The Echoes of Love by Hannah Fielding Page B

the courtyard.
    Trattoria Tonino was a small restaurant on the main drag into Torcello, and opposite The Devil’s Bridge. There were no airs and graces about it to attract tourists, merely ten tables in two rows, a bar, and an open-plan kitchen where the three chefs were cooking and singing while flipping pans of risotto up into the air with a wooden ladle, just as if they were performing in a circus. It had cluster-shaped ceiling lamps and a few ceiling fans in use during the summer months. The white walls held shelves decorated with gondoliers’ trophies and all sorts of stuffed birds under glass bells.
    Paolo explained to Venetia that Tonino, the owner, came from a family of great gondoliers. He was the only one of four brothers not to have followed family tradition, preferring instead to open a restaurant, because, as he often boasted: ‘I like my food to be well cooked and you cannot get a decent meal in Venice today. Inoltre, io sono un cuoco eccellente , besides, I am an excellent cook.’
    To Venetia’s surprise the place was packed. Waiters were moving up and down the central aisle and there were far more people coming in than tables to hold them. She had forgotten her apprehension. Paolo’s easy manner and the way he seemed to fit in with this charming place were making her feel more relaxed that she had expected.
    Tonino, a rotund little man with a mass of black hair and a bushy moustache, greeted Paolo like a long-lost friend. ‘Il tavolo è in attesa di lei signore , your table is waiting for you, signore ,’ he said with an affable business smile as he led the couple to a table next to the window, with a view of the fifteenth-century free-parapet Devil’s Bridge. Venetia smiled back at him; she could well imagine this proud man boasting about his cooking.
    Venetia let Paolo choose the menu since he seemed to know the place well. He ordered moeche soft-shell crab, followed by the traditional goh risotto, and a Pino Grigio that the trattoria offered in open carafes.
    â€˜I love that bridge,’ she said, once they were seated. ‘I love its lack of parapets. It gives it such an elegant line.’
    â€˜Il Ponticello del Diavolo. Do you know why it was named the Devil’s Bridge?’
    â€˜Something to do with the Devil gathering souls, if I’m not mistaken. Although I don’t quite see the connection, but I’m sure there’s some kind of illogical superstition behind it.’
    â€˜There’s a legend about the bridge.’
    Venetia laughed. ‘Of course there is! In Italy there’s a legend for everything. Do you know that one?’
    â€˜ Naturalmente . Like my compatriots, I’m very superstitious and a great believer in legends.’
    She looked at him and it struck her again how well he could pass for the Devil himself.
    â€˜So, tell me, what’s the legend of Il Ponticello del Diavolo ?’
    Paolo reached for the carafe and offered her some wine. When she nodded, he filled her glass, and she noticed he poured only water for himself. She couldn’t help but raise her eyebrows at this but he seemed not to notice.
    â€˜During the occupation of Austria, a young Venetian girl fell in love with an Austrian soldier. Her family disapproved of this union and the young man was murdered. The girl was so desperate that she went to a magician who made a pact with the Devil to bring her soldier back to life, in exchange for the souls of seven children. The contract between the Venetian girl and the Devil was signed and their meeting place was the bridge of Torcello. When the sorcerer and the girl went to the meeting, they saw the Devil and the young man on the other side of the bridge. The girl crossed the bridge and both lovers fled. When the time for payment came, the sorcerer and the Devil arranged a new meeting at the bridge, but on the way to the rendezvous the magician died of natural causes before he got there. And from