The Glassblower of Murano - Marina Fiorato [68]
Idiot. You didn't even know him.
But when it came to it, as Alessandro led her through the ranks of almost military-style graves, and she was brought face to face with her father's name etched neatly in stone, she felt nothing but a dry emptiness. She felt no urge for tears. Alessandro murmured that he would find his grandmother, and melted away, but Leonora hardly noticed.
BRUNO GIOVANNI BATTISTA MANIN 1949-1972
He was only twenty-three when he died.
She didn't know what to do. She was visiting the bones of a twenty-three year old man - a man she had never met, a man who was still ten years younger than her living self.
And forever shall be ...
The words - half remembered from school and Sunday church, rang their solemn refrain in her head. She was lost. At length, she lay down her tribute on the headstone - simple white daisies. Buy your favourite, don't try to guess his, Alessandro had said, and he had been right. Then she sat on the grass, looked at the stark letters and numerals again, and simply said: `Hello, I'm Leonora.'
Alessandro found his grandmother in a matter of moments, and placed his roses at her headstone. He could scarcely remember her now, but though the complete memory eluded him, specifics remained. He remembered her black clothes, worn daily since the death of his grandfather. He remembered her tagliatelle con burro e salvia, which had never, in his opinion, been bettered by any trattoria. He remembered her wholly unexpected love for Vicenza Calcio, a love which had begun his own lifelong obsession with the team, and the game of football itself. He felt no grief, just fondness, as he crouched to flick dried twigs away from her plot and ran his thumbnail under a frill of lichen. He straightened up to look for Leonora, and quickly identified her bright head, bowed, her face hidden under her mass of hair. Discomfited, he thought she might be crying, then, as he saw her lips move, that she was praying. He crossed himself, but Leonora's eyes were open, and her demeanour more casual, more comfortable than one at prayer. He realized that, for the first time, she was having a conversation with her father.
She did not know how long she had been talking. She had begun at the beginning, and told her father all about her life: her childhood, her art, Stephen, the childlessness, the divorce, the move to Venice, Murano, the house in the Campo Manin, and Alessandro. She talked of Corradino, of her extraordinary fondness for her - for their - ancestor. She spoke of the stain of treachery of which she had just learned, of Roberto, Vittoria and Professore Padovani. She even spoke of Elinor, of their difficult relationship, and asked about the Elinor that Bruno knew - that different Elinor of long ago, the romantic and reckless Elinor, so different from the buttoned and bitter woman that Leonora knew. She talked herself to a standstill, and felt better. She looked up at last, stretched her aching legs, and beckoned to a hovering Alessandro that they could go. As he started towards her she turned for one private farewell. She laid her hand on the warm stone with affection. `Goodbye. I'll come again.
And I will.
Alessandro and she walked to the vaporetto stop and prepared to cross the Styx again - but this time the water would take them from the province of the dead back to the land of the living. She had found some peace here. She still needed to find the truth about Corradino but it had done her good to connect with her father - her immediate family - first. And he had been so easy to talk to. She had told him everything. Everything save one thing.
I didn't tell him I was pregnant.
CHAPTER 22
The Island of the Dead (part 2)
The feeling of grit in my mouth, grating between my teeth.