She spent a sleepless night. Her first appointment in the morning was with the Maestro to discuss a selection of songs for a forthcoming concert. They were seated in his office, which overlooked the enclosed garden where sunshine filtering through the trees gave a cool greenish light to the room.
“Maestro, there’s something very important I should like to discuss with you,” she said when the matter of her program had been settled.
“Yes, what is it?” He sat back in his chair, a white-wigged, fine-featured man in his fifties, and he linked his long, artistic fingers.
“You’ve always listened without comment when I’ve talked about my future as a singer and I’ve assumed that you wished me to remain at the Pietà for as long as possible.”
“That is correct. There is no one ready to step into your place just yet.”
“Nevertheless, something has happened that I had never envisaged and I think it would be best if I began to make preparations for leaving. I hope that, when I have explained my reasons, you will understand that I really have no choice in the matter.”
He nodded his head with kindly indulgence. “You need have no fear about that. I realized it must come sooner or later.”
She welcomed his attitude, which was making it all much easier for her. “I want to go on the concert stage as soon as possible.”
His eyes narrowed and he frowned slightly. “The concert stage?” he repeated.
“I have always said that I did not want to be at the beck and call of the bullying director of an opera company. I would appreciate your advice as to which of the recent offers of concert tours I should accept.”
He shook his head, holding the bridge of his nose briefly between finger and thumb. “Are felicitations not in order then?”
Enlightenment dawned on her. Domenico had mentioned there would be no opposition from the board to his wish to marry her. She was foolish not to have realized the Maestro would also know of it. “No, Maestro. I have yet to give Signor Torrisi my formal refusal of his offer of marriage, but my mind is already made up. And since he is a governor of the Pietà, it would be best for me to leave as soon as possible after giving him my answer.”
The Maestro left his chair and paced up and down a couple of times before he halted and spoke grimly to her. “I never thought it would fall to me to have to tell you this, but your future was sealed by the governors over two years ago. I can pinpoint it to the day. It was the morning after you sang on the Bucintoro. Signor Torrisi arranged to meet with the full board here and he announced his wish to make you his wife at such time when it suited both you and himself. The contract was duly drawn up and signed within the week. Whatever he has said to you was simply a courtesy on his part.”
She was appalled. “But as a principal singer I should have been consulted!” she cried out.
“I agree, and I haven’t the least doubt that your wishes in the matter would have been heard if Signor Torrisi had not endowed the Pietà with what can only be described as a small fortune for the advancement of its good work. The ospedale had never before received a donation of such size and the governors agreed immediately to his request that nothing be said until such time as he chose to speak to you of marriage. They then gave him a coveted place on the board as a gesture of their appreciation for his generosity.”
She looked at him fiercely. “So he reserved me like an item on a shop shelf! Why didn’t you speak on my behalf, Maestro?”
“I did, Marietta, but mine was the only dissenting voice. I wanted other countries to have the chance to hear you sing before marriage claimed you. Adrianna was lost to the music world all too soon and I did not want that to happen to you.”
Outraged, she went to the window where she gazed down into the deserted garden. A medley of sounds drifted from the various music rooms. She struggled in mental torment to adjust to her career as a singer being at an end. The concert stage had been no more than a dream that she alone had cherished. It had been destroyed by Domenico and those who had conspired with him to take away her liberty.
But how could she endure a life of idleness? Elena had adjusted to following the routine of a noblewoman, rising at noon, receiving her hairdresser while friends sat and chatted, and then turning night into day at ridottos, theaters, balls, and parties in an endless round of pleasure. For a while it would be fun, Marietta could not deny that. But she had always seen her singing and eventual teaching as a contribution to life for all she had received from it. To only take and to give nothing back was contrary to all she believed in.
“I could go away, Maestro,” she said quietly, still looking down into the garden. “There is nothing to stop me from singing under another name.”
“Do you suppose a Torrisi would allow you to slip the net? Or the governors either, for that matter? They would fear a demand for the return of that donation, which they are already using for the extension and expansion of the building to accommodate more waifs. Would you bring that work to a halt?”
She shook her head. “You know I cannot.”
“Then you have no choice but to accept what has been arranged for you.”
Another terrible consequence of her fate was dawning on her. She as a Torrisi and Elena as a Celano would be barred from seeing each other. “Maestro!” she exclaimed, swinging around to face him. “Let me visit Elena when the day’s lessons are over. I have to talk to her!”
He guessed the reason. “I will take you to the Palazzo Celano myself.”
It was not the first time the Maestro had been received there and while Filippo served wine to him and sat in conversation Elena took Marietta to her boudoir. Marietta explained what had happened.
“The trouble is that I’m angry about the way I have been secured by a contract, while at the same time I’m drawn to Domenico as to a magnet. I can see now that it has been the same since I first saw him in his golden mask. I find I want to be his wife as much as I wish to be free of him.”
“But the Torrisi family is such a cruel one!” Elena cried out. “I’ve heard so much about their dreadful deeds against the Celanos down the centuries.”
Marietta gave a wry smile. “In all fairness I think you should admit that it has been six of one and half a dozen of the other when it comes to responsibility for the vendetta. It was the Celano barnabotti who sank the Torrisi gondola four years ago on your wedding day with such tragic results.”
“That haunts me still. Although most of that day is a haze to me I can remember Signora Torrisi as she waved to me. Why that should be I have no notion. Who knows? Perhaps it registered with me that she hoped the two of us might mend the blood-feud.”
“Then let us have the same aim.” Marietta’s voice became choked. “It would help me to believe there might be some purpose to this marriage, which appeals so strongly to me in spite of myself.” Her head dipped and she covered her eyes with a hand as she struggled with her feelings. “I’m so confused.”
Elena flew to kneel by her chair and put a comforting arm about her. “Don’t despair, Marietta! Oh, why is nothing ever as it should be!”
The comforting arm then became a clinging one. Marietta disentangled herself to take her friend by the shoulders. “Something has happened to you too. What is it?”
“You came to tell me your troubles, not to hear mine.”
“Tell me!”
Elena hesitated no longer. The words burst from her. “I’m beginning to believe I might never have a child!”
“It’s far too soon to draw that conclusion. It takes a few years sometimes.”
“I’ve told Filippo that, but he is getting so impatient with me. Ever since he made up that old quarrel with his mother he has been far worse to me in every way. He listens to her now when she is spiteful about me.” She clutched Marietta’s arm. “I’m so afraid. I believe that if I don’t eventually give him an heir she will conspire to get rid of me.”
“You mustn’t allow yourself to suppose such a thing!”
Elena’s
agonized face did not change. “You don’t know her as I do. She is ruthless and unforgiving.”
“Have you told anyone else of this fear? Lavinia, perhaps?”
“I dare not. She would never believe it of her mother. Sometimes I wish I had never advised Filippo to mend matters with the Signora, because it has given her an entrée back into our home and she is careful not to anger him. But she had not been well and I thought he should go to her. Now I’m sure she pretended to be at death’s door for that precise purpose. She is a devious woman.” Elena shook her head unhappily. “I’ve never needed your friendship more than at this time, when you are about to become the wife of a Torrisi.”
“But we shall go on meeting after I’m married,” Marietta decided determinedly. “You visit Adrianna and so do I. We can always talk safely in her house. Nobody else will ever know.”
Elena brightened, her spirits always as quick to rise as to fall. “So we can. Remember the communication code we devised at the Pietà? We could use that whenever we see each other in a public place.”
“I don’t remember everything. It’s a long time since we last used it.”
“Let us go through a few of the signs. I’m sure it will all come back to us.”
They practiced signals for alarm and danger first, which in the past had meant no more than Sister Sylvia’s approach but which, in the realm of a bloodthirsty vendetta, might well be needed to warn of much more. The code was quickly recalled. If a sign momentarily evaded the memory of one, then a prompt from the other brought it immediately to mind.
“We must practice every time we see each other from now until your marriage,” Elena said, linking her arm through Marietta’s as she had done so often upon their leaving a room together. “Nobody from either side will be able to keep us from communicating.”
It was a consoling thought for both of them.
NOBODY AT THE Pietà dared to deny Domenico when he arrived to take Marietta unchaperoned to the opera. The Maestro refused to be bothered when Sister Sylvia went rushing to him, and none of the governors was available. Marietta was dressed in a gown of smoky blue satin with a velvet domino about her shoulders. She had been to the opera twice previously when away from Venice to sing, but never in La Serenissima itself. The excitement she would normally have felt was dispelled by the cloud hanging over her. In the gondola on the way to the opera house she told Domenico she knew of the marriage contract.
He frowned with displeasure. “You should not have been informed. It was my intention to win you over myself. However, since my plans have already been thwarted I see no reason why we should not marry soon.” He took hold of her white-gloved hand and folded it sensuously into his own. “I shall court you after our wedding day, Marietta. It will be a great deal more convenient than having those nuns fluttering around all the time like the pigeons in the square.”
She had not meant to smile, but it was such an apt description. “You must admit that Sister Giaccomina was quiet enough with those books.”
“Yes, she had settled like a pigeon on a Basilica ledge.”
She smiled again in spite of herself. Those white robes did billow and fold like feathers. For the first time she considered how it would be to have freedom at last from constant chaperonage. Except that she would exchange one kind of restriction for another. “I have considered running away from you,” she admitted frankly.
He almost replied that she was not very good at escaping from Venice, but checked himself. “Why did you decide against such action, Marietta?” he questioned.
“You might have penalized the Pietà for my absence.”
He gave her a long look from under his lids. “You must have a poor opinion of me to think I would renege on benefits donated to foundlings.”
“I don’t know you. How am I to judge what you would do?”
“Few couples really know each other before they are wed. Take me on trust, Marietta.”
“It seems I shall have to, but does the ceremony have to be very soon?”
“I have already said it is pointless to delay.”
“Are you so desperate for an heir?”
He was silent for what seemed minutes instead of seconds before answering. “I am, but I also want you, Marietta.”
She swallowed and turned her eyes away from him. “Let it be a quiet wedding at Santa Maria della Pietà.”
“Whatever you wish. Order everything you need and let all the bills be sent to me. I suggest we marry six weeks from now.”
“I should like to invite Filippo and Elena Celano to our wedding as a gesture of goodwill.”
“Impossible! Filippo Celano would not come and your friendship with his wife can’t continue.”
Her glance flashed at him. “We could put the invitation to the test!”
He lowered his voice to answer her, although the shutters of the felze were closed and the gondolier, singing a serenade, could not hear their conversation. “The last friendly overture made by some minor member of my family about forty years ago resulted in bloody slaughter on both sides. Leave well enough alone, Marietta. If you should meddle in the vendetta or misguidedly try to maintain contact with Celano’s wife, you may find yourself responsible for the death of others.”
“How cruel it is!”
“Cruelty thrives in Venice! When I was a boy I often saw condemned prisoners dying in cages suspended from the Campanile. The torture chambers are less busy than they were years ago, but they have not been closed up. At times a criminal convicted of a violent crime is still slung up by his thumbs between those two deeper rose columns of the Doge’s Palace. Have you never heard their screams?”
“Don’t say any more!” She turned away and closed her eyes, but he seized her by the wrists and gave them a jerk that forced her to look at him.
“I’ve made enemies by my attempts to abolish such punishments and by exposing corruption where I have found it. So it’s not just the Celanos who would rise against me if the chance appeared. For mercy’s sake take note now, Marietta! Let things rest at present in the certain knowledge that good is being done even when all appears to be as black as night. Maybe one day everything will be as we wish, but in the meantime the Doge is an over-indulgent hedonist. He closes his eyes to too many things. Just as the city is being undermined by the sea so is decadence draining away its strength. It can survive, but a revival of its old strength and spirit is vital. I and others like me are working under cover toward that end, but secrecy has always been the lifeblood of Venice and that secrecy must be maintained.”
She was alarmed and concerned for his safety. If it meant not meeting Elena she would have to make the sacrifice. At least they could still communicate through their sign language. She would be able to give Elena support without revealing anything concerning Domenico that her friend might inadvertently mention in an enemy’s hearing.
“I shall keep your confidence always, Domenico,” she promised, using his Christian name for the first time.
“So, Marietta, we have made a new beginning, have we not?” he said with a slight smile.
“Yes we have,” she acknowledged. In a curious way, all he had just said had bound her to him more than any talk of love. She was extraordinarily pleased that he should have confided in her in that way. It made her hopeful that in the future she might be of help in the secret work he had undertaken, and he should have his heir. The most tender thing he had ever said to her was that it could be a joy for her to teach her own children to sing.
“I think this is an appropriate time to seal our betrothal with a ring, Marietta.”
He took a ring from his pocket—a magnificent emerald set thickly in gold—and slid it onto her finger. She supposed his choice of the jewel had been guided by the color of her eyes, although he did not say so.
“It is beautiful, Domenico.”
He drew her into his arms then and kissed her as passionately as before. This time he cupped her breast and through the satin felt her nipple against his
palm. He could tell that, for all the unusual circumstances, he would have a responsive lover in this woman he so desired.
They had reached the opera house and the glow of many candle-lamps shone golden on the water. The Torrisi gondolier edged his way through the crush of vessels vying to land their passengers at the steps of the entrance. It was a grand assemblage in silks and satins, the women’s coiffures trimmed with plumes and flowers and ribbons.
In the Torrisi box, which was in the third tier of six rising up in a great horseshoe, Marietta had a wide view of the stage and the whole animated scene. Fans fluttered, quizzing glasses winked, and people thronged about, greeting friends and acknowledging the bows of those too far away to be spoken to directly. Each box was hung with crimson drapery, and the candle-glow and the radiant jewels within made each one a little golden cave within the greater cave of the auditorium itself.
Marietta had surrendered herself completely to excitement. Her eyes sparkled as she glanced here and there. This was the largest of the six opera houses in Venice and she thought it a perfect venue for her first visit.
“I’m so glad you brought me here,” she said enthusiastically to Domenico. “I have never been to the opera in Venice before.”
“Have you not?” He was noticing that their box was receiving a lot of attention, because she was being recognized on all sides, but Marietta was still unaware of it. It was as well that he had ordered the footman outside the door to allow no entry to anyone except Antonio, whom he expected later. There would be time enough for friends and acquaintances to meet her after the marriage.
Venetian Mask Page 21
