The Face of the Waters (First Born of Egypt Series)

by Simon Raven

  ‘Dartford Tunnel,’ said Carmilla to Theodosia, as they got out of their taxi at the garage in Milton where they kept their Volkswagen during Full Term, ‘Dover this evening, White Cliffs Hotel for the night, leave at dawn tomorrow, Monday.’

  ‘Right,’ said Theodosia, as she paid off the taxi driver. ‘If it wasn’t for the reason, I’d be looking forward to this trip.’

  ‘What will you do with Jeremy if you find him?’

  ‘Love him.’

  ‘In every way?’

  ‘In every way I can.’

  ‘Amen,’ said Carmilla warmly, at the same time detecting dubieties in her sister’s phrasing which might not promise well for the future. ‘Off at dawn, then, charge down the autoroute. Venice by Tuesday night, forty-eight hours from now. And let’s just hope Nicos Pandouros was right to steer us towards Torcello.’

  ‘He was basing what he said on what Jeremy said while immersed in that sarcophagus of Ptoly Tunne’s,’ said Theodosia taking the wheel. ‘Now I’ve been in that sarcophagus, last summer if you remember, and you have not: so let me assure you that when you’re floating in there, hull down in warm water, totally relaxed and almost weightless, you tell the truth. Now then, I know, because he told me, that Jeremy is looking for an explanation, perhaps a justification, of something horrible which happened to him. We know, because Nicos has told us, that Jeremy is obsessed by a place, possibly a marsh or a lake, where he believes there could be an entrance to the underworld…a place which is presided over by two powerful Madonnas. He has mentioned the Venetian Lagoon in this connection, and in particular Torcello…where we know that there is at least one very remarkable Madonna – and why not another, as there is a second Church on the island, to say nothing of other Churches on other islands very near to it? So what do we infer from all this? That Jeremy will look for his explanation precisely in this place of his obsession, where there is an entrance to the kingdom of the dead flanked by two Mothers of God, and that this place is almost certainly Torcello. Nicos is surely right, cara mia. It must be odds on that Jeremy will sooner or later fetch up in Torcello, if only because he has spoken so much about it.’

  ‘Sooner, if he is so hot for certainty. We may already be too late.’

  ‘If so, there will still be some trace of him that we can follow.’

  ‘If he gets his answer, what will he do with it?’

  ‘Act in accordance with it, I suppose.’

  ‘And if he doesn’t?’

  ‘I expect he’ll go on looking. Keep a sharp eye open,’ said Theodosia, ‘for the road to Chelmsford; I want to be through the tunnel and on to the A2 before dusk.’

  Leonard Percival, bored sick in his hotel by the Station at Mestre but hardly daring to leave it for five minutes in case the girl in black should come to him with a message, at last received an unstamped envelope (presumably delivered by hand, though later on no one remembered seeing the hand that had delivered it) which contained a complimentary ticket to the Ceremony of Unveiling, by the Most Honourable Marchioness Canteloupe, of Asolano’s Celebrated Painting of the MADONNA CON I RAGAZZI DELLE PESTE, now to be restored to its rightful situation in the Church of San Martino in Burano, by the Generous Donation of Captain the Most Honourable Marquess Canteloupe of the Aestuary of the Severn. The ceremony would take place, it appeared, at noon on the coming Wednesday (the day after next) and would be followed by a Collation in the Locanda Cipriani on Torcello, to which Leonard was also invited and to which guests would be conveyed by Special Launch from Burano to Torcello.

  For a minute or two Leonard thought that this invitation must have been sent to him on the instructions of his employer; but then he realised that Lord Canteloupe had not the faintest idea that he was in the Hotel Garibaldi in Mestre, must indeed imagine that he was by now hundreds of miles south and probably in Greece.

  ‘I tell you,’ said Canteloupe to Baby, ‘that the Hotel on Torcello is closed.’

  ‘The Hotel on Torcello,’ said Baby, ‘is the Locanda Cipriani. The Locanda Cipriani is opening to provide luncheon on Wednesday after the Ceremony. There is therefore no reason on earth why it should not also open some of its upstairs rooms to receive you and me for the two nights, of today and Tuesday, before the ceremony.’

  ‘They won’t like it.’

  ‘Make them do it.’

  ‘But why? Aren’t you comfortable here in the Gritti?’

  ‘I want to be on Torcello. I want to sleep two nights on Torcello. I can’t explain why, or not very easily, but that is what I yearn to do,’ Baby said, ‘and since you promised me a present, some time ago, and I have not yet had it, please let this be my present – tonight and tomorrow night on Torcello and perhaps Wednesday night after the ceremony as well. If anyone on earth can arrange this, it must surely be you, if only because of your immense prestige in the Tourist business as High and Mighty Mikado of Cant-Fun.’

  The reference was not tactful, as Canteloupe did not care for his connection with Cant-Fun and never ceased to wish to himself that his money and his ‘immense prestige’ came from some other source (though from what?). But while he was annoyed by Baby’s apostrophe of him as a sort of Super Circus Master, he was aware how important it was to keep her in a good humour until after the unveiling, and indeed he was pleased that she was at last showing some sign of being interested in something (though precisely what or why was obscure to him). He therefore engaged in three hours’ negotiation with the management of the Cipriani Hotel, who finally agreed to open up the residential accommodation in the Locanda for the following week (as a shorter period would be uneconomic) provided Lord Canteloupe undertook to pay in full, over the entire period, not only for his own rooms, but also for any others which might not be occupied – i.e. for the whole lot, as Canteloupe thought at the time, though in this, as he was later to find, he was mistaken.

  Money, Fielding thought; everything, when I get back to England, will turn on money.

  Piero and Fielding sat silently in the cabin of a water taxi as it emerged from the mouth of the Grand Canal and started to make the wide arc across the Lagoon that would bring it round and down to the Gabrielli Hotel.

  So far, thought Fielding, I have comforted myself by insisting that I have not used as much of my reserve as I expected to and that something nice may have happened by the time I return to England. But why should it? The plain fact is that my reserve is down to its lowest level since the early sixties, and that I may well have to face a crippling bill for taxes on undeclared income. Furthermore, my car has gone badly wrong, thus causing delay and extra expense on the journey here; it will have to stay in the Garage in the Piazzale Roma indefinitely and until some arrangement (God knows what) is made for it; Piero and I will have to fly home; and once there I shall at once need a new car. Money. It is no good just drifting on and hoping that things will come right: I must absolutely premise that everything will go wrong, and take the necessary action – which is to obtain money. ‘Put money in thy purse.’ No, not in my purse, but in my bank: lots of lovely money in my bank.

  Stern & Detterling. Detterling. Canteloupe. Tell Canteloupe that he must now make himself ready to find anything up to £20,000 to be paid to me, Fielding Gray, either from Stern & Detterling’s resources or from his own. Tell him that the two secrets, the ancestry of the idiot boy in the marshes near Oriago, and the paternity of the male infant in the pram in the Wiltshire rose garden, must, together, be worth this sum. Tell him to arrange payment in the form of an advance from the firm on a new series of novels, or of a loan by the firm against my expectations from rights and royalties, or of the private purchase by himself of a share in my future profits; tell him to set it up or trick it out as and how he will, but that there must be, by such and such a (pretty near) date now to be agreed, the sum of £20,000 available for immediate transfer, in part or whole, to my, Fielding Gray’s, account in my, Fielding Gray’s, bank.

  When they came to Asolo, Isobel, Jo-Jo, Oenone and Jeremy put up at the Villa
Cipriani, where they engaged two double rooms, one for Isobel and Jo-Jo and one for Jeremy and Oenone, who much preferred sharing a room with Jeremy providing that her mother or Isobel (preferably the latter) popped in from time to time. During their journey Oenone had been quiet and contented in the back of the Lagonda with Jeremy, beside him in her carrycot; and on the fairly frequent occasions when he took her on his knee or in his lap she had glowed with bliss. To Isobel too she responded warmly, while to her mother she was merely polite. For all her adoration of the man of the party, however, she appeared well aware that certain offices were best performed by the females, and in the matter (for example) of nappychanging she preferred even Jo-Jo to Jeremy.

  Jo-Jo too had been happy on the journey, sitting with Isobel in the front and watching her limbs flex over the controls. When it was time to retire for the night Jo-Jo would start glowing (rather like Oenone in Jeremy’s lap) but would drag her feet like a bashful child until Isobel took her firmly by the hand and led her away to the room which they now shared. For after the first day, during which Jeremy had scored his initial success with Oenone in the back of the Lagonda, Jo-Jo had asked him outright if he would have Oenone with him in his room, as she herself wished to be in the same room as Isobel but could not be if Oenone were there too, because she (Oenone) made her (Jo-Jo) feel guilty. Jeremy had consented to take on Oenone and for the first time a double room was engaged for Isobel and Jo-Jo. That evening, when bedtime came, Jo-Jo made her debut in the role of foot-dragging ingénue and even proposed to linger for another drink (though the bar had closed and it would have been difficult to obtain one); but Isobel settled her nonsense by saying that she did not like girls who ‘sozzled’, and that in any case she had her ‘travelling bottle’ of whisky in their bedroom should Jo-Jo be overcome by alcoholic craving during the night.

  This ritual was performed on each night that followed. As Isobel had laid down at the start, they neither loitered nor hastened on their road, keeping a schedule that took careful account of the needs, appetites and vulnerabilities of Oenone. They said nothing to each other of the object of their journey, nor of how they would set about attaining this at journey’s end.

  But now, during dinner at Asolo, Jeremy said to Isobel and Jo-Jo, ‘There is a notice in the foyer. The Locanda Cipriani will be open as a hotel for one week as from last Monday, yesterday, and everyone staying there will receive free tickets for a ceremony on Burano tomorrow followed by a celebratory luncheon in the Locanda itself.’

  ‘A ceremony on Burano?’

  ‘It seems that Canteloupe is handing back some picture to the Church of San Martino. Lady Canteloupe is going to unveil it. I propose to be…discreetly…present. You see, the picture is one which I very much need to see…and which I missed last time I was there because it had gone away to be restored. I do not understand,’ Jeremy said, ‘why they say that Canteloupe is responsible for its return, but that will no doubt be explained later and is in any case a question of little importance. What is important is that I should see that picture.’

  ‘Why not wait until after the ceremony?’ said Isobel. ‘If Baby sees you, you might set her off again.’

  ‘Don’t worry. I shall be in the shadows, in the best Venetian manner. I particularly want to see the actual unveiling. The Madonna with the Children of the Plague. And thence to Torcello, to see the other Madonna.’

  In the end it was all very easily arranged. Bookings for the next two nights (Wednesday and Thursday) at the Locanda Cipriani were readily made and at a pleasing discount, since the Villa Cipriani, where they now were was of course in the same chain. They would leave at nine the following morning and be at the Piazzale Roma on the outskirts of Venice by ten thirty. The Cipriani organisation would have arranged a boat to take them all on to Burano for the ceremony at San Martino (for which they were given tickets on the spot) and another boat to carry their luggage out to the Locanda on Torcello. It was felt that the ceremony might be rather an ordeal for Oenone, who would not have her favourite Jeremy to comfort her since he would be lurking behind pillars out of sight of Baby Canteloupe; but as Isobel observed, Oenone might as well learn now as later that everything could not always be arranged to her entire convenience. With such occupation and deployment determined for the morrow they retired to bed early, Jo-Jo making only the barest pretence of wishing to linger.

  At nearly the same time as Jeremy & Co rose from their dinner in Asolo, Fielding and Piero sat down to theirs in Venice.

  ‘Tomorrow,’ said Fielding, ‘we shall take the nine fifty-five boat from the Fondamente Nuove to Massorbo, walk over the meadows to Burano, and find out whether that picture Jeremy wanted to see – and presumably still does – has been put back in San Martino. After that we can go on to Torcello.’

  Piero, who had seen in the foyer of the Gabrielli an advertisement of the ceremony in San Martino along with an announcement that tickets for it and/or the luncheon which would follow it were on sale at the Head Porter’s desk, nevertheless said nothing about this. For if Fielding got to know about the ceremony now, he would insist on taking tickets and going to it; and after what had happened at Ptoly Tunne’s house in the Fens Piero was not anxious to be present and in view when Baby Canteloupe unveiled the Asolano, lest sight of him should again provoke her to make some ghastly hysterical scene. On the other hand, while Piero did not wish to be seen by Baby, he was very keen to accompany Fielding to Burano and Torcello, being certain that it was this area for which Jeremy would be heading and being eager to get sight of him again as soon as possible.

  Piero’s two intentions were, then, at variance: in order to be prompt in apprehending Jeremy he must linger in an area infested by the inflammatory Baby. By keeping Fielding and himself away from the actual ceremony, however, he would lessen the risk of being spotted by her; and for the rest he must reconcile his conflicting aims as best he might.

  Carmilla and Theodosia Salinger arrived at the Piazzale Roma on Tuesday night, more or less to plan but rather later. It took some time to buy a parking ticket in the high rise car park as the man at the desk was talking on the telephone. It seemed to Carmilla, who had some little Italian, that the man was receiving instructions to transfer the luggage, from a car which would arrive the following morning, out of the car park and on to a boat which would take it to the Locanda Cipriani at Torcello. The man was obstinately insisting that the Locanda Cipriani was closed at that time of the year but was being resolutely informed that an exception was being made for one week, intelligence which he eventually accepted. When, therefore, they had made arrangements for berthing the car, Carmilla proposed to her sister that they should telephone the Locanda for rooms and go straight out to Torcello. She had always wanted to sleep on the island, she said, and they would be right on the spot in case of any sight or sign of Jeremy there.

  Fifteen minutes later they had already passed the Island of San Michele, where the dead sleep in banks of drawers, and were skirting the crumbling warehouses of Murano, where the living blow tasteless articles of glass, well on their way to their night’s lodging.

  ‘I’m so glad we came out here,’ said Baby to Canteloupe at dinner on Torcello. ‘Thank you for arranging it.’

  ‘I’ve hardly seen you all day.’

  ‘When I left you in the cathedral this morning, I walked up the canal, not the one that goes from here to the public landing stage, but a wider one, a channel really, which divides the island east to west. I walked with the water on one side of me and what Ruskin calls “meadows” on the other, only they’re not meadows, they’re just flat stretches with a kind of reed growing out of them. But they set me thinking of Ruskin, so I decided I’d go back to the cathedral and climb to the top of the Campanile, as he did: “for there is none to hinder,” he wrote. But there is these days, Canty. There’s a fence to keep you away from it, until you find a gap, and then a huge padlock on the door, which Ruskin says was swinging loose when he came. Somehow I had forgotten how long ago that must have
been, I was expecting to find everything just as he described it, so I was angry and disappointed when I found that door padlocked, I felt that Ruskin must have been telling deliberate lies, making the whole thing up for the sake of a purple patch. But then, “Someone must have a key,” I thought. So I knocked on the door of one of those little houses behind the other Church, the round one. No one answered, but a man, a sort of peasant in an apron, came up from behind me and showed me a key. “I expect he’s watched me trying to get in,” I thought. Anyway, he led me back to the Campanile and unlocked the padlock and pulled back the bolt, and led me up the stairs, such a lot of stairs, Canty, but oh how it was worth it. There was the whole Lagoon spread out beneath, just as Ruskin said, so he hadn’t been lying after all. There were the wild sea banks to the north and the Dolomites far beyond them, and there too the cities and factories and furnaces, which came after Ruskin and are murdering his Venice, all down the coast as far as the Brenta canal, and south of that the dunes and pines and salt marshes, which Ruskin loved. And there were all the islands, Venice itself and the Giudecca and Murano, the small islands with prisons and hospitals, and near Torcello was San Francesco and a tiny island beside it, on which I saw a black figure moving towards a house.

  ‘And then I started thinking, Canty. For hour after hour I stood there–’

  ‘–I sent someone to look for you at lunchtime–’