with me, that’s when I’ll need to make an appearance.”
“I’m sure the other children love you,” thought Teo.
“Anyway,” continued Renzo, “I’ve told him I am working on a special history project.” He glanced at The Key to the Secret City with a greedy eye. “And I suppose I am now.” Once Teo started to share the book with Renzo, things began to move in a new direction. The Key seemed to be working twice as hard, perhaps because Renzo was such a mine of history and so could ask much more interesting questions. And real objects appeared between its pages or dropped out of somewhere in the binding. By the end of the first day, Teo had in her pocket an ivory token dated 1785 for leaving her coat in the cloakroom at the Fenice opera house, a tiny golden mosaic tile from the Basilica of San Marco, and a long white whisker from a Syrian cat. These ferocious striped cats, Renzo told her, had been imported into Venice centuries ago to help destroy a plague of rats.
“Where are they now?” she asked longingly. Teo adored cats but her protective parents had never allowed her one on the grounds that they were “unhygienic” and “uncontrollable.”
“Over the centuries the Syrian cats interbred with the local cats and became domesticated; that is, spoiled, lazy and overfed. These days, if a Venetian cat passed a pantegana in the street it’d just flick up its tail.”
An image of a fierce Venetian rat scuttled across the page of the book.
Everywhere they went, people waved and chatted to Renzo. Everyone had a kind word for him, a message for his mother or a warm cake to put into his hand. Renzo did not condescend to introduce her.
The adults, of course, could not see Teo. But the Venetian children saw her only too well. What they saw was a Napoletana. They looked at Teo out of the corners of their eyes, barely acknowledging her.
Renzo could have said to the children, “This is Teo, my friend,” or even, “I know she’s not from round here, but she has more about her than you would suppose.” It clearly didn’t occur to him. That hurt a little every time it happened. But Teo had been sneered at and snubbed by experts—that is, schoolgirls—back in Naples. She could deal with that. What hurt Teo more now was discovering something she had been missing all her life.
Until she met Renzo, Teo hadn’t even known what it was to belong to a place. But Renzo, in contrast, clearly felt as if this city was his mother, or something very like her. He was somehow related in spirit to every other Venetian. They were a tribe, not merely a group of people who happened to live in the same place. For the first time in her life, Teo started to seriously wonder about where she had come from. She had never truly hungered to know about it before. Her adoptive father had offered to tell her, “It is your right, Teodora, and intellectual curiosity is nothing to be ashamed of.” But Teo knew he was being noble, and that it would hurt him and her mother deeply if she asked about her past. “You are my parents,” she’d declared. “I don’t need anyone else.”
Anyway, she loved them, and was proud of them. And Naples was the only town she’d ever known.
But knowing isn’t the same as belonging. Renzo belonged, not just to his parents, but to his city. It made him a different kind of person from herself.
“Quite apart from the fact that’s he’s clearly alive,” Teo pointed out to herself, “and I may well be dead. At least he doesn’t seem to feel cold around me, though.”
She knew it was ridiculous, but she felt the prickling of tears at the back of her nose after she had said goodbye to Renzo and was picking her way back to the hotel at the end of the day. Nothing could be cozier than Venice in the evenings, the deep blue sky arching over the enclosed island, with the lights of the shops all aglow, and the endless affectionate greetings of one Venetian to another, people lingering on doorsteps to
“I’m sure the other children love you,” thought Teo.
“Anyway,” continued Renzo, “I’ve told him I am working on a special history project.” He glanced at The Key to the Secret City with a greedy eye. “And I suppose I am now.” Once Teo started to share the book with Renzo, things began to move in a new direction. The Key seemed to be working twice as hard, perhaps because Renzo was such a mine of history and so could ask much more interesting questions. And real objects appeared between its pages or dropped out of somewhere in the binding. By the end of the first day, Teo had in her pocket an ivory token dated 1785 for leaving her coat in the cloakroom at the Fenice opera house, a tiny golden mosaic tile from the Basilica of San Marco, and a long white whisker from a Syrian cat. These ferocious striped cats, Renzo told her, had been imported into Venice centuries ago to help destroy a plague of rats.
“Where are they now?” she asked longingly. Teo adored cats but her protective parents had never allowed her one on the grounds that they were “unhygienic” and “uncontrollable.”
“Over the centuries the Syrian cats interbred with the local cats and became domesticated; that is, spoiled, lazy and overfed. These days, if a Venetian cat passed a pantegana in the street it’d just flick up its tail.”
An image of a fierce Venetian rat scuttled across the page of the book.
Everywhere they went, people waved and chatted to Renzo. Everyone had a kind word for him, a message for his mother or a warm cake to put into his hand. Renzo did not condescend to introduce her.
The adults, of course, could not see Teo. But the Venetian children saw her only too well. What they saw was a Napoletana. They looked at Teo out of the corners of their eyes, barely acknowledging her.
Renzo could have said to the children, “This is Teo, my friend,” or even, “I know she’s not from round here, but she has more about her than you would suppose.” It clearly didn’t occur to him. That hurt a little every time it happened. But Teo had been sneered at and snubbed by experts—that is, schoolgirls—back in Naples. She could deal with that. What hurt Teo more now was discovering something she had been missing all her life.
Until she met Renzo, Teo hadn’t even known what it was to belong to a place. But Renzo, in contrast, clearly felt as if this city was his mother, or something very like her. He was somehow related in spirit to every other Venetian. They were a tribe, not merely a group of people who happened to live in the same place. For the first time in her life, Teo started to seriously wonder about where she had come from. She had never truly hungered to know about it before. Her adoptive father had offered to tell her, “It is your right, Teodora, and intellectual curiosity is nothing to be ashamed of.” But Teo knew he was being noble, and that it would hurt him and her mother deeply if she asked about her past. “You are my parents,” she’d declared. “I don’t need anyone else.”
Anyway, she loved them, and was proud of them. And Naples was the only town she’d ever known.
But knowing isn’t the same as belonging. Renzo belonged, not just to his parents, but to his city. It made him a different kind of person from herself.
“Quite apart from the fact that’s he’s clearly alive,” Teo pointed out to herself, “and I may well be dead. At least he doesn’t seem to feel cold around me, though.”
She knew it was ridiculous, but she felt the prickling of tears at the back of her nose after she had said goodbye to Renzo and was picking her way back to the hotel at the end of the day. Nothing could be cozier than Venice in the evenings, the deep blue sky arching over the enclosed island, with the lights of the shops all aglow, and the endless affectionate greetings of one Venetian to another, people lingering on doorsteps to
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