The Glassblower of Murano (7 page)

The stench of the sickroom brought bile rising to
Corradino's throat. Twisted on the bed lay Nunzio del
Vescovi, cocooned in his vile coverlet, half his face eaten
by the `male francese' - the `French Disease'. Syphilis. The
man was dying. But the thing on the bed - once a Prince
- began to gasp at Corradino and it was long moments
before Corradino understood. Nunzio's face was twisted
meat, the disease had eaten large portions of his lips, and
the sibilants and plosives of speech were denied to him.

`... ino.' A claw-like hand extended to the table by the
bed. On it sat a flask of wine and a goblet, dusty with the syrup of an ancient draught slick in the bottom. God only
knew how long it had been since the man had been tended
by another human soul.

Corradino crossed himself and poured the wine. A dead
wasp fell into the glass, but it did not seem to matter. The
Prince eased himself onto his shoulder with palpable agony,
and drank, the wine dribbling like blood from his roofless
mouth. Corradino knew he did not have long - he asked
the only question he had. `Angelina?'

`... ead.'

Corradino turned to go. He had expected as much. He
would send a priest for Nunzio, but he could do no
more.

`In ... hildbirth.'

The hideous whisper halted him. Corradino turned.

`There's a child?'

`In ... ieta.... ell o-ne ... onour of family.... o-one:

Very well. He could grant this last thing. He nodded, in
an unspoken agreement to keep the secret.

`And her name?'

.. eonora. ... anin.'

The supreme irony.

She has my name.

Corradino watched Nunzio die, the moment after the
wretch had unburdened his heart. He shed no tears for the Prince and was no more than momentarily saddened
about Angelina - he had done his mourning for her in
his two years on Murano. And he had not loved her.
Corradino had never been in love. But he went to see the
two-year-old Leonora Manin at Santa Maria della Pieta
and fell in love for the first time in his life.

On the dock of San Zaccaria, at the entrance to the Piazzetta
di San Marco, there stand two tall white pillars. They hold
aloft the statue of Saint Theodosius of Constantinople, and
the chimera of the winged lion, adopted and bastardized
by the city as the Lion of St Mark. The Lion's paw rests
on a book, the pages of which read `Pax Marce in Tibia'
`Peace be with you Mark' - the fabled greeting of the
Angels as they dubbed Mark the Saint of Venice. Three
pillars were looted from distant Tyre to stand here, but the
third toppled into the sea while being unloaded, and still
lies at the bottom of the lagoon. At the instant that
Corradino first laid eyes on his daughter, the Camelopard
- thin and weary from its three year progress around the
great courts of Milan, Genoa and Turin - was being loaded
onto a ship bound for home. A mass of ropes encircling
its long neck, it was but two short steps from the vessel
that would carry it back to the African potentate who had
lent it to the north. But the planks that ramped to the
ship were glassy with rain; the creature reluctant to walk
into the heaving sea. Like the pillar centuries before, the
Camelopard pitched forward into the lagoon as its handlers leapt clear. Its enormous height meant that the noble head
could be seen above the water, liquid brown eyes rolling,
black tongue lashing, as it swallowed salt water. A gathering
crowd pulled at the slippery ropes, but the creature's gawky
limbs were too ungainly for rescue and, within an hour,
the Camelopard died. It sank to the bottom of the lagoon,
in silent peace, and in a last motion of grace the long neck
and heavy head sank to rest over the lost pillar of Tyre.

Nora looked at her reflection and knew she had made
a horrible mistake. She should never have come. There
was none of the resolve in her eyes that had been there
earlier.

I see the portrait of a blinking idiot.

It was her second day in Venice and she was on a trip
to Murano, organized by her hotel. Thousands of tourists
every year were shuttled over to Murano by the boatload,
cameras in hand. Ostensibly they had come to have a trip
around the glass factories and marvel at the glassblowers'
skill. In actuality, such trips were little more than a shopping expedition for wealthy Americans and Japanese. The
highlight of Nora's trip had come earlier - a five minute
tour around the factory floor. She watched the men at
work, blowing and shaping the glass, some with serious intent, some with crowd-pleasing theatricals. She looked
at the building and the furnaces, and knew they had
hardly changed in four hundred years. She wanted very
much to be a part of it, knew she could do a little of
what these men did. She stood, rapt, and was jostled by
a crowd of impatient Germans eager to get to the point
of sale.

So that they could buy a conversation piece for their Hamburg
dinner table, and say to the Helpmanns over coffee; `Yes, we picked
this up in Venice, genuine blown Murano glass, you know.'

This was their endpoint - this large shopping area, well lit,
whitewashed, and bright with glass of every sort. Goblets
stood in regimental ranks on the shelves, their orderly lines
belied by the spectra of coloured helixes that twisted
through their stems. Chandeliers and candelabri of astonishing baroque detail hung from the ceilings, crowding
each other like the branches of some fantastical forest.
Beasts and birds seemed moulded from volcanic larva of
all hues of orange and red. Subtle pieces with the clarity
and texture of cracked ice jostled with hideously ugly
nineteenth century work; fat birds trapped in perpetual
song by trellised cages. And the walls were crowded with
mirrors, of all sizes, like a collection of portraits which
featured only their admirers. I will frame your face, was
their fickle promise. You are my subject. I will make you
beautiful. Until you pass me by and the next face stares into my depths. Then only that visage will be my concern.

Nora looked now into one such.

Little wonder that a mirror is known as a looking glass. We're
all looking for something when we gaze into one. But I am not
looki►1c' at myself today, but the glass itself The glass, the glass
is what matters.

A mantra which was meant to make her brave again. She
looked to the mirror's frame for reassurance.Weaving around
it were glass flowers of such delicacy, such colour, that she
felt she could pluck one and smell its scents. Such artistry
convinced her - not to go on, but to go back.

I am crazy. I will look round a little more and then go home,
all the way home, to London. I must have been mad to think
that I could come here and expect an entree into one of the oldest
and most skilled Venetian professions. Just on the basis of my
name and my own small talents.

She clutched the A4 black portfolio which she had brought
with her. It contained glossy photographs of the glasswork
she had exhibited in Cork Street. She had been proud of
it, until she saw this room.

Mad. I will go.

`E motto bello, questo specchio; vetro Fiorato. Vuole guardare la
lista dei prezzi?'

The voice came close to her ear, shocking her out of
her dismal reverie. It belonged to one of the smooth, well
dressed gentlemen that helped the customers with their
purchases. He looked elderly, proprietorial, kind. He could
see that he had surprised her, and looked regretful.

`Mi scusi, Signorina. Lei, e italiana?'

Nora smiled, in apology for her reaction.

`No, not Italian.' Now was not the time to explain her
pedigree. `Sono inglese.'

`I apologize,' said the gentleman in perfect English. `But
truly, you have the look of an Italian. A Botticelli,' he smiled
with great charm. `Would you like to see our catalogue,
our price list?'

Nora screwed up the last of her resolve. His recognizing
her for an Italian seemed an invitation into the last chance
saloon. `Actually, I wanted to enquire about a job.'

Instantly the man's demeanour changed. Nora had slipped,
in his eyes, from wealthy customer to worthless backpacker.
He had such enquiries for shopwork daily. Why couldn't
they all go to Tuscany and pick grapes? `Signorina, I regret
that we don't take foreign nationals to work in the
shop!

He made as if to leave her. She said, with desperation,
`I don't mean in the shop. I want to work in the fornace.
As a glassblower. Una soffiatrice di vetro.'

She wasn't sure if the request sounded more ridiculous in English or Italian.

The man laughed with derision. `What you suggest is
impossible. Such work takes years of training. It is a
highly skilled profession. A Venetian's profession. And,'
this to her blonde tresses,'a man's profession' He turned
from her to a German couple arguing loudly over a
goblet set.

`Wait,' Nora said in Italian. She knew she had to leave,
but not like this. Not with this man thinking her an idiot,
a nuisance. She could not be dismissed this way. `I wish to
buy this mirror.' She wanted the mirror of flowers to take
back to London. She had gazed into it while her dream
died, and the flowers would serve to remind her of what
a beautiful dream it once was.

Seamlessly, the man altered his manner again.With smooth
charm he gave orders for the mirror to be packed, and
took Nora downstairs to the shipping desk. He asked for
an address in England and Nora, on an impulse, gave her
mother's. The mirror could stay with Elinor until Nora
sorted herself out. She despondently wrote out her own
details and signed the Amex slip, while the man checked
her signature with a cursory glance.

She was actually walking down the staircase before he
called her back.

'Signorina?'

She returned to the desk, now weary of the trip. All she
wanted now was to be able to leave, to get back on the
boat with all the rest of the tourists, for that was where she now belonged.

`Is there some problem?' she asked.

The man was looking at her mother's address, and back
to her Amex slip.

`Manin?' he said. `Your name is Manin?'

`Si.'

He took off his half-moon glasses as if dazed. In Italian,
as if unable to compute his English anymore, he said, `Are
you - do you know ... have you heard of Corrado Manin,
known as Corradino?'

`Yes, he is my direct ancestor. He is the reason I wanted
to come here, and learn the glass.' She suddenly felt tears
pricking her eyes. She was an abject failure, failed mother,
failed wife, failed adventurer on a fool's enterprise. She
wanted to go, before she cried in front of this man. But,
surprisingly, he stayed her by holding out his hand. `I am
Adelino della Vigna. Come with me for a moment, I'd just
like to check something:

Nora let him steer her by the elbow, not down the main
staircase but through a side door marked, forbiddingly,
`Privato.' The Germans looked on with interest, sure that
the fraulein had been caught shoplifting.

Nora followed Adelino down an iron staircase, until the
smell and heat told her they were approaching the factory
floor. He led her through a heavy sliding door, its materials
warm from the temperatures within. She felt the full blast
of the forno for the first time.

Like the fifth of November when your front is toasted by the
bonfire but your back stays cold.

Adelino led her to the flames, answering in swift Italian
the whistles and teases of the maestri who made predictable
comments on old Adelino entering with a young blonde.
The old man stripped off his jacket and reached for a
blowpipe. Nora began to proffer her portfolio, but Adelino
waved it away. `You may as well throw that on the fire.
Here we begin all things new' He pushed the blowpipe
into the fire, raddling the coals till they spat. `I run this
place. All I deal with now is point of sale and shipping,
but I used to work the glass, before my lungs went. Show
me what you can do with this.'

Nora took off her coat and slung it behind a pile of
buckets. She took the rod gingerly, knowing she had only
one chance.

Help me, Corradino.

Nora collected the gather from the forno and began, gently,
to blow the glass. She rolled it, reheated, shaped and blew,
holding her breath out until the parison had formed. Only
when satisfied did she breathe in again. Corradino had
heard her. It was perfect.

Nora drank the evil, dark espresso Adelino had poured her
while he hunted round his chaotic desk for a pen.

`I'm taking you on as an apprentice, for one month, on
trial. The pay is low, and you'll just be a servente helping
the maestri. No finished pieces. You understand?'

Nora nodded, incredulous. He handed her a form, covered in his inky scrawl.

`Take this to the Questura - the Police Station - in
Castello. It's on the Fondamenta San Lorenzo.You need
to get a residency permit and a work permit. This will
take a while, but it should help that your father is from
the city, and that you were born here.' For now Nora
had recounted her history to Adelino. `Meantime get
this form franked by them and you can work here
while the paperwork is being processed.' He shrugged
expressively. `This is Venezia, and she takes her sweet
time.'

Nora put down her cup gently on the desk, afraid that
any sudden moves would break the spell; that she would
wake and find herself back though the Looking Glass again,
staring at her reflection in the shop. Adelino caught her
eye.

`Understand this. You have a small talent for this work,
which may grow But I'm hiring you solely on your name,
and my respect for Corradino's art. Try to live up to him.'
He rose dismissively. `Be here on Monday at 6am sharp.
No lateness, or you'll be fired before you are hired.' He
allowed himself a smile at his small witticism, which lightened the asperity of his speech. `Now I must get back to
the shop.'