The Four Seasons: A Novel of Vivaldi's Venice

by Laurel Corona

  Despite differences of opinion about the extent of her talent, from the moment of his arrival in Venice, Vivaldi began pressuring Claudio and the other investors in the Teatro Sant’Angelo to put up the money necessary to secure a commitment from the diva. Claudio had attended her Venetian debut and was not sufficiently impressed to change his plans for a business trip just to hear her sing for the first time at the Teatro Sant’Angelo, so Chiaretta and Andrea were in the Morosini box with only Luca and Antonia for company.

  At that moment the effects of a great deal of wine taken with only the first course of their dinner had made them giddy and more than a little caustic about the spectacle taking place on the stage. Anna was flinging her arms out to hold a sustained note and offering up great heaving sighs to cover her difficulties when the music suddenly slid downward. Though Anna was a contralto and thus not prone to screeching on the high notes, Chiaretta heard the quick key changes the orchestra made so she could manage the lowest notes without sounding rather like a dog growling over a bone.

  Antonia had managed to pass nearly two years without a pregnancy and had recovered some of her old spirit. “Look at her flapping her arms! You could get up there today and sing better without even practicing,” she said to Chiaretta after Anna finished an aria and swept off the stage to great applause.

  “Ah, but it’s not all about the voice,” Andrea said. “She’s obviously hard to ignore, and one could argue she’s great if people say she is.” He turned to Chiaretta. “What do you think?”

  Her only response was a shrug of her shoulders. She hadn’t really been listening. When she had gone to the theater to speak to Vivaldi about his failure to acknowledge Maddalena upon his return to Venice, he couldn’t wait to talk about Anna. I had to remind him I had a sister, she thought. Who is this Anna Girò to him?

  They adjourned to the back of the box and were eating another course of their dinner when Luca made a reference to the Duke of Massa. Antonia, wanting to be in on every joke, asked Andrea why he was laughing.

  “It seems that Anna wanted a harpsichord and used some money her good friend the duke had given her to buy it.” Andrea arched his eyebrows. “And let’s just say it was more than enough money to cause one to question the nature of the friendship.”

  Luca coated a forkful of meat with sauce and popped it in his mouth. “I’ve heard Anna is a very friendly girl,” he said with a leer. “Anyway, the man who sold the harpsichord to her somehow got the idea he had been duped, and he went to court.”

  He put his fork down and wiped his mouth with his napkin. “I’m surprised you haven’t heard about this, Chiaretta,” he said, picking up his wineglass. “It involved your old friend Vivaldi.”

  Chiaretta’s heart thudded. “What did he have to do with it?”

  “He was the go-between. It was Vivaldi who was sued. Seems the old duke gave Anna twice as much money as she spent on the harpsichord. The man who sold it got the idea he had been swindled by the good priest.”

  “An amusing little scandal made of nothing,” Andrea said. “So what if she didn’t spend all she had on his harpsichord? He agreed on the price.”

  “The court saw it that way too, but it makes you wonder why Vivaldi had gotten involved in the first place,” Luca said and then cocked his ear. “Isn’t that La Girò?” They got up to watch her sing, and the conversation was over. Chiaretta stood with them looking down at the stage, not hearing another note.

  By agreement with the pietà, Maddalena was to take the unusual step of going to Vivaldi’s home to work with him. He had been having a long run of bad health and convinced the Nobili Uomini Deputati that it would be in their best interests if he did not have to move around town unnecessarily during the winter. At home, he could have what he needed at hand while he labored on what he had assured them would be the greatest instrumental work of his career. To sweeten the proposal, the violin Maddalena used when she was there would become the property of the Pietà when the work was complete, an expensive gift not to be sneered at by the cash-strapped Congregazione.

  Fioruccia, who had so openly disdained the coro’s use of melodies from Gasparini’s operas, grudgingly agreed to be Maddalena’s chaperone when it was pointed out that her dislike for opera composers was the best guarantee that nothing immoral would happen. Even so, it took a month to reach an agreement whereby a woman from the Pietà could go to a man’s home, even if the man was a priest.

  Vivaldi lived in a part of Venice that Maddalena had never seen. The canals and the fondamenti lining them narrowed with each turn, until the crumbling buildings loomed overhead like rows of beggars in tattered clothing. A woman stepped outside to fling the contents of a slop bucket into the canal, startling a scrawny cat that ran for cover in a dark alley no wider than a wheelbarrow. On the other side, two rats inspected a small pile of garbage, ignoring the curses of a man who kicked at them as he passed.

  Is this where he lives? Maddalena wondered, looking up at the houses. How could any music come from here?

  They crossed under a bridge and entered a wider canal, lined with well-maintained houses whose bright colors glimmered in the sunlight reflecting off the water. This is better, Maddalena thought, but her heart sank again when the gondolier stroked across the canal toward another one too small for a walkway and into which so little light penetrated it would be difficult to tell night from day.

  He stopped within seconds at a small landing on the side of a pleasant, although rather poorly maintained, rose-colored house that looked out on the larger canal. The gondolier banged on the door with the top of his oar, and while they waited for a response, he turned to them. “Madonne, it’s very cold,” he said. “If it pleases you, I’ll wait at the shop we just passed, where there’s a fire.” He gestured across the canal to a small saloon, outside of which two men were talking, stamping their feet to keep warm.

  Seeing Fioruccia’s expression, he added, “I won’t be drinking, if that’s what you’re wondering. Just staying in against the cold. They can send a servant to get me when you’re ready.”

  Just then the door swung open. The chance for Fioruccia to argue with him passed as a manservant held out his hand to her and assisted her inside. When he lifted Maddalena onto the dark landing, her nostrils stung from the smell of mildew in the frigid air. The servant opened another door into a hallway lit with a single oil lamp that cast dim light on a carpet worn through in several places.

  “This way,” he said, gesturing to a door at the far end. Through it they passed into a parlor in which a small fire cut slightly into the darkness and the cold.

  “I’ll tell him you’re here,” the servant said, knocking on a closed door.

  Maddalena heard a chair scrape back, followed by footsteps moving to the door. It opened with a squeak of the hinges.

  Vivaldi was smaller than she remembered, and his eyes were cloudier. The skin had loosened below his chin, and the bones in his face were even more pronounced.

  “Ah!” he said, by way of greeting.

  Maddalena was taken aback that he said nothing about how long it had been or even that he was happy to see her. “It’s nice to see you again,” she said, but he nodded as if he were too distracted to hear and said nothing in reply.

  He was wearing a housecoat of moss green wool, over which his untidy hair fell onto his shoulders. Fioruccia scowled at his appearance. “Forgive me,” he said, interpreting her expression. “It’s the cold. I can put on my priest’s cassock, if you insist, but it is still damp from when I got caught in the rain yesterday.”

  “That won’t be necessary,” Fioruccia said, staring at his slipper-clad feet with such disdain that he ordered his servant to bring him a pair of stockings and shoes.

  He motioned them into his study. The room was almost as large as the parlor, but so cluttered they could scarcely move around. The walls were covered with bookcases, stacked with materials in no apparent order. The floor space was divided between a harpsichord, a large desk, and a mu
sic stand. On each were piles of music scores and stacks of paper. Next to a fireplace in which a minuscule fire was burning was an ornate chair with fraying upholstery and a small, mismatched table on which a tray was perched holding a teapot and a crust of bread smeared with the oily remains of some butter.

  “It’s beyond straightening up,” Vivaldi said, motioning to his servant to take away the tray, “but it’s the way I work, I’m afraid.”

  He went to the far side of the desk and picked up a rosary, muttering a prayer as he kissed it and put it in a drawer. With a sweep of his hand, he moved the clutter aside.

  He turned to Fioruccia. “I’ve had a fire laid for you outside, where you can be more comfortable while we work. I’ll have my servant light the lamp.”

  Fioruccia scowled, as if she were about to resist leaving them alone, but after a second glance around the cluttered room, she sighed in resignation.

  When Fioruccia was settled, Vivaldi retrieved his violin from its case and went straight to the point. “Do you remember years ago when I asked you what this sounded like?” He played a few warbling notes and looked at Maddalena.

  “Birds singing in a tree,” she said. “And then you made it sound like they were flying away.” Her words were chopped and flat. Small. She felt that way again, as she sat ignored in his study while he wrapped himself in his music.

  “That gave me an idea I’ve been thinking about ever since.” Still holding his bow, he pressed down with his fingertips on a page of an open notebook to hold it flat. “Listen to this.” He cleared his throat and began to recite.

  Spring has come in all its gaiety

  And the birds welcome it with joyful song

  And a zephyr’s breath inspires the brooks

  To murmur as they flow.

  He closed the notebook while he played the birds’ song and began reciting from memory when he had finished.

  The air is filled with black clouds,

  And then the arrival of lightning and thunder,

  But when it is once more quiet

  The birds come back to sing again.

  He played a wild cadenza depicting the birds’ flight. “Do you know who wrote the poem?” he asked.

  She shook her head. “I don’t recognize it.”

  “I did,” he said. “I’ve written four sonnets, one for each season, and I’m going to write a concerto to go with each one. I’m calling it The Four Seasons. Do you like the idea?”

  “I don’t understand what you mean.”

  “I thought of all people you would.” His brow creased with annoyance. “I need you to.” He picked up his violin and began to play. “It goes like this.”

  He played a bright melody quickly, tapping his foot to provide a continuo. “That’s what the orchestra will play. It’s setting the mood of spring. Then the solo violin will do this,” he said, launching into the song of the birds. “Then”—he switched into a lower, more flowing melody—“we’ll hear the sound of a brook flowing in the spring thaw. And then thunder will frighten the birds.” He shut his eyes and began a wild flight of notes. “But they’ll come back to their branches, and we end the first movement like this.” He played the opening phrases again but in a more muted key, with a hint of melancholy in it.

  Maddalena’s spirits had lifted with the music. It seemed as if no time at all had passed since he had last sat and played with her. Nothing in my life is like this. Nothing can take its place, she thought, accepting the fact that if she wanted the music, she would have to deal with the self-absorbed and often thoughtless man who created it.

  “The problem is how to find anyone to play it the way I want,” he went on. “There’s rain, and wind whistling outside a door, and a man falling down drunk, and a dog barking while his master sleeps.”

  His breath had begun to catch, and his words were coming out in short phrases between shallow gulps of air. “You’re the only one I know who can possibly understand. Everyone else will argue with me, or just play it however they want. I need someone who feels it—and can make the other musicians feel it too. Maddalena Rossa—”

  They both turned their heads at the sound of a shrill voice outside the door. Fioruccia’s snoring in the parlor was interrupted by the voice of a younger woman.

  “Who are you?” Maddalena heard the voice say to Fioruccia before the door to the study was flung open the rest of the way.

  “Anna!” Vivaldi’s voice rose in alarm.

  The woman was wearing a wig and an ornate hat not at all in the Venetian style. Her face was made up as if for a party, and the top of one of her nipples had begun to work its way out from the bodice of her dress.

  She flicked her chin in Maddalena’s direction, and scowled at him, her hands on her hips. “Who’s that?”

  He took in a deep breath, but it caught in his throat and he coughed to the point of gagging. His inhalations turned into staccato whoops as he grabbed his chest and fell into a chair.

  “Paolina!” Anna cried out. “Come quickly!”

  Within a few seconds another woman, a few years older than Anna, hurried into the room. She was dressed similarly, but she had taken off her wig and the brown hair matted next to her skull gave her powdered and rouged face the appearance of a Carnevale mask.

  She didn’t seem to notice either Maddalena or Fioruccia, who was by now wide awake and standing inside the doorway. “Is it bad?” Paolina asked.

  “I think so,” Anna said. “I’ll go get the servants.”

  Paolina went to a cupboard and pulled out a small pouch. She sprinkled a spoonful of herbs into a handkerchief, then twisted the top and rubbed the contents in her palms to release the odor.

  “Breathe in,” she said, holding the sachet to his face and securing him around the back with her other arm. “Anna will be back with the steam.” Vivaldi nodded, wide-eyed, but he did not speak.

  “Take this,” Paolina barked, handing the sachet to Maddalena. Standing so close to him, Maddalena could see his lips had gone blue. Paolina came back with a poultice, and when she loosened Vivaldi’s coat and tore open his thin shirt, Maddalena saw how his flesh pulled in under his ribs as he struggled to take each breath.

  The smell of camphor and mustard filled the air as Paolina applied the poultice to his chest. By the time Anna got back with a servant carrying a bowl of hot water and squares of steaming cloth, he was breathing more easily. Still, Paolina ordered him to lean forward and breathe through the cloth until it cooled.

  She went to the cabinet again and rifled through a box in which were at least a dozen marked packets of herbs and powders. “Lavender, licorice, ginger, chamomile, hyssop,” she said under her breath.

  Paolina turned to the servant who had carried the cloths and bowl. “Boil water with a spoonful of honey. No—make it two spoonfuls. Then bring it to me in a teapot.” She chose two of the packets. “I’ll do the rest.”

  Maddalena stood aside and watched as Vivaldi’s manservant took him back to his quarters to change his clothes while Paolina prepared herbs for his tea.

  When the women were alone in the study, Anna turned once again to Maddalena. “And who are you?” she asked with the proprietary air of someone in her own home.

  Fioruccia already had Maddalena by the arm before she could answer. Her shoulders heaved as she led Maddalena through the hallway and across the dark portico to the back of the house. When she flung open the door, she saw only the water of the canal below her, and she raged back through the house, demanding to be taken to the front door.

  “With pleasure,” Anna said with a smirk and an exaggerated curtsy. “Follow me.”

  Outside, the cold assaulted them before they could stop to put their cloaks on. Fioruccia stormed into the saloon and pulled the gondolier to his feet, spilling the cup of warm wine in his hand.

  “Take us home,” she ordered.

  Inside the felce, Fioruccia pulled the curtains closed and flung herself back onto the seat. Making the sign of the cross, she moved her lips in
prayer, touching her fingers together as if rosary beads were slipping between them.

  Who were those women? Maddalena wondered. They knew where everything was and ordered the servants around as if they lived there. But that wasn’t possible. Vivaldi was a priest. A priest who had broken his vows—that seemed obvious. Maddalena had watched men and women interact enough by now to recognize that this Anna was no student, no casual friend.

  Why didn’t he choose her to break his vows with, if his vow of celibacy wasn’t sacred to him? The betrayal left Maddalena so numb she was frozen to her seat.

  Pictures spun in her mind of Vivaldi and her as man and wife or lovers sitting next to each other in a carriage as they traveled to a new city, or sharing tea and pastry in their house robes in front of a fire. The pictures shifted in her mind, and she saw Vivaldi and Anna in the carriage, Vivaldi and Anna in front of the fire, and she knew that those images were probably true. Why had he told her he wanted her but they could never be together, when he then turned around and had that kind of life with this other woman?

  I should hate him for being so false to me, Maddalena thought. He’s a hypocrite. I should say she’s welcome to him.

  Then a revelation hit her so quickly she put her hand over her mouth so Fioruccia wouldn’t hear her gasp. Maybe it isn’t because he was a priest that he pulled back from kissing me. Maybe it’s because I am who I am.

  If they had become lovers, what then? She couldn’t leave the Pietà except as a wife or a nun, and priests couldn’t have wives. If he had left the clergy, the Pietà would not have permitted her marriage to a defrocked priest. It wouldn’t be moral, and worse, in the eyes of the Pietà, the scandal would be terrible. If she ran away to be with him, what kind of a life would she live, going from town to town with an opera impresario, whispered about wherever she went and not able to play professionally because she was a woman?