The Sudden Appearance of Hope

Chapter 86

Venice in the rain. The tourists flee, the canals hiss like an angry goose, towers vanish into blurred-out grey, veils of water slipping off the bridges. Hawkers, hair glued to their faces, wheel their tarpaulin-covered wares through narrow metal doors in the basements of undecorated houses given over to the storage of a thousand papier-mâché masks.

Hard to use an umbrella, too many others competing to get through the narrow spaces; those shops that were smart enough to stock brollies now cash in, thirty euros a go. Better off with an anorak, head down, concentrating on placing your feet one before another, the sun gone, dizzying, north-south-east-west, Calle del Magazen, Calle Arco, Calle de la Pietà, Calle Crosera, turn left, turn right and you’re back at the Grand Canal though you could have sworn you were heading in the opposite direction.

I held a new mobile phone in my hand, only Luca Evard’s number saved, and walked.

Come to Accademia, I texted, breaking the lock into the tower of Chiesa di San Vidal as the message sent. He came to Accademia, arriving twenty minutes later, hatless, water dripping off the end of his nose.

I watched him from the tower and texted, Campo Sant’Angelo.

He received the message, looked around, started walking, hands buried in his pockets, a thin attempt at staying warm, towards Campo Sant’Angelo, passing me by, unseen in my perch. A baroque quartet was warming up as I descended the tower, cat-gut strings and horse-hair bows. A lone vendor was left in Campo Santa Stefano selling masks: the Bauta (good for eating in); the Columbina; the plague doctor and the Moretta, Arlecchino, Harlequin and Pantalone; the Volto, the most famous of the Venetian masks, stark white face around which colour bursts, gold and silver, bright greens and polished bronze, have I told you about

focus

Focus.

I passed him at Sant’Angelo, moved a few streets on, took refuge in a café selling pancakes filled with fruit and melted chocolate, ordered one and, as I waited, texted, Campo Manin.

A few moments later, he went by, elbowing his way through the crowd, and I let him pass, and looked for followers, obvious signs of protection or security, and didn’t see any.

Rialto, I said and followed fifty yards behind him, hood over my head, eating my pancake from its paper bag, stopping in doorways only twice, as he looked back.

He walked to the middle of Rialto and stopped at the peak of the stairs, looking down to both ends of the bridge. Rialto Bridge, completed 1591, not the first bridge on the site, at least four wooden predecessors collapsed beforehand and ruin was predicted for the final evolution but here it is hulking above the waters

here we are

hulk: the main part of an object i.e. ship which is no longer used. One that is bulky or unwieldy; to move ponderously; to loom

together at last

hulk: big green monster with stretchy pants and rage issues and here

now

Can’t put it off, could just go, walk away, but he texted me, he contacted me, I am in his awareness he will remember that I didn’t show or will he?

Will he not in fact remember that he went to Rialto Bridge and perhaps we met and perhaps we spoke and perhaps it was wonderful and he forgot so really I could go now, and maybe his fantasy will be better than the reality what did anyone expect and

he turned, standing at the top of the bridge, and saw me, and recognised me.

Not, perhaps, me.

Words that described me. Black is the colour of my true love’s hair, her lips are like some roses fair…

If he didn’t guess who I was before, he knows now, I am staring at him and can’t look away, and he sees the truth of it, and doesn’t move, and neither do I, both deciding perhaps if we’re gonna bolt

a moveable bar or rod

a part of the lock

a sudden dash

flight

escape

desertion

a length of woven goods from the loom

woven goods, , a bolt of cloth, measure word, Chinese uses measure words whenever counting, most commonly also shitty shit what the fuck am I doing here

I can’t move, feet frozen in place, so he comes down to me.

“Hello,” says Luca Evard. “You must be Hope.”