Frail Barrier (36 page)

‘You've come back down quickly,' Gaby said. She was standing beside the doorway at an angle that gave her a view of both rooms and the door into the vestibule.

Gaby, with her long face, large mouth, and reddish blond hair, closely resembled her sister, but she was heavier by about twenty pounds and her blue eyes were slightly hooded. Almost as tall as Olimpia, she habitually kept her shoulders hunched and her head slightly pulled down. She had once been as attractive as her sister, but her emotional problems had taken their toll on her face, which was heavily lined. She had a death-like pallor, as a consequence of having stayed inside the house for the past two decades.

He did notice, as he had on other occasions, that Gaby never had her back turned to the entrance of a room for longer than necessary. Her eyes had a habit of surveying doorways and she never went closer than five or six feet to the main entrance out to the
calle
, even when admitting visitors.

She wore a gray smock-like dress that almost reached her ankles. An indigo-colored scarf was wrapped around her throat, and pulled down on her long, unkempt hair was a small red woollen cap that vaguely gave her the look of a female cardinal. A damp, musty smell wafted from her that reminded Urbino of the scent that her cousin Alessandro's clothes had given off at Florian's the other day.

She screwed up her face and managed to get a handkerchief to her nose a second before the sneeze came, followed in rapid succession by two others.

‘God bless you,' he said. ‘I hope you don't mind that I'll be spending some time in the museum. I will try to keep out of your way and out of the way of visitors. I think you know that I'm reading letters that were written to your relative Efigenia. They were written by –'

‘Fortuny!' she shouted, cutting Urbino off and startling him.

The name echoed off the walls.

He was about to say that the letters were indeed from Mariano Fortuny when Gaby showed that her enthusiasm wasn't limited to identifying the Spaniard so vociferously, but that it had been the prelude for one of her favorite games. It was a word game.

‘Fort! Rot! Turn! Urn! Nut! Your! Our! For! Or! Nor! Toy! Run! To! On! No! Not! Fun!' The words rushed out of her. Gaby was in one of her excessively energetic phases, which alternated with periods of almost complete lethargy. This particular word game probably gave her a needed feeling of control.

When she recaptured her breath, she said, ‘Fortuny's a good one! Who would think that there are so many words in only those seven letters? Oh, I forgot two. Tour! Runt! I think that's the end.'

She was filled with energy today, but she would fall, unfortunately and inescapably, into her other state tomorrow or next week, maybe later today. Whenever it would be, it was as inevitable as were these excited, light-hearted states. Probably she had confided in Mina in one of her dark and down moods.

‘Give me another word. Please!'

‘Gabriella,' he said.

She frowned. ‘That's too easy. I've done it many times.'

‘What about Mina Longo?'

She stared back at him. Her face broke into a smile.

‘A very good name!
Two
names. How clever of you.'

She took a deep breath, but before she could utter one word concealed within the names, a man's hearty voice called out, ‘It's you, Urbino! I heard voices. I thought that we had a visitor at our little museum. It has been a long time, hasn't it, Gaby dear?'

It was Ercule Pindar. His moon-shaped face was open and candid, with the Pindar blue eyes almost always twinkling behind his round, gold-rimmed glasses.

Gaby ignored him, took an orange-colored rag from her pocket, and started to rub the freestanding globe in quick movements.

Ercule, who was portly and short, wore an oversized dark brown wool coat. A thick black scarf was wound round his throat. His large coat pockets bulged. If Urbino had been forced to bet money on what was inside them, he would have said that they were books – and not only books, but exotic travel volumes and most probably about Turkey. The Pindar family's connection with that country and the Venetian Republic's long relationship with Constantinople had ignited his interest years ago. It was still burning strong and bright.

‘Yes, it's me. I have some work to do here.' Urbino indicated the box of letters. ‘I'll be working so silently everyone will think I'm one of the exhibits.'

‘If anyone comes by to notice. Gaby wanders around all by herself most of the time. Just her and the things, and not one solitary soul putting down any money. These things are not doing anybody any good. There are better ways to make money from them.'

Gaby stiffened. He smiled with unmistakable affection. It was possible that both Olimpia and Ercule were engaged on a program of not coddling their sister, as Olimpia had warned Urbino and the contessa against doing. But Ercule's comment struck Urbino's ears as cruel. The museum meant everything to Gaby. Being parted from it would be a calamity.

‘Those are Apollonia's letters,' Ercule said, turning back to Urbino.

‘Great aunt Efigenia's letters,' Gaby corrected him sharply.

Gaby's respect for provenance amused Urbino. It was what you would expect of the curator of a museum, although Urbino doubted that she could provide the origin for even half of the objects in the Pindar collection, no matter how much she treasured and needed them.

‘Right, Gaby,' her brother agreed. ‘Great aunt Efigenia's letters. And that's great great grandfather Oreste's globe, dear sister. But it is ours now. Yours, Olimpia's, and mine, like everything else in our little museum. Oreste was before our illustrious association with Barbara's family, Urbino.'

The Pindar clan's fondness for the Italian versions of classical Greek forenames was one of their idiosyncrasies, but it was not consistently applied. It was like some uncontrollable impulse that struck Pindar parents in unpredictable attacks and could end up with comical results, as in the case of Ercule, who could not have been more different from his namesake.

Gaby put the cloth back into her pocket. She stood looking at Urbino and Ercule.

‘Ask me where I am today, Urbino.' A mischievous smile played on Ercule's round face.

If Gaby had her word game, Ercule had his own little game. He frequently asked the same question, ‘Where am I today?'

Urbino, who knew the answer because it was invariable, decided to give the appearance of mulling it over. He cast his eyes in the direction of Oreste Pindar's globe.

‘Could it be … Istanbul?'

‘Good! But to be more exact, let us say Constantinople
and
Istanbul.' He reached into one of his coat pockets and pulled out a book with the title
Imperial Istanbul
.

‘Exquisite,' Ercule said. ‘You see how I prefer the stones of Istanbul to the stones of Venice!' He slipped the book back into his pocket. ‘Come by and visit me one of these days. We'll have a nice chat.'

‘I'll leave you to your work,' Gaby said when Ercule's footsteps faded away up the stairwell. ‘If you need anything, just let me know. I shall be in either the next room or the vestibule. I –'

The buzzing of the doorbell interrupted her. Her face brightened. ‘Oh, my! The bell for the museum! A visitor! You've brought it good luck.' She hurried into the vestibule. ‘
Avanti, per favore!
'

Gaby was going through her usual procedure for admitting people to the building. She would cry out for them to enter through the unlocked door after they rang the bell. She never went to the door and opened it for anyone.

Low voices came from the vestibule. Gaby guided two middle-aged women, who spoke English with a German accent, into the first room. She described the objects in a voice that thrilled with notes of happiness. After the women had expended their curiosity over the cat mummy, they admired the Gabriele Bella before passing into the second room. Urbino picked up the first letter and did his best to create an air of industriousness. Perhaps their opinion of the museum would be higher if they thought that it held important documents.

Urbino suddenly felt protective toward the Pindar collection. It was a way of expressing his desire to protect Gaby from disappointment or something much worse.

When Urbino was alone, he started to give the letters his attention in earnest. Even given his methodical way of working, he should have no difficulty getting through them all before leaving for America.

The first letter, written in November 1925 from the Palazzo Fortuny in Venice, was a thank you for a dinner Efigenia had given Fortuny and his wife Henriette. The occasion was a staging of
Saint Joan
at the Goldoni Theater. Fortuny's printed silk velvet had been used for the costumes and stage sets. Another letter from Venice, dated September 1928, had a pen and ink drawing of the Jemaa el Fna in Marrakech and referred to a Biennale exhibition of his sketches of Morocco and Spain.

The third letter had been written in January 1930 from Paris after Fortuny had been obliged to close his factory on the Giudecca because of the stock market crash. The factory produced cotton prints made on the innovative machines he had installed. Efigenia had offered him a sum of money to help reopen the factory.

Urbino made some notes. His handwriting was cramped due to the cold in the room. He found these details about Fortuny's formerly unknown relationship with Efigenia fascinating. They would help flesh out his portrait of a man he not only admired but also, in the humblest of ways, identified with. For there were some pale parallels to Urbino's own life.

Fortuny, like Urbino, had been born elsewhere, in Spain, but had fallen under the spell of Venice and had made it his home and the center of his work. He had bought a Venetian palazzo and renovated it to suit his special needs – although in Urbino's case the palazzo had been inherited. He had been a man of great curiosity, with a love of things Venetian and Arabic. But Fortuny, unlike Urbino who feared that he was something of a dilettante, had excelled in various domains. He had defied categories, being not only a textile designer and couturier, but also a painter, inventor, sculptor, set designer, theater director, costume designer, and photographer.

And he had been an eccentric – for example, dressing in summer clothes in the depths of winter and sporting a black Inverness cape – which only endeared him to Urbino's heart more, as the Pindars did.

Urbino unfolded the next letter, written in October 1931 in London, where Fortuny was working on a lighting project for the Royal Academy, but, chilled as he was, he had lost his concentration and returned all the letters to the box.

As he sat at the table, his eyes started to bring into focus an object in the collection that he had been staring at without actually seeing. As he took in its details, he realized that it was something he had not noticed in the collection on previous visits.

It was an oblong wooden box the size of a small vegetable crate. It was designed as a miniature stage. Constructed of dark wood and lacquered, it rested on its longer side on a shelf. On one side of the box, a piece of Fortuny fabric, pleated in the way that Fortuny had devised, simulated a theater curtain. It must have been cut from a much larger swath of material. Across the top of the box was a carved ornamental panel with ‘Melponeme' and ‘Thalia' painted in cursive gold letters. On the stage of this miniature theater were small carved and painted wooden figures. Urbino went over to examine them.

There were four figures, none higher than nine inches. It did not take Urbino long to identify them as caricatures of some of the house's residents: Olimpia, Gaby, Ercule, and Apollonia. They were lined up as if receiving an audience's applause after a performance. A delicately carved bouquet of white roses was at the feet of the Apollonia figure, painted flat black and holding a string of purple rosary beads. The black lace head covering that Apollonia wore all the time looked more like a snood and revealed a fringe of white hair.

Urbino picked up the figure representing Olimpia. It wore a yellow coat spotted with black: an ocelot coat.

Gaby's voice startled him. ‘Alessandro!' He almost dropped the figure. He put Olimpia back on the stage. He waited for Gaby to start spouting the words lurking within her cousin's name, but instead she asked, ‘Do you like the theater?'

‘It's very well done.' He turned back to look at the figures. The whole effect was weird, but amusing. ‘Yes, I do like it.'

‘Alessandro is very talented. I told him he could put it down here. The museum hasn't had a new addition since my grandfather was alive.'

‘Alessandro did it?' Urbino had not been aware that Apollonia's son was interested in woodcarving or carpentry. He had not been aware he was very much interested in anything. He was well past the age when he should have applied himself and found a job, but his main and only job seemed to be looking after his mother – and living off her.

‘Yes, our Alessandro.' Warmth filled her voice. ‘He's working on statues of Eufrosina and him. He wants to do the whole family of us under the same roof. He was so excited about the idea that I told him he shouldn't wait until he finished the others to put these on display.'

‘How clever to have the names of the muses of both tragedy and comedy on the stage.'

‘That was my idea! Neither one alone suits us. Our family has had both comedy and tragedy. Often at the same time.'

Gaby went over to the stage and picked up the figure of Olimpia. She rubbed it against her sleeve and replaced it, taking care that it was exactly aligned with the others as it had been before Urbino had examined it. She moved the figure of Ercule, whose roundness and spectacles had been exaggerated and who was wearing a long white robe, fractionally closer to Olimpia and away from the figure representing her. The Gaby figure wore a small red cap and a red scarf, and a gray, uniform-like outfit with pants.