Magic Island: What Happens In Venice: Book Three
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THIS BOOK IS DEDICATED TO MY SIBLINGS —
Jim, Rick & Theresa
AUTHOR’S NOTE: Characters in this novel (as well as the previous two, Love Spirits and Lagoon Lure) sometimes speak in broken English, use improper tenses or make mistakes with their Italian. These are not typos, misspellings or grammar errors but part of the characters’ personalities. Venetian dialect also varies from island to island and even street signs can change across a bridge or from left to right. The letter G may become a Z or X or might be left off entirely (good luck finding places using those guidebooks). Therefore, in this novel, when characters’ use dialect, it is usually spelled phonetically.
OTHER BOOKS by Diana Cachey
Love Spirits -- What Happens in Venice: Book One
Lagoon Lure -- What Happens in Venice: Book Two
Copyright © 2015 Diana Cachey
Interior Photographs Copyright © 2015 Diana Cachey
All rights reserved.
ISBN: 1502836408
ISBN 13: 9781502836403
Library of Congress Control Number: 2014918636
CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform
North Charleston, South Carolina
DISCLAIMER: This is a work of fiction. All characters, organizations, locations and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.
CONNECT ONLINE
www.dianacachey.com
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CONTENTS
Clues from the Ghosts of Venice
Chapter 1 Uno (1)
Thrift Shop
Chapter 2 Due (2)
Vignole
Chapter 3 Tre (3)
The Cat Women of Arsenale
Chapter 4 Quattro (4)
The Fortress of Arsenale
Chapter 5 Cinque (5)
Tarot Reading
Chapter 6 Sei (6)
Walk and Worry
Chapter 7 Sette (7)
Fear and Gratitude
Chapter 8 Otto (8)
Snow Queens
Chapter 9 Nove (9)
Ghost Train
Chapter 10 Dieci (10)
Matteo’s Package
Chapter 11 Undici (11)
The Chase
Chapter 12 Dodici (12)
Twins
Chapter 13 Tredici (13)
Phantom Island
Chapter 14 Quattordici (14)
Arrivederci
Venetian Frittelle Recipe
Things to Do in Venice
Book Club Fun
Clues from the Ghosts of Venice
At night is when we walk the grounds,
To find the places all around,
Where we live a sober life,
Free from watchful eyes and strife,
We wondrous Venice ghosts abound.
Beyond the sound of tolling bells
But not so far from Venice swells
Lies a ship of fishing fools,
Lies a ship’s brass cutting tools,
There sits a plate with tails that tell.
The story is an ugly one,
The story that is far from done.
Clue from Venetian Ghosts found by Louisa
LOVE SPIRITS -- What Happens In Venice: Book One
Calm in the evening, quick in the morn,
Days end here as they dawn.
Curtains drop or raise, lovers come and go,
Within the master’s framework, the waters of life flow.
Neglected at the onset, savored when it’s gone.
Her knowledge grows thick & taut
With every rook
And pawn.
In lures unknown to foreign shores,
They frolic & jump.
Sad eyes lost, tossed in nets,
Killing the smallest and the poor.
Words whispered in the Seattle wind to Barbara
LOVE SPIRITS -- What Happens In Venice: Book One
MAGIC |'majik| noun
The power of apparently influencing a course of events by using mysterious or supernatural forces.
Venice isn’t sinking. For it to sink, this magical lagoon town must float. It isn’t floating, can’t be sinking. Its canals simply can’t rise up enough to take over hundreds of palaces and churches. The shallow waterways, dredged through marshlands, have often been refilled throughout history to create additional land, new calles and campos. Venice hasn’t lost ground, it has gained more earth. True, Venetian streets and houses flood occasionally and, admittedly, do so with increased frequency as time goes on. But the lagoon cannot wash away San Marco forever. Never has, never will. That was Louisa’s opinion.
Even if Venice were sinking, much more pressing problems frustrate locals and visitors. They must climb over bridges, trudge through throngs of sightseers, suffer sweltering summers and endure icy winters. Not the least of all frustrations for the budding Venice aficionado are the labyrinths and the looming probability of getting lost.
And Louisa was lost again.
But it might net more clues regarding the double homicides than purposeful hunting. Purposeful hunting — for Venetian sites, hotels, restaurants or apartments — baffles visitors and locals alike who long to journey to specific locations. Louisa believed her new method of wandering around — going this way, that way, left, right, incorporating window shopping and stopping for coffee or gelato — worked better than stares at maps and street signs. Venetian street signs were usually written in dialect while guidebooks listed locations in either Italian, or worse, English counterparts. Street signs were sometimes painted by immigrants who didn’t spell the names correctly. Street names also change in a new decade, on a whim or as an honor, like the Burano Island rechristened area, Campo Settembre XI, in memory of the World Trade Center’s fallen firefighters, several of whom had distant Buranese relatives.
Most tourists, however, don’t believe one word of this “get lost and love Venice” principle. They continue to search for streets that now possess different names. They also hunt for the perfect map to guide them. But no such map exists. They twirl around with their maps held high in the air, as if better light might invoke an answer or display a street long gone. They scream, “I’m all turned around, I’m all turned around.” They pray for a magical compass to appear. They begrudge the Venetian history that crafted street mazes. They curse the hotel owner who could’ve provided better instructions or scold themselves for not printing out the directions. All the while they should have allowed themselves to be a little lost and enjoy the views on the way to whevever.
Louisa often did likewise and tried to focus only on getting to her destinations. She would forgo incredible views in her rush to locate another famous landmark. Recently, she’d also surmised the many bas-reliefs, statues, placards and memorials, attempting to find clues to the murders of the glassmakers as she’d been instructed to do by the ghosts and their messengers.
She couldn’t discern which was which. Who was a human messenger? What was a ghost? Had some concerned Venetians, too afraid to come forward themselves, sent all of these cryptic clues to her?
It didn’t matter. Somebody or something, maybe both supernatural and human, wanted her to find clues and decipher the mystery of the dead glassmakers. Louisa had even stopped trying to determine if Matteo had arranged or participated in the deaths and she didn’t care if the deaths were accidental or homicides. All she knew for sure was that, for some important reason, she’d been guided to uncover a tragedy or a scheme that threatened all of Venice — a tragedy or scheme that she assumed was related to a “commercial endeav
or.”
The merchants of Venice were at it again — someone was seeking to profit.
She’d been directed to find a way into Arsenale, the naval yard normally off-limits except for when small portions were opened for the not rare occasions of special events. The Venice Arsenal sometimes hosted public regattas, Carnival parties, the biannual, world famous art fair or (once or twice — if you’re lucky you caught it) the America’s Cup races. It was none of the above this week, so Louisa couldn’t get into the arsenal area like the clues from the ghosts had instructed.
In the area surrounding the Arsenal — Parrocchia San Martino where Louisa had stayed on a past trip — getting lost was a constant. If she didn’t put a coin in the cup of the gypsy who hung out at a bridge, the gypsy would curse her to be forever circling. She’d pass the gypsy until she relented and paid the toll. If Louisa didn’t pay strict attention to every step, every second, she’d end up heading in the opposite direction, to Via Garibaldi instead of San Marco. If distracted by a phone call, she’d end up on the lagoon front, not central Venice.
Getting lost in this area occurred so frequently that her joke became “pay attention or you will end up in San Francisco.” San Francesco encompassed a huge campo, parish, convent, church, cloisters, garden and on and on, all named after the same saint, St. Francis, and it foiled Louisa on many occasions. Despite its beauty and hidden art, there were few cafes, restaurants or people in the neighborhood. Way out of the way, being in there was like being in a twilight zone. Late for any date.
When near that area, she knew she’d find herself singing, “Are you going to San Francisco?”
Today, Louisa was in San Francisco because she wanted to be there, after she had perused a map--yes even old pros like Louisa were guilty of such offenses. She thought she saw another way into Arsenale from there.
Her sister would’ve told her to ask God for guidance. Bold enough to ask for guidance, Louisa still didn’t do it. For years she thought God had abandoned her in favor of more devout individuals, like women who didn’t drink to excess with wild consequences or steal free rides on the vaporetti. She believed that people who asked God for answers didn’t cheat on exams and boyfriends or shoplift items, both cheap and couture as Louisa had done when she was younger. But Barbara assured her the creatures that He often took care of were the ones who misbehaved.
Louisa suspected that, if this were true, it was because they needed extra help from Him.
Apparently God was a him?
When she analyzed it, usually to assuage a guilty conscience, she envisioned He must spend disproportionate energy cleaning up after the bad guys. He could let the good ones carry on in proper fashion.
Except that, for Louisa, her God might not be a He. Could be a She?
Nope. As a she, God didn’t jive with the unfair fact that women got pregnant then bore children through painful labor. Giving birth was also followed by years with no rest, days and nights consumed with the feeding, caring, crying and cleaning up poop of said children. Women also had to fight to get rid of the belly fat created by the feeding, pooping, crying, cared for ones.
Men, however, could proudly display their growing bellies--achieved not by pushing out babies through too small holes, but by drinking beer that women fetch for them or eating food prepared by women. Men also worked quantifiable hours at jobs where the money they make belongs to them.
Woman’s work? INever done. Never finished. And with lower or no pay.
Those facts alone negated any hope that Louisa had that God might be a She.
But Louisa did believe there was one from whom she could ask for help. There was another holy one, an invisible being to whom she could turn for guidance.
San Marco, the most perfect ghost in Venice. Louisa always had a spiritual connection to her beloved Saint Mark, the city’s patron saint.
And aren’t saints just super powerful ghosts anyway?
Louisa soon approached the Grandiben palace in San Martino, where she stayed once during Carnival. She remembered fondly the two tiny snowmen that appeared outside her window after an unaccustomed snow storm. They’d been built from every bit of the sparse snow that had fallen. Near the palazzo, church bells rang at odd hours. Although she enjoyed it, she knew they would annoy Rebecca, who now occupied the same darling apartment for rent inside the palace during this year’s Carnival.
Louisa stopped to say the dreaded prayer, for she hated to pray even to San Marco. In the spot where the tiny snowmen had once been, she stopped and prayed:
Remind me that you have a path for me, oh dear He or She, but in all likelihood, a He, like San Marco.
An odd thing happened. Louisa got an intuitive thought. It wasn’t her thought, but had come from somewhere out there in the vast universe of skies, planets, stars, solar systems and perhaps aliens. She knew it was from somewhere outside her because she would never have thought what she’d just thought:
Pray further.
What the fuck?
Then more words came to her:
Pray with extreme clarity.
She had the urge to kneel, right next to the Grandiben. She knelt, unaware that she now faced the San Martino church and its steeple, topped by a crucifix.
Nothing. Nothing happened. She waited.
The bells rang.
A clue?
Was San Martino (St. Martin) himself a clue? Was the church a clue? Was the church thrift shop, which had opened an hour earlier, a clue? The thrift shop, which she was dying to visit and forget Arsenale, was it her clue?
Go shop. That was the clue. She would shop!
At the thought of that word “shop,” the bells rang again. Confirmed by the bells, Louisa sensed that shopping would probably lead to another clue. Maybe Barbara was on to something with this prayer stuff.
She was supposed to shop at that thrift store. Shop with the smoking nuns who wore furs, as Louisa called them, although they weren’t nuns but volunteer parishioners. They were indeed fur-wrapped and chain-smoking when she arrived. But before she entered the shop, she closed her eyes.
“Thank you,” she said.
It was a final, uncharacteristic gesture during Louisa’s first foray into prayer.
She was blowing off Arsenale to go shopping? Surely He hadn’t intended this at all. Had she become a prey to prayer?
Perhaps she had contracted what Barbara referred to as “the disease of those unschooled in prayer and not yet in contact with Him.” The symptom was hearing selfish answers to prayers. Taken without question as words from on high and mighty, they were not answers to prayers but merely wishful thinking.
Works for me, she thought and entered the store.
Cramped, smoky, cold, damp, San Martino’s closet of a second-hand shop always stayed piled with walled shelves of stuff. Sweaters, gloves, scarfs, pants, skirts filled the clothing sections. Cups, plates, knick-knacks, books, chimes, charms and anything a pack-rat Venetian was forced to dispose of and would give to charity filled the rest of the shelves.
In the doorway of the minimal yet messy space, three women greeted her in dialect, as did their lone helper, a tiny man. The man was always moving through the shop, folding and stacking things. This elf of a man seemed to do all of the work while the women chatted then named a price when asked. Their prices appeared as if pulled from a hat like a magician out of nothing. After the price exchange, they took the coins. Coins because the price they pulled out of the hat was, most of the time, only one euro.
Pleased with the answer to her first prayer, Louisa decided to go for it again being cognizant of the instruction to pray with extreme clarity. This prayer stuff was so simple it was laughable. Prayer was easy when it involved shopping.
Please San Marco lead me to, show me, the best deal in this place that is perfect for me, and if you are in a generous mood--Barbara said that you are infinite--make it cost only one euro.
Immediately after her prayer, Louisa observed an Asian woman (not a local one eithe
r) pick up what looked to be a brand new fur hat. She then asked for and got the one euro price for it. It was impossible that this fur hat was anything but the absolute best deal in the shop and was perfect for Louisa.
The prayer was answered and then someone — a beautiful, tall thin Oriental woman no less — gets the goods.
The goods that cost one euro and for which Louisa had recently searched all over Venice. She’d found nothing costing less than 180 euros.
How could she pray with any more extreme clarity? Should she add, “And don’t let a tourist get the fur hat before me?”
Louisa was about to lie to the shop caretakers — she’d say that the fur hat belonged to her and she’d set it down to admire something else when they’d mistakenly sold it. But another interesting thought seized her.
Forget the hat and go to the second floor.
Louisa considered both paths, to lie to the nuns and steal the fur hat from the Chinese lady or go upstairs. She made the unlikely choice to take the stairs not the hat off her head.
At the landing point, halfway to the upper level, she felt it. A cold wind blew.
Why would the thrift shop women leave the window open during one of the coldest days of the year? Venetians, and Italians generally, were obsessed with energy conservation, not out of duty or political bent, but out of necessity or greed. Why would the darling elf-man allow it? Why hadn’t he gone up to close it?
She blinked.
In the second floor attic room, a man stood by the open window and fanned himself. He’d removed his coat, hat, scarf and shirt. Bare-chested, he was about to try on what looked to be the next best deal in the shop, a cashmere sweater with Armani label.
The room wasn’t suffering from the dreaded “they heat the place like people don’t always come in dressed for the outdoors.” It was not an unbearable oven. It was chilly. Yet sweat poured down the man’s face.
Louisa couldn’t help but stare for he stood half naked with perfect abdomen and a peek of what was below the belt. His pants hung low on his tan, tempting, tapered waist.
The man jumped and gave an unnecessary apology in thick Buranese dialect.