Lucifer's Shadow

30 Alone on the Arsenale

How many secrets can one head hold before it bursts? Too many for me. The human mind is made for deceit, of others and of itself. I make these observations to myself now, since I no longer dare set them down on paper. Looking back, I wonder I told Lucia as much as I did. The Republic has ways of getting its hands on letters. I can only hope that the unspoken reasoning which lay behind my folly — that the ramblings of a nineteen-year-old to his sister in Spain would hold no interest for their spies — proves well-founded.

The game is now set for the concert. Gobbo took me to a tavern off the rio behind Ca’ Dario and told me what he knew of the details. Leo and Delapole remain the prime movers, my uncle fixing the musical side of matters, while Delapole orchestrates the ceremony and handles the money.

“Why are they doing this, Gobbo?” I wondered, not much minded to drink the sour red wine he had thrust into my hand.

“For my master, it is a rich man’s game,” he answered. “These are the amusements that keep the wealthy alive, Scacchi. Without them they would die of boredom. As for your uncle, ask yourself. What motivates him in anything? Money, naturally. I imagine he hopes to catch the coattails of whoever emerges as the composer. I don’t think Delapole would mind wetting his beak there, either. Being rich is one thing, but the rate he spends it, he needs to make sure he stays rich too.”

He was wrong about Leo, though I did not point this out. Gold drives my uncle, but there are deeper matters there too.

“And after the concert is a success?”

“Why,” he said, grinning, “they wage this campaign to the very end. The plan, I gather, is to wait until the public is salivating for the composer’s identity like a sailor begging to bed a Dorsoduro whore. Then they wait a little longer, just for fun. Finally, they announce another concert — tickets in advance, please — at which the composer will reveal himself as a finale. A bit of good theatre, that’s what Venice likes, and my master fancies he can do that to a tee. Much as he feels he could toss off a play or concerto himself if he wanted, but that’s the rage today. Old Leo’s much of the same mind, and our sadly departed French friend seemed to think there was not a job in the world he couldn’t do.”

My mind overran with images of what might happen at this planned event. But who could I talk to, other than Rebecca and Jacopo, both of them too close to these issues to see them clearly?

Lucia’s death and this web of pretence we have built around us both served to sour my mood. I collected Rebecca as arranged but scarcely spoke after we played our customary subterfuge upon the guard and stole off to La Pietà. For once I could not listen to her play. Instead I walked along the waterfront, to the gates of the Arsenale, and watched the workmen slaving there over ships for the fleet. As they worked their hellish braziers, the air rang to the sound of curses in tongues I had never heard before. It was both fascinating and a little terrifying too. I understood how Rebecca must have felt when she freed herself, albeit temporarily, of the ghetto. Venice has, to some extent, become my own prison. I wonder if I shall ever have the chance to escape it.

I sat upon the quayside, the very picture of misery. Then, after an hour or more of useless cogitation, I walked back to the church and caught Rebecca as she left, shiny new fiddle case in hand, inside it the instrument Delapole had so generously provided. Her lot in the world has improved so much in these past few weeks. She must have looked at me and wondered what was up, for she took my hand briefly, then led me away from San Marco, back towards the Arsenale, stopping short of the great entrance to lead me into a deserted public garden. Here we sat beneath a patch of fragrant oleander and watched the boats cross the lagoon. There were a few lights on the Lido, the distant island that is the barrier keeping out the full force of the Adriatic. The night air was thick with the scent of the tree’s musky blossom. Chattering swifts cut dark silhouettes against the moon. I seemed to be incapable of speaking a sentence which consisted of more than three words.

Finally, Rebecca turned to me, her face earnest and taut in the moonlight, and said, “Lorenzo. You are my dearest friend. What is wrong? I have never known you like this.”

I am a man. I must not weep. Yet such passions live inside us all, and we block them out in order to become the very picture of the modern Christian being, all sensations kept tight under lock and key, all feelings, all emotions fastened tight within the heart. When I walk these city streets and see these pale, chaste faces trapped in the daily round of habit and duty, I feel myself surrounded by the dead. And in their eyes, a plea that I should join them.

I told Rebecca about my sister’s fate, as clearly and with as much detail as I possessed. I spoke of our family and of my love for my sister. And I cried. In grief and choler. I raged upon that waterfront like a madman, cursing myself, cursing humanity. Cursing God. Hers. Mine. Any I might name. The tears ran down my face. I knew madness that night. It was the taste of salt and saliva in the mouth, the sound of blood boiling in the ears, and the empty black hollow that sits inside the chest.

When, finally, my rants subsided, I sat down next to her once more and wiped my streaming face with my sleeve. She did not touch me. I couldn’t blame her. I was the one transformed, not her. What woman would like to see a man behave in such a fashion? Once again I misjudged her.

“Lorenzo,” she said in a very calm voice. “Your rage is not against fate. Or God. Or Venice. It is against yourself. You ask why you could not save Lucia from this fate. Even though you know there is no answer, the question continues to consume your soul. You feel responsible, and this presumed guilt turns your anger inwards. It is, I think, one of the stations of grief. Jacopo and I are orphans too. Do you think I don’t recognise it?”

It was a sane and rational response, and had I been at that time sane and rational, I would have recognised it as such. Instead I said, with a degree of bitterness inside my voice which shocked me as I heard it, “How could you blame yourself for your father’s death? Did you taunt God, as I have done these last few weeks? Did you walk into his house and shake your fist in his face?”

“You know that is ridiculous, Lorenzo,” she said with a distinct note of disappointment. “Lucia is dead of misfortune, not some divine revenge.”

“I know,” I answered. And it was true. Yet in each of us there lurks the demon of unreason, and it never sleeps.

She looked at me oddly. Then she took my arm. “Come,” she said. “I shall show you the true face of God and let you decide for yourself.”