The Lost Diary of Venice Read online

  Instead he leaned toward the window and breathed on the glass. The star she’d drawn there reappeared, a faint design. He tugged the cuff of his shirt up over his palm.

  Rubbed the star away.

  Inside, the house was thick with the scent of roast pork and the hot, starchy steam of potatoes. Jane and Lucy were setting the table, forks and plates, folded napkins. This was Sarah’s new habit, to make dinner. When they’d lived in New York, they’d always just ordered in, but here she’d started cooking. Simple meals at first, pastas and rice, then gradually risottos, stews. Sauces for the meat. William had understood what she was doing, that it was her way of trying. See the lengths I’ll go to? Taste my effort.

  He appreciated the meals, he did, but for some reason the image of her in the kitchen with an apron on made him think of the Stepford Wives—as if she wasn’t the one who’d been at an office all day—and only drifted him further away from the idea of them together that he still carried. A set of memories of who they’d been, once, years ago. A couple who’d laughed, went out to eat, had sex in the laundry room while the girls were down for their naps. A couple who’d known each other. He wasn’t sure now how much he could trust those memories—had part of her always been standing by, dissatisfied?—but he wasn’t ready to trade them all in just yet.

  Half the time he made dinner before she got home just so she wouldn’t have the chance.

  He watched Sarah from across the table that night, as the girls chirped about their day, squirming in their chairs. The precise way she cut into her meat, how even her hair was orderly, parted in a perfect line. He thought of Rose’s hair, unruly as vines, seemingly one firm headshake from tumbling down completely.

  He’d been excited to see her again. There wasn’t any sense denying that. He’d stood in front of his closet, wondering what to wear, then tried on three different shirts until he found one that wasn’t too badly wrinkled. He’d used hair gel, for Christ’s sakes—couldn’t remember the last time he’d done that. Sarah took a bite; he heard the small metallic tink of the fork against her teeth. Had she felt that giddy getting dressed for work?

  He thought of the messages she’d shown him, from Mr. Boat Shoes. He’d demanded to see it all: every text, every email. The only thing he’d asked not to know was his address. He’d started running by that point, miles at night, and didn’t want the opportunity. He could imagine himself on some doorstep too easily, sweating through his T-shirt, gripping a bat like an overdressed caveman. That was mine. My wife.

  You killed it in that meeting. One of the first texts.

  Hey, I’d love to get your take on this case. Smoke break?

  I just heard about a great new tiki bar. Wanna try it? Sarah loved tropical drinks. William hated anything that could be served with an umbrella. Hated people who used “wanna” in texts.

  I finally watched that movie you recommended—you were right. Amazing! William had asked which movie; Sarah had named an old sci-fi film. But you don’t even like that movie, he’d said, getting angry. You just know other people think it’s good! It’d felt like a different sort of betrayal somehow. A betrayal of taste.

  Then, the clincher. Did you get a haircut?

  That was the sort of attention she’d wanted: the kind people pay when they’re trying to impress each other. Before the curtain’s lifted on every flaw and bad habit, when the warm glow of potential still softens all the sharp edges. Admit it, you were taking a vacation from life! he remembered whisper-yelling at her during one of their early fights. You fucking tourist.

  Was that why he’d told Rose about Sarah, his girls? Because he’d walked into the bookshop with his ring in his pocket and watched her flush, and felt that same honeyed light—the allure of being mistaken for a better version of himself? In that second, he’d understood the danger was more serious than he could have imagined: it wasn’t just that she might take him for someone greater, it was that through her he could convince himself he was.

  Talking about Sarah felt like a form of self-preservation; a desperate measure taken against his own instincts, against the part of him that had wanted to pull Rose into his chest the instant he touched her shoulder. He’d had good intentions: he’d seen how flustered she’d gotten talking about her dad, a comforting gesture seemed warranted—he just hadn’t expected to feel such an animal impulse, not from something as innocuous as putting a hand to her back. He’d just spent a year crowing from the peak of his moral high ground; there wasn’t a way he could follow in Sarah’s footsteps now, not after ending so many fights with that one line she had no counter for:

  I would never have done this to our family.

  He imagined what Lois would have to say. Probably something maddeningly noncommittal.

  These are very interesting thoughts, William.

  William set his fork down with a clatter, rubbed at his eyes.

  “You okay?” Sarah was frowning at him from across the table. Jane and Lucy kept forming small mountains out of their mashed potatoes.

  “Yeah, fine.” Suddenly, the image of Giovanni’s portrait flashed before him, shadows and light. “But I think I’ll head to the studio after dinner. There’s a new idea I want to explore.”

  8

  THREE DAYS LATER, GIO ONCE again stood before the great house, contemplating the heavy snake’s-head knocker. He raised a hand to grab it, then impulsively gave the door a push. It swung open with a halfhearted creak. He ducked through, into the front entry, which stretched out cool and empty. From one end came kitchen sounds, a distant clatter and bang. He hurried toward the servants’ passage.

  The stairwell was unlit and plunged him into a disorienting darkness. Sliding one palm along the curving stone wall for balance, Gio ascended carefully. As he did, he began to hear voices again, drifting down from the floor above. This time he recognized both immediately: Venier and Corvino. Their murmurs sharpened into meaning as he neared.

  “She’ll make a fool of you.” Corvino’s voice was urgent, pleading.

  “I am old enough to know the ways of this world, Corvino. What she does or does not do is none of your concern.”

  The door at the top of the stairs was open a quarter of an inch. Gio peered through the crack at Corvino’s profile. The Crow was staring straight ahead as if a disturbing scene were taking place in front of him, his lips pinched together anxiously. All Gio could see of Venier was his broad-shouldered back, his head of close-cropped gray hair thinning at the top.

  “She’s distracting you.” Corvino turned to Venier, dark eyes scouring the statesman’s face. He grasped Venier’s elbow. “Bressan needs your attention. We must field-test the galleasses, we must—”

  “We must do nothing of the sort. I—”

  A door opened down the hall. At the sound, Venier wrenched his elbow away and strode toward the grand staircase. Corvino trailed behind with clenched jaw, scrutinizing the floor. Gio waited, listening to the mismatched tempo of their heels as they retreated. Then the sound of a door again, scraping shut behind the unseen servant. Gio darted out, scurrying toward the rose-colored sitting room. Before he could reach it, the faint strains of Chiara’s voice snared him, twirling out from another chamber. When he pressed that door, it swung open just wide enough for him to slip inside.

  Near the far end of the room, Chiara sat at an ornately carved desk, brushing her hair. A mirror was mounted on the wall in front of her; other, smaller mirrors were scattered on side tables, so that the afternoon sun multiplied itself in their surfaces, weaving a drowsy gold matrix. Dust motes floated sideways in the faded beams. A low fire crackled and sputtered on the hearth, and between the hearth and the door stood her bed: sturdy four-postered walnut, with brocade drapes embroidered in a repeating pattern of thistle blossoms. Over the bed a canopy drooped, threaded through with gold. Even the sheets were embellished, with small jewels sewn in at the corners, shimmering in the ligh
t. Chiara’s tinted hair drifted in slow waves under her brush, and when she moved, the outline of her body revealed itself through the fabric of her linen shift. Gio realized she hadn’t heard him enter—he froze at the threshold.

  Still watching her own reflection, she began the song again. As she sang, her voice dropped smoky and low, then rose clear and crisp as winter morning. Expertly she rippled through the tune. After one refrain she paused, setting the brush on the corner of the desk before picking up a quill pen, scribbling the song notes on a piece of parchment as if racing to capture the melody before it could escape her mind. The feather of the pen bobbed in the air. Reading over what she’d written, she hummed the snatch of song again, then leaned to make a correction. Nodded in approval.

  Gio cleared his throat.

  “Giovanni!” Chiara jumped, knocking the brush off the table.

  “My apologies!” he blurted, extending a hand as if to halt her from standing. “I was coming to escort you to the studio for a sitting. I—I didn’t mean to interrupt.”

  She stared at him a moment, then bent to pick the brush up, saying nothing. He set his bag by the door, then took another tentative step into the room, approaching her the way he would a skittish animal. “It sounded lovely, Chiara. But…am I to understand that the most beautiful woman in Venice is also a composer?” He tried a grin, in part to test her response.

  To his relief, she smiled back. Raising both hands, she tucked her hair behind her ears. Undone, it fell past her waist, surrounding her like a downy golden aureole. Glancing at the desktop, she reached out to touch the parchment with her fingertips.

  “I’ve always loved to compose. As soon as I learned to read music, I started writing. It’s…I suppose you could say it’s my passion, though I’m only a woman.” She looked up, sharply. “You’re curious, aren’t you?”

  He took two more steps into the room. Her face grew intelligible, serious and bare. He shrugged. “I’m certainly more interested in this version of you. I’ve met the reluctant courtesan with a noble family a few times already.” This earned him another grudging smile. “May I hear it again?”

  She inhaled, hesitating. Without thinking, he reached into the pouch that hung at his hip and pulled out his spectacles, dangling them by one of the ribbons. The lenses glinted in the light.

  “If my secret’s safe with you, yours is with me.”

  She watched curiously as the glasses spun in the air, then nodded. Plucking the parchment up from the table, she held it at arm’s length, took a breath, and began the song again. The sun filtering in through the drapes conspired with the hearth fire to cast her in a mellow glow; the delicate features of her face strained with concentration. As she sang, she trilled her fingers in little waves, indicating where accompaniment might be added.

  In an instant, the room behind her slid away as Gio’s mind summoned a backdrop of musicians, chiming in with pipe and lute, to weave the song together. There was a mathematical precision to the composition: it quickened in complex ripples and allegros, then slowed to the simplest progression of notes. It was brilliant—anyone could recognize that—and with vague surprise Gio felt his chest constrict, his arms prickle, his skin suddenly too tight for his flesh. As Chiara’s fingers murmured to a stop, the musicians behind her disintegrated, replaced by the sturdy walls and bedposts. She held the last note for a fraction longer, then clamped her lips shut. Her eyes shot to him expectantly.

  “It’s magnificent, Chiara—but I think you might know that already.” He caught the corner of her mouth twitch. “Have you shown your work to anyone else?”

  “Rarely.” She sighed as she sat back down on the stool, crossing one leg over the other, leaning to rest an elbow on the table. Two soft dents marked the flesh beneath each kneecap. “Sometimes I’ll sing for Margherita and Veronica, though I think they’re both too sweet to be critics—or really understand what they’re listening to, to be honest. I showed a piece to another musician only once. He offered to publish it under his own name.”

  “What was your response?”

  “I told him I’d rather my work were never heard for being a woman’s than stolen by a man.” She stared down at the hand that rested in her lap, palm up, as if reading her own fortune.

  “That was the right choice. But your work will be heard, I’m sure of it.”

  She raised her brows at this, then turned back to the mirror and began pinning up her hair. On the table in front of her a small army of makeup pots, brushes, and perfume bottles stood in formation. Gio moved closer, until he was directly behind her.

  “Do you know Aurelio, the alchemist?” He posed the question to her reflection.

  “I’ve heard of him—well, I’ve drunk his liquor, I should say. At Domenico’s. Why?” She shifted her gaze to observe him in the glass.

  “He has a theory about artists. He claims we’re no different than alchemists; that we’re both seeking communion with a force greater than ourselves. He says in the work of a true artist, you can feel the thumbprint of the divine.” He watched her hands slow their movements at this. “You’re a true artist, Chiara. I can tell, even just from that.” He gestured to the parchment. “There was…a pattern in it, a complexity and a balance…” He stumbled, went silent. The right words were there—he could sense their edges in his mind, but for some reason he couldn’t grasp hold of them. Her hands had stopped completely, so they rested, fingers interlocked, on top of her head.

  “I haven’t thought it through as much as Aurelio has, I’m sure.” She surveyed her own reflection. “All I know is that when I sit down to compose, I’m surprised by what comes out. I start, and it just…takes form. A chord, a progression—and there’s mystery in it, because I don’t know where it comes from. It’s a part of myself I’m not in control of.”

  She dropped her arms, a lock of hair coming undone at the nape of her neck. “I’ll have to think more on it, I suppose. I’ve never actually talked to anyone about it.” She turned to look up at him over her shoulder. “Don’t we make a pair, though. A woman composer and an artist going blind.” She tried a half smile, but it wilted and died.

  He didn’t expect the tears. They must have been there all along, waiting.

  In an instant she’d leapt to stand in front of him—her fingertips cool on his skin, wiping the wet from his cheeks. He thrust his hands into his robes, bumping up against the smooth weight of his lenses in their pouch. Felt the sudden urge to break them, snap their frame in two.

  “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. And after you said such sweet things.” Her hands had stopped moving and now held his face, cheek to palm. Without her shoes on, she stood at chest height, arching her neck just to look up at him. He observed her pupils as they dilated and contracted, black pinpricks floating in lavender.

  “May I make a confession?” The scent of rosemary on her breath. He nodded; she kept her hands clasped to his face. “I asked to be painted by you. I saw the portrait you did of Livia Colonna; her husband put it on display at Domenico’s. Do you know the one?”

  He nodded again, screwing his eyes shut tight. He could recall the painting exactly, every minute detail—down to the small half-moons in Livia’s nail beds. He’d noticed the blackness just as he finished it.

  “You’d captured her, her essence, in a way I didn’t think was possible. That same night, I told Venier I wanted you to paint me. I wasn’t seeking a tribute; please don’t think this is vanity. I just wanted to be seen—the way Livia had been seen.” She paused. “The way you’d seen her.”

  Then she raised herself onto her toes and put her mouth to his.

  The soft press of her body against him and the taste of salt—a sudden awareness of how much smaller than him she was, how easily he could crush her. Thick heartbeats filled his head, like a panic of bird wings flapping escape. He opened his eyes; hers were closed in front of him. He put a hand to her ches
t and pushed. Pushed harder than he’d meant to. She stumbled, the backs of her legs knocking into the stool, eyes shooting wide. A pulse of blood darkened the skin of her cheeks.

  “I don’t want your charity.” The words spoke themselves. As he watched, her face hardened and shut in on itself. She took another step backward, away from his hand still suspended in midair.

  It was in this pose that the little dog found them, bounding through the door left ajar. They had only a moment to register the rapid click click of his claws on the hall tiles before he burst into the room—a lapdog, low to the ground, with a silky chestnut coat and a short tail that shook the whole of his body. A pink tongue flopped out of one side of his mouth, the world too thrilling for him to contain himself. Showing them the whites of his eyes, he scampered through the room, nearly toppling a stack of books as he tried to leap onto the bed.

  A breathless Margherita entered in pursuit. “I’m so sorry, but isn’t he darling! A present from Matteo. Here, Nicco, here!” Holding up her skirts, she chased after the dog, finally clutching him, squirming, to her chest. He began to lick her neck enthusiastically, tail wagging from between her arms.

  “Giovanni! I didn’t know you were coming today.” Margherita addressed the ceiling as she leaned her face out of Nicco’s reach.

  “He was just leaving,” Chiara interjected, before he could respond.

  Margherita’s face puckered in confusion. Without registering his own actions, Gio was suddenly at the door. Picking up his satchel, he bowed farewell stiffly, then departed, glancing back only once to see the women standing side by side in the yellow afternoon, the restless animal the only point of motion left.

  * * *

  Before he could raise a hand to knock, Aurelio’s door swung open. On the other side, Gio was startled to be greeted by a cloaked figure, hood drawn down nearly to the nose, thin lips creased with lines. Without a word she—or was it he?—edged past, smelling of sage, earthy and sharp. Then they vanished into an alleyway so abruptly that Gio began to question whether he’d seen anyone at all.