Well, Andrea was not about to let anyone, especially a ghost from the past—a demon from hell, rather—thwart him now.
Besides, it was too late. He’d tossed the dice amongst the uprooted cobbles of the Arsenal’s workyard. They must fall where they fell.
Andrea strained his attention over the rather rhythmless music of the madrigals, out into the sultry night, for one single thump that would change the evening’s rhythm all together.
By God, what time was it? Surely the bells had already rung midnight and he had missed them with all this revelry. But how could that be, when any such communal sound made him jump since his return to Christendom? He missed the muezzins.
“In truth, young messere, what do you think?” Foscari laid a confidential arm about Andrea’s shoulders.
What do I think about his daughter? The thought left Andrea at a loss for words.
“What do I think about what, sir?” he managed to get out before he said something more foolish.
“I mean, what do you think about Chios?” Foscari said.
“Chios?” Andrea repeated with a gulp.
“Do you think we can take it?”
Because his son failed to give an opinion, Agostino Barbarigo stepped into the breach. “This close to the end of the season, the Turk will not be expecting a new offensive.”
Sofia had all but promised that if he were successful—
Foscari said, “No. And if the Genoese cannot hold such a prize, gateway to the East, the Republic surely stands to inherit.”
“The chances of the success of our fleet seem fairly good, don’t you think?” Andrea’s father said.
Andrea tried desperately to determine where east might be, the direction of Chios, the island that was the hushed topic of conversation. East was the direction, too, of the Arsenal where, as he had seen that afternoon, the outfitting of the fleet for this enterprise was progressing apace. Because there was no telling east from west now in the dark, he feared his own plans, as opposed to the Republic’s, might have miscarried.
Suppose Giustiniani—that Genoese Chian who had no desire to see Venice take what he considered to be his own—suppose he were discovered. Suppose he were already taken by the night watch. Although rash enough, Giustiniani’s was not the sort of bravery that would stand up to the first hint of torture. He might be confessing his accomplice’s name even as they stood there chatting among the roses and oleanders.
Andrea thought he could hear the patrol’s gondola slipping down the rancid waters of the Grand Canal, over the madrigal, over the echoing night songs of the gondoliers. Any second now, any second, they’d be pounding for admittance at the Foscaris’.
“Andrea, answer our kind host,” his father hissed.
“A young man.” Foscari laughed. “His mind on my daughter.”
“You must have something to say on the subject of Chios rather than standing there like a total fool.”
Andrea swallowed the last of his wine and cleared his throat. “The Turks sets great store by Chios.”
His voice started high, reminding him of the eunuch again. “Sofia Baffo’s hellborn hair will destroy you.” The memory made Andrea’s words end in a squeak. He tried once more.
“The Turk will not be induced to give the island up so easily as we may hope.”
“Indeed?” said both older men together. The rigid constriction of two pairs of brows awaited more.
“The profit from the annual mastic harvest alone is worth a fortune.”
“All the more reason it should belong to the Republic,” Agostino Barbarigo said, the many hairs of his chest-length beard quivering as one.
“Indeed, sir.” Overcoming a Turkish hesitation to speak on such a subject, Andrea forged ahead. “But all these profits go to the support of the...of the imperial harem. The Turk will not easily endure such an insult to his womenfolk.”
His womenfolk will not endure it, Andrea thought, smelling jasmine mixed with almond paste, remembering the last time in the Jews’ shop. No, by God, say not “last time.”
“Our fleet shall teach the infidel to endure it, the lecherous old lout,” said the elder Barbarigo with a passion he usually reserved for redheads.
Involuntarily, Andrea said, “Inshallah.”
“And what is that heathen word supposed to mean?” his father asked.
“Forgive me, sir. No Turk would speak of the future without uttering it. The word means, ‘If Allah wills.’ “
Foscari laughed, the jovial host. “The Turk would then find anathema any festivity looking to the future such as we hold tonight?”
“I think Allah shall have very little will in the matter when he comes up against San Marco on Chios.” Agostino puffed out his beard like a bullfrog marking territory with his song.
Andrea could not suppress another “Inshallah.” But fortunately, no one heard it. Santa Sofia began to ring midnight, followed closely by San Felice, the more distant campanile of the Apostles, all the many bells of Venice that had stilled him to sleep as a child. Their notes were as liquid on the sultry night air as canal water.
Over the fading peals, Andrea heard a thud. Of course, he was listening for it. He only had time to think. That must be the patrol at the door, before he knew it was not.
The “Mashallah” of pure astonishment with which he followed the thought was also unheard by his scrupulous audience, for the syllables were blasted from their ears by a sound that rocked the very mud flats beneath their feet. Slivers of glass exploded from the upstairs windows of the palace and shivered through the wisteria’s leaves like a waterfall.
And suddenly there was no doubt which way was east, which way the Arsenal was, for the sky over that quarter of the palace’s roof glowed orange and coquelicot with soot and sulphur like the approach of daylight.
V
“She will not come to see me.”
Andrea heard the lifelessness in his own voice and knew he caught it from the
