fresh air, he looked more than ever like an older-generation cherub, a worn cupid caught in some sportive billows aimed by Venus. ‘It had a population of several thousand at one time,’ he said. ‘Hard to believe now, isn’t it? The church was built by Carducci. They didn’t keep up the sea walls. Shortage of cash, or so they say – it’s the province of the Magistura alla Aqua. There are drowning islands all over the Lagoon, and quite a few underneath the water, of course, like Costanziaca for example, which was a flourishing place long before San Marco was thought of, with churches and monasteries – it was a place of pilgrimage famous throughout Italy. Then the tides just slowly made a marsh of it. The waters closed over it some time in the eighteenth century, I think.’
They were approaching Mazzorbo now, with the campanile of Santa Caterina rising immediately before them. The motoscafo turned at right angles up the wide canal, stopped at the Burano landing stage where it deposited Raikes and Wiseman. They stood for some moments on the jetty, watching the boat nose out again towards Torcello.
‘What we need now,’ Wiseman said ‘is a sandolo to take us to San Pietro. We’re at the end of the line here, more or less. The water-bus services don’t go beyond Torcello. Mrs Litsov offered to pick us up here, but I said we’d make our own way. They’ll bring us back, I should think.’
They went down to the busy little harbour, where the coloured reflections of hulls and houses rocked on the water, and almost at once found a man who was willing to take them – he was making for the mouth of the harbour, about to set off on a fishing trip.
‘You need someone who knows the waters,’ Wiseman said rather nervously as they stepped down into the boat; though perhaps the nervousness was for his balance, Raikes thought, rather than the uncertainties of the Lagoon. He was more than ever impressed by Wiseman’s kindness in braving all this for the sake of introducing him to Chiara Litsov, née Fornarini. And he felt guilty in a way, as if he were going on false pretences. Still, she might be able to tell him something. His discovery of the evening before had definitely linked the name of Fornarini with the statue – and therefore, in his own mind at least, with the house in San Giovanni Crisostomo.
Something of the excitement of that discovery returned to him as they turned eastward beyond the harbour wall in what he thought was the direction of the open sea. The light was hazier now and the long strips of the Lidi, those essential ligaments of the Lagoon, were no longer visible. With Burano left behind they were without immediate landmarks, moving on a calm waste of water, prey like everything else to its perpetual glimmering reflections. Astern, in the distance, a darker mass rose above the flats and Raikes guessed this might be the cypresses of San Francesco del Deserto, which he had read about but never visited, where there was a monastery still, and where St Francis of Assisi was said to have put in during a Lagoon storm. Though where coming from or going to he could not remember. He had planted his stick and a pine had sprung up …
The boatman stood upright in the stern, propelling them fairly briskly with a rhythmic forward thrust on his single oar. He uttered a regular heavy breathing sound, like a quiet grunt, not a sound of exertion but seeming in the nature of self-encouragement, as another might sing. That, with the creaking of the rowlocks and the faint slap of the wash, was all the sound there was. Silent gulls probed for clams in the shallows not far away. The light flashed on their breasts as they turned. They were wading, not swimming, Raikes noticed – the water was no more than a few inches deep there. Beyond them, glistening mudbanks rose clear of the surface like a shoal of enormous amphibians basking half submerged. Here obviously both skill and knowledge of the channels was necessary;
They were approaching Mazzorbo now, with the campanile of Santa Caterina rising immediately before them. The motoscafo turned at right angles up the wide canal, stopped at the Burano landing stage where it deposited Raikes and Wiseman. They stood for some moments on the jetty, watching the boat nose out again towards Torcello.
‘What we need now,’ Wiseman said ‘is a sandolo to take us to San Pietro. We’re at the end of the line here, more or less. The water-bus services don’t go beyond Torcello. Mrs Litsov offered to pick us up here, but I said we’d make our own way. They’ll bring us back, I should think.’
They went down to the busy little harbour, where the coloured reflections of hulls and houses rocked on the water, and almost at once found a man who was willing to take them – he was making for the mouth of the harbour, about to set off on a fishing trip.
‘You need someone who knows the waters,’ Wiseman said rather nervously as they stepped down into the boat; though perhaps the nervousness was for his balance, Raikes thought, rather than the uncertainties of the Lagoon. He was more than ever impressed by Wiseman’s kindness in braving all this for the sake of introducing him to Chiara Litsov, née Fornarini. And he felt guilty in a way, as if he were going on false pretences. Still, she might be able to tell him something. His discovery of the evening before had definitely linked the name of Fornarini with the statue – and therefore, in his own mind at least, with the house in San Giovanni Crisostomo.
Something of the excitement of that discovery returned to him as they turned eastward beyond the harbour wall in what he thought was the direction of the open sea. The light was hazier now and the long strips of the Lidi, those essential ligaments of the Lagoon, were no longer visible. With Burano left behind they were without immediate landmarks, moving on a calm waste of water, prey like everything else to its perpetual glimmering reflections. Astern, in the distance, a darker mass rose above the flats and Raikes guessed this might be the cypresses of San Francesco del Deserto, which he had read about but never visited, where there was a monastery still, and where St Francis of Assisi was said to have put in during a Lagoon storm. Though where coming from or going to he could not remember. He had planted his stick and a pine had sprung up …
The boatman stood upright in the stern, propelling them fairly briskly with a rhythmic forward thrust on his single oar. He uttered a regular heavy breathing sound, like a quiet grunt, not a sound of exertion but seeming in the nature of self-encouragement, as another might sing. That, with the creaking of the rowlocks and the faint slap of the wash, was all the sound there was. Silent gulls probed for clams in the shallows not far away. The light flashed on their breasts as they turned. They were wading, not swimming, Raikes noticed – the water was no more than a few inches deep there. Beyond them, glistening mudbanks rose clear of the surface like a shoal of enormous amphibians basking half submerged. Here obviously both skill and knowledge of the channels was necessary;
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