A boot.
A tiny fur-lined boot.
Sofia’s boot.
Something cracked apart deep within him. His knees buckled; he knelt there on the ground, hugging the boot to his chest.
Letta . . .
What had happened to her — to them?
Was it a gang of witch-hunters? The constabulary? A band of thieves?
An assassin?
He rubbed his cheek against the soft fur at the top of the boot, then rose slowly to his feet and looked about. To the east, low on the horizon, the sky gleamed pearly gray. Morning would come soon. Though the alley was dark, he could see a churning of footprints in the dirt leading away from the glassworks; he could see feathers.
He jogged a few steps down the alley, then stopped, seized with indecision.
But by now they must be long gone. Long enough for the furnace to have cooled. And even if he did find them, what could he do? Fight off the constables, or a gang of thieves? No use, either, to go for help. Who would come to the rescue of a band of homeless, foreign children, deemed by many to be witches?
On the other hand he’d never heard of an assassin going after a band of children. And Taddeo . . . surely no one would see him as a threat. Whoever had taken the children would probably banish them, that was all. And the children had been banished before. They knew how to be banished.
Warmer days were coming. Letta was canny and fearless; she’d keep them safe.
Meanwhile, in the glassworks . . .
The overturned benches, the scattered trail of broken glass, the tools strewn across the floor. The feathers. The droppings.
An image of Sergio blinked into his mind. Twirling the feather. Showing it to the padrone.
The padrone began work every day not long after dawn. He would be here soon. If he saw signs of many birds, he’d likely give credit to Sergio’s accusations. And then, for Renzo, there’d be no more of spinning and shaping the hot glass. No more stemmed goblets, footed bowls. His days in the glassworks would be over.
He made for the window, chucked the boot inside. He jumped up, climbed over the casement, dropped into the storeroom. Then he set to work. He swept the floor, seeking out every feather, every dropping, every shard of broken glass — scouring the glassworks of every trace that the children had ever been there, every trace that they had ever lived. He fed stick after stick of wood into the furnace, stoking the flames until they were roaring, until sweat rolled down his forehead, down his back.
Memories of Letta kept rising before him. Leading the children across the floor to the furnace, brooking no resistance from him. Thrusting the blowpipe at him, refusing to let him give up. Tracing the embroidered roses on Mama’s mantle.
Where was she now?
At last, reluctantly, he threw the little boot into the furnace; it vanished in a burst of flame and a whiff of burning leather. He knew he should destroy the wading bird as well — but it didn’t seem right that it should be bound together in death with the instrument that had slain it. He cradled the bird in one hand — soft, gray-brown, speckled — and carefully worked the arrowhead from its breast. He flung the arrow into the furnace first and watched the fire consume it. He brought the bird up near his face, breathing in the dusty smell of feathers, remembering how it had perched on Paolo’s shoulder and pecked at the top of his head. A heaviness settled on his heart; for a moment it was hard to breathe.
He tossed the bird lightly, gave it to the flames.
Above him now light sifted in through the glass roof panels. He walked to the main door and peered out.
The sky glowed pink, the color of the inside of a polished shell. A soft breeze blew in from the west, bringing the smells of salt and tar and fish. Pink tipped the choppy gray wakes of the boats that plied the canal. The fishermen had long been up and gone, but the water teemed with boats — boats bringing in grain and spices, bricks and sand, kegs of wine.
And here came the glassworkers: Ettore, tying up his boat at the side of the canal. Anzoleto, with his little dog trotting beside him. The padrone and Sergio, walking up the path, the padrone with his chin thrust out, and Sergio trailing sullenly behind.
Nothing out of the ordinary.
Nothing that seemed amiss.
Renzo slipped back inside, unseen.
He was stirring the batch as they entered. He kept his head down, minding his work, but tuned his ears to their conversations.
A new commission for Carnevale. Somebody’s wedding, somebody’s saint’s-day feast. A tiff over breakfast that morning. The padrone announced that there would be clients in the glassworks on Monday, merchants who wanted to see the latest innovations and might well commission much work based upon what they saw.
The glassworkers must not know, then, what had happened here last night. Not yet.
Very soon he would have to tell the padrone that Taddeo had been gone when he’d arrived. But that was all.
Of course, Taddeo might turn up at any moment, telling a tale of bloody abduction. Or a constable could come knocking. Could tell about the bird children, and that Renzo had been sheltering them.
But for the space of this brief moment, it seemed that he was safe.
◆ ◆ ◆
After Renzo told of Taddeo’s absence, the padrone sent Anzoleto to search. When he returned, the news was ill. He had not found Taddeo, nor had any of his neighbors seen him. “Should I keep looking?” Anzoleto asked.
The padrone frowned. “No. Go back to work. Maybe he’ll turn up later. If not, I’ll ask around, see what I can find out.”
And it was back again, to the glass. To the heat and roar of the furnace, the sun-bright glow of the gather. Renzo tried to close himself up inside his work and shut out all else, but his hands were stupid, weary, clumsy. Things slipped away from them, stretched out of shape, shattered. Ettore barked at him, “Think, Renzo!” “Move!” But something dragged down inside him, fathoms deep.
There would have been men, Renzo thought, three or four of them at least. Shouting, surging through the glassworks doorway. Snatching up the children, hauling Taddeo to his feet. The children would have cried; the birds would have flapped and called; Letta would have fought. There would have been fists to pummel, and maybe knives to draw blood —
“Not there, boy! Over here!” Ettore snapped. “What are you doing? Pay attention!”
Renzo managed to recover his focus with the padrone later on. But the heaviness returned to sit upon his heart, and the mere act of breathing made him ache.
◆ ◆ ◆
Late that day, while lifting a white-hot gather from the furnace, Renzo became aware of a commotion somewhere in the glassworks. A clapping of hands. Shouting: “Go! Begone!”
Renzo blinked, turned away from the glass. Dazzled, as if waking from a dream. It was Sergio who had called out; now he pointed up toward the ceiling. Renzo blinked again, waited for the afterglow of molten glass to fade from before his eyes and allow him to see into the gloom.
It was a bird. A little kestrel, winging above the glassworks.
Letta’s bird?
Sergio and Ettore waved their blowpipes at the bird. It circled the glassworks, dipping low toward Renzo, then circled away again. But in the moment when it came nearest, he saw something affixed to its leg.
A message capsule.
For him?
That would mean . . . she was alive.
He wanted to leap into the air, to call to the kestrel, to hold out an arm for it to land on.
“It’s just like the one he made,” Sergio said. Accusingly. Pointing at Renzo now.
Anzoleto burst through the door and began hurling pebbles at the bird. It swooped toward Renzo again.
“Renzo,” the padrone said, “have you seen this bird before?”
Renzo ached to untie the capsule, to unroll the message, to find out where she was.
He glanced back at the padrone, whose eyes were curious. Probing.
“No,” Renzo said. He clapped his ha
nds, shouted up at the kestrel. “Shoo!” he said. “Begone!”
25.
Ill Tidings
Signore Averlino was droning on about wood.
He had approached Mama after mass again, had taken Renzo’s place at her side, had walked with her down the aisle in the slow procession of jostling parishioners. Mama had proudly told him that Renzo had passed his test, and Signore Averlino’s long, homely face had crinkled into a smile. He had grasped Renzo’s hand in his — large, sinewy, rough with calluses.
“Excellent, Renzo. Well done.”
Renzo had shrugged, not meeting his eyes. He itched to be out of the cloying air, heavy with the smells of candle wax, incense, and sweat. He wished Mama would tell Signore Averlino to leave them alone. Renzo was the man of the family. He would support Mama and Pia, would bring them honor. Though it would be years before he graduated to glassmaker, now their future was secure. At least, if no one found out that he’d protected the bird children. But two days had passed with no news . . .
Now Mama was encouraging Signore Averlino, asking about his work. At first he had tried to deflect the questions about himself — affecting modesty, Renzo thought. Still Mama had insisted, and now, as they approached the door, he spoke of miters, of joists, of crowns. Of dull and heavy matters, of interest to no one.
They stepped into the sunlight, turned the corner toward home. A cool breeze swept in across the lagoon; clouds sailed across the sky like fleets of galleons. Pigeons rose up before them in the campo, flapping and creaking, shadowing the sky. Renzo searched for the shape of a kestrel, halfway hopeful, halfway afraid. As the birds crossed the dazzling face of the sun, he narrowed his eyes to a squint, but he did not shut them. Because every time he shut his eyes, her face swam in. Lips pursed in concentration, regarding the glass. Holding out the blowpipe to him — Take it. Color rising in her face as she held Mama’s mantle for the first time.
Behind him Pia said, “You look sad today.”
Renzo turned to answer, but she hadn’t spoken to him. She had found her beggar again, squatting beside the churchyard wall in his accustomed place after several Sundays away. He was swaddled in rags, his face hidden, but his cupped and outstretched hand, with its gnarled fingers, was clear to view. Pia bent forward to hand him the coin, seeming to peer into his eyes. He tipped his head toward her, and a wedge of sunlight slashed his face, its gaunt lines suffused with something like longing.
Renzo took Pia’s hand, suddenly uneasy. “Come, Pia,” he said. “Let’s go.” He pulled her away. “You’re to put the coin in the alms box, not give it to the beggar!”
Mama stood beside Signore Averlino. She looked back at Pia and Renzo, shading her eyes against the glaring light. Her face was glowing, pink. Her eyes shone. She used to look like this when Papà —
A bright flash of anger shot through him.
She should be attending to Pia!
And Signore Averlino . . . Who did he think he was, this tall, stooped, balding, soft-spoken, dreary man? This carpenter!
Renzo remembered how Papà had sung to Mama, how he had danced her around the table, whispering in her ear and making her laugh. He had been a man of gusto, hungry for life. He had eaten and drunk overmuch, but the weight sat well on him, gave him substance. True, he had a temper, but his storms soon blew over, and afterward no one could be more tender. He flirted with every pretty woman who crossed his path, but Mama was the only one he loved.
And he was an artist with the glass, a great master.
This man could never compare to Papà. Not ever.
“Signore Averlino has an important commission, Renzo.”
“Only doors,” Signore Averlino murmured.
“Palace doors, Marcello,” Mama said. “I remember when you opened your shop, all those years ago. Did you ever imagine . . . the Doge’s Palace!”
Signore Averlino shook his head. “It was a complete surprise. We put in a bid, but — ”
“Doors!” Mama said, turning to Renzo and Pia. “The doge wants to leave his mark on the palace. He’s commissioned new and handsome doors, each carved with the winged lion of San Marco. Every exterior door of the palace.”
Doors. Nothing of beauty there. Nothing of art. Renzo snorted in contempt.
Signore Averlino inclined his head slightly. But Mama turned to look at Renzo — hard. Not with her usual affectionate reproof but with something different. Something cold. The way she might look at a stranger. She took Pia’s hand, then turned to Signore Averlino and said something Renzo could not hear. Then they set off, the three of them, across the campo, leaving Renzo behind.
◆ ◆ ◆
By the next day, Monday, the padrone still had no tidings of Taddeo. It was, he said, as if Taddeo had fallen into a canal, never to reappear.
Renzo pushed aside his worries — for Letta, for the children, for Taddeo, for himself. He tried to lose himself in work.
But later that morning a tiny owl flew into the glassworks. It circled about them, whooting in high, flutelike notes, and would not leave until chased out with blowpipes and stones. It might have had a message capsule; Renzo couldn’t see for certain. But none of the children had owls. Still, it was odd to see an owl in daylight, and this one so persistent.
Soon clients converged upon the glassworks, and Renzo’s thoughts were taken up with the making and selling of glass — except for a thin hum of worry that wormed its way in, unsettling him as he worked.
The first client was a merchant from the main island, a proud-looking man, richly garbed, with an aquiline nose and sleepy eyes. The padrone and Renzo made a glass kestrel for him, the two of them performing a graceful dance before the furnace. When it was done, the padrone held the bird out before the merchant, bowing deeply. As Anzoleto bore the bird to the annealing oven, the padrone and the merchant sealed an order for forty more, the largest single commission of the year.
After that there were more merchants, and some noblemen, and the captain of a trading ship — a portly, bushy-haired man with a hearty air and a watchful eye. They wanted to stand in the heat of the great furnace; they wanted to watch the falcons emerge from the flowing glass as if by sorcery; they wanted to buy. Now Renzo made the birds alone, save for the addition of glass for the wings. The padrone stood beside him, telling a story in his booming voice, a story of fire and soda and sand, a story of transformation, of magic.
The clients all admired the birds, though with the restraint typical of merchants who don’t wish to seem overeager and thereby raise the price. The captain, though, upon gazing at the finished bird, made a disturbing leap.
“All the talk is of birds of late. Have you heard the tidings of the bird children, the ones the Ten are holding in the dungeon?”
Renzo started, nearly dropping the blowpipe.
Sergio was staring at him. Renzo turned away, and was caught by the padrone’s gaze.
“Bird children?” the padrone asked, his voice carefully level.
“I heard tell they were taken in Murano. I thought I saw them once, though I could be mistaken.” He shook his great curly head as if to banish the image.
The dungeon. Renzo’s knees turned to water beneath him. Quickly he finished the bird and cracked it off the end of the blowpipe. Then he sank to the floor and made a pretense of lacing up a boot.
He’d heard tales of the dungeon. Though it occupied a wing of the Doge’s Palace, there was nothing grand about it. People said it was dank and foul and reeking.
It could have been worse, he told himself. If they’d been kidnapped by ruffians, they might all have been slain. And surely the Ten would just deport them.
But still. If only he’d warned them.
The dungeon.
He shivered. Well, at least now he knew for certain they were alive.
◆ ◆ ◆
Late that afternoon two men came into the glassworks. They were garbed as government officials, in velvet caps and long, dark woolen robes. The padrone set aside his work and went t
o greet them; they stood talking in a knot by the doors.
It was over. Someone must have told; they must know what Renzo had done.
He glanced at them from time to time while assisting Ettore, but the roar of the furnace drowned out all sound of what was said. In a while, though, the padrone turned from the men. “Renzo,” he called. “Come here.”
Renzo handed the blowpipe to Ettore. He crossed the floor, his heart thundering in his chest, looking straight ahead but feeling the weight of every eye in the glassworks upon him.
The padrone didn’t bother to introduce the men but launched right into a question. “When you came here every night,” he asked, “was Taddeo always alone?”
Renzo nodded.
“You never saw anyone with him?”
Renzo shook his head.
“Speak up, boy! You’re saying you never saw anyone else in the glassworks with Taddeo? Anyone who didn’t belong?”
“No,” Renzo said. “I did not.”
The words tasted sour in his mouth. He felt his face grow hot with the brazenness of his lie, with the shame of his betrayal.
The padrone nodded, shifted his eyes away. Renzo wasn’t sure if the padrone truly believed him or if it was merely convenient to believe, because of the glass birds.
“It was Taddeo, then,” the padrone said.
One of the officials raised his brows. “It’s a pity he’s not alive to defend himself. We’d been searching for those children, and then — ”
Renzo gasped. “Not . . . alive?”
“Dead,” the padrone said gruffly. “Not slain — or at any pass, it seems not. He was likely affrighted; his old heart probably seized and gave out.” He dismissed Renzo, turned again to the men.
Renzo stumbled back toward the furnace.
Dead. Taddeo, dead.
All at once Renzo recalled the look on Mama’s face the day before, as if she’d been regarding a stranger. Someone she’d thought she’d known but did not.
Who are you, Renzo? What have you become?
26.
Visit with a Ghost
Renzo couldn’t sleep.
Falcon in the Glass Page 12
