Inamorata (2 page)

V
ENICE
—S
EPTEMBER
, 1879
S
OPHIE

E
very book I’d read said that Venice was at her most beautiful come upon from the sea, at sunrise or sunset, and that we
must
see her first that way. So naturally we did not. My twin brother and I first encountered Venice in the dead of night, and not from any romantic gondola, but from the windows of the train racing across the railway bridge from dismal Mestre.

I leaned close to the glass, pushing the veil of my hat impatiently from my face to better see, but there was nothing to look at. The train itself seemed suspended in darkness. Sparks from the engine glowed bright and fleeing, fluttering away into ash, the only thing to show we were moving. I had the strange impression that we were completely alone in the darkness, only Joseph and me in our dimly lit compartment, floating on nothing, disappearing into nothing.

I said, “We’re almost there.”

My brother gave me a sleepy smile, his dimples parenthesizing his wide mouth, stunning even in half sleep. “You’ve no need to worry, Soph. I promised it, didn’t I?”

“You did.”

He squeezed my hand. “This will work. We’ll have everything we want. You’ll see.”

I nodded and looked back into the abject darkness. It was too early for the moon. It was disappointing. I
had
so wanted to come upon Venice as in a novel, watching the campaniles and the top-hat chimneys come into view against a pink-and-lavender-tinted sky as I listened to the soft plashing of a gondolier’s oar. I’d read th
e Murray guidebook cover to cover, over and over again—it was within easy reach even now, shoved into the outer pocket of my carpetbag, which nudged gently against my feet. I’d described how it would be to Joseph a thousand times, though he’d just laughed at me and said, “Only pretty words. They’ll never show what my brush will.”

Once we had decided to flee New York City, I had thrown myself into travel preparations. I had made lists of everywhere we were to visit, all the things we should pay attention to, no matter that I knew such effort was pointless. Joseph had not opened a single book, and had only listened to my itineraries with amused detachment, but he would be the one who truly knew the city once we stepped foot in it. He would know it in that strange way he had of taking in everything, of seeing what was important, of finding things I did not even know to look for. All my words from Murray or Ruskin or Byron or Howells would be as naught.

But I couldn’t just leave it all to chance, could I? So much depended on this. Everything, as he’d said.

You’re not leaving it to chance, Soph. You’re leaving it to me.

It was true; Joseph’s talent and confidence had opened doors for us before. But I was never so easy as my brother, and I knew what lay beneath his confidence. I could not help feeling nervous and afraid. I wanted so much for him—Venice
must
be the answer we’d hoped for.

“You’re worrying,” he leaned close to whisper. I felt the warmth of his breath against the bare skin below my ear, and I turned to give him a quick kiss.

“I’m not. Truly. Or . . . not much. Oh, when
will
we be there?”

“Now,” he said, glancing toward the window, nodding for me to look. Then I saw it. Little pins of light that grew larger as I watched, a city that seemed to bloom from the darkness, spreading and spreading so that I couldn’t tell what was real and what was only reflection. But before I could truly grasp it, the train plunged into the station, and shuddered to a halt. A cloud of smoke fogged the window, momentarily obscuring everything, and then it was only bustle. Joseph rose, grabbing my bag and his own, teasing, “You intend to stay here all night?”

I followed him, grabbing on to his arm as he led us into the station, where people raced to and fro, jostling with luggage, and Italian officials in their worn gray-and-green uniforms called for passports. Joseph shifted both bags to one side and reached into his pocket for ours, which were offered and glanced over so quickly we were moving on before I knew it, maneuvering around piles of trunks and luggage and carts, people squeezed in so tightly I did not dare release my grip upon my brother’s arm.

We were running a gauntlet now—porters and
valets de place
and men trying to get us to look this way or that, gesturing and shouting in Italian I barely understood—it sounded nothing as it had in Rome, though surely those were the same words? Joseph approached a porter—a small man with very large brown eyes and an official-looking badge—who asked us in perfect French where we would like to go, and I answered in kind before my brother could say a word, “The omnibus. We’re to look for the omnibus.”

The porter nodded and began to turn. But Joseph said, “No omnibus.”

The porter halted. I looked at my brother in confusion. “But the guidebook says the omnibus is cheaper.”

“We’re in Venice, Soph,” he said.

I stared at him, not understanding, and he said to the porter in French, “We’ll have a gondola.”

In a low voice, I said, “But Joseph, the cost—”

“You wanted to see it from the lagoon at sunset,” he said softly, for me alone. “Instead we’ll have it from the Grand Canal at night. Our first night in Venice, under the stars. It will be like one of your stories.”

How well he knew I would find such a thing irresistible.

“To where, monsieur?” The porter asked.

Joseph looked questioningly at me, and I knew a moment’s exasperation that he hadn’t remembered the name of the hotel. I said, “Albergo Beale Danieli.”

The porter nodded. He glanced at the bags Joseph held and asked if we had luggage, and Joseph motioned toward the small trunk we shared, sitting forlornly among the mounds of other trunks. I saw the way the porter looked at us again, askance this time, as if he knew we hadn’t any money. I felt myself grow hot, and it wasn’t until he arranged for the trunk’s delivery and led us through the crowd and out of the station, where the water of the Grand Canal lapped right up onto the steps and the golden dome of San Simeon loomed across, and the whole glittering, otherworldly spangle of the city burst into being, that I forgot to be embarrassed. I halted, jerking Joseph to a stop and causing the people behind us to stumble and curse.

“Oh,” I breathed, and Joseph laughed and pulled me gently toward some man who offered us a piece of paper with the tariffs for the gondola printed upon it.

Joseph didn’t even look at it. He took me with him to where a row of gondolas waited, the strangely shaped funereal boats bobbing gently with the current, the toothed projections of their bows alien and vaguely threatening. My brother handed our bags to a tall, broad-shouldered gondolier whose face I could not see well in the darkness, and glanced up at the sky. “The stars are out. Look.”

He was right. Glitterdust across a broad expanse of blue. Before me, the water unfurled like dark swaths of shadowed silk, colors muted, reflections cast by the lamps hanging from the prows of the gondolas rippling, and my heart swelled at the beauty and the romance of it.

“You’re spoiling me,” I told him.

“Don’t you deserve it?” His dark blue eyes looked black in the darkness, glowing. “Don’t we both?”

He passed me off to the gondolier. The man’s long, strong fingers wrapped mine, warm even through my gloves as he helped me into the boat. I arranged myself as comfortably as I could upon the pile of black-leather-covered cushions in the middle, but they were made for lounging, and I could not lounge in a corset and tight skirts.

Joseph settled himself beside me, stretching out his long legs. The white of his trousers glowed in the darkness. White, in spite of the day of travel and dust, but one could not see the dirt on them now. He put his arm against my back, a bolster, something solid to lean against, and I gave him a grateful look.

The boat pushed off into the Grand Canal, and we were plunged into a world of impressions, other gondolas like shadowed hearses gliding past, the bouncing halo of their colored lamps lending an enticingly mysterious air. Abandoned palazzos in dilapidated splendor rose from the water, together with the reflections making a strange sort of labyrinth that melted and dissipated constantly, always changing so I was never quite certain of what was real and what was just an image. A shadow might become a man who disappeared through a silently opening door, a quick shaft of light slanting, washing away, gone, the candles and tiny oil lamps from little street shrines seemingly floating in an endless dark. We caught smatterings of music or conversation as we passed beneath balconies, the sounds carrying distinctly on the water.

It smelled of elusive perfume and river water washed by a sea tide and ancient stone. Joseph and I were silent with wonder as we were swept farther down the Canal. It seemed to go on forever, and I was glad for that, so perfectly stunning it was, and then suddenly there was the Campanile, the pillars of the Molo, St. Mark and his winged lion, the pink-and-white glimmering pattern of the Ducal Palace, all so beautiful and unexpected in spite of the fact that I
had
been expecting them. Only . . . not this way, not in darkness and not in enchantment.

The boat turned into a narrow canal, stopping only a few yards beyond a low, arched bridge. “Danieli,” the gondolier said in a deep voice.

Joseph got to his feet and helped me from the gondola onto the slippery stone steps. He arranged to have our trunk brought in, and then hefted our bags, and together we went inside the hotel.

I had never been in a place so fine. I felt an imposter as I took in the marbled floors and walls, the Moorish arches and Oriental-styled pillars. The lobby was opulent, with multi-tiered gilt stairs leading into an atrium. We could not possibly afford to stay here—how had I made these arrangements? I was certain, as Joseph went to the desk and checked us in, that the man there would say, “Oh, monsieur, I am so sorry to tell you that the price is not what was quoted you. I am afraid you must pay a good deal more.” But the man only handed Joseph a paper to sign and then we were going up those impossibly narrow, beautiful stairs, past more galleries and more gilt. Gaslight blazed brightly from sconces everywhere, and there was so much heavy marble I wondered that the whole thing didn’t sink into the lagoon.

When we finally reached our room, and the porter left us, I leaned back against the door and said, “Did you check the price? Did I make a terrible mistake?”

Joseph had gone to the window, and was pushing aside the slate-blue velvet drapes. He looked over his shoulder. “It’s cheaper than you remember. And we’re only here until we can find something else.”

“There were others I could have chosen. I’ll look into it tomorrow—”

He motioned for me to come to him. When I did, he drew me close, my back to his chest, and wrapped his arms around me, resting his chin on the top of my head. “Look out there,” he whispered, his voice rumbling. “It looks like the setting of every story you ever told me.”

I followed his gaze. The Canal glimmered before me, the towers of San Giorgio Maggiore looming shadows in the near distance. The Molo stretched to the right with its dozens of gondolas moored for the night, black and jagged shadows against the lamp-lit glow of the
fondamenta
. It did look like a fairy tale.

“It’s beautiful,” he said, and I heard his reverence; I felt it in him as he held me tight and close. He leaned forward, his dark hair brushing my cheek. “You did this perfectly, Soph. I won’t let you regret it.”

I took a deep breath. “And tomorrow?”

“Tomorrow I’ll discover who we must see. I’ll find the way in. It will take a few days at most, I promise, while you look for a place to rent. All right?”

I gripped his arms, holding him in place, and nodded, my hair coming loose from its pins where it caught on the stubble of his cheek. “All right.”

Gently, he pulled away. I let him go. “Now go to bed,” he told me. “You’re tired.”

“You must be just as tired.”

“Not yet. I want to look for a while.”

He was right; I was tired. I unbuttoned my coat and took off my hat and my gloves. I went to him to undo the myriad fastenings of my gown and petticoats and corset, which he did, his deep blue gaze focused on the view outside.

I undressed and put on my nightgown, and then I let down my hair, brushing it before the mirrored dressing table. When I went to braid it, Joseph said, “Leave it,” so I knew what he meant to do. I left it falling about my shoulders, dark and curling, as he liked it, and went to the bed. The room was chilly and damp, and I was cold. There was neither fireplace nor stove. I lay down—the mattress was thick and comfortable. I asked, “Might I have a blanket?”

Joseph shook his head. I didn’t protest. I lay there on top of the bedcovers and waited. But he only stood at the window, and I was too tired, and so I closed my eyes. I felt sleep hovering, no matter the cold, and I was back on the Canal again, swaying in a gondola beneath the stars while the water lapped against the sides in a soothing, quiet rhythm, and it was only then, in some distant part of my mind, that I heard Joseph go to his bag at last. I heard the
shush
as he took what he needed from it, the scrape of a white-and-gilt chair as he pulled it across the floor, next to the bed. I heard the hush of his breath and the quiet rustle of paper, the scratch of charcoal. I didn’t open my eyes, and he didn’t ask me to. I let the lap of water and the familiar rhythm of his drawing rock me to sleep.