Stone's Fall

by Iain Pears

  “They weren’t the only ones,” he answered, anxious to allay my suspicions. “Over the next few weeks I saw him more and more often. He is following me. Everywhere I go.”

  His voice was becoming more high-pitched and hysterical, so I endeavoured to calm him.

  “He offers you no injury? Does not threaten you? From your description he could do no harm even if he wanted.”

  “No. In that respect he does me no harm.”

  “Has he ever spoken to you?”

  “Once. Once only. I saw him in a crowd last week as I was walking home from work. He was coming towards me and nodded in greeting as I approached. I could take it no more, so I tried to grab him by the arm to stop him. But I could not. I reached out for his arm, but it was as though it wasn’t there. Almost as if my hand passed right through him. He kept on walking, and I called out to him, ‘Who are you?’

  “He stopped, and turned round, and answered in English, as I had spoken to him. ‘I am Venice,’ he said. That was all. Then he hurried off again and in a few seconds was lost to sight.”

  “He was Italian?”

  “He spoke in Venetian. But you see? He is following me, for some purpose of his own. Why else would he say such a thing? Who can he be? Why is he doing this to me? I feel I am going mad, Mr. Stone.”

  The panic was back, rising higher in his voice. I gripped his arm tightly, trying to inflict pain on him to bring him back to his senses before he lost control. I dared not say that I considered it more likely that this encounter was yet another hallucination, that he should seek medical advice before it turned into a full hysteria. But neither did I mention my own vision; I do not know why. I think that I was slightly revolted by his show of weakness. I saw myself as a man of strength and rationality, and wished to keep my distance.

  “Calm, my friend, calm,” I said gently, still gripping tightly. Slowly he relaxed, and obeyed. Then I realised he was shaking with sobs, as his efforts at self-control, at manly dignity, crumbled. I could say nothing; I was deeply embarrassed by the spectacle. It was undignified, we were in a public place and I hardly knew the man. My better self said that Cort must be in dreadful straits to so unburden himself to me; the rest of me wished fervently he had not.

  “I am most dreadfully sorry,” he said eventually when he regained control of himself. “This has been a nightmare, and I do not know where to turn.”

  “And what does your wife think?”

  “Oh, I don’t want to bother Louise,” he said hesitantly. “Poor thing, she has so much to concern herself with, what with Henry being so small. Besides…”

  He didn’t finish, but lapsed into a moody silence instead.

  “Forgive me for asking,” I said as delicately as I could. “But are you certain this man is real?”

  “You think I am imagining it?” He was not angry at my question. “Believe me, I have considered it. Am I going mad? Is this man a figment of my imagination? Of course, I wonder. I almost hope he is; then at least I could go to Marangoni and he could do… whatever such people do with the insane. But his feet make a distinct sound on the pavements. He speaks and smiles. He smells, a very distinct smell, like an old cupboard that hasn’t been opened for years, slightly damp, musty.”

  “But you failed to touch him, you said.”

  He nodded. “But I felt his breath on me as he spoke. He was as real to me as you are now.”

  He gripped my arm as if to reassure himself on that point.

  “I do not know what to say,” I answered. “If this man exists, we must accost him and make him answer questions. If not…”

  “Then I am insane.”

  “There you go beyond my knowledge. I am a practical man. I will assume for the time being that you are not about to foam at the mouth.”

  He laughed for the first time since dinner. “That is good of you,” he said. “And can I rely on you…”

  “Not to say a word to anyone? I give you my word. I assume you have said nothing of this to anyone else?”

  “Who could I tell?”

  We had reached his lodging, a grim, tumbledown place in what I later learned had been the Ghetto, where the Jews of Venice had been corralled by the city until Napoleon liberated them. Whatever good that new freedom might have done the Jews, it had little benefited that part of town, which was as malodorous and depressing as any grim industrial town of England. Worse, I should say, for the buildings were rank and collapsing, a positive rabbit warren of tiny little rooms where once thousands had been crammed in, exposed to every unhealthy miasma that huge numbers and unsanitary conditions might create. Cort lived here because it was cheap; I could well imagine it. I would have insisted on hefty payment even to enter his building. It seems that his uncle (though dutiful in the matter of his upbringing and training) was known for a certain parsimony that came from the belief that pleasure was offensive to God. Cort was therefore kept on a tight leash, and had barely enough to house his family as well as live and eat, although their conditions were poor. His lodging was a necessary economy to put aside some small surplus for diversion.

  He saw my look as we stopped by his doorway. “I do not live in luxury,” he said apologetically. “But my neighbours are good people, and even poorer than I. In contrast to them I am nobilissimi.”

  It would not have served me. But his remarks reminded me that I had engaged to visit Longman’s Marchesa. I asked Cort about her. “A charming woman,” he said. “By all means go; she is worth meeting. Louise knows her and speaks highly of her; they have become quite close.”

  He gave me the address and then shook my hand. “My apologies for the display, and my thanks for the company,” he said.

  I told him to think nothing of it, and turned to walk back to the hotel. Cort and his troubles were wafted away on the night air almost before he was out of sight.

  CHAPTER 6

  By six the next evening I was established in my new accommodation, the Palazzo Bollani on the rio di San Trovaso in Dorsoduro, and the property of the Marchesa d’Arpagno. I had sent my card at ten that morning and was instantly ushered in to see her. In my mind’s eye I had seen an old lady, decorously dressed with the signs of departed beauty all about her. A little stout, perhaps, but in diminished circumstances, dreaming perpetually of the glitter of youth. A pleasing, if melancholy, vision, which lasted until the moment I entered the salon.

  She was quite ugly, but strikingly so. In her late forties, I guessed from the fine lines that could just be seen beneath the thick powder around her eyes and mouth; tall and imperial in manner, with a long nose, black hair which was plainly dyed hanging down her back in a thick plait. She was wearing a dress with an overskirt in white satin trimmed with green, which was far too fashionable for one of her age. Around her neck was a necklace of emeralds that drew attention to her extraordinary eyes, which were of exactly the same hue. On her bony fingers were several excessively large rings, and she wore a perfume so strong and over powering that even now, more than forty years later, I can still smell it.

  It is not often that I am lost for words, but the contrast between expectation and reality in this case was so strong that I couldn’t find anything to say at all.

  “I hope you do not mind speaking in French,” said the lady as she approached. “My English is terrible, and I imagine that your Venetian is worse. Unless you prefer German.”

  She had a harsh voice, and the slight smile she gave as she spoke was grotesque in its girlishness. I replied that I could manage French, and quietly thanked my mother for having had the wisdom, all those years ago, to engage a French governess for me and my siblings. They could not afford much at the time and, with governesses, you get what you pay for—in this case a lazy, coarse wretch. But she spoke French and, once inside our home, was dislodged only with difficulty. She stayed long enough to teach me the language, although far too much of its nether reaches and not very much of its higher flights. Only with Elizabeth did I ever properly master it; she is one of those anno
ying people who pick up languages quickly, by merely listening. I have to study hard, but Elizabeth has always preferred French to English. So study I did, to please her.

  The Marchesa sat down, indicating that I could do the same, offered coffee, and fell silent, looking at me with a faint smile.

  “I understand from Mr. Longman that you occasionally consider allowing people to stay in your house,” I began a little hesitatingly. That was why I was there, and the subject would have to come up sooner or later.

  “That is true. Maria will take you to see the rooms a little later, if I decide I can bear to have you under my roof.”

  “Ah.”

  “I do not do this for money, you understand.”

  “Quite, quite.”

  “But I find it interesting to have people around me. The Venetians are such bores, they drive me to distraction.”

  “You are not Venetian yourself?”

  “No.”

  She offered no more information and, much as I would have liked to, I felt unable to continue the questioning.

  She was not an easy conversationalist. Rather, she was one of those who command through silence, contributing little, but looking with a faint smile that affected her mouth more than her eyes, summoning the other on to fill the void.

  So I told her of my journey around Italy, my current stay in the Hotel Europa, my decision to stay and my desire for slightly more comfortable accommodation.

  “I see. You leave out much in your account, I think.”

  I was astonished by the remark. “I don’t believe so.”

  No response to that one either. I sipped my coffee, and she sat quietly, watching me.

  “And how do you find Venice, Mr. Stone?”

  I replied that I found it perfectly agreeable, so far, although I had seen little.

  “And you have done as everyone does here, and hired a gondola to think sad thoughts in?”

  “Not yet.”

  “You surprise me. Are you not disappointed in love? Recovering from a broken heart? That is why people come here, for the most part. They find the city a perfect place to indulge in self-pity.”

  A sudden sharpness in her tone, all the more strange for being so unexpected. I looked at her curiously, but could see nothing in her face. She had said it as a matter of fact, an observation only, perhaps.

  “Not in my case, madam,” I replied. “I am perfectly unencumbered.” If she desired to make me ill at ease and put me on the defensive, then she was succeeding. I was not used to such conversations. She saw that and was enjoying my discomfort, which made me fight back.

  “Then you are here to have your heart broken. You will become like the others.”

  “What others?”

  “Those who cannot leave. There are many here. The city traps the weak and never lets them go. Be careful if you stay here for long.”

  I shook my head. I had no idea what she was talking about.

  “Foreigners, especially from northern countries, make a mistake when they come here. They do not take Venice seriously. They come from their lands full of machinery and money, and feel pity for it. They think it is a harmless relic of the past, once glorious, now beyond hope. They walk and admire, but never rid themselves of a feeling of contempt and superiority. You are the masters now, no?”

  Again, I said nothing.

  “And Venice waits, bides its time. Most come, and see, and go away again. But the weak are its prey. It sucks the life out of them, bit by bit. Robs them of their will, their autonomy. They stay, they stay a little longer and then they cannot even imagine leaving. Their life has had its purpose removed, they become mere shadows, walking the streets, eating at the same place every day, walking the same routes every day, for what reason they cannot recall. This is a dangerous place, Mr. Stone; it is cursed. Beware of it. It is alive, and its spirit feeds on the weak and unwary.”

  “I think it unlikely that this is to be my fate.”

  She laughed softly. A beguiling laugh, but disturbing in the context of her words, which had nothing humorous about them. “Perhaps not. But you came for a few days, and now you are taking an apartment for a longer stay. I sense you are searching for something, Mr. Stone, although I do not know what it is. Nor do you, I think. But be careful: you will only find sadness here. I feel that in you; you thrive in adversity. You think yourself strong, but your weakest place is your heart. One day it will destroy you. You know that, do you not?”

  This melodrama completely reduced me to silence. Obviously she was trying to fascinate me, put me off balance, and, if you wish, dominate the conversation by the bizarre nature of her words. And, equally obviously, she was succeeding. I felt an air of foreboding descend over me, and realised it was the same feeling I had experienced the day before. The feeling of sadness as I walked the streets, the sense of the inexplicable I had had that first night watching the palazzo, these were all part of the same sentiment that she had expressed in words. The desire to taste the recklessness of extreme emotions, throw off the usual cautious, careful way of life I had developed for myself. That was why I had left England, was it not? Why I had roamed Italy for three months, in search of precisely that? But had not yet found it. I caught myself, at that very moment, thinking of my brief introduction to Mrs. Cort, the way her eyes had met mine.

  It was mere absurdity, a combination of the light and the tiredness, the strangeness of the surroundings, the water. Quite soothing and relaxing in its way, all the more so because it was so foreign to my normal life. I looked up at the Marchesa and smiled. Almost grinned. It was a challenge to her. Silently countering that I was not be fooled by her words, try as she might. I was a tougher nut than a man like Cort.

  She smiled back, accepting the challenge, and clapped her hands.

  “Maria!” she called out. “Please show Mr. Stone the apartment.”

  “So you can bear to have me in your house? I am flattered,” I said.

  “You should be. But you have the aura of an honest man, a good man,” she replied seriously.

  “I beg your pardon?”

  “Your aura. It radiates around you, revealing the nature of the spirit which animates the machinery of your body. Yours is gentle, blue and yellow. You are divided in spirit, between the desire for peace and for adventure. For power and for tranquillity. You desire much, but I feel that you have a sense of fairness. You are divided between the masculine and the feminine, but in you the attributes are wrongly apportioned. It is your feminine which is adventurous, the masculine which desires peace. You will have trouble reconciling these, Mr. Stone, but they make you interesting.”

  She gave the distinct impression that she wanted me in her house so she could study me, like some grotesque entomologist, but she nonetheless had described the battle between my fiery mother and my peaceable father remarkably well. Disconcertingly so, and she saw that I was impressed despite the fact that she was talking nonsense.

  The business of packing was delayed by an encounter I had in the hotel on my return. As I walked into the lobby and asked for my key, I noticed a small man get up from his chair, and come towards me.

  “My dear Stone!” this person said in a thick Italian accent as he grabbed me by the hand and pulled me round to face him. “I hardly expected it to be true! Remarkable! I’m so pleased to see you!”

  I looked at him blankly for a moment, then it dawned on me who he was. I believe I mentioned that, several years previously, I had tried my hand at dissipation. I am not ashamed of this period of my life, I believe it is inevitable in young men whose energies are not wasted by manual labour, and, as I say, I found that the pleasures of such a life faded quickly and have never returned. I have not spent my older years wondering what it would have been like to have done certain things, nor did I have any temptation in middle age to try and recapture my youth and thus make myself into a laughingstock.

  During that period, I made the acquaintance of a group of young men: some were the useless sprigs of nobility we
ll on their way to illness and early death from excess (thus weakening a class of society and fending off the likelihood of revolution, for why trouble to overthrow people who are doing such a good job of rendering themselves powerless ?); some were simple idlers spending an inheritance pretending to be poets or painters; and a couple were medical students, who had a wildness of such severity that I would hesitate ever to place myself under their care. One of these, however, is now a personal physician to His Majesty, which goes to show that even the greatest sinners are capable of redemption. Of the others, one became a high court judge and one shot himself in the aftermath of the Dunbury scandal, a foolishly conceived scheme to dun the public by proposing vast profits from a railway built across a two-hundred-mile swamp in Russia. My friend, a man for whom I continued to have affection to the end, went vastly into debt to buy shares in the hope of recovering a dire financial situation, and was ruined.

  The man who now greeted me was one of the medical students. I never paid him much attention and never even knew his name—something foreign, I knew, but everyone always called him Joe, a nickname more insulting than friendly, for it assumed an informality more suited to a pet or native bearer than an equal.

  Joe—or Dottore Giuseppe Marangoni, as he was now called—had changed over the past few years, that was clear. Previously he had had the sort of personality that could lead you to overlook him entirely; one of those who waited to be spoken to, and appeared grateful to be included in any conversation. Only his eyes suggested there might be something more to him, for he was always watching, always interested. For what purpose never seemed clear.

  And this was the person now beaming at me and shaking my hand, leading me to a table in the corner for a chat. It is disconcerting to encounter someone once known but not seen for several years. At that stage the shock was limited, but still real. Now it is positively a heartache to meet a person I have not seen for thirty or forty years, to see the thinning hair, the stoop, the lines when you expect (no matter how much your realise it cannot be so) the person to look exactly as they did when last seen. And to realise they are as shocked by your appearance as you by theirs.