“—don’t know how much to tip the gondoliers—”
“—looking for the nearest currency exchange—”
“—were here back in ’48, not long after the war—”
I scanned the crowd, looking for the Hollises. Mr. Hollis was a tall man, although a bit stooped; still, the top of his head should be visible—unless, of course, he and his wife had arrived early enough to snag one of the little tables. I squeezed through the crowd, muttering apologies to the people I unavoidably jostled, until at last I caught a glimpse of them seated at a table very close to the one where Markos and I had sat. I started to make my way toward them, but at that moment another announcement came from the intercom, and although this one was no clearer than the previous ones had been, someone must have understood something. In the manner peculiar to crowds, everyone in the place surged to their feet as one, and began moving toward the entrance. I was swept along with them, trying to keep Mr. Hollis’s head of thick wavy salt-and-pepper hair in view. We moved down the passage to the midships staircase and flowed down the steps, where a bottleneck formed as we reached the open hatchway that crossed the gangplank. I managed to squeeze past an elderly lady without knocking her down, and a couple who stopped in their tracks to snap photos, but my efforts were futile. By the time I stepped off the gangplank, the Hollises were already being bundled into one of the launches that would convey passengers to the Piazza San Marco.
I thought of my promise to Markos, and glanced about. There were a few people I was on nodding terms with—the couple who’d won the dance competition, and a pair of elderly women I recognized from the lifeboat drill on our first day at sea—but no one I felt I knew well enough to invite myself along with their party; I remembered how Sylvia Duprée had latched onto us in Rome, and didn’t want to be guilty of doing the same thing to someone else. The thought of Sylvia not unnaturally reminded me of her fate, and made me all the more determined to find the Hollises. Frustrating as it was, my best course of action was to wait in line for a launch and try to catch up with them at the Piazza.
This, as it turned out, was easier said than done. Three more launches filled and departed before I reached the front of the line and clambered aboard. At last we drew up alongside the Piazza, and I forgot my dilemma long enough to be charmed by the long black gondolas bobbing on the water between barbershop-striped poles, and the twin columns framing the Piazzetta, one topped with a statue of St. Theodore and his dragon (which looked remarkably like a crocodile) and the other with the winged Lion of St. Mark. I left the launch and wandered about the Piazzetta, searching for some sign of the Hollises as I passed booths selling everything from postcards to elaborate Carnival masks adorned with sequins and feathers. I wouldn’t mind buying a mask or two later—besides making lovely wall decorations, they might be useful teaching aids when my classes read “The Masque of the Red Death”—but for now I had a more urgent task at hand. Unfortunately, the Piazzetta was even more crowded than the ship had been, and after half an hour of crisscrossing the square looking for them, I was forced to admit that they weren’t there. My hasty breakfast had long since worn off by this time, and I located a charming little osteria, where I parted with far too many of my carefully hoarded lire for a Caprese salad, a glass of the house wine, and an umbrella-shaded table on the Piazza where I might keep a weather eye out for the Hollises while I ate.
By the time I’d finished, I still had seen no sign of them. Where could they possibly be? I decided the domed and multi-spired Basilica San Marco might be a likely possibility; besides being hard to miss, dominating the eastern perimeter of the Piazza as it did, it was just the sort of thing Mrs. Hollis might want to photograph in order to share with her friends. I stood in line and bought a ticket, and stood in yet another line to gain admission. While I waited, I decided to take a few photos of my own; it would be a pity to spend a day in Venice and be blind to anything but the back of Mr. Hollis’s head. I snapped a shot of the basilica’s western façade, and a couple more of the four bronze horses mounted on the loggia overlooking the Piazza. Here was another representation of the Lion of St. Mark, this time a mosaic showing the winged creature holding an open book with one paw. It occurred to me that he and his twentieth-century namesake had something in common: Markos was apparently no stranger to books himself, but he could be bold when the occasion warranted—and he would certainly do some roaring of his own if he discovered I was wandering around Venice on my own when I’d promised him I wouldn’t.
“I’m trying, I’m trying,” I muttered aloud, eliciting a funny look from the young man, apparently a college student, in front of me.
Once inside, I gazed about the cavernous space, my search for the Hollises momentarily forgotten. The interior was built on a Greek cross design, and the upper walls and bowl of the dome were covered with colorful mosaics and lavishly adorned with gold. I snapped a few more photos and then resumed my search for Mr. and Mrs. Hollis, the soles of my shoes clicking loudly on the tessellated marble floor. My shoes were not the only sounds that echoed in the vast room; voices did as well, and my heart leaped as I caught a snatch of a deep voice speaking in a Midwestern twang. I couldn’t understand any words, but I set out at once in the direction of the sound. I located the speaker, but it wasn’t Mr. Hollis. Instead, the college student who had stood in front of me in the line had been joined by three friends, all with knapsacks slung from their shoulders and all engaged in lively debate over where they should go for dinner. Upon seeing me, one of them smiled appreciatively in a way that might have been highly gratifying, had I been in a mood for flirtation. Instead, I mumbled an apology (although I wasn’t quite sure what I was apologizing for) and turned away. I gave the presbytery and the treasury each a quick look and even climbed the stairs to the loggia, thinking Mr. Hollis, being a farmer, might be interested in giving the bronze horses a closer look, but saw no sign there of either him or his wife.
Discouraged, I retraced my steps down the stairs and exited the basilica. What next? I wondered as I scanned the square. The Doge’s Palace was the next most likely place, I decided, so I bought another ticket and stood in another line. At any other time, I would have been delighted to discover what lay beyond the pink and cream façade with its arcade and delicately arched loggia, but I was too aware of the fact that my time was running out; if I couldn’t locate the Hollises soon, I would have no choice but to return to the ship. I wouldn’t want to be alone in Venice after dark, even without the threat of Devos hanging over my head.
And then, just as I reached the front of the line and entered the palace, the bells of the many campanili across the city began to toll. I’d been hearing them at intervals all day, but for the first time it occurred to me to wonder just how long I’d been searching. I checked my watch, and was shocked to discover that the afternoon was already far advanced. Determined to speed up my search, I did little more than stick my head into each chamber, looking in vain for a glimpse of Mr. or Mrs. Hollis before moving on to the next room.
The place was so vast that I wondered more than once if I were simply going around in circles. Then, without knowing exactly how I’d gotten there, I found myself on the famous bridge dubbed by the ubiquitous Lord Byron as the “Bridge of Sighs.” Made of white limestone and completely enclosed save for two stone-latticed windows on each side, it connected the Doge’s palace to the prison on the opposite side of the canal. The “sighs” were supposedly the reaction of convicted prisoners getting their last glimpse of the outside world as they were taken to their cells. Instinctively, I crossed to the nearest window and looked out through the latticework just in time to see a gondolier in traditional striped shirt and straw hat steering his sleek black craft beneath the bridge—a craft bearing a beaming Mrs. Hollis and her husband, who gave her a quick peck on the cheek as they disappeared from view.
I didn’t hesitate. I turned and retraced my steps as quickly as I could, glancing into chambers occasionally to make sure they were the same ones I
’d passed on my way in. The palace was enormous, and my wrong turns were just frequent enough that it was some time before I finally emerged onto the sunlit Piazza. I hurried toward the edge of the lagoon, startling a flock of pigeons strutting about the square in search of handouts, and reached the place where tourists waited in line for gondola rides. I stood there for a quarter of an hour watching for the Hollis’s gondola to return. Surely it shouldn’t take this long; the Bridge of Sighs wasn’t far from this spot at all. I waited another ten minutes, but there was still no sign of them. Clearly, they had returned while I’d been lost in the maze of the Doge’s Palace. They were gone, and I’d lost my last, best chance of catching up with them. With a sinking heart, I turned away, prepared to catch the next launch back to the ship.
On the other hand ...
I glanced back at the line of tourists waiting for gondola rides. The sun was low in the sky by this time, casting the twin columns of the Piazzetta into stark silhouette and turning the curved bronze prow ornaments of the gondolas to gold. It would be a pity to leave Venice without ever having had the ultimate Venetian experience. I’d been here all day, searching in vain for the Hollises; surely if Devos were anywhere nearby, I would have seen him. And even if he did happen to be lurking about, he couldn’t get anywhere near me if I were on a gondola in the middle of a canal ...
I wasn’t even aware of having made up my mind, but suddenly I found myself counting out my lire into the gondolier’s outstretched hand and stepping off the pier and into the long, graceful craft. It bobbed crazily beneath my weight, and I collapsed, not so gracefully, onto one of the two red velvet upholstered seats in the middle of the boat. The gondolier took up his position on a platform at the stern, from which point he plied his long oar. Soon we had left the lagoon behind and headed up one of the canals.
“This is the Rio di Palazzo,” the gondolier informed me in lilting English. “See the enclosed bridge ahead of us? That is the Ponte dei Sospiri, the Bridge of Sighs.”
He went on to recount its history—some of which I already knew, but I couldn’t deny it sounded much more romantic when he said it than it had when I’d read it in the guide book. We passed beneath the high arch that formed the bottom of the bridge and made our way further up the canal, my gondolier pointing out sites of interest along the way while I returned the friendly waves of passengers in the gondolas we met coming back from the other direction. As we left the popular tourist sites behind, the gondola traffic grew thinner, the canals narrower, and the elegant pedestrian bridges that spanned them smaller, sometimes so low that my gondolier had to duck as we passed beneath them. The buildings close along each side blocked out most of the sunlight that remained, casting us into an early twilight and creating so romantic a mood that I began to wish for Markos for reasons entirely unrelated to safety or smuggling.
“The signorina would like a song, yes?” offered the gondolier, apparently sensing my mood.
“I would love it,” I assured him, and he obliged by launching his very fine tenor into a poignant melody in a minor key.
It was quiet along these backwaters; the noise of tourists had faded to the point where there was nothing to compete with the melancholy song of my gondolier except the lapping of water along the walls of the buildings that clung to the canal on each side. Some of them had back exits with tiny private jetties where a small motorboat was tied; others had doors that opened directly onto the canal, with only a couple of moss-covered steps between the floor and the water. Baskets of colorful flowers hung from some of the windows overhead, while others were tightly shuttered, their secrets locked away inside. All had an air of elegant decay, with paint in shades of cream or pink or terra cotta peeling from the plastered walls.
Then my gondolier turned a tight corner, and I saw up ahead a crush of boats pulling up to a dock that formed one side of a paved square. Several dozen people milled about, all wearing elaborate masks similar to the ones I’d seen for sale in booths along the Piazza, and all dressed in clothing more suited to 1761 than 1961. The women’s hair was piled high on their heads and coated with a thick layer of white powder, and their dresses had wide, panniered skirts of satin brocade, with foaming lace cascading from the elbow-length sleeves. The men wore gold-laced swallow-tailed coats, silk stockings, and breeches with knots of ribbon at the knees. Their hair was powdered as well, or perhaps they wore wigs, as no one but a beatnik would wear his hair so long—and anyone further from a beatnik than these elegant “macaronis” would have been hard to imagine. It was almost as if I had stepped back two hundred years in time, and I was utterly captivated, if a little confused.
“It isn’t Carnival, is it?” I asked, turning to address my gondolier. “I thought that was earlier in the year.”
“The signorina is correct,” he assured me. “Carnival marks the last chance for revelry before the beginning of Lent, so it usually falls in February, or perhaps late January. But the wearing of masks is such a great part of Venetian history that private masquerade parties are popular any time of year. This is very likely such a party. But all these boats, they block the canal, sì? I know another way that will be, what do you say, a cut of a shortness.”
“A shortcut,” I said, suppressing a smile. His excellent English, contrasting with a rather charming failure to grasp colloquial speech, reminded me a bit of Markos. The thought of Markos was enough to make my smile fade, as I wondered what, if anything, would happen to us after Maggie and I disembarked in the morning for the last time. Meanwhile, I had to make sure my bags were packed by the time I went to bed tonight, so it was just as well that the gondolier steered us around the crush of boats and turned into another, still narrower, canal. We had gone a short distance along this canal when it opened onto another small square, this one lined with what appeared to be shops catering to the locals rather than the tourist trade. And in front of one shop window, with their backs facing the canal, stood a tall yet stooped man with thick wavy salt-and-pepper hair, and a woman wearing a flowered cotton dress and sensible shoes.
“Stop!” I cried, startling my gondolier. “That is, you can let me off here, if you don’t mind. I was separated from my traveling companions earlier today, and it looks like I’ve found them at last.” Seeing he was torn as to whether or not to obey this request, I added, “I know this isn’t one of your usual stops, but if you’ll make an exception for me, I would be so grateful.” I gave him what I hoped was a charming smile, and made a subtle gesture in the direction of my handbag to make it clear to him just what form my gratitude would take.
He didn’t hesitate. He plied his long oar, and the gondola came smoothly to rest against the steps that formed one side of the square. He offered his hand to assist me out of the vessel, and I took it. I stepped up onto the square, and when I released his hand, I didn’t leave it empty. He thanked me profusely, wished me a “Buonasera,” and rowed his way back out into the canal. I gave him a little farewell wave, then joined the couple looking into the window of what I now saw was a shoe store.
“I’m so glad to find you at last!” I told the Hollises. “I’ve been looking all over for you.”
The couple turned to me with friendly yet puzzled smiles, and I found myself looking into the faces of two strangers.
“Oh! I—I beg your pardon. I thought—” I could tell by the courteous yet blank expressions on their faces that they couldn’t understand a word I was saying. I shrugged my shoulders and raised my hands in the universal gesture of helplessness. “Mille pardons,” I said, hoping my schoolroom French would express the same sentiment in Italian.
They smiled and nodded, then turned back to the store window. Clearly, there were no hard feelings, and yet now I was left with the task of finding my way back, on foot, to the place where I could catch the launch back to the ship—no easy task even if I knew where I was. Which I didn’t. I thought of asking the Italian couple for directions, but rejected the idea; even if I could communicate the question in a way they could compreh
end, it was unlikely that I would understand the answer they gave me. I looked up at the deepening shadows cast across the canal by the buildings hugging its sides, and was able to determine by their direction which way was west. The lagoon, I knew, formed the southern edge of the Piazzetta, so if I could just work my way southward, I should come upon it eventually.
Fortunately for me, not every street in Venice was a canal, as I’d always believed. The major thoroughfares certainly were, and not a few of the minor ones. But there were also narrow pedestrian passageways—some of which crossed the canals at intervals, which explained the graceful little bridges spanning them. I chose one of the walkways that seemed to head south, and set out on foot.
I don’t know what made me suspect I was being followed, or what made me look over my shoulder. But at some point I glanced behind me, and saw a figure dressed in a long black cloak and black tricorn hat, a figure whose face was covered with the long-beaked white mask of the medieval plague doctors. One of the masqueraders, I told myself, who was either leaving the party early or who had gotten lost trying to find it. There was no reason for me to panic, or to think of Markos’s warnings about Devos. Still, something about that bizarre face that was no face made me walk a bit faster. I turned right, away from the canal, and had gone perhaps half a block when I looked over my shoulder again. The figure was still there. Probably an ardent young Italian man in search of a flirtation, I told myself with increasing desperation; after all, my bottom had been pinched more than once during our stops in Florence and Rome by too-aggressive Latin lovers. Still, I cut back to the left, trying to lose my unwanted admirer without losing my bearings completely. After all, it would be dark soon, and I would no longer have the shadows to judge direction by.
Moon over the Mediterranean Page 19
