by Zizou Corder
‘Are you English?’ she inquired politely.
‘Yes,’ said Magdalen. It was easier than Aneba explaining no, he was Ghanaian but he lived in England.
The Bearded Lady looked thoughtful.
‘Come,’ she said, ‘I’ll take you to him.’
As she led them along the deck, a curly freckled boy ran up to them.
‘Hi, Madame,’ he said. ‘Um …’
And he looked at Aneba and Magdalen with great interest, and aimed a sort of questioning look at the Bearded Lady.
This made Aneba and Magdalen aim questioning looks too. What was going on?
‘Actually,’ said the Bearded Lady, and then she grabbed Magdalen’s arm and pulled her quickly into a gap between two cabins. Aneba, prodded by the freckly boy, followed swiftly.
The Bearded Lady stared fiercely at Magdalen and Aneba in turn.
‘Are you who I think you are?’ she hissed.
The freckly boy was watching them intently.
‘Who do you think we are?’ asked Aneba cautiously.
‘We think you’re Charlie’s mum and dad!’ said the freckly boy. ‘The ones who’d disappeared and …’
The Bearded Lady shushed him with a look.
‘Are you?’ she hissed.
Magdalen looked at Aneba. It was pointless to deny it – but there was something about being grabbed and propelled down a dark gap that made them both cautious.
‘Yes,’ said Aneba. ‘We are. Who are you?’
‘I am Madame Barbue,’ said the Bearded Lady. ‘This is Julius. We are your son’s friends. Well, we were. Before …’
They all knew what she meant. Before Charlie ran off with the Lions.
‘And now?’ said Magdalen. ‘What are you now?’ She was wondering if it was the running off with the Lions that had upset them, or the fact that he hadn’t told them.
‘We don’t know,’ said Madame Barbue. ‘We hear nothing from him, we don’t know what to think …’
‘We can’t hear anything from him!’ exclaimed Julius. It sounded as if they had had this discussion many times before. ‘He knows Maccomo and Major Tib are furious with him, there’s the reward on his head, police and everybody looking for them – how could he risk getting in touch? It’s the same reason he couldn’t tell us what he was doing …’
‘He could have told us,’ said Madame Barbue sulkily. ‘We would have sympathized. We understand about animals …’
‘He couldn’t have known,’ said Julius. ‘He couldn’t take the risk. How could he have known we’d be loyal to him not to Major Tib?’
‘Oh, I know, but he should have trusted us,’ said Madame Barbue. She looked up suddenly at the parents. ‘But this is an old argument. Why have you come here? Are you looking for him? He is not here, you know that …’
‘We need to find where he is,’ said Aneba. ‘We thought Major Tib might …’
‘You don’t want to talk to him,’ said Julius. ‘Even mention Charlie’s name and he goes purple and starts throwing brandy bottles about. He’s furious, specially since Maccomo’s disappeared too – it turns out that he had been drugging the Lions, and Major Tib’s angry with him about that because it’s against regulations and could get Major Tib into trouble. It’s been really bad … So you don’t know where Charlie is?’
‘No,’ said Magdalen and Aneba. ‘Do you?’
‘No,’ said Madame Barbue.
‘No,’ said Julius.
They looked at one another unhappily.
‘Any ideas?’ said Aneba.
They stood around.
‘Well,’ said Julius.
They all looked up expectantly.
‘I’m pretty sure,’ he said, ‘that the Lions would have wanted to go home.’
‘Of course!’ exclaimed Magdalen. ‘So where do they come from?’
‘I don’t know,’ said Julius unhappily. ‘Maccomo would know, but …’
That was no use. Maccomo wasn’t there.
‘Mabel might know,’ said Madame Barbue.
‘Mabel?’ said Aneba. ‘Who’s she?’
On the day of the pageant, the Lions, Charlie, Claudio and the Doge went in the Doge’s gondola round the island to the Arsenale, the shipyard where the Bucintoro lived. Charlie had heard that the Bucintoro was a fabulous ship, but when he saw her, lying in the great smooth bay of the Arsenale dock, he gasped.
She was a long barge, covered over like a building – covered in gold. And not just simple gold – this was more of the grand icing of Venetian ceilings, carved and moulded into ranks of winged women along the sides, into vines and sphinxes. On the poop were two golden lions, and on the prow a figure of Justice, larger than life, with her scales and a golden umbrella. Of course there was a great golden throne for the Doge – and on the bowsprit, leading the ship, sticking right out the front, stood another beautiful shining golden lion.
The floors were polished wood. The seats were red velvet, and so were the walls. It was forty-three metres long and eight and a half metres high, forty-four men would row it, four to an oar, and the oars had stripes of red along the edges of the long, shining wooden blades. Golden vases were built into the decoration, and they had been filled with lilies, whose scent washed the air. A massive cloak of crimson brocade spread out behind, hanging from the high, carved, gilded canopy of the stern, with great corks sewn into its edges to make sure it floated.
It was in this ship that the Doge had gone out each year to marry the sea; in this ship, now, he was going to present Primo the Smilodon as the Lion of St Mark.
The other boats, gondolas and fishing boats, water taxis and all who were to take part in the pageant, were waiting along the way to join, or assembling already in the Bacino – the basin – of San Marco (it means basin, but it also means little kiss). The Bacino, at the end of the Grand Canal by the Doge’s Palace, was the Piccadilly Circus, the Times Square, the Piazza Navona of the Venetian boatways. The centre of town.
The Bucintoro moved slowly at first, its oars rising and falling, coming over to the quay where the Doge and the Lions waited to embark. A great drum kept the oarsmen in time; its slow boom, boom, boom was soothing, and the water trickled from the blades of the oars as they rested for a moment at the top of each stroke. When the boat was alongside, the Lions leapt on happily. The Doge hobbled aboard, assisted by several men in medieval livery whose ancestors had always had the job of helping the Doge on to the Bucintoro. He slowly made his way up to the bow and sat in his golden throne, breathing heavily.
Charlie, who had been togged out in velvet tights, one leg red and one leg gold, with a laced-up jerkin like the boy in the painting, had to sit at the Doge’s feet. This was apparently a great honour, but Charlie was rather annoyed as he wanted to run all over the fantastic boat looking at it, and after that he wanted to climb on the gold lions, and after that he wanted to hang over the edge and yell things at the passers-by and throw things in the water. But none of that was on the agenda: he was to sit at the Doge’s feet, like an angel in one of those paintings of how powerful Venice was, and the Lions were to lie about, again like a painting, with their scarlet collars and silver chains.
Only Primo was to stand up, on the little platform above Justice’s umbrella, where everybody would be able to see him, and he was to hold in his paws a great book that the Doge had produced.
‘And what page will it open on, I wonder?’ said Claudio quietly. ‘ “Freedom and Justice for all”? Or “Give me all your money and stop complaining”?’
Charlie remembered how Napoleon had changed the words on the book to change the minds of the people of Venice. What would he write, if his writing could change how people think?
Primo still had his bandages on.
‘Take it off now,’ the Doge had said.
‘Later,’ said Charlie.
The Doge looked cross, but he said only, ‘Before we get to the Grand Canal.’
Charlie had smiled politely.
The oarsmen were all
in their places in the under half of the great barge. They were shipbuilders from the Arsenale. Claudio knew most of them so he went down to visit them. They grinned at each other and clapped hands a lot. Charlie, wriggling around at the Doge’s feet, could see down into the oarsmen’s section. He was jealous. Then Claudio came up again, whistling his tune, and sat with him. The Doge would have preferred not to have this common gondolier at his feet, but Charlie insisted, and the Doge had quickly recognized that if he wanted the Lions to behave (which he rather did) then Charlie was the one he had to be nice to. Also the Doge had noticed how flimsy the leads were, and didn’t mind having a strong young man in place, in case. There was, of course, a row of elegantly dressed and heavily armed Doge Guards just behind him, but frankly none of them looked as if they would have a clue what to do with a Lion on the rampage … He had thought of putting the Lions in a cage … but then the effect of the Lion of San Marco in a cage was not quite the effect of the Lion of San Marco strong, beautiful and standing freely of his own will on the top of the Bucintoro, not eating the Doge. No, he would just have to be nice to this brown boy and his blond friend.
The Bucintoro was circling the whole main island of Venice. The lagoon, with its distant islands of Murano and Burano, spread off to the right. Charlie was happy to be able to see so far, having been locked up for so long. The water slapped against the flanks of the boat, the oars lifted and fell in rhythmic motion, and the Bucintoro slid gracefully along, golden against the grey-green waters. Charlie found himself humming the beautiful gondolier tune: today it sounded just sprightly and dancing and the sadness had gone from it.
When Rafi reached the Piazza San Marco it was still early, but people were already gathering for the pageant. He moved carefully through the crowds, heading for the Doge’s Palace. Even if there had been time for him to try to raid the palace, one look at it told him that he would never succeed: the great doors, the high gateways, the rows of guards.
He moved on to the front alongside the Bacino, walking, as he passed, between the two columns where Claudio had told Charlie never to walk. He stared out at the ruins of San Giorgio Maggiore. He climbed to the top of the bridge there, and turned back to see the Bridge of Sighs, which led from the palace to the prisons on the far side of a small canal.
Looking down, he noticed moored on the canal a sleek and beautiful solar-powered boat, in which two young guys were stowing some stuff. They were talking in low, earnest voices.
Rafi was naturally a nosy person. He moved further down the steps and inclined his head. ‘Leoni’, he heard, and also ‘Charlie’. He stopped. Most of the Venetians were talking about the ‘Brown Angel’. So who were these people who knew Charlie by name?
He stood with his back to the parapet and leaned backwards, for all the world as if he were admiring the view. Their words rose up: too much Italian. Rafi couldn’t make sense of it. He turned and leaned forward, for all the world as if he were admiring the Bridge of Sighs. Beneath his sunglasses, he dropped his eyes.
One of the young men was putting a leather bag into a locker: ‘Sta più sicuro qui,’ he was saying.
Rafi didn’t care what he was saying. He recognized the bag. It was the bag Charlie had brought with him from his parents’ house all those weeks ago.
His mind ticked quickly.
He wanted the bag. Whatever was in it, Charlie would value. Rafi wanted the bag.
How to …
He had no time to think or plan.
But then it took no time to stagger, as if he had been pushed, shout out in defensive annoyance and simultaneously shove the small girl standing next to him into the canal just in front of the sleek boat. It took no time at all to produce a scene of small local chaos, in which the girl was yelling and splashing, the people with her were crying out in alarm and rushing forward, one of the two boatguys was racing to the bow of their boat and throwing her a life-ring, and the other was jumping in, noisily and splashily, to save her. It was easy for Rafi to give the impression that he was trying to help, and stumbling, when in fact he was just taking the opportunity to throw himself on top of Charlie’s bag. He’d been going for the handle, so he could pull the whole bag under his leather coat and then make off with it, but what he’d thought was the handle turned out to be the neck of the bag, and now his hand was inside instead.
He closed his hand on – what? A cool, smooth hard thing, and something papery. And then, proceeding with the masquerade of concern for the girl, he slipped the items into his big pocket, while shouting out, ‘Is she all right? For crike sake, who pushed me?’
Then, swiftly, before calm reappeared and anyone asked him what on earth he was doing, he legged it.
Gazing off over the lagoon, resting his eyes, Charlie saw a low pile of rubble and a whirlpool effect, rising slightly above the water level. Beside it was moored a floating pontoon with an enormous crucifix standing on it, all alone in the middle of the flat waters of the lagoon, washing to and fro sadly on the tide.
Claudio saw Charlie looking at it, and crossed himself.
‘What is it?’ asked Charlie.
‘San Michele,’ said Claudio.
‘And?’ said Charlie.
‘Beautiful church, beautiful convento …’
Ah, thought Charlie.
‘And …’ Claudio looked a bit sick. ‘It was the island of our cemetery.’
Charlie looked at the tumbling waters, eddying above the ruins below. The water was darker there. The bright early-morning sunlight seemed not to touch it.
‘Oh,’ said Charlie softly. He thought a bit about drowned skeletons, and remembered a poem that his mother had told him, about a drowned sailor – ‘Full fathom five thy father lies … Those are pearls that were his eyes’ … something like that. But to be drowned after you are dead and buried …
Poor Venice. The tune in his head began to yearn again.
At that moment a little sparrow flew down and perched on a bit of gold icing just by Charlie. His scaly little feet gripped a golden nymph’s ear, and he bobbed his brown head.
Spirits live on, thought Charlie, and he didn’t know where the thought came from. Bodies die, and buildings tumble, and Empires fall, but spirits live on.
The Bucintoro had now been joined by four smaller, outlying barges that came along after her, like very grand ducklings. Two of them carried musicians, who were playing as loudly as they could and keeping time with the Bucintoro’s oarsmen’s drum. Two more carried glassblowers, who were making lovely little glass lions, which they threw to the children on the canalsides. And around them smaller boats were joining in their wake. They were scruffy, poor-looking things on the whole, but they had been decorated – all were decked out in red and gold, and were flying the Venetian flag of the lion, gold on red. Some had red cloaks floating behind them on the water in imitation of the Bucintoro; some had ribbons and garlands in their rigging and on their rowlocks.
As they rounded into the Cannaregio Canal, the boats that joined them seemed rather smarter, and when they turned into the Grand Canal, the standard went up again. Gliding past the palazzi that he had seen on his first day here, Charlie noticed that everybody was excited and happy. As they passed under the Rialto, rose petals fluttered around them. Balloons were unleashed from balconies along the way; people lined the quaysides and leaned from their windows, cheering and singing and, above all, gasping with amazement when they saw Primo. Amazement, as they realized that he was – real. He was Real.
The Lion had returned to Venice! Venice was blessed again!
All alongside the Grand Canal, Charlie could make out more people in red and gold livery. They were handing out food and drinks from trays. Children were gnawing on what looked like … They slowed down and Charlie was able to look carefully. It was! It was little sugar lions, in pink and green and yellow and blue. Charlie laughed out loud. He wanted one.
As they reached the Doge’s Palace, a twenty-one-gun salute went off. Several pieces of mosaic fell from the fron
t of the cathedral. In the silence between the guns, you could hear them tinkle. (‘Never mind,’ murmured the Doge. ‘It’s worth it.’)
The crowds in the piazza and round the Doge’s Palace were enormous: monks and priests and nuns, the aristocrats and citizens of Venice, tourists and children, pianists and fishermen, footballers and teachers, beggars and drunks, journalists and charity workers, writers and administrators, dogs and cats, workers and layabouts, waiters and dancers and an English lad in a leather coat … Everybody in Venice who wasn’t on a boat was there in the crowd. (Except for small quiet bands of gondoliers who were at the telephone exchange, the station, the Arsenale, the TV headquarters and the main bank – all of which were closed for the pageant. Swiftly and carefully, whistling between their teeth and throwing each other little smiles, the gondoliers were breaking in, changing the locks and hacking into the computers.)
One cat in particular was watching carefully and biding his time.
As the Bucintoro hove into sight, the Marangona began to ring, and the people began to shout. Flags were flapping bravely against the blue bright sky – red and gold, blue and gold – and the musicians in the duckling boats were joined by another orchestra on the Doge’s balcony. They weren’t quite in time but even so the sound was glorious, especially when all the bells of the churches of Venice joined in, from the Redentore and the Salute, Santa Maria dei Frari and dei Gigli, from the Gesuati and the Pietà. One old lady in the crowd said that even the drowned bells of the drowned churches of San Michele and San Giorgio Maggiore were joining in from under the water.
‘They will rise again!’ cried the Venetians.
‘They will rise again!’ cried the boatmen.
‘They will rise again!’ cried the children and the tourists and the priests and the drunks.
The Doge smiled.
The boats crowded round.
Some people fell into the Bacino, so crowded were the banks. Others hoicked them out again, and their dripping added to the chaos.
Primo looked at Charlie. ‘Now,’ he gestured.
Charlie leapt up on to the gilded platform where his friend stood, high and visible to the whole city of Venice, and swiftly unwrapped his huge and terrifying head.
