The Four Seasons: A Novel of Vivaldi's Venice

by Laurel Corona

  “Try it,” he said after he stopped.

  Maddalena had been too surprised to do anything but watch. Try it? She felt nailed to her chair. “I don’t want to,” she said. “I mean, I can’t.”

  “Can’t? Why not?”

  “I—I don’t know.” Because I don’t know how to use my body. Because frivolity isn’t allowed. Because I don’t like things I’m not used to. Because you frighten me.

  Vivaldi came over and sat across from her. He was wheezing, but his cheeks were rosy and his eyes glistened.

  “Maddalena, do you know how to feel happy?” he asked. “Where you want to stand up and shout? Where you want to pick up your skirt and twirl in circles just because it feels good?”

  “I—”

  “I didn’t think so. Happiness like that is not condoned by the Pietà.” He took her hand. “Listen to me now. Your playing is beautiful. I hear the best musicians in Venice—in all Italy—and some of them don’t make the music mean half what you do, even though their technique is better. And it should be. After all, most of them have been playing longer than you’ve been alive.”

  He noticed he was still holding her hand, but instead of pulling away, he squeezed it. “But I have never heard a happy note from you. The poetry in your head is— What is it? Sad? Lonely?”

  He pulled away his hand, and Maddalena clasped hers together, wringing them. “I don’t know how to talk this way.”

  “Well, try! Find a word for what your images mean. One bird in the sky? A leaf falling? A flickering candle? What do these things say about you?”

  It was like grasping a handful of ashes. Her thoughts slipped away, refusing to form. Then she whispered something.

  “I couldn’t hear you,” he said.

  “Small,” Maddalena said. “I just feel small.”

  “That’s better. Now we will start work on making you feel bigger.” He stood up. “May I have this dance?”

  Maddalena’s stomach felt like a pan of water reaching a boil. “I don’t know how.”

  “Neither do I. I’ve discovered it’s much better that way.” He pulled her to her feet and placed her hands in his. Then he began to hum, and she found her feet moving, a bit clumsily but in step with his. The third time through the melody, she lifted onto her toes and joined him in humming. He was so close she could see the prickles of sweat turning his red hair brownish at the temples, the flecks of green in his gray eyes—eyes that were probing hers, daring her, demanding something she did not quite understand. Then he pulled away.

  “Oh my,” he said, sitting down and mopping his brow.

  Panting, she dropped in a chair and shut her eyes. All my life I have waited for something like this to happen. All my life I wanted someone to look across a room of girls in their red dresses and white caps and see me. You— no, you over there in the corner. The one with the auburn hair. Come here. I know who you are. I know what you need.

  When the blood stopped pounding in her ears, Maddalena heard whispering in the hallway, and the sound of giggles suppressed behind hands as the rustle of skirts receded into the distance.

  “Did you hear that?” she asked Vivaldi.

  “Next time we should ask them to join us.” He was still smiling. The moment was gone. I am in trouble, she thought, wildly hoping she was mistaken.

  “You danced with him?” Anna Maria scowled. “What does that have to do with music?”

  Maddalena stared at her, dumbfounded. “People dance to music.”

  “Not the people who are supposed to be playing it.”

  Chiaretta wasn’t listening. “I wish he would dance with me,” she said. “Well, maybe not him, but someone. A handsome man.” She turned sideways and took a few tiny, skipping steps as they walked toward the practice rooms the morning after Maddalena’s lesson. “Was it like this?”

  “Chiaretta, I can’t show you. Everybody’s watching me.”

  Maddalena dreaded each step toward the sala dal violino, where she knew Luciana would be waiting, furious but exultant. She had to have heard, because gossip carried in no time up and down staircases and along corridors from one workroom to the next, until it had reached every wing of the Pietà. A few hours after her lesson with Vivaldi, the figlie in the lace room had grown quiet when she came in, and she had seen them giving each other smirking looks all afternoon. Anna Maria and Chiaretta had both heard the story of the dancing violinists before Maddalena had a chance to tell them that evening. To Maddalena’s relief, what they heard had not been much embellished in the telling, but the truth was embarrassing enough.

  Luciana pretended not to see her when she came in, and Maddalena opened her violin case inch by inch, her front teeth locked in a grimace, as if the slightest squeak might betray her. As she took out her bow, she heard the maestra tapping on the table.

  “Before we start today,” she said, “there is a matter to take care of.”

  “Oh, no,” Anna Maria whispered.

  Luciana was staring at Maddalena so intently that the other figlie turned to look at her. “It’s clear,” she said, addressing all the figlie, “that some of you fail to understand your work here.”

  Maddalena felt her temples pulse. Anna Maria moved close enough to brush against her as Luciana went on. “This is not a room full of soloists. You are members of an orchestra. Your job is to play the music that is put in front of you, to rehearse the music you have been assigned to play.”

  Luciana was looking at Maddalena again. “The sotto maestre are aware of how best to help you improve, and they know our ways. That is why I have always thought we should employ as few outside teachers as possible. You have all been here long enough to recognize anything out of the ordinary, yet some of you obviously cannot, and where judgment in these matters is lacking in both instructor and pupil...”—her voice lowered to a growl as she addressed the group again—“you hurt the coro. You hurt the Pietà. And who knows what can come of that?”

  She said no more, leaving all possibilities open to the imagination, as she shuffled to her chair and sat down. She motioned for her pupil to come take her seat, turning her back to where Maddalena was standing. The other figlie went to their appointed places as quickly as they could, too intimidated even to look at one another.

  “You’d better go talk to her,” Anna Maria whispered.

  “I know,” Maddalena said without moving.

  “Now, before she gets started.” She gave her a push in the small of her back, and Maddalena crept across the room to the maestra.

  “Yes?” Luciana looked up.

  “I just wanted to say I’m sorry. He was trying to teach me—” He was trying to teach me not to feel small.

  “I don’t care. You know I have never approved of this special little arrangement.” Luciana’s snort echoed through the room, loud as a horse. “Apparently, I’m sure you’ll be glad to hear, Maestro Vivaldi has been successful at explaining himself to the priora and the Congregazione. They have, in their superior judgment, not found it necessary to fire him, or to stop his current lessons. And they have decided you are not to blame, and that two days of bread and water are an appropriate punishment.”

  Maddalena felt a shudder of relief travel through her body.

  “But he has been admonished most severely,” Luciana went on, “and you, Maddalena, should consider that you have been also.” She shook her head, curling her lip. “Dancing!” She turned away in disgust. “And now, leave me, please.”

  The figlie had been listening to Luciana’s every word, just as she intended. When Maddalena turned to go back to her seat, they huddled over their music, giving her furtive looks as she passed. She scarcely noticed. Bread and water were nothing. Her life was not over after all.

  A subdued Vivaldi greeted Maddalena the following week. “I must have caused you a great deal of embarrassment,” he said.

  Maddalena averted her eyes, running her finger over her bow strings.

  “The Congregazione were not amused by my—peculia
r, I think they called it—teaching style,” he said. “I assured them it wasn’t my style, just a thought I had at the moment.”

  “Are you sorry you had it?” Maddalena’s voice was barely audible as she continued playing with the bow.

  “I said over and over again how sorry I was. But I didn’t mean a word of it.” He stifled what sounded like the beginning of a laugh.

  “They told me not to take any more liberties where you”—he corrected himself—“where the figlie di coro are concerned.”

  Were you sorry you danced with me? Maddalena was too afraid of the answer to ask. Vivaldi had already taken his violin out of its case, and his head was bent over the strings as he tested one of them. He sighed and, resting the violin in its case, walked over to the stove, turning his back to her.

  “The coro is—so competent. But where is that flash of brilliance? I told them if they weren’t interested in that, I wasn’t interested in being here.” He chuckled to himself and turned around. “Of course I was bluffing. I can’t afford to lose this job.”

  He walked back over to Maddalena, still running the loose bow strings between her fingers. “So quiet,” he said. “What’s wrong?”

  Were you sorry you danced with me?

  When she did not reply, he continued. “They went on and on about how much they respected my judgment concerning the potential of the figlie, and how freethinking they were to let me spend any time with you. At the same time they told me I am to prepare you to be a third violinist. I seem to be the only one who sees any inconsistency in that, but how could so many great men of Venice be wrong?”

  He sniffed. “I am to produce brilliance among the first violinists... whether they possess it or not. And make third violinists out of girls like you.” He picked up his violin and began to tune it again. “So we will be taking a different approach—that is, if you ever decide to look at me.”

  Maddalena raised her eyes. “Does different mean ‘nothing special’?”

  “What? So sad? Of course it will be special. I won’t let it be grim. And I won’t let you turn out to be ordinary, not if I can help it. Even if I have to do it one stolen minute at a time.” He cocked his head and gave her a conspiratorial grin.

  “Were you sorry you danced with me?” Finally she had said it.

  “I’m just sorry I can’t do it again.” He shrugged. “And besides, I thought about it and they’re right. Your imagination isn’t helping you become an attiva. You play to please yourself, and that doesn’t carry much weight here.”

  “I want to please you,” Maddalena said, her eyes filling with tears.

  He exhaled slowly through pursed lips, causing a wisp of his hair to lift off his forehead. “You don’t understand. If you were not a ward of the Pietà and I were not a priest, and we lived somewhere in Venice, we could pull out our violins and play to our hearts’ delight.” His voice tightened as he spoke. “But none of those things are true. The Pietà is not paying me, or raising you, to entertain each other.”

  If we lived in Venice? Images swirled through her mind. A living room. A fire. Violins. Dancing.

  Vivaldi was giving her a quizzical look. “Do you understand?”

  The vision dissipated and she was back in the practice room. She felt the cold and shivered. “Yes.”

  “And if you don’t get a third violin chair soon—” He did not need to finish. The Congregazione would not continue to support a failed violinist forever.

  Maddalena stared at the floor. “I think if I did not have music...” She could not even finish the thought.

  “That you would die? I don’t suppose you could know how well I understand you.” He paused. “I would like to lift your face, but I am forbidden. I want to tell you a secret, but you will have to look at me.”

  Complying, she saw the strain in his eyes. “I don’t remember choosing to be a priest,” he began. “My father is a barber who plays the violin with the orchestra of San Marco. He was worried about my future...” His voice fell off as he looked across the room.

  “I’ve never been healthy, never been able to breathe well, and my heart pains me. My parents thought I was going to die before living even a month. When I was fifteen, they pushed me toward the priesthood. I can’t say I objected strongly—after all, I would always have a job. And we all thought it would suit me. I’ve carried a breviary with me from childhood. Prayer steadies me, and most days I follow the holy office as much as I can.”

  He was an adult, a priest, a man, and much as she wanted to know his story, much as she wanted to be the one he told it to, she was uncomfortable hearing it. Still, she let him go on.

  He shook his head hard, as if to dislodge an unwanted thought. “After I was ordained, I was very unhappy. I would say mass, and hear confessions, minister to the sick, bury the dead, but I wasn’t really paying attention. Please don’t misunderstand, it wasn’t for lack of love of God, or a feeling the work wasn’t important, but I had all these melodies floating in and out of my head. It was like trying to catch a flock of birds with my bare hands. By the time I could write them down, they had escaped.

  “One day I was celebrating mass, and just before the Elevation of the Host, the most glorious music came into my head. I swear I thought my life depended on writing it down before it was lost. I felt short of breath, as if I might faint, so I handed the communion wafer to the other priest and ran from the altar. Then I sat in the sacristy and wrote the music down.”

  “What happened next? Did you get in trouble?”

  “Of course.” He laughed quietly. “It’s odd to call it fortunate to have an illness that causes me so much pain—you’ve seen that, I’m afraid—but I was able to use my shortness of breath as an excuse, and then I realized it might be a way to get out of being a parish priest altogether. May God strike me dead, but I cannot help but believe He would rather hear my music than my mumblings at the altar.”

  Vivaldi saw the quizzical look on her face. “Have I offended you, Maddalena Rossa? I don’t suppose you have ever heard a priest talk this way.”

  She shook her head. “It’s not that. No one—at least not any adult—has ever talked to me like that. I mean, they tell me lots of things, like stop daydreaming and pay attention, or pick the threads off my skirt.” She looked down at her skirt and brushed her hand across it, although nothing was there. “I don’t mean to complain, but here, when people look you in the eye or call you by name, it’s usually because they’re angry, or giving you an order.”

  “Complain all you want. I won’t tell.” He winked at her. “We should start the lesson,” he said. “It would be a very bad idea not to teach you anything today.”

  Soon he was lost in his warm-up and no longer paying attention to her, but he was seated so close she could hear the tiny whistle in his throat where his breath caught, and see loose ends of red hair splayed on the shoulders of his robe. She didn’t dare reach out and smooth his hair as she did Chiaretta’s, but for a second her hands wanted to. Then the world of the Pietà closed back in around her, and she picked up her violin.

  During the rest period that afternoon, Maddalena’s stomach began to hurt, and she felt an awareness of her body at the point between where her thighs met her belly. She had been told all her life not to allow her fingers to stray to that place, but the feeling was so foreign her hand went there without her willing it. Her fingers felt slippery, and she lifted them in front of her eyes, staring at the coating of blood.

  Keeping such matters private on an open ward was impossible, and Chiaretta was horrified at what she thought had to be an injury deep inside Maddalena’s body. But when the older girls talked about it, Chiaretta understood that if she didn’t bleed, her breasts would fail to grow. Her nipples had grown puffy and large, but that was all, and Chiaretta was tired of staring down at nothing while the other figlie di coro had such beautiful, soft mounds pressing out of the bodices of their gowns. Chiaretta wanted something to show off, even if she had to accept the bleeding to get
it.

  “You can pretend,” one of the figlie said to her as a half dozen of the coro prepared to leave for what would be Chiaretta’s first private party in a Venetian home. “You take a couple of handkerchiefs and put them like this.” The girl shoved her fingers deep into the bodice of her dress. Her breast was so ample the nipple peeked out. Embarrassed, she tucked it back in.

  Chiaretta looked down at her own flat chest. “I don’t have anything to push up,” she said.

  “Neither did I,” the girl said, tugging at her bodice to straighten it. “Just try it. You’ll be surprised.”

  Chiaretta looked down at the tiny protuberances forced upward to the edge of her bodice as she stepped out of the damp gloom of the alley alongside the Pietà. Sunlight bounced off the light stones of the Riva degli Schiavoni and sparkled on the lagoon. Forgetting her self-consciousness, she blinked at the brightly colored clothing and masks of passersby celebrating one of the many festivals of the Venetian year. A large black gondola, polished until it shone like obsidian, was tied up at the dock. The felce had azure velvet curtains, embroidered with the family crest of Antonia Morosini’s family. The gondolier was dressed in a brocade jacket of the same blue, his head topped with a black tricornered hat. When he saw the figlie emerge from the Pietà, he jumped off to help them board.

  Chiaretta savored every footstep, pretending she was boarding her private gondola to go home to her palazzo after a visit. Her fantasy was interrupted by the commotion on the quay. Someone was calling to one of the soloists. “Agostina! Agostina! Bravissima!” Then another picked up the refrain, but this time for Cecilia.

  And then she heard it. “Chiaretta!” She turned to look and saw a cluster of people who seemed to know who she was. They had pulled off their masks and were smiling and waving at her. A flower landed atop one of Chiaretta’s shoes from a bouquet someone had dismantled to throw at the figlie, followed by a blue-andpink mask in the shape of a bird that clattered to the ground in front of her. She bent to pick it up, but the chaperone grabbed her arm and hurried her along with a clucking sound.