While no great, grievous illness befell Giacomo, over the next two years his health slowly but steadily failed. He was sixty-two, after all, yet it took some time for me to reconcile the robust man I had married with this elderly one, who would take to his bed for days at a time.
For every stretch of days that he remained abed, there would be another stretch when he insisted on being up and about, seeing to his government duties and setting his affairs in order. He had a new will drawn up, the contents of which were nothing extraordinary: I, as his widow, would be given control of his estate until Antonio reached his majority; there were also generous sums set aside for Lucrezia’s and Cecilia’s dowries.
While I fully supported his foresight and initiative, I believed him a bit overdramatic in his belief that death was imminent. He still had many good years left—provided he minded his physician—yet it did not seem I could persuade him otherwise.
It did not surprise me that once he had seen to his worldly affairs, he would look to his soul, and the no doubt questionable state in which he found it. He resolved the best way to set this right would be to make a donation to some godly institution—and which was more godly than the Pietà? The donation would not be enough, of course; he would also host a concert, so that others might be encouraged to donate as well.
When he told me of this, during the Lenten season of 1724, my only response was to mildly inquire as to whether his health would permit such an endeavor. He indignantly assured me it would.
This time, there was no mortal dread of coming face-to-face with the man who had single-handedly wreaked so much upheaval in my life and my heart. There was a bit of trepidation, but mostly annoyance. Finally I had managed to steady the rolling, heaving ship that my life had been for so many years, found peace and even happiness; and now he was going to return, like a storm that had the power to destroy everyone and everything in its path, with only God’s will to decide if there would be any survivors.
But no, I told myself firmly. It was my will that ruled my life now. And surely I was strong now in a way that I had not been at nineteen years old.
The Pietà responded swiftly to Senator Baldovino’s request. They were happy and honored to oblige, and would gladly send their orchestra, under the direction of Maestro Antonio Vivaldi, once Lent had ended.
Indeed, the orchestra was currently putting the finishing touches on an “exceptional” new work by Maestro Vivaldi, and the concert which we were to host would be the perfect venue for the debut of such a work, if we were interested and agreeable.
I was immediately overcome with an almost physical desire to hear it, and to be among the first outside of the Pietà’s stone walls to do so.
Within the hour I had dispatched a reply, my irritation gone, and only anticipation remaining.
I debated over whether or not to send an invitation to Tommaso Foscari and his wife. He had, after all, been the one to reinitiate friendly (or friendly enough, anyway) relations at Senator Barbo’s ball, long ago though it had been. In the end, I sent him an invitation. It would be up to him whether or not to accept—which he did.
And so everything was set, waiting for the day to approach: the third of May, 1724. It could not come soon enough.
* * *
On the appointed day, I could not help but take much care with my dress and appearance, instructing Meneghina to dress me in the gown I had ordered especially for the occasion, having accurately predicted my state of mind on this day. It was of a vibrant, rose-colored pink, with a tight-fitting bodice and voluminous skirts, pinned and tucked just so, and inches of lace on the sleeves. Meneghina wove a strand of large pink diamonds through my elaborately pinned-up curls, and added a pair of teardrop-shaped diamond earrings, also pink. My neck and shoulders I left tantalizingly bare.
Things proceeded much as they had at that first concert: Giacomo welcomed the members of the orchestra as they arrived, directing them to the ballroom. And once I was finished with my toilette, I joined him in greeting the guests.
Though playing the role of the gracious and attentive hostess, inwardly I could think of nothing but the music. I could hardly bear all the polite social trivialities, so impatient was I for the concert to begin.
The arrival of Giulietta and her husband pulled me from my reverie. “My, my, cara, how wonderful you look,” Giulietta said, eyeing me with approval. She heaved a false sigh and patted her own flawlessly arranged coiffure. “I always take such pains to outshine the hostess at these events, but it would seem that today I have been bested.”
I laughed and embraced her, kissing her once on each cheek before she and Roberto moved on to mingle with the other guests.
Not long after, Vittoria and Giuseppe arrived. “I am most excited for this new work,” Vittoria said, her smile wide as she looked up at Giuseppe. “I am afraid I have quite wearied my husband with all my talk and anticipation of this day.”
Giuseppe smiled in return. “And how can I help but also anticipate with pleasure something which promises to bring you such happiness?”
Their obvious joy and delight in each other had not dimmed since their wedding day. In the almost two years since they had been married, they happily flew in the face of custom by appearing everywhere—the opera, Carnevale festivities, parties—together, despite how unfashionable it was. And now Vittoria was expecting their first child in August.
Giuseppe’s smile faded ever so slightly as he turned to me. “And how do you fare this day, sorella?” he asked, his eyes asking what he could not.
I smiled. “I am well, Giuseppe, thank you.”
He seemed unsure whether he should believe me, but he let it pass. I knew he would be keeping a close watch on me throughout the evening, as he always had, and the thought gave me strength.
Once most of the guests had arrived, Giovanna brought the children, dressed in their finest, downstairs for the concert. I had promised they would hear some wonderful music today—violin music, I had specified for Cecilia’s sake—and, true to their mother’s blood in their veins, they had been excited for days.
Settling Cecilia on one side of me and Lucrezia on the other, with Antonio next to her, I waved over Vittoria and Giuseppe, who readily came to sit with us. Giuseppe settled himself into the chair next to his nephew, who began to speak animatedly to his uncle. The three children—but Antonio especially—adored Giuseppe, seemingly more than they did their own father. And Giuseppe, bless him, fulfilled his role as someone for Antonio to look up to, perhaps sensing Giacomo fell short in that regard.
Vivaldi’s presence was a humming under my skin, without my looking at him even once. Now I dared to sneak a glance in his direction, only to see him look at me in the exact same moment. I froze as our eyes locked, unable to look away. Mercifully, he broke the gaze, nodding in my direction. I returned the nod, and he continued arranging his scores on the music stand in front of him.
He looked much older than he had the last time I had seen him. I knew that he must be well into his forties by now. His priests’ robes hung loosely off his thin frame, and his face had a number of lines I did not remember. A white wig covered his hair, but I would wager there were strands of gray in the fiery red now, as well.
And neither am I as young as that girl who fell in love with him, I reminded myself, suddenly aware of my soft and heavy flesh beneath my gown and corset. We have both grown older, in more ways than just years.
Giacomo came and took his seat beside Cecilia. Seeing that their host and hostess were seated, our guests quickly sought the nearest seat, their chatter ceasing. Such was the assembly’s eagerness to hear Vivaldi’s new music that even the gossip, the one pastime that Venetians sometimes preferred to music, had stopped.
Vivaldi glanced at Giacomo and myself, seeking permission to begin. Giacomo, rather than making a speech of introduction, simply nodded to the maestro to commence. At this cue, Vivaldi rose from his seat and addressed the audience.
“I must first thank our gracious host and hostess”—he bowed in our direction—“for having myself and the orchestra here today. I must also thank all of you for being so good as to attend.
“What you are about to hear is a new work I have spent much time in composing and perfecting, and an equal amount of time rehearsing with these most capable musicians. And it bears a bit of explanation before we perform it for you, the first audience ever to hear it.
“This work is a series of four concerti, each representing a different season,” he went on. “We shall go in the same order as does nature: beginning with spring, continuing on to summer and fall, and concluding with winter. The work as a whole is titled, as you might guess, Le quattro stagioni. The first concerto, Primavera,” he added, fastening his eyes on mine, “we would like to dedicate to our lovely hostess, as thanks for having us here this day.”
His eyes lingered on mine just a moment longer, allowing me to hear all the things he could not say. Are you still writing music for me, caro mio? I wondered, an almost fathomless well of sadness opening within me. But when he took his seat once again, and the music began, all my sorrow was swept far away.
The opening bars were lively and joyful, an exuberant, fitting herald of the coming of spring. Yet after the opening tutti came the first of many remarkable things we were to hear: Vivaldi sent his bow gliding over the highest string in a series of high-pitched notes and trills, mimicking almost exactly the chirping of a bird. Beside him, the second violinist played a passage that was very similar, an echo and a harmony.
The second movement, a largo, was much more languid and melodic. As I listened, I suddenly found myself carried back to that rainy April night, more than a decade ago, when a rebellious eighteen-year old with music in her heart had sought out the great Maestro Vivaldi. Perhaps he had thought of the same night while writing this.
I was so lost in the past that, when the largo ended and the last movement of the Spring concerto began, I was quite startled. The tone had again shifted to a joyous, celebratory one, with the solo melody playing almost a dance.
The first movement of the Summer concerto evoked the sweltering heat of the summer, heat so heavy and oppressive that one can barely move. The movement was punctuated here and there by bursts of rapid violin passages, perhaps an indication of an oncoming storm, as well as several more tentative sections of birdsong. The second movement continued this, a brief, apprehensive prelude to the storm of the third movement.
With no warning, all the instruments began to play at a frantic pace, with the violins moving to create waves of sound like rolling thunder. Vivaldi’s harried, agitated solo evoked both lightning flashing jaggedly across the sky, as well as some poor creature trying to flee the storm. The lower string instruments combined to imitate the ominous rumblings of thunder, with the violins rushing on almost without pause. The harpsichordist forcefully beat out the continuo underpinning it all.
The season of Autumn brought with it joy and festivities again, colored with all the merrymaking of a country harvest feast and its aftermath. I could see people dancing, such was the vividness of the music.
The second movement, however, brought with it the first chill winds of the autumn, when the skies start to turn gray, bearing the melancholy news that winter is coming.
The last movement was again upbeat; one last celebration before winter arrived and drove the world indoors.
Then, finally, Winter came, the opening bars sounding just as a shiver would, if one could hear it. Vivaldi had again a frenzied solo which enhanced the feeling of shivering, of moving about almost frantically to try to keep warm, while the increasingly forceful winter winds of the orchestra blew about.
In the second movement most of the strings, incredibly, played pizzicato, and the sound perfectly imitated a crackling fire in the hearth when the day outside was frigid, and the melodic violin solo contributed to the feeling of warmth and contentment.
In the third movement, it was back out into the cold, to watch the snowflakes glide to earth, to slide on the ice of frozen canals and to fall down.
When this final movement ended, the silence that followed the last crashing chord seemed to stretch on and on. Yet it was broken, all at once, by the entire audience rising to its feet as one and bursting into tumultuous applause. The orchestra rose in acknowledgment, with Vivaldi bowing deeply, happiness and excitement creeping cautiously onto his careworn face.
I had forgotten everything while I had been lost in the music: where I was, with whom, any reason that I should be scared or hurt or hiding. I had even forgotten my children, who were all now clamoring for my attention. Once again, Vivaldi had stretched forth his hand and given me something of glorious beauty when I had needed it most.
Perhaps I should have made some speech of thanks to the orchestra, to my guests, yet I was rooted to the spot by what I had just heard. Giacomo did not speak either, thus our guests began to mingle, talking excitedly about the music.
Antonio had turned to talk to Giuseppe, since I had not responded to his tapping on my arm. Beside me, Lucrezia was much more persistent.
“Mother! Mother! Oh, did you like it? I did, very, very much! It was wonderful! I have never heard music like that before!”
Slowly I was coming back to myself, returning from the world the music had taken me to, a world where birds sang and people rejoiced and I was as beautiful as a spring maiden, as Vivaldi thought me. Yet finally I was forced to acknowledge the reality: that I was a woman no longer young, hostess to a teeming ballroom full of people, with three children needing attention at my side, and that this magnificent, sublime music had been written by a man as full of imperfections as any man.
Drawing a deep breath, I bid farewell to that other world, and turned to address my daughter. “I am glad you enjoyed it, darling. I certainly did as well.” An understatement. But there was only one other person in that room who would ever truly understand my feelings.
Or perhaps, I thought, turning to Cecilia, there is more than one person who understands. My nine-year-old daughter was staring determinedly at the orchestra, as though trying to unravel their magic. On my other side, Lucrezia was still chattering away. “I did not know one could play like a bird singing, or snow falling or…” she continued on, running through the list of things she had heard in the music.
This seemed to free Cecilia of the spell she had been under. “Have you ever played such music, Mother?” she asked.
“No, carissima,” I said. “I have played much music in my life, but never any such as this.”
Giacomo leaned across Cecilia. “I grow hungry, wife,” he said, the touch of petulance that had taken up residence in his tone of late very much present. “Do order the feast to begin soon, won’t you?”
Hot anger flared in me. I had been patient almost to the point of sainthood with his moping and mooning about, yet this struck me as blasphemy beyond bearing. You have not the faintest idea in your thick skull what you have just heard. “Of course, husband,” I replied through clenched teeth. “I shall send someone to the kitchen to see if all is ready.”
Once I had accomplished that errand and returned to my children, I saw that Lucrezia had found a new audience for her raptures in Vittoria. I felt a slight tug of guilt as I saw how attentively Vittoria listened.
My gaze wandered, unbidden, seeking the source of my distracted mind; to my surprise, I saw him bending over the harpsichord, explaining something to a small boy seated behind it—my son.
There was no help for it; I had to approach him. “Figlio, come away from there,” I said, voice calm. “Is my son bothering you, Maestro Vivaldi?”
He looked up at me. “Not at all,” he said.
“Mother, can you play the harpsichord?” Antonio interrupted.
Vivaldi’s eyes met mine, a smile playing about his lips, and I knew we were both recalling the very same moment. “Not well, I am afraid,” I said, feeling hopelessly foolish as a blush rose to my cheeks. “But would you like to learn?”
“Oh, yes,” he said, his usually quiet eyes shining with his new discovery. “We have one in the parlor, but I have never heard anyone play it. I like it, I think.”
I laughed. “Very well, then, I shall look into it if you promise me you will practice. You must practice just as much as your sisters do.”
“I shall!” he promised. “Perhaps I can play for Lucrezia when she sings.” Antonio had an almost puppylike devotion to his older sister.
“Perhaps, but you have much to learn before that,” I said.
“The harpsichordist who plays at the Sant’ Angelo is excellent,” Vivaldi interjected. “And I know he takes on students. I can give you his name and direction before I leave, if you wish.”
“That would be very kind of you,” I said. “Thank you.” I looked away again, down at my son, who was carefully pressing the harpsichord’s keys, one after another. “I see you have met my son Antonio.”
Vivaldi’s head jerked up upon hearing the name. I looked up and saw on his face surprise mixed with sorrow and joy, and perhaps a bit of pride in the boy who bore his name. For a moment I thought he would weep; but then he swept my son an exaggerated bow. “A pleasure to make your acquaintance, Don Antonio.”
My son giggled at being addressed like an adult. “It is a pleasure to meet you also, maestro.”
Jealous of the attention the maestro was paying her brother, Cecilia suddenly appeared at my side. “You are Maestro Vivaldi, si?” she said.
He glanced at me with a quick smile before answering. “Si, I am.”
“My mother plays your music all the time,” she announced. “You play as well as she does. I think even better.”
“He plays much better than I do, carissima,” I said. I hesitated. “He always has.”
Cecilia studied Vivaldi. “Someday,” she said, “I am going to play as well as you, maestro.” Then, as if suddenly remembering her manners, she bobbed a small curtsy and said, “Pleased to meet you.”
He laughed. “I am very pleased to meet you as well, signorina.”
“Both of you run along to your sister,” I told them, smiling.
“Antonio’s twin sister,” I explained. “Cecilia.”
“Ah.” He was smiling broadly. “She looks very much like you. And is very much like you in other ways, I think.”
I smiled. “That she is.” I nodded toward the children. “And my older daughter, Lucrezia. I named her for my mother.”
“Ah, yes.”
When the conversation seemed to end there, I moved to extricate myself. “I must go see to my guests.”
“Wait,” he said, moving as if to prevent me from leaving, but stopping abruptly. “Am I to have no other word from you, Adri—Donna Baldovino?”
I sighed. “We cannot speak here. Meet me in the small parlor just outside the doors as soon as you may. Dinner will not be served for another half hour at least.” Without waiting for him to reply, I swept away from him, stopping to speak with several of my guests so no one would think anything was amiss.
Just as I was poised to head to the parlor, I found myself hailed by none other than Tommaso Foscari.
Mentally I cursed myself; I had forgotten altogether that he was to attend, and he must have arrived after we had all adjourned to the ballroom. Momentarily I panicked; had he seen me speaking with Vivaldi? Had he guessed?
By God and the Virgin, I am too old for such intrigues!
My breathing steadied as I thought of how silly I was being, and I threw him a genuine smile. Whatever had passed between us in years past, he was once a friend to me, and I was glad to see him. “Don Foscari,” I said. “I am so glad you could attend. I did not see you earlier.”
“I am not surprised, for my wife and I arrived late,” he said. “I shall introduce her to you before we dine, if you wish.”
“I should be pleased,” I said politely.
He nodded. “I remember well that you are a true lover of music,” he said. “What are your thoughts on this performance?”
“It was magnificent,” I said. “Something entirely new; a way to use the instruments that has never been done before.”
“I agree wholeheartedly. It will be the talk of Venice before long.” He took a small step closer to me. “You look beautiful, Adriana. But I am sure you do not need me to tell you that.”
“And I am sure that you do not need to be told a compliment of beauty is always welcome to a woman—especially an aging one.”
“You are as beautiful today as the day that we met.”
“As are you,” I said, before I could stop myself. Yet it was true. There was a hint of gray among his dark curls, and a few lines in his face, but he was still handsome, perhaps the most handsome man present. Always I had been somewhat dazzled by his looks, from that very first moment when he rescued me from a lecher in his parents’ ballroom.
“Adriana … may I come call on you?”
Seeing I was rather taken aback by the implications of his request, he hastened to reassure me. “I mean nothing that would bring dishonor upon us, nor call your reputation into question,” he said. “Only that we may become friends again. I bear you no ill will for things long past. And I miss your company. Truly.”
“And I yours,” I said, meaning it. “But for my sake, and yours—and the sake of my children—I would not want to provide gossip for idle tongues.”
His smile, charming as ever, stopped my protests. “Have you no handsome young swains coming to engage in courtly love with you, Adriana?”
I laughed. “I do not, I am afraid.”
“Then this I shall do, though I am not so young,” he said. “It is to a lady’s credit to have a devoted cavaliere servente, I believe.”
“I believe it is,” I said, conceding.
He bowed low. “Then I shall leave you to your guests, my lady, and will be glad to call on you as soon as is convenient for you.”
I could not help but smile as I walked away from him and slipped through the doors of the ballroom. Hopefully my next encounter with my past would end as well as the first.
Opening the door of the parlor, I found Vivaldi pacing inside. He whirled to face me as I entered, clutching a rosary tightly in his hand.
“Am I a demon from your past that you would exorcise, then?” I asked with a sardonic smile, nodding toward the rosary.
He looked a bit startled by my question, but his face soon relaxed into a wry smile. “Hardly. Yet I might well pray to be delivered from temptation where you are concerned, Adriana.”
“Now you would call me temptress?” I demanded, but he shook his head.
“Nothing of the sort. Do not think that I mean to lay any blame at your feet, only at my own where it belongs…” He trailed off and looked away. “I only meant to compliment your beauty, which for me will always be far and beyond that of any woman living.”
I gazed at him, this man I had loved with such passion it had nearly destroyed us both, my anger and bitterness melting away. This man, flawed as any mortal, had somehow managed to create music beyond what even I had thought him capable; I, who knew him better than perhaps anyone else. Surely that was worth more than all his failures, even if one of them had been that he failed me.
“I am sorry,” I said quietly. I sat on the daybed that stood between us and, taking my cue, he sat beside me. My body lurched awake at his nearness.
After a moment of silence, he said, “What did you think?”
“It was—it is—a masterpiece,” I said.
“You think so?”
“There has never been anything like it before,” I said. “You must know that.”
“Yes, but that does not make it a masterpiece,” he said. “Perhaps there is a reason there has never been something like it.”
“Surely you cannot doubt that the composition of such a work is a remarkable feat, and the performance of it no less so,” I argued.
When he did not reply, I spoke again. “Still so unsure of yourself, Tonio?” The old endearment slipped out yet again, but I paid it no mind. “There has never been anything like Le quattro stagioni before because there has never been a genius like yours.”
“Do you truly believe that?” he asked.
“I always have.”
He sighed heavily. “You must know what your opinion means to me,” he said. “More than that of anyone else, I think. And you must know…” His expression softened, and its tenderness made me want to fall into his arms and run away all at once. “Every time I sit down to compose for the violin—for my instrument and yours—I am writing for you. Always for you. I write as if you are still the same young woman about to appear at my door to play music late into the night.”
I bowed my head, hiding my tears. “And I still play, Tonio. I play all the music you sent me, and I write my own. Thus a part of me is still that young girl, after all.”
I could sense he wanted to take my hand, but he did not. “Then you have found the music again?”
I nodded. “Yes. Yes, I have.”
And then our stolen time came to an end, as it always had, and I was forced to rise, to excuse myself, and leave him.
In truth our lives run in seasons as well, I thought as I left the parlor. My youth was spring, and my affair with the man I loved was summer, with all its heat. And autumn came as we began to come apart, and winter when we were undone, and I was forced to give up our child. And yet surely that winter has ended long since. Then spring came again with the births of my children, and this peace and contentment I know now is like the beautiful sun of summer once again.