“As soon as we can arrange it. While you are still here.”
“And you’ll live here?”
“Of course. It’s my home. And now yours, whenever you like. I know you’ll be in America, but you’ll come back sometimes. Where we live there is always a home for you too.”
On her money. The thought, always buried somewhere, now flashed to the surface. Would they stay at Ca’ Venti? No, he must have his own, the family house, plaster crumbling, untended these last few years. The daughter with bills in Bologna. Cognacs at the Monaco. All paid for now, taken care of with the scratch of her pen across a check. He was smiling at me again, intimate, the same easy charm that must have taken her in. Gray hair, sober suit, not even young-no warning signals at all.
“You don’t say anything.”
“I’m just trying to-it’s a lot in one gulp. I didn’t expect-”
“You know, neither did we. Not at first.”
“It all just seems a little fast. To decide something like this. I mean, it’s only been-” I let it hang there, waiting for him to finish, but instead he smiled again.
“Only the young have so much time. At our age it’s better to hurry. And you know, the wedding, that’s your mother’s idea, to have it before you go back to America. She wants you to-such an expression-to give her away.”
“The father does that.”
“Well, the family. Why not the son?”
I shrugged.
“Good. She’ll be pleased.”
But it was Gianni who was pleased, smiling broadly, and I realized that in his mind I had somehow consented, given in, and could now be brought into the planning. There would be an engagement party. A friend had offered to perform the ceremony. I picked at my crab and half listened to one detail after another, the whole impossible scheme already worked out, discussed while I’d been somewhere else. Now there was nothing to be said.
And later? I saw the sensible talk with my mother back at Ca’ Venti, straining to stay calm, the inevitable hysterics. Bertie would be better-one of his bracing heart-to-hearts. I wondered if he already knew, could get to her before things spun completely out of control and sense became a kind of public embarrassment.
Gianni was ordering espresso, another endless meal, and talking about a trip. But perhaps it was better just to stay in Venice. There were so many details to arrange. To get the house ready for my mother, repairs he wanted to make, a new decorating scheme they’d discussed. It might be better to go away later, a long trip, somewhere new. What they must have talked about over brandies, their new life together.
“Maybe even America,” Gianni was saying. “It’s many years now since I was there. Many changes.”
She’d give a party to introduce him to her friends. The whispered conversations later: Did you see what Grace picked up in Italy? No longer just impulsive, a figure of fun.
“I went all the way across to California. A wonderful country.”
He had put some bills on the saucer and was standing up, smiling at me.
“And now Americans in the family,” he said airily, and as I folded my napkin, trying to smile back, I felt the real implications of his news rush over me, like a prickling of the skin. Not just a folly, not just one of those things. All our lives changed, one way or another.
Outside, the sun was shining just enough to brighten the marble on the church. We started back toward the hospital, Gianni full of more plans. I tried to keep up, an eggshell politeness, but my mind was elsewhere, so distracted that I didn’t even look at the group of GIs coming over the bridge, just felt the sudden hand on my shoulder.
“Hey, Adam? I didn’t recognize you in your civvies.”
I blinked for a second, taking in the breezy American voice, the sound of my own life coming back.
“Joe. What are you doing here?”
“Seeing the sights. I’m over in Verona, but they let us out once in a while.”
“Still chasing rats?”
“Rat files. Some of Kesselring’s boys. They come up for trial next month and they left a paper trail all the way to Verona, so somebody’s got to look. You know. But you-what is it, a month now? Two? What the hell are you still doing over here?”
“My mother lives here.”
“Lives here? People live here?”
“For now, anyway,” I said, then stopped, suddenly aware of Gianni at my side. “Oh, sorry. Joe, this is Dr. Maglione. He’s-” Who was he now, exactly? My mother’s fiance? My new stepfather? Looking at Joe’s open GI face, I felt Gianni’s foreignness for the first time. Was she prepared for this? Years of not quite getting jokes, living half in translation. “A friend of my mother’s,” I said. “Gianni, Joe Sullivan.”
“Lieutenant,” Gianni said, decoding the bar on his collar and shaking his hand. “You see, people do live here, a few of us.”
“Sorry. I didn’t-”
“Oh, no. Sometimes even I think we’re all visitors here. Of course, Verona, it’s different. You’re enjoying it there?” Now he was charming Joe, second nature.
“Well, enjoying. It beats Germany, anyway.”
“You were friends in the army?”
“G-2. Bloodhound detachment. Sniffing for Nazis. Happy days, huh?” he said to me.
“Every single one. When do you get out?”
“Never. They like my accent. Maybe June, though. Memphis in June, like the song says.” He glanced at the group behind him, too large to introduce. “Well, I’d better push. Live here. I wish I’d known-cadge a bed next time.”
“You need one tonight?”
“No, that’s all right. We got a special deal at the Bauer. Can’t get away from the krauts, huh?” he said, grinning. “Come have a beer if you can. We’re there a few days. Nice meeting you,” he said to Gianni. He jerked his thumb toward the city behind him. “Quite a place you’ve got here.”
Gianni didn’t react, just watched him go, then started again for the hospital.
“He’s a good friend?”
“We worked together.”
“Finding the Nazis. That’s who decides?”
“He just finds them. Someone else decides.” I paused. “He likes to kid around. But he’s not as dumb as he sounds.”
“I didn’t mean-well, perhaps a little. The world is simple for him.”
“Sometimes it is simple.”
“You think so? I never find it that way. Look at us. We have lunch. Happy news. But for you I think not so simple-a little difficult, even. Who is this man? You worry about your mother. Yes, you do. It’s natural. What can I say to make you feel easy? There hasn’t been time for us to become friends. Later, I hope. For now, I only ask you to be happy because we are happy.”
“If she’s happy, fine.”
“But you are still uneasy,” he said, watching me as we walked.
“I just don’t understand the why of it. Why not-be the way you are.”
“And not marry, you mean. Why marry now, so late? Not for children, to make a family. Not for-what? Propriety? We don’t have to be respectable, your mother and I. No one cares. Not even you, it seems.” A half smile. “So why? I wish I could tell you exactly. Sometimes I think to marry is a kind of insurance.”
“What, for old age? If one of you dies?” Another thing I hadn’t considered. What if?
“No, not so pragmatic. I think a way to ensure the love does not go away. To make it feel permanent.”
“Even if it’s not?”
“Sometimes, you know, it is. Don’t you wish this for us?”
I hesitated, embarrassed, but we were coming down the bridge into the campo and Gianni turned to me, not waiting for an answer.
