Joseph Kanon - Alibi

“You’re not just a girl at a party.”

“Yes, I am,” she said, pretending to be light, but I was shaking my head. “No? What happened to her?”

“Signora Montanari looked at her dress.”

She met my eyes, a little startled, then looked down. “My poor dress. So, what happened then?”

“I knew I was in love with you.”

“Oh,” she said, only a sound, her head bent. “You don’t mean that,” she said quietly. “You don’t even know me.”

“Yes I do. Everything about you. Right then.”

“Oh, all in one look. You’re being-”

“I know. All right, not everything. Just enough.”

“What does it mean, to say something like that?”

“What it always means. I want to be with you.” I lifted her head. “I’ll take Italian lessons.”

She smiled weakly, her eyes troubled. “No. Go to America. Your life is there. Not all this.” She spread her hand. “But thank you. To say that. The opera, even. I didn’t expect-” She leaned and kissed me on the cheek, a flutter of breath. “It’s a good time to stop. While it’s all still nice.”

I reached for her, but she put her hand on my chest again.

“No, go.”

“I can’t walk away from you.”

“No? All right. Me, then,” she said, her hand trembling. She looked up. “Don’t follow. I’m all right on my own,” she said, then turned and started walking.

“I don’t believe you,” I said to her back. “I don’t believe it’s all the same for you.” No answer but the click of her heels on the stone. “Tell me it was the same.”

“Yes, the same,” she said, not turning around, still walking. Then she stopped, her shoulders drooping. A long quiet. “No,” she said finally.

I stood for a minute, then started moving toward her gently, as if she were a bird that still might be scared off. I stepped around to face her, not saying anything. She looked up, her eyes still uneasy.

“Not the same?” I said softly.

“No,” she said, the word not much more than a breath.

“Then let’s go home,” I said, stepping closer, our faces almost touching.

“You’re so sure. How can you be so sure about this?”

“We can get a taxi at the Gritti,” I said, putting my arms around her, feeling her head fall against my shoulder. “Is that all right, a taxi?”

She nodded, resting against me. “To the gardens. Not to the house. Signora Bassi, the owner, she lives there too. The noise-”

We were quiet in the taxi, as if Signora Bassi were already listening. The room was plain, up a staircase at the side of the house, overlooking the small misty canal and a back calle full of clotheslines. We stayed quiet in the room, not making love, just holding each other in bed. I did get to see her asleep, hours later, in the predawn when I usually tried to make out the Redentore and wonder how I was going to spend the day. Now in the light from the window all I could make out was the sewing machine and a dressmaker’s dummy, her own shape standing straight and purposeful, the way she had at Bertie’s party, and in some wonderful way I saw there were two of them now-the public, tailored Claudia at the window and the one only I knew, who’d stepped out of the dummy to crawl into the warmth beside me.

The library ceiling was as beautiful as Gianni had promised.

“Early sixteenth century,” he said, not a boast, just placing it. “The carving is the best in Venice, I think. Of course today it’s difficult to see.”

The morning had been dismal, and even the long side windows were not much help-the library seemed barely lit. But the ceiling turned the patchy light to its advantage, forcing you to look at it carefully, follow its intricate lines into shadow. Only Venice could have a hospital like this, a converted scuola grande whose facade was crowded with trompe l’oeil and marble panels. The entrance hall was a soaring space with pillars, as damp and gloomy as an old church, filled with the ghosts of shivering consumptives, but beyond it the working hospital was bright and up-to-date with wards and nurses’ stations and X-ray rooms, what you’d see anywhere. And now the old medical library, which Gianni had saved for last, a special finale.

“Not as grand as the Sansovino staircase,” he was saying, “but I think more beautiful. The proportions.”

“It’s wonderful. Is it still used?”

“In theory. In practice, no. Now it’s-a treasure.”

“Locked away,” I said as he closed the door and we started down the stairs.

“Yes. Otherwise-” His voice drifted off in the drafty hall, where families had begun to arrive for visiting hours.

“I feel privileged.”

Gianni accepted this with a nod, then smiled. “Good. And now, are you hungry?”

“I don’t want to take you away from your work.”

“No, no, it’s all arranged. A restaurant very near. We can talk.”

About what, I wondered, but Gianni was all smiles and affability, clearly wanting to please.

“Quite a hospital,” I said, looking at the facade again as we came out.

“Well, the scuola was suppressed-I can’t remember why-and so there was a big public building to use. Not so practical, maybe, for modern times, but in Venice nothing is practical, so you adapt. The facilities are good. And of course it’s pleasant, every day to see it.” He pointed to one of the reliefs. “Saint Mark helping Antinus.”

“Who?”

“A beggar in Alexandria. The series is Saint Mark’s life. But I always think if you didn’t know, it could be a doctor helping the sick. Appropriate, yes? Who knows? Maybe Lombardo had a presentiment that it would be a hospital.” He smiled. “Anyway, it’s an idea.”

“What happened during the war? I mean, was it a military hospital?”

“No. It was never a war zone here. You know, behind the lines it’s a kind of peace. Things keep going. The hospital too. There was always food. In the south, with the fighting, it was different. Terrible shortages. Here at least no one starved, we could manage.” We were crossing a bridge out of the campo, and he indicated the houses on the other side of the canal with their running sores of fallen plaster. “But no paint, no wood, nothing like that. See there? No repairs, not for years. The city is falling apart. Of course the visitors, for them it’s always falling apart, they love the decay. Your mother thinks that. Don’t fix it, it’s all part of the charm. Well, maybe it’s lucky for me she thinks that way. At my age, I’m falling apart too.”

I laughed, the expected response.

“You know we have become good friends,” he said.

I kept walking, not sure how I was meant to answer.

“She has a gift for that, I think. A rare quality. To make people happy. Here we are.”

He turned toward a door. No getting out of it now. But what excuse could I have found?

The restaurant was in the little campo that faced Santa Maria dei Miracoli. In summer there would be tables outside, people writing postcards and looking up at the marble walls. Now it was a poky room with a bar in front and just enough space in back to be intimate without being noisy. Gianni was evidently a regular, known to the waiter.

“You like granchi?” Gianni said to me. “He says it’s the special today.”

“Yes, fine,” I said, toying with my fork, already uncomfortable.

“Wine? I can’t, but if you like-”

“No, water’s fine.”

For a minute or so we watched the waiter pour the mineral water.

“I’m glad we have the chance,” Gianni said, “to meet like this.” Leaning forward, opening.

“Yes, thank you,” I said, steering away. “For the ceiling especially. I never would have seen it otherwise. By the way, I’ve been meaning to ask-who are the Montanaris?”