My uncle had been a racing car driver (badly smashed nose, mangled left hand) and he did everything fast. Now he had hopped from his cockpit and come forward to me. “Let's go,” he said, unbuckling the strap across my knees. “Presto!” he said, swinging me up from the cockpit to set me on my feet. “You can take off those goggles now,” he added.
"But I like the goggles,” I said. Wearing the leather helmet and goggles helped me pretend I was an aviator.
"Okay, keep them on. Let's go.” He tucked a notebook inside his flight jacket, grabbed my hand with his good hand and began a quick walk.
We seemed to be on a starched tablecloth between walls made of white silk. “This isn't a mountain,” I announced. “This isn't a mountain at all!"
"Right, it's not a mountain,” he said briskly. He bounded up a short stairway, pulling me along behind him.
"This is Lucia,” he told me, making a grand gesture toward a young woman with red-gold hair. “Lucia, this is my nephew, Jason."
She extended her hand to me, saying, “Hello, Jason."
I said hello. Her hand was nice and warm.
Lucia turned to my uncle. “I'm delighted to see you. Even two days late,” she told him. “But are you out of your mind?"
"I can explain everything,” my uncle told her.
"Yes, Vincenzo, you always do. Now, can I get you an aperitif ?—What about you, Jason? Can I get you a glass of ginger ale? You can take off those goggles, there's no wind up here, you know. The cloud is like a sailboat."
"This isn't a cloud,” I informed her. “Clouds are made of fog. This is a balloon or a parachute or something."
She looked at me and smiled and said nothing.
"He's a bright kid,” my uncle told her cheerfully.
"He's bright,” Lucia agreed. “And you're out of your mind to bring him up here."
"Where is everybody?"
Lucia shrugged and waved her hand dismissively. “Zio Domenico's in the wheelhouse watching the dials. Everyone else has gone down. Carlo and Guido went down to work, so of course Miranda and Azzura went down with them. Antonio comes back on weekends but stays down during the week. Which is fine by me. He can have it.—They all love flatland,” she added.
"Being on the ground, you mean."
"In the dirt, yes,” she said. “It affects their minds, you know. After a few years working down there, Antonio's decided that everything he was taught about us is lies. All that history—just lies. The story of the propellers, the building of the new wheelhouse—not true, he says. He even claims the logbooks are fakes."
Uncle Vincenzo took a deep breath, but didn't say anything.
"They think I'm crazy, I think they're crazy,” Lucia said. “So the feeling is mutual.—I'm staying here, no matter what,” she added.
"How many times have we been over this?"
"Too many."
"You can't manage this alone,” my uncle told her.
"You don't think so?” Lucia seemed to be daring him to answer.
My uncle started to say something, but I guess he changed his mind. “Well,” he said.
"Let's not talk about it,” she said.
Uncle Vincenzo reached inside his leather jacket and pulled out what I had thought was a book—a big flat square package like a notebook but much thinner. “For you,” he said, handing it to Lucia.
Lucia's face lit up. She bit the ribbon in two—Wow! I had never seen a grownup do that!—and already she'd ripped off the wrapping. It was two records in brown paper jackets. “Bessie Smith!” Lucia cried. “And—and Ma Rainey! Where did you find this? This is wonderful!"
"It took a while,” he said, clearly pleased about something.
"Your uncle's a nice man,” she said, turning to me. “A very nice man."
Later, my uncle and Lucia sat together at the corner of a very long table, drinking Cinzano while I took a look at some of the pictures and the ratty old furniture. Mostly I looked out the window—my uncle wouldn't let me go onto the balcony—at the land that spread beneath us like a pastel-colored map. Their voices were low and for the first time I became aware of a slow gentle thumping sound, rhythmic and soft, an engine of some sort, barely moving us along. I watched a tiny pickup truck on a meandering country road; the truck was moving faster than we were and gradually slipped out of sight. My uncle explained to Lucia that he had to bring me along because he was taking care of me this week. My sister had appendicitis and had been whisked off in an ambulance with my mother, and my father—rushing to the hospital—had given me into the care of Uncle Vincenzo, simply because he lived closest to our house.
"I can't find my house from here,” I complained.
"Keep looking,” Vincenzo said. “It's down there someplace."
I gave up looking at the landscape and began to steal glances at the murals which showed rosy, opulent women, many of them in rumpled nightgowns that had slipped from their shoulders and down their arms. All were dining and drinking with darkly tanned men, mostly naked, though some wore grape leaves to hide their privates. The room's ceiling, which sagged like an old tent, displayed a faded scene of angels gliding up to the clouds. Two large wedge-shaped areas had been replaced with blank white silk, or some such material. One of the women portrayed on the wall had the same red-gold hair as Lucia. Lucia was beautiful and wore sparkling bracelets that jingled whenever she moved her arm, and when she looked at me she smiled as if we shared a special secret. I had never seen anyone like her; she was fascinating.
"It's not polite to stare, Jason,” my uncle said, interrupting my reverie. “It's time you and I flew back to earth. Right?” And with that he threw a kiss to Lucia and pulled me off my feet as he strode to the airplane.
* * * *
3
Now back to the unlikely history of Venice. In 1797, Napoleon Bonaparte swept across Northern Italy at the head of a fast-moving victorious army and prepared to march on Venice. Lagoons and marshes had protected Venice for over a thousand years, but they couldn't shield the city from Napoleon's famous artillery. Venetian villas housed a treasure in paintings, books, gold, jewels, ornate mirrors, tapestries, and murals, but no cannon. On Friday, May 12, 1797, 537 members of the Great Council of Venice met to consider Napoleon's ultimatum. Frankly, there was no place for the Venetians to go.
Among the handful who were prepared to vote against surrender was Giovanni Anafesto Pauli, called Nino Pauli. His proposal was simple. He began by saying, “Our ancestors took to the sea to escape barbarians and to build in water this Venice, our Venice, the most beautiful city on earth.” His speech lasted only five minutes and concluded with lines which have since become famous: Nostra volta é arrivata. Dobbiamo andare al cielo per costruire altra Venezia, una citta ancor piu bella in mezzo delle nubi. “Our time has come. We must take to the sky to build a second Venice, an even more beautiful city amid the clouds.” The proposal was listened to in melancholy silence, after which some councilors sighed and others merely looked glum. Then they voted. The Council accepted the terms of surrender by a vote of 512 to 20, with five abstentions, and thereby dissolved the glorious and independent Republic of Venice which had lasted one thousand and seventy years.
Nino Pauli was not discouraged. The Pauli family were merchants with offices throughout the Mediterranean littoral and Europe, and as part of his business Nino had kept himself informed of the latest political, social and scientific news. Years ago he had heard of the Montgolfiers and their remarkable balloon, and the Venetian merchant was one of the thousands who had journeyed to Paris to watch its ascent. On September 19, 1783, at Versailles, surrounded by 130,000 spectators, the Montgolfier brothers, simply using hot air, sent their first passengers aloft—a duck, a rooster, and a sheep—and all three landed intact two miles away. Nino Pauli had been delighted and fascinated. He lingered in Paris two more months in order to see another hot-air balloon rise from the Bois de Boulogne.
By the end of 1783 Jacques Charles and Nicolas Robert overcame the limitati
ons of hot air and ascended in a balloon filled with hydrogen gas. Ballooning became popular throughout Europe—became a kind of craze, in fact—and by June of the following year the new entertainment, or science, or whatever it was, claimed its first fatalities. Pilatre de Rozier and Pierre Romain crashed to earth beneath a balloon which they had ridden aloft on a risky combination of hydrogen and heated air. Nino Pauli had returned to Venice early in December, 1783, bringing with him visions of a future in which the skies had become a global sea where great balloons lofted ships laden with goods for trade. Fourteen years later, when he made his speech at the final gathering of the Great Council, he had those balloons in mind.
* * * *
4
Vincenzo had met Lucia by accident years earlier when he briefly escaped Boston to visit Montreal. He had come from Europe to Boston because Boston was where all of us—my mother and father, my grandfather and all my uncles and aunts—lived. But he was never completely at ease here. “Boston was made by Puritans and everyone who lives here is turned into a Puritan. I'm going to Montreal,” he announced.
"This is the wrong season for Montreal,” my father told him.
"What difference does the season make? They speak French in Montreal and I'm sure they're not Puritans. It's a romantic city, Montreal. Even the name is romantic."
Montreal in November turned out to be small, cold, and damp. The houses were made of gray stone, the sky was gray, and the air itself was gray. Vincenzo spent three days trudging around the city and three nights meeting the non-Puritan women who frequented Montreal's bars and brasseries. He was walking back to his hotel in the freezing fog, so discouraged that his chin was sunk to his chest, and—wham!—a girl had come running around the corner and smacked into him.
"Pardon!” she said politely, slipping past him with a brief scent of perfume and cigarette smoke. Vincenzo unhooked her earring from his lapel, but by then she was already fading into the fog. “Your earring!” he cried in French, running after her. She was silhouetted in a lighted doorway just as he caught up to her and at the same moment the girl and the rosy illuminated room behind her lifted up into the mist. And so did Vincenzo, who had lunged in behind her.
"I'm sure this is yours,” he said, holding out the earring. It looked like a miniature chandelier made of pearls. The girl glanced around in panic—she was seventeen, maybe nineteen, Vincenzo couldn't tell—then she whirled around, flung open a door and dashed into the next room. Vincenzo took after her, but stumbled to a halt as two rows of startled faces stared at him from the sides of a long table. The men and women had begun to get to their feet, but slowly and with care because (Vincenzo took it in now) they were so old, most of them.
"Excuse me,” Vincenzo announced. “All I wanted to do was—"
The stooped elder at the head of the table had sheltered the girl behind him, and now was pointing an antique pistol at Vincenzo.
"What's that?” Vincenzo said. He laughed. “Please, sir, put that thing away before it explodes and blows off your hand."
"This is crazy,” one of the younger men said in Italian. “This is exactly why we have to quit this insanity, this, this—” He waved his hand in the air.
"This farce,” an elderly woman murmured in Italian, finishing his sentence. “That one's clearly a gentleman,” she said, referring to Vincenzo. “Too bad about his crooked nose,” she added.
"I apologize for interrupting your—” Vincenzo hesitated as he looked around. Some of the women were dressed all right but others were clothed in what looked to be museum pieces, and the same was true of the men. “I apologize for interrupting your costume party,” Vincenzo concluded. “Sorry.” He smiled.
The room swayed ever so slightly, then settled firmly in place. “Go!” the old man croaked, his hand trembling as he kept the antique firearm on Vincenzo.
"I take it we're back on solid ground,” Vincenzo said. He tossed the earring to the girl, who snatched it out of the air, then he stepped out to Montreal and walked the deserted streets to his hotel, half singing and half humming an aria from Gianni Schicchi. He was happier than he'd been all year, simply because he'd seen such a pretty girl.
When he arrived back in Boston, Vincenzo, who loved to tell stories about his adventures, entertained my father and mother with the tale of Montreal. “And the next morning I went back there and walked up and down the street five times,” he said. “But the girl never appeared. All I have is the memory of the French cigarette smoke in her hair. And the street—well, by day you could see the street ended in a trail of broken asphalt and stones just at the place where the lighted doorway had been."
"You still think Montreal is a romantic city?” my father asked.
Vincenzo laughed. “As you said, it was the wrong season."
"I think it's a romantic story,” my mother said. “A girl who lives in a dirigible."
"I suspect it was just a big gondola attached to a balloon,” Vincenzo told her. “I think they were a circus troop. You should have seen the way they were dressed—very odd, rather gaudy, exaggerated."
"Maybe they were gypsies,” my mother suggested.
"Or pickpockets from some fly-by-night carnival,” my father murmured.
* * * *
5
Between 1797 and 1814 Venice was controlled first by Napoleon, then by Austria, then again by Napoleon, and once more by Austria. None of this made any difference to Nino Pauli, who continued to experiment with different designs for a framework of balloons and suspended chambers. What we know about the structures Pauli built, or attempted to build, comes from three account books in which he recorded the purchases he made to advance his plan.
The old ledgers were discovered during cleanup work after a flood. In recent years Venice has had several episodes of “aqua alta,” or high water, when tides and winds have pushed the Adriatic into the squares and piazzas of the city. The floods of 1966 were particularly destructive, and a group of graduate students from Ca’ Foscari University helped to drain and clean the flooded dwellings, during which they came upon Pauli's waterlogged ledgers.
The books were dried and eventually identified as belonging to the merchant Giovanni Anafesto Pauli whose business and family line had petered out late in the nineteenth century. They contained lists of different woods, cloths, various tars and paints, and so forth—the amount of each, the cost, and the date when purchased—and an occasional page of geometric doodles. In other words, they appeared to have little or no historical value.
Nonetheless, one of the graduate students who had found the books, Salvatore Bruni, was drawn back to the accounts again and again, intrigued by the large quantities of silk and by the curious varieties of wood, some from as far away as Indonesia, that Pauli had acquired, for it appeared that the merchant had never re-sold the material. Young Bruni saw what none of the investigators from Ca’ Foscari University had even guessed at—Nino Pauli had amassed the materials “to build a second Venice, an even more beautiful city amid the clouds.” Furthermore, it became clear to Bruni that what had been regarded as meaningless geometrical doodles on some of the ledger pages were actually airship designs, not complete designs but sketches of what might later be elaborated and engineered to a final structure.
According to a recent monograph (S. Bruni, 2001. Evoluzione degli desegni strutturale per dirigibile di Giovanni Anafesto Pauli. [Evolution of the designs for airship structures of Giovanni Anafesto Pauli. ] Serie di Storia Venezia Pub. 7 Universita Ca’ Foscari di Venezia), Nino Pauli's early plans consisted of a balloon or set of balloons from which was suspended a rectangular construction fabricated of light wood, wickerwork, and cloth. Later designs incorporated balloons of different sizes gathered inside huge white silken bags ("sacchi di seta") in order to more closely resemble clouds, and the final designs employed great swaths of white gauze to camouflage the structure, the “villa,” which housed the living quarters.
* * * *
6
A few days after that f
irst airplane ride, my uncle drove us again to the grassy airfield, speeding all the way, as if in a race against an invisible competitor, but when we arrived we could do nothing more than stand inside the old hangar and look out glumly at the rain which had begun to fall. “We can't go up in this soup,” he murmured, more to himself than to me. He stood with his arms folded across his chest, he paced back and forth, he stood with his hands clasped behind his back, he sighed, and always he watched the gray drizzle. At length he said, “We're stuck, Jason. We'll have to do it tomorrow.” He muttered a few swear words in Italian, went off to speak to one of the mechanics, then we sped back through the rain.
"Why didn't you ever get married?” I asked.
He laughed. “What a question! I don't know why I never got married. It just never happened."
We drove for a while in silence, just the rumble of the motor and the beat of the windshield wipers.
"Lucia is a nice person,” I announced.
"Yes, she's that,” he said agreeably. “And she has a remarkable singing voice, too."
"Why don't you marry her?"
He glanced at me, then turned back to the road. “You ask all sorts of questions, you do. I'm too old, Jason. And she's young. Young women like young men, especially young men who have two good hands and don't have a big crooked nose in the middle of their face."
I felt momentarily sorry for Uncle Vincenzo. He had trained as a meteorologist in Italy, but had earned his living as a fencing master, then an Alpine mountain guide and downhill skier, and later as a race car driver for a French automobile company. Photos showed he had been handsome until another racing car smashed into him. Shortly before immigrating to the States he had learned to fly, and flying had been his love ever since. When World War II broke out he volunteered for the US Army Air Force, as it was called back then, and he was accepted, not as a fighter pilot, but as a meteorologist, forecasting weather for the Northeastern seaboard.
Asimov's SF, September 2010 Page 7
