grief is challenging, blessings and smiles and questions are uttered and hinted at. Don Titta embraces Innes tightly and gasps with emotion. Donna Clara’s eyes are glassy and almost frightening. Nanny, with tears in her own eyes, whispers, ‘In the end you managed to take him from me.’ Minna stands shyly behind everyone. She holds a silk kerchief with a handful of coins in it under her apron. The others are awkwardly absent. They won’t have understood. What will they choose to believe? Bianca no longer cares.
Soon after they have said their goodbyes and just before departing she turns to Innes, won over by a crumb of her old curiosity, which lifts her spirits.
‘What did Bernocchi want from you?’
‘He wanted to commend me his soul. Not his own, of course. And anyway, since I am no priest, I suggested that he look elsewhere.’
‘And what about the money? He did offer you money, didn’t he?’
‘Bianca, you are incorrigible. Let’s say that it was his modest contribution towards the creation of a better world. It was just a start. The rest of it will co
me a little at a time, once we settle down. No, he hasn’t converted to our cause; he likes his world the way it is. It was an act of contrition, late but well timed. I doubt that he could ever consciously be generous: he would find it too banal. He feels only slight regret.’
Bianca stares at him without understanding.
‘Enough with the secrets,’ Innes says clearly. ‘The money is for Pia.’
A spark flares in Bianca’s mind. Is it possible? Is young Pia pregnant, too? That’s why Pia had understood. If only she had been more vigilant, wiser, more careful. Bianca’s expression must reveal her thoughts, because Innes is staring at her, perplexed. He shakes his head.
‘No, Bianca. No, no. What on earth did you think? Pia is Bernocchi’s daughter.’
So she is his daughter. The truth hangs like an empty nest in the bare branches of a tree in winter. It has been there all along, well hidden, but there. You didn’t see it, she thinks. That possibility didn’t even exist to you. But when finally it comes forth in its naked simplicity, she recognizes it, nods, and accepts it. It is no less true because she hasn’t thought of it. She leaves the fact suspended there, austere and pure. And everything goes back to its place. Pomo pero, dime’l vero. Dime la santa verità. (Apple-pear, tell me the truth. Tell me the blessed truth.)
‘You really didn’t know?’
It is all so simple in the end. All she needed to do was look at things with the right perspective, without letting herself be blinded by the light of misunderstanding. Don Titta could never have been an unknowing father, or even worse, a knowing accomplice. Don Titta is a man who honours his children, although perhaps a little more in death than in life.
Innes looks at her indulgently and with mild surprise. She hopes he cannot read her mind. She has been so silly. She has been stupid. She has no defences now and carries the burden of nobody’s child.
‘For what it’s worth . . .’ Innes says, and then turning around, he asks, ‘You are in agreement, aren’t you, Pia?’
She comes towards them from the kitchen with two heavy baskets of provisions for the first leg of their trip: fruit, biscuits, cordial. Without knowing what they have been discussing, the girl smiles at them. Innes takes her burden and she curtseys her thanks.
Of course Pia is in agreement. All that has happened before means nothing, even if it has led to her being there now. She might never have been born. She might have been sent back to where she came from when she was still an infant. She could have remained entangled with her destiny as a servant. She’d be lining up with the rest of her peers for that sad and indifferent goodbye, and then she’d have to hurry back to her poorhouse duties. Instead Pia now stands on the right side of the wall. She climbs in, situates herself in the corner, fixes the folds of her skirt, and waves her hand out the window even before leaning out to show her face to whoever wishes to remember it. It is as if she has rehearsed this act of liberation thousands of times. She is going out into the world and the world is ready to unfurl before her. This is only the first act. Pia is going to London. She, who has never been anywhere, is going to London. So everything truly is possible after all.
Everything is possible, including dying in an ice storm in the Alps, the coach tipping over on one side, like a ship on a wave, the wind whistling by them, the wheels barely making it through the two feet of snow, the cold scratching deep into the dark cabin. Snow in summertime is far worse than in winter because it is unexpected.
They could be caught by a band of French highwaymen in their capes and cone-shaped hats, grim characters who come down from the mountains with their rifles to impose a harsh sentence in the name of black hunger. They could be chased and finally captured by the Austrian forces, the kind that shows no compassion, and sent to Spielberg.
Everything is possible. But nothing happens. These three beings have already been part of a storm; they have already confronted and defeated their own bandits, let themselves be manipulated by suspicion, ill will, and hearsay. The trip is as smooth as the crossing of multiple borders can be, with exhausting interactions at customs, exchanges of documents and money; with the lice in the cold inns, the greasy food and greasy bowls; with drunkards’ songs that sound the same in all dialects. The late-summer rain diligently beats its meek song down on the rooftop of their carriage; they see the occasional comrade whose eyes are sharp and who wants to peer in. Outside, postcard images roll by, postcards no one cares to write. There are damp rice plains, solid mountains and pure blue skies. There is France, with its damp haystacks and fairy-tale castles surrounded by woods of marzipan.
Bianca has been sleeping through a great deal of the journey. She blames it on travelling sickness, but is seized by a strange sort of lethargy. Her body has advised her to rest because she knows that later on the creature will steal her sleep away. Therefore, in the final scenes of this story – or of this episode at least – we shan’t look at the world as we would normally, over her shoulder, trying to make sense of things through her eyes. No, Bianca’s eyes shall remain shut in an imitation of rest that absolves her from the effort of paying attention. Ultimately, it is better that she does not look outside. Otherwise her memory might tease her into remembering that she has seen these lands before with an unnameable, now-departed companion, and she would feel sadness, great sadness. In recompense, she now has a different companion inside her, an unknown parasite who has turned her life upside down. She doesn’t know where she is going. Or rather, she knows but doesn’t want to imagine it. She will have all the time in the world soon, and more. Is it any wonder that she avoids looking out at the landscape? This journey isn’t one of pleasure. It is necessary. Let’s leave her to rest, or pretend to sleep, and let’s move quietly away so that we can obtain that tiny bit of perspective that changes everything.
At last, the moment arrives. As if in a dirty dream, the dusty profile of a thousand rooftops and a million chimneys appears outside the sweat-glazed windows of their final coach ride.
‘Is this London?’ Pia asks, with a dazed look.
‘This is London,’ Innes replies without even looking out of the window.
It feels to him like the trip has been far too short. He will never go back. He can’t. It is only a small consolation to know that he is now safe. He didn’t even go to Rome. He would have liked to die in Rome. Not deliriously lost, like Keats. He’s had his fill of poets. No, he wishes he had become the head of a group of intrepid, uniformless men, out waving a flag that has yet to be imagined. It is still early days, though; he needs to be satisfied with being alive and elsewhere.
‘Where are we going now?’ asks Pia.
‘Home,’ Innes says.
Pia draws closer to the window.
He thinks back to what he has left: a locked door, a few things, things he can’t have and can’t be, now or ever. He looks over at Bianca, who is as pale and parched as a flower that has been without water for too long. She is alive, though. Alive for herself and for the unnamed creature. Pia’s not even pretending to be tired. Her eyes shine with the future. A young woman, a girl, and an unborn baby – for the first time Innes feels old. The three of them need him. And he, a new kind of man, will always be there for them.
A Note from the Author
The Watercolourist was inspired by voices and places, by the voices that places own. Places are characters. First of all, the garden at Villa Manzoni in Brusuglio, near Milan. As the plaque at the front gate indicates, this was the summer residence of Alessandro Manzoni: writer, poet and statesman. The novelist of Italian literature. The villa was a place of leisurely activities and bucolic interests, where the writer grew cotton, planted rare grape cultivars that he ordered from afar, attempted to make wine, took an interest in silkworms, tended to exotic plants, and christened his favourite catalpa tree ‘Hippopotamus’, due to its enormous size. It is a fascinating place for children, who have always wished to trespass, to climb the wall and enter that charming park, as vast and as obscure as a jungle.
Th
e Watercolourist was also inspired by a town house: Casa Manzoni, on Via Morone in Milan, the winter home of Alessandro Manzoni. Here, people skilled in the art of conversation gathered to discuss the future: whether it was the Great Novel that Manzoni was working on, or the Republic of Italy, a daring idea which was taking shape at that time.
A third inspiration came from the city of Milan, and in particular those neighbourhoods where so little has changed that it is easy to imagine what life was like two hundred years ago. A city of brick that was transformed into a city of marble; a ‘city of contradictions’, as the keen traveller Lady Sydney Morgan once described it.
Fifteen years ago, while working on a children’s book project about foster parents, I had the chance to visit the historical archives of the Brefotrofio, the former orphanage of Milan. There, inside those large sliding shelves, surrounded by the smell of metal, moisture and dust, rest the traces of many lives, summarized in the dry language of bureaucracy. Everything had its origin there: the church documents that attest to a state of poverty, which in turn justified the need to resort to institutions; the requests and promises of parents (‘that she may be named Luigia’, ‘we are giving her up out of poverty; I beg your kindness; we will come back and get her’); and especially the tokens and keepsakes – medals and medallions, little images cut in half, embroidered pillows, crucifixes, anything that would allow the parents to deposit and reclaim their children in months or years, and always under the mask of anonymity. Sometimes, when the parents were finally ready, it was too late. The children might have died as infants of smallpox or infection, or from an epidemic or ailment in the distant homes of those who raised them. The antique pages of those ledgers are misshapen and deformed by the objects they contain; they press at the pages as if struggling to tell their own stories.
It was a place where one didn’t want to be alone. Both Pia and Minna’s stories started there.
The Watercolourist Page 29