The Orphan's Song

by Lauren Kate

  When it was not ready by Easter, he felt anxious about disappointing Ana. She had invested so much in him. Her happiness was increasingly essential to his own.

  Was this love?

  She was generous, gave him things he didn’t know he wanted. In return she made her expectations clear. There were many, but they were reasonable, and most had to do with his work. He was to be frugal with his expenses. He was to honor the relationships her family had established with the other merchants on the calle. He was not to take his earnings to a tavern. Between the two of them, in the little bedroom they shared at night, with Sprezz, life was easy. They could please each other so simply. They could fall asleep fast in each other’s arms.

  Every day he grew more confident in his work, his blade quicker at the wood, his fingers steadier at fine-tuning the strings. His prototype looked finished, but it still did not approach his first violin.

  He sat at the table for two days, staring down at the instrument, mystified. He walked the streets with Sprezz. He avoided Ana’s probing questions about opening the shop. He snuck into a tavern. He ordered a drink, and then another, feeling guilty but in need of the jolt. He let his mind travel back to repairing his first violin.

  Before that carnevale afternoon. Before he’d bought the masks and found the golden ring between cobblestones. Before he’d kissed her for an instant in the apartment.

  Back to when he was just agreeing to the terms of his work at the squero. For a year before his full apprenticeship began, Mino had volunteered his time at the boatyard one afternoon a week. He was given small tasks, mostly hauling materials to and from the workshops. He watched old men sawing wood for gondolas, waiting for them to break for supper so that he could devote himself to that broken instrument.

  Mino remembered varnishing it, but now he wondered why he would have done it. The violin would have already been varnished. Then he remembered the plague of worms that had swept through the squero’s store of wood. He remembered being tasked with dousing the shipbuilding oak and fir and elm with a potent, protective brine. When no one was looking, he had submerged the violin in the brine as well. He would not surrender his most prized possession to worms.

  The violin had sounded different ever after.

  Now, in the tavern in Cannaregio, Mino paid his bill and raced back to Ana’s apartment.

  “Mino!” Ana sounded shocked when she found the prototype in pieces once again.

  But he was heating canal water over the hearth, too consumed with his work to answer.

  * * *

  BY THE BEGINNING of April, two weeks after Easter, Mino was ready to open. Ana wore her best dress and had ordered a new light blue suit for Mino. She brewed tea, brought in oranges and dry sausages on a tray as Mino counted the minutes until his first appointment. Stella was sending her friend Elizabeth and her husband, John, from the opera house in London.

  At eleven o’clock, the three of them entered in a whirlwind of high voices and blond hair, flitting about the shop as Ana showed off Mino’s prototype.

  “The angle of the neck is his signature,” Ana said, running her fingers down the instrument’s body. They had agreed to let customers know about the neck but not the brining; Mino wished to keep his greatest innovation still a secret. “Notice how high it is. It produces a stronger, far more brilliant sound than the traditional shape.”

  “What we need is repair,” John said. “We have half a dozen violins in need of attention.”

  Mino was watching Elizabeth, remembering the rumor that she knew every musician in Venice. He stayed close to her as Ana poured tea and led John to a chair, suggesting prices that made the man shift uncomfortably in his seat.

  “Your wife is good at this,” Elizabeth said to Mino.

  He flushed, and Elizabeth raised her chin slightly, understanding his embarrassment. “Never mind, Mino. You can marry anytime, or not at all. This is Venice, isn’t it?”

  “Yes,” Mino said. The idea of marrying anyone but Letta still surprised him sometimes.

  “Hmm . . .” Elizabeth smiled and picked up his violin from its stand near the window. She held it expertly and drew the bow across the strings, drawing out a beautiful, trembling C minor. “Wonderful!”

  It struck Mino that Elizabeth had played the opening chord of his mother’s song. He thought of what Ana had said about the plaque being a talisman. The British woman’s candor set him at ease.

  “May I ask you something?” he said.

  When Elizabeth set down the violin, Mino pulled out the half token. “Maybe you saw this outside.”

  She nodded. “It’s very pretty.”

  “My mother left it for me. She was a singer, I think, and I . . .”

  “You were hoping I would know her,” Elizabeth said kindly. “I am sorry.”

  “Excuse me.” Mino put his token away, wishing he had never shown it. He had ruined his first appointment with this personal request. He felt ashamed, watching Ana smoothly serving the tea to John.

  “What if Mino made us new violins, John?” Elizabeth called across the shop. “He might spend as much time repairing your old, decrepit instruments as building an orchestra from scratch.”

  “That’s a huge commission, darling,” John said. “The man has just opened shop today. Give him a moment to catch his breath.”

  “Didn’t you hear the way it played? If we give him a moment, he’ll be booked for years.”

  John looked at Mino and laughed. “In all of Europe are there two women with stronger convictions than ours?”

  Mino pushed Letta from his mind.

  “I’ll do it,” he said.

  “In that case, we’ll need champagne.” Ana grinned at him.

  When Mino returned with the bottle, he was still trying to reconcile his gloom over the token with his pleasure over the commission. Ana worked out the financial details with John while Mino popped the cork and filled the glasses. Everyone drank heartily but Ana, who tasted hers and returned to her accounting. Mino wished she would give in to the moment a little more.

  At the door, Elizabeth kissed his cheek in parting. “I hope you find her, Mino.”

  When the English couple left, Ana caught him by the wrist, concerned. “What’s wrong with you?”

  Was it his mother? Was it Ana? He didn’t know, and so he told her, “I wish they were Venetian. I don’t like to think about my violins traveling to England, somewhere I’ll never see.”

  “Mino, this is only the beginning. And an incredible one! We must thank Stella.” She looked up at him tenderly and kissed him. “There will be many more violins.”

  He nodded, but something nagged at him.

  “I’m off to help Mamma,” she said. “I’ll be back at closing time.”

  With Ana gone next door, it puzzled Mino that he had the next year of his life sorted. He glanced around the storage room, where he would now be every day. He felt immense gratitude, but then something else, something stifling that he didn’t want to look at too closely for fear of what he might discover.

  * * *

  TWO WEEKS LATER, as Mino was measuring the cut he would make to the ribs of the first violin, the shop door opened. When he looked up from his worktable, his chest constricted. The prioress of the Incurables and Laura stood in the middle of his store.

  “Mino?” the prioress said, seeming as struck as he was by their meeting. She rushed forward to embrace him and held him close. Mino could not move. Over her shoulder he saw Laura studying him.

  Was Letta nearby? Waiting outside? What would Mino do if she stepped through his door? Would he fall to dust?

  “What are you doing here?” he asked, his voice a whisper.

  “We’ve just come from auditioning a trumpeter at San Apostoli,” Laura explained. For parts like the trumpet, deemed unsuitable for women players, the ospedali commissioned external musicians to
play with the coro.

  “He’s good,” Mino said. Ana loved the trumpeter at San Apostoli, though Mino had always preferred strings over brass.

  “We heard about a new shop in this neighborhood,” the prioress said, “but I never dreamed we’d find you.” At last she released him, keeping his hands in hers. “Look at you. How marvelous. But—what about the squero?”

  He shook his head. “Things changed.”

  The prioress looked stunned, her mind working as she glanced back out the window. “I recognized the painting outside but wasn’t sure why. Now, of course, I remember.”

  “My mother—”

  “Your half token—”

  “I’m still looking for her.” Mino found himself looking at Laura. They did not know each other. They had never spoken in the thirteen years they’d both been at the Incurables. But Letta used to talk about Laura. Mino was surprised to feel Laura looking at him pointedly. What would Letta have told her?

  “Did you make this?” Laura asked, approaching his prototype. “The bridge is so unusual.”

  Mino moved to her side, placed the instrument in her hands. “Please.”

  She began to play a measure. He closed his eyes, aching to hear the old sacred music again. Ana and Mino went to church in their sestieri on Sundays, but the music was nothing compared to that at the Incurables.

  “It’s remarkable,” Laura breathed when she was finished. “I’d love to hear how it sounds in the church.”

  Mino bowed his head. This was significant praise from an Incurables musician—and from someone Letta had spoken of so highly. “Thank you.”

  Laura raised an eyebrow, as if getting an idea. “Many of the coro violins are in need of repair.”

  “Laura, I’m not sure we have the funds—” the prioress started to say.

  “That violin outplays any I have ever touched. Think of the Sensa concert, siora. At least let us discuss it with the maestro.”

  The prioress’s face took on a stubborn set. “The Pietà girls do try to outshine us every year.” She looked at Mino, raised her shoulders as if helpless. “Come by. We will talk.”

  Mino’s heart was racing. He had been back to the Incurables to hear Letta sing, but anonymously, briefly. He’d had to face no one and left the church feeling shattered. To return at someone else’s request, as a merchant, when Letta might see him? He could not trust himself to act professionally in her presence. He would do more harm to his fledgling business than good. Ana would sense something. It was impossible.

  “Tomorrow?” Laura said.

  “I’ll be working.”

  “Come when you can then,” the prioress said.

  “It’s difficult. My customers—”

  “Make us your customers,” Laura said. “Your violins could transform our coro.”

  “Sunday,” he blurted out against all reason. Before he could change his mind, he added: “After mass.”

  As soon as they left, chattering excitedly, Mino collapsed in a chair. He closed his eyes and heard Letta’s voice. He yearned for her, still, with such ferocity that he could no longer deny he’d yearned for her every moment of these recent months with Ana. That his instruments might accompany Letta’s voice, might share the air she breathed, was too much.

  He didn’t know how long he sat there petting Sprezz, but when Ana returned to the shop and he rose to pretend nothing had changed, it was dark outside.

  FIFTEEN

  SPRING CAME LATE THAT APRIL. Rain cloaked a cold sky outside the parlor windows where Violetta and Laura sat on a languid Wednesday afternoon. They should have been studying the new sheets for vespers, but Violetta was exhausted. Her eyelids felt weighted as if by sandbags used to barricade doorways during high tide.

  She’d had too much champagne last night. When Federico was pouring, Violetta couldn’t say no. Now she lay on the floral chaise, stretching her feet toward the fire, holding the libretto up so Laura wouldn’t see her eyes drift closed.

  A nap would be delicious. She let her mind glide toward Federico, toward the night world of La Sirena, her thoughts lingering on each beguiling detail. He’d been exuberant after her set, his arm around her waist as he introduced her to three visiting French gentlemen.

  “Your friend Elizabeth is back in Venice,” he’d said to her, nodding toward the back booth, where the English woman sat examining an array of exquisite fans from a vendor’s trunk.

  Violetta had brightened behind her mask. The women had dined together several times since their first meeting, but when Elizabeth returned to England at Christmas, Violetta was left to eat alone after her performances. Now Elizabeth grinned at Violetta, hiding her face coquettishly behind a black lace fan. Violetta waved, blew Elizabeth a kiss.

  “She requested to have dinner with you,” Federico said. “Order anything you like.”

  “Will you dine with us?” she asked, turning to him.

  “I have eaten already,” he said, and kissed the back of Violetta’s hand twice, as he always did when he had business to attend to.

  “Which do you prefer?” Elizabeth asked, gesturing at the fans as Violetta slid into the booth. She wore a new red dress that complemented her hair and she sipped champagne, laughing heartily at her own antics with her fan. “Fans make me feel young again, as fresh and lovely as you. I’ve missed you, Sirena. You were wonderful tonight.”

  “Thank you.” Violetta smiled. “I’m happy to see you, too.” She chose the cream-colored fan, flicking it open in front of her as Elizabeth poured them both champagne.

  “What brings you back to Venice?” Violetta asked.

  “John and I discovered the most brilliant new luthier,” she said. “To hear his violins, Sirena, it’s as if you’ve never heard music before.”

  Violetta was glad her mask hid her expression. She heard exceptional violin music every day, but none compared to Mino’s on the roof, long ago.

  “You’re contradicting yourself,” Elizabeth said.

  “What?” Violetta said, confused as Elizabeth reached to reposition her collapsing fan.

  “Half open and you’re beckoning.” To demonstrate, Elizabeth turned to survey the room, and Violetta watched a masked man a few tables away notice her. His chin lifted in complicity. “Once you have the gentleman’s eye,” Elizabeth explained, “open the fan further to let him know I’m available now.” But she did not move her fan. “Or close it slowly”—now she demonstrated, the gentleman leaning forward in his seat to watch—“to let him know I’m available later.”

  “What’s the signal for I’d rather lie with a Byzantine oar at the bottom of the canal?” Violetta asked.

  Elizabeth laughed loudly. “I don’t need to tell you that,” she said. “It’s the message you radiate all the time.”

  “It is not.” Violetta picked up a second fan, slowly clicking it open, delighted by the small painted scene of a woman picnicking with two centaurs.

  Elizabeth was so unlike the women at the Incurables. She wasn’t modest or quiet or demure. Violetta wanted to be more like her. She hadn’t forgotten the woman’s offer to visit her in London.

  Across the room, Federico glanced up from his conversation with the Frenchmen. He smiled at her. Her heart quickened as she clicked her fan open all the way.

  “Oh no,” Elizabeth teased. “Don’t tell me . . .”

  Violetta flushed, tossing down the fan so that it jostled her champagne. Why should Elizabeth be surprised? Why should Violetta be embarrassed? Why wouldn’t any woman in La Sirena—or in Venice, for that matter—want Federico? He was like the finest champagne: effervescent, complicated, emboldening, and gone too quickly from each encounter. Elizabeth was married, but surely she’d taken lovers on her trips to Venice, where a beau was as much an accessory as a bauta. She had just been flirting with that gambler across the room. She must see the appeal of Federico.


  “Tilt your fan elsewhere, Sirena,” Elizabeth said.

  “Why?”

  Elizabeth filled both their glasses, finishing off the bottle and gesturing to the waiter for another. “For one thing,” she said, “he’s far too old. Any young man in this casino would kill to have you. And almost all of them would treat you better than Federico.”

  Violetta rolled her eyes. But it was true that men were watching her. All she had to do was look around to catch a dozen glances. She felt watched when she sang in the coro, but at the Incurables, gazes threatened to turn into marriage proposals. She’d never thought about what might be different at La Sirena. What she thought about at La Sirena was Federico.

  “What if I introduced you to my luthier,” Elizabeth said. “He’s absolutely—”

  “I know what I want,” Violetta said. “I don’t need anyone to approve.”

  “Only him,” Elizabeth said, nodding in Federico’s direction. She clinked her glass against Violetta’s. “When you tire of the effort, let me know. I’ll take you to London. You won’t believe your fortune there.”

  Violetta’s frustration thundered inside her. Her flirtation with Federico, which had once seemed to point in an inevitable direction, had stayed right where he’d left it the night he’d taken her out on the burchiello—nearly six months ago. Violetta knew he cared for her. He saw to her every comfort. He watched her from across the room with intense affection. Why did he draw away when she got close?

  * * *

  “ARE YOU SLEEPING?” Laura’s voice startled Violetta awake, and she jumped up from the chaise. Her eyes adjusted to the light from the window.