He stopped, afraid of offending, and just then Lucille stood up again, this time for a comic, sexy version of “The Frim Fram Sauce,” flirting with the audience, coating each word with innuendo. Claudia tried to follow it, taking her cues from Jim and Mario, who laughed at all the right places, but inevitably her reactions were late, one step behind, foreign.
“What’s chiffafa?” she asked Mario as we applauded. “A vegetable?”
He laughed. “It’s just jive,” he said, almost shouting. The band had started playing, without Lucille, so people talked above it, the small room noisy. He pointed at Claudia’s wedding ring. “So does this mean you’re going to the States?”
“What do you think, will I like it?”
“Like it? You’re gonna love it. It’s the States.”
“Yes? Which one are you from?”
I sat back watching, not really listening. New York had everything-the big shows, everything. It never stopped, not like here, where they rolled the streets up-well, canals, rolled the canals up. Jim laughed, trying to picture this, then both soldiers turned to Claudia to tell her about things she had to see, things she’d like because they liked them. GI talk. America now a movie to them, shinier than anything they’d ever known. And why not? I smiled to myself, enjoying the breezy descriptions, Claudia’s face as she listened, pretending to be wide-eyed, the sort of girl they might want to take back themselves. There were more drinks. Mario asked her to dance, if it was all right with me.
“You’re a lucky guy,” Jim said, stuck with me now. “Want us to clear out?”
“No, she’s having fun,” I said, looking at her on the floor, doing a foxtrot with Mario.
“Some place, huh? Like being home.”
I looked at her again, my chest suddenly tight. My wife. Of course we’d have to go back sometime. But even in this ersatz version in San Fantin she seemed out of place. America was about easy happiness, chiffafa, as casual as picking up a girl in a club. I thought of the look in her eyes that afternoon as she had stared across the empty campo. What would she do with it there, her old life? Pretend it didn’t exist, like Bertie, until it started to grow inside her?
Mario finished with a surprise twirl, so they were laughing as they came off the floor. When her laugh stopped suddenly, cut off, we all looked at her, then followed her gaze toward the back of the room.
“See a ghost?” Jim said.
“No, no, sorry,” she said, sitting down. “It’s nothing.”
But my eye had caught him now too, the mustache neatly brushed, sitting against the wall in a double- breasted suit, on the town. A woman was with him, her back to us, and I tried to look away before he saw me. Not Signora Cavallini. Maybe a friend from Maestre. Lucille’s was a kind of Maestre-no one his wife knew would come here. I felt embarrassed, as if I had opened the wrong door by mistake.
“He’s coming over,” Claudia said.
I turned, expecting some version of a man of the world wink, an elbow nudge, but instead he was smiling, delighted.
“Signor Miller. So you like the jazz too? All the young people, it seems,” he said, waving his hand toward his table, where the woman had turned to face us.
Giulia. For a second I simply stared, too surprised to move, then she was nodding and I had to nod back. She was dressed for a night out, lipstick and earrings, no trace of mourning. To see Cavallini? In a place where no one would see them. But neither of them seemed disconcerted by our being there. Cavallini was taking Claudia’s hand, greeting her.
“Please, you’ll join us?”
“Oh, but-” Claudia fluttered, spreading her hands to Jim and Mario, clearly unnerved by the idea of sitting with Cavallini.
“That’s okay,” Mario said. “We were just having a beer. You go sit with your friends. I mean, what the hell, your wedding day.”
“How?” Cavallini said.
“Claudia and I were married today,” I said to him.
He looked at me, speechless for a moment, then fell back on form, taking up Claudia’s hand again with a flourish. “Signora Miller. My very best wishes,” he said, the English sounding curiously like a translation. He turned to me. “So. You didn’t wait for your mother?”
“We didn’t wait for anybody. We just thought it was time.”
“Yes, I know how that is. Everything for the family, and really you want to be alone.” I thought of his wife, an unlikely candidate for elopement. “And now here we are, more people. But at least have some wine with us to celebrate?” He glanced at the table of beer bottles.
“That would be nice,” I said, shooting a look at Claudia.
Cavallini extended the invitation to the GIs too, but they begged off, so it was just the four of us at the little table in the back.
“Giulia, what do you think? Married today,” Cavallini said, waving his hand at us, then summoning the waiter for more chairs.
“Yes?” Giulia said to me, taken aback. And then, for an instant, a look that was more than surprise, a question mark, a change of plan. “So. That’s wonderful. You didn’t tell anyone?”
“Ah, no secrets from the Questura,” Cavallini said, joking. “You see how we find you out, even here.”
I laughed, but Claudia barely managed a smile. When the chairs were brought, she sat at the edge of hers, as if she were afraid of accidentally touching Cavallini’s leg. It was an awkward table. Giulia talked about jazz, popular at the university because it had to be clandestine, almost a link with the Allies. Cavallini asked about the wedding. Finally the bottle arrived and Cavallini made a toast to our future.
“Yes, the future,” Claudia said, edgy.
“And what will it be?” Cavallini said pleasantly.
Claudia shrugged.
“You don’t know? But women always know. They’re the ones with the plan. The men-” He opened his hand, all of us feckless.
“America, I suppose,” she said. “It depends on Adam.”
“Ha, already a wife. My wife too. Everything depends on me, as long as it’s what she wants,” he said, raising his glass to Claudia.
I glanced quickly at Giulia, surprised he’d mentioned his wife. Maybe not a girl from Maestre after all.
“You could leave Venice?” Giulia said. “You know, I thought I could, and then at university I missed it. Terra firma, nothing moves. I missed the water.”
“Not everyone likes the water,” Cavallini said. “Maybe it’s different for Signora Miller.” He nodded at her new name. “When you can’t swim-”
“How do you know that?” Claudia said, off-guard.
“I’m sorry,” he said, genial. “It’s not true?”
“No, it’s true, but how do you know? You asked someone that?”
“No, no, Signor Miller mentioned it. We were talking about boats. He said you didn’t like boats, only the vaporetto.”
“She’s getting better,” I said, jumping in. “Today we took a gondola ride and she wasn’t nervous at all.”
“So you think I’m always the bloodhound?” Cavallini said, amused.
“Your men were asking questions at the hotel,” I said, explaining. “Checking times.”
“My men,” he said, blushing a little, as if he’d been accused of being clumsy.
“Any news? About the boat?” I said, moving him away from Claudia.
“No, it’s very difficult.” He sighed. “But not tonight. Tonight the bloodhound is not official. Just a wedding guest. The bride will permit me a dance?”
He held out his hand, smiling, so Claudia had to raise hers and get up before she could think of any excuse not to. She glanced at me, then let Cavallini take her elbow, following him to the dance floor like someone being led away for questioning.
Giulia took out a cigarette and waited for me to light it.
“You really like jazz?” I said.
