Daughter of Venice

by Donna Jo Napoli

  I don’t even want to take care of Antonio’s children—but I want even less to go to a convent. “The boys all get to live here forever if they want—and they take up rooms, too.”

  “Men can vote. It’s important that the family voters stay close and all vote the same way.” Mother shrugs. “Women can’t vote. It isn’t practical to keep daughters at home.”

  Practical. I remember Francesco saying that to be Venetian is to be practical. I want to scream. “Is it practical to lock girls away in convents?”

  “I don’t know any girls who were locked away, Donata, and neither do you.” Mother reaches with the brush for my hair.

  I step away and shake my hair as though it’s a mane.

  Mother goes back to brushing Laura’s hair. “Girls go into the convents voluntarily, for the good of the family.”

  “Voluntarily?” I stare. “Who would volunteer for such a life?”

  “The convent has its advantages.”

  “What advantages?” I demand.

  “Women are protected there.”

  “Protected? Mother, they’re trapped. They have no freedom.”

  “That’s not true, Donata. They can continue their music studies. They can have parties with lovely foods and any guests they like. And those who are so inclined can talk to diplomats and influence the direction of government.”

  The last thing I want to do is continue my music lessons. And what’s the point of parties, if all I wear is long, black, shapeless gowns?

  No one speaks.

  “If I hadn’t married,” says Mother, at last, “I’d have entered a convent happily.”

  “So you could influence the direction of government?” asks Laura.

  Mother laughs. “A girl of my background couldn’t do that. But nuns can work. Many of them weave. That’s what I would have chosen.”

  I know it’s true the moment she says it. Just yesterday morning her voice filled with joy when she talked of weaving. “That’s why you don’t feel sorry for us now. But look at us, Mother. We’re not lucky like you were. We have no trade to pursue. We’ve never had a chance to know a trade. Noble girls have no chances.”

  Mother’s eyes cloud with pain and for an instant I’m sure she does understand, after all. But she blinks, and her eyes change again. “This from the one who always laments when asked to work? My dear Donata, you can’t have it both ways. Lucky, indeed. Your childhood has been full of pleasures. Your adulthood will be, as well, if you allow it.”

  How does she do this? How does she manage to make me feel ungrateful whenever I complain? I want to argue more.

  But Laura steps forward, cutting me off purposely, I know. “How often can nuns visit home?” Her very question smacks of resignation. I want to shake her.

  “Suora Luciana came home for every important family event.”

  Suora Luciana was another of Father’s sisters. She drowned in a boating accident when I was small. I don’t remember her. “That’s not enough,” I say. “This is our home. Not some dreadful convent.”

  “There’s nothing dreadful about them. Oh, my daughters, the families of Venice recognize the sacrifice, and they are tolerant of behavior in the convents. They shut one eye.”

  “As well they should, Mother.” My voice is firm, but already the practical side of me, the Venetian in my veins, wonders exactly what behavior is tolerated. I cannot ask, though. I will do nothing to suggest the convent is an option to consider.

  “Don’t play the rebel now, Donata. It will serve you well to accept your future. What can you do about it anyway? This is the way things are.”

  Laura sniffles. “Girls in convents do not fall in love.”

  “Many girls outside of convents don’t fall in love, my daughter.”

  I think of the whispers about unhappy marriages. Maybe by the time women are Mother’s age, they accept the idea of loveless marriages. But how can anyone accept that idea at the start of a marriage? “Andriana wants love,” I say. “I know she does. When the girls our age talk at parties, we talk about love—that’s what we talk about—and about the boys we’ve seen at Mass on Sundays and about who might like our brothers. Andriana wants love, Mother.”

  “We will do our best to find Andriana the proper husband, but she will have to do her best to be happy with him, whoever he is. Old or young. Ugly or handsome.”

  A proper husband. Mother always talks about proper this and proper that. She’s always trying to prove to everyone that she’s proper—that she’s worthy of Father. I’m so sick of being part of her proof. “What makes someone the proper husband, Mother, if not love?”

  “Don’t talk nonsense, Donata. You know very well that a noble girl needs a husband who can offer her the kind of life she’s accustomed to. Falling in love has little to do with a good marriage.”

  “Father fell in love with you,” says Laura. “He married you out of love.”

  “And he paid for it roundly.” Mother puts the brush down and turns Laura to her. “Your father has the makings of a governor. There is no one smarter or more diligent than he. But when he chose a wife outside the nobility, he cut himself off from that kind of success.”

  “I didn’t know that,” I say, instantly going limp inside. Father has always seemed content in his world. He talks of his brothers’ achievements without rancor—he boasts of them, even.

  “That’s why he’s been so careful with you children.” Mother talks softly now. “The boys have been educated at home longer than most—so that Father could keep an eye on them. You girls have been more sheltered than most—so that no one can question your virtue and noble character.”

  “Father got love, but we never will,” whispers Laura.

  “There are all kinds of love.” Mother goes to the large canopied bed that Laura and I share. She sits and rests her hands in her lap. “Convents are bursting with the love called charity.”

  “But they’re not bursting with children,” Laura says. “I want children, Mother.”

  “Oh, my daughters, what you don’t know.” Mother motions us to her. Laura sits on the floor and puts her head on Mother’s lap. I remain standing, but close enough that my skirt presses against Mother’s. “The courtesans of Venice run a high risk,” says Mother, in a grave voice. “Many of them have children they neither want nor can care for. Venice has so many illegitimate children, her orphanages overflow. Besides that, many mothers die in childbirth, and their infants often go straight to the orphanages.”

  I tremble slightly. When Mother gave birth to Giovanni, she was sick for months afterward. So sick that we had to get the wet nurse, Cara. When Mother first said Giovanni was her last child, I was grateful. I’d forgotten how grateful until just now.

  “Clergy help in the education of these children,” Mother says. “Nuns teach the girls to sing and play instruments. They teach the boys the virtues of discipline and hard work. You can be like mothers to tens of children. You can do so much good with your lives.”

  I don’t want to teach music. I don’t want to be surrounded by tens of children and pious women. I don’t know what I do want anymore, but it’s not that, it’s nothing like that.

  Mother pats Laura’s cheek with one hand and takes my hand with her other. Her clasp is tight. I cling to it.

  CHAPTER SIX

  CLOTHES

  I’m wrapping the white cloth around my chest. It’s soft, filmy silk, the finest Venice makes, which means the finest in the world.

  Mother would blink at such a claim. Her cheeks would go ruddy and the corners of her mouth would pucker just a little and she’d wait for me to continue—for me to say, “That notwithstanding, the quality of this silk is clearly second to that of Venice’s wool.” Then she’d smile hugely and continue her rushing about.

  My hands tremble a little as I tuck the end of the swath in place. It’s been three days since Father’s announcement of the family marriages, but it feels like forever. Everything has changed. I stand in profile and examine m
y changed self in the mirror.

  “Flat as a man,” says Paolina with a giggle. She slinks up behind me and gives me a conspiratorial grin in the mirror.

  I twirl around and kiss the tip of her nose.

  Laura makes a tsking noise and plucks at the silk swath that binds my breasts flat. “Someone’s going to guess. Someone outside.”

  “No one outside will guess,” says Andriana. “Neither of you will ever have enough bosom to arouse suspicion.”

  “That’s the truth.” I laugh teasingly. “I saw you sitting in profile at the balcony windows yesterday. No one in Venice is ignorant of your ample charms. I bet half the bachelors in the city long for you.”

  But Laura’s chewing on her bottom lip. She doesn’t give even the smallest smile. “Do you have to bind yourself so tightly, though, Donata? That can’t be good for your growth. Think of Chinese women’s feet, after all.”

  Francesco has told us stories he’s heard about Chinese women’s feet, contorted so unnaturally from binding that the women cannot walk. They have to be carried around. And stories about their nails, grown so long that the women cannot use their hands. They have to be fed and washed. A spasm of distaste jerks me tall. I don’t want to be a man. I simply want the privileges of a man. Or at least this one privilege: free passage. And I must seize this privilege now, before it’s too late. But I wouldn’t give up my womanhood for it.

  I loosen the silk swath and breathe deeply.

  Laura’s face softens in relief.

  “Laura’s right,” says Andriana. “You’re going to get caught. Not by strangers. By Mother. Then we’ll all get in trouble. And if that happens, I’ll say I told you not to do it. I mean that, Donata. I won’t get in trouble over this—not now—not when Father and Mother are looking for a husband for me.”

  “That’s all right. I wouldn’t ask you to take any blame on my behalf. Besides, there won’t be any blame to take. And think of it, sisters. Francesco has been practically ignoring us lately—he almost never tells us stories anymore. But today I’ll go out and have adventures myself, and I’ll bring home wonderful stories for all of you, and no one will be the wiser.”

  “We don’t need wonderful stories, Donata.” Andriana presses one hand against the spot between her eyebrows. I know she’s trying to keep her brow from furrowing—she does that to prevent those ugly lines that worriers get. “Don’t do it. You will get caught.”

  “How?” My hand goes to my mouth and I look at Laura. “Oh no, you’re not going out yourself today, are you? You’re not visiting a friend?”

  “No no,” says Laura. “But you will get caught.”

  “Not if you pretend you’re me when Mother comes asking, as you promised.” I catch her right hand in both of mine. “You will be true to me, won’t you?”

  “Of course. I’ll curtsy for you and hurry to whatever task Mother sets. I’ll be the most obedient and sweetest self anyone could want. All in your name, I swear.”

  “So that will work,” I say. “Mother is so busy these days, carting Andriana around to the dressmaker’s and all those . . .” I stop myself. I was about to call the things Mother and Andriana do foolish. Jealousy can make me unkind. That’s truly foolish. Besides, I am happy for Andriana. I must remember that. “Mother’s never in the workroom. She hardly notices I am here now. She won’t notice when I’m not here.”

  “She’ll notice,” says Andriana. “How could she not, if Laura is as obedient as she promises to be?”

  I look at her quickly. Then Paolina laughs, and we’re all laughing.

  I pull on the black hose and slip into the blousy, thin shirt common to noble boys in summertime, and, finally, the light sleeveless jacket. I stole these clothes two days ago from a pile of my brothers’ castoffs that Cara had gathered for the poor bin at the church of San Marcuola. It was actually that pile of clothes that started everything. It sat there, like an opportunity.

  I snatched this outfit before my head could even think what I would do with it.

  But, really, the thought was always there. After all, it was wearing boys’ clothing that gave me my one chance to go crabbing years ago.

  If my adventure is successful, if I am not caught, life will be very good. At least until Father dispatches us to the futures he chooses for us. I am going out into the world today. Me, Donata. Out into the world, on foot.

  “Your patch is less than artful,” says Laura. She’s plucking at me again, nervously trying to arrange my sleeve so the patch doesn’t show so much.

  I put the patch on last night, working under the oil lamp late into the dark. What a pity that the one shirt I grabbed from the charity pile had a rip in the sleeve. But by the time I had the chance to spread the outfit out in my room and examine it, it was too late to pick another shirt; Uncle Umberto had already bagged up the rest of the pile and lugged it off over the one little bridge to San Marcuola yesterday, before Sunday Mass. When I asked him what had happened to the pile, he didn’t even question why I should want an old shirt. He just offered me one of his own. I didn’t take it—Uncle Umberto is three times my size—but I kissed him and thanked the Lord for the ripped shirt I already had.

  “Who cares?” I say now, though I am promising myself silently that I will be extra careful not to get new rips in this outfit. It must last me, if I am to go on lots of adventures. “The boys who walk the streets don’t all look refined, you know.”

  Laura’s eyes grow large. She didn’t know that, really. None of us know it with our own eyes. All of us understand that anything I say at this point comes indirectly via a brother, probably Francesco. Yet the very fact that I am about to go out in my disguise has somehow already lent me an air of authority. I warm to my subject. “Most of the boys outside aren’t at all like our brothers. They aren’t the sons of nobles, but of citizens. And not always well-to-do citizens. They’re rough characters.”

  Andriana presses both hands to her brow now. “You need to look like one of the refined boys, Donata. Absolutely respectable. You don’t want someone picking a fight with you.”

  “Or worse,” says Laura.

  “What’s worse?” I ask.

  “I don’t know,” Laura whispers. “I don’t want to know.”

  Paolina claps her hands suddenly. “Ha!” she says, and climbs onto our high bed. She carefully spreads her skirt out around her in a circle. “You don’t have to worry about that patched shirt. I’ve taken care of it.”

  “What?”

  Paolina’s fat little cheeks almost burst with pride. “A boy is coming here. A guild member.”

  Andriana steps close to the bed. “What do you mean?”

  Paolina clasps her hands together and bounces on her bottom in glee. “I arranged a trade. Donata will give him her clothes—her boy clothes—and he’ll give her his.”

  “My clothes are patched and worn threadbare. Did you tell him that?”

  “Yes.”

  “If he’s willing to take them, then, his must be just as bad,” I say.

  “Not at all,” Paolina says. “His are good. I made sure of that.”

  “Why on earth would he trade good clothes for bad?” Laura asks.

  “Because . . .” Paolina sits up tall. “I also promised one of my outgrown dresses for his little sister.”

  “But what about your own little sister?” Andriana’s voice is a scold.

  “Maria won’t fit into it for years. And by that time, Mother won’t remember it. Besides, I wore it gardening at Giulia’s home. It’s so stained, Maria would be glad to avoid ever wearing it.” Paolina beams. “See? I thought of everything.”

  I know the dress Paolina means. Last fall she wore it almost every day. Cara had to practically wrestle it away from her to wash now and then, muttering little angry words in her native Friulano dialect. Paolina has so many funny ways.

  But stains or no stains, the boy is getting the better end of this bargain, I bet. He is assuredly less well-off than we are. So Paolina’s outgrown dress
, despite the stains, will be far finer than this boy’s sister’s other clothes.

  I take off the hose and sit on the floor cross-legged so I can rub at the birthmark on the bottom of my right foot. This is how I wish for luck. “Where is this boy?” I ask.

  “He’s supposed to deliver fish within the hour.”

  “A fisherman?” Laura’s voice rises in a squeal. “You talked with a fisherman?”

  “A fisherboy. He’s nice,” says Paolina.

  “A fisherboy,” says Andriana in a murmur. “I’ve never even been allowed to talk to the spinners when they take away the bobbins of yarn, but here you talked to a mere fisherboy. His father probably isn’t even a citizen. Did anyone see you with him?”

  “Cook, of course. I went down to the ground floor with Cook and helped him select the eels yesterday,” Paolina says. “And when he was out of earshot, shouting orders to Giò Giò about where to lug away a barrel, I asked the fisherboy. And he said yes. Just like that.”

  “Aren’t you something,” Andriana is saying slowly. “You may have as much mischief in you as Donata does.” She looks slantwise at me.

  I stare at Paolina. A fisherboy? I’ll be wearing fisherboy’s clothes.

  “Fishers wear terrible clothes,” says Laura. “Trousers and big, loose shirts. Donata would never want such clothes.”

  “Yes, I do,” I say, suddenly realizing the possibilities. Fishermen don’t live in our section of town, in Cannaregio. The fishing industry is in Dorsoduro, the only section of Venice that is larger than Cannaregio—much larger. If I’m going to blend in wearing those clothes, if I’m going to be an anonymous fisherboy wandering the alleys, I’ll have to go to Dorsoduro. Alley after alley, all the way to Dorsoduro. “The fisherboy’s clothes will be perfect.”

  “You can’t be serious,” says Andriana. “Fishers aren’t refined. You can’t go out dressed as a fisher. Someone awful could come up to you. Don’t do this, Donata. Forget the whole thing.”

  “I’m going out,” I say. “No matter what.” Out.

  My heart flutters, then slowly begins to pound, louder and louder. I feel like I’m passing through the giant, thick doors of a cathedral.