If the orphan wheel, that creaking wooden scaffetta that draws the infants behind the convent walls, has haunted me, then the tiny kick in my side has unnerved me to the core. As I hear the convent door latch closed behind me and I melt back into the bustle of the city, I feel lightheaded, as if I might faint. I press my palm to the rough brick convent wall for a few moments, judging how many steps I must take from here to the painter’s gondola.
The painter’s boatman is waiting for me.
He is seated next to Trevisan’s gondola with his legs hanging over the stone lip of the quayside. Beside him, a tall, slim boatman with a red velvet hat is sharing a husk of bread.
“They stuff themselves with sausages and sweetbreads, while we only have a ration of bread and wine, and hardly enough wood to keep the bedchamber warm,” I hear him say to the other boatman.
They have not seen me. I think of the dank room off the kitchen where the boatman sleeps. Part of me feels pity for him.
“Count yourself fortunate,” I hear the other boatman say. “I am sleeping in a corner of the chicken yard.”
I step carefully to the waterside and lower myself into the gondola. The other boatman gestures in my direction and Trevisan’s boatman notices me for the first time. He scrambles to his feet and jaunts into the boat, grasping the oar from where it is tucked along the side of the keel.
I have no desire to engage the boatman in conversation. I press myself into the passenger compartment and close the curtain behind me. I place the package with my aunt’s pastries on the seat beside me, their aroma still wafting from the linen wrapping. I close my eyes. I feel the boat rock as the boatman takes his position on the aft deck. I hear him place the oar into the carved oarlock. Then I feel the gondola begin to ply the water. Mercifully, he does not speak during our journey to the painter’s workshop.
After a while I feel the gondola make a turn into the cool darkness of the painter’s cavana. I stand and gather my package of pastries, knowing that Antonella will be waiting in the kitchen to see what I have brought. But when I try to climb out of the boat, the boatman is blocking my path. I try to go around him, but he moves to stand in front of me. I hesitate for a moment, then meet his gaze.
“Perdoname,” I say, squaring my shoulders to his. But he does not budge. His eyes form large, expectant orbs.
“Surely you cannot expect a boat ride without paying the fare, signorina.” The corner of his mouth rises into a smirk.
“You have already been paid,” I whisper, meeting his gaze.
“And I have sealed my lips,” he says. “So far.”
The cold canal water laps against the stones and makes wavering patterns of light against the dark, cavernous space of the painter’s boathouse.
“I cannot continue to siphon off gold leaf,” I say. “Soon I will have exhausted the supply I brought with me from my father’s workshop. I cannot go back home to get more. I will also not have any more to work on our commission, and the painter will know that it is missing,” I say.
The boatman shrugs. “But you misunderstand, signorina. I am a reasonable man and payment may come in many forms. Surely you have access to more of value than gold leaf.” His pupils look wild and shiny in the darkness of the boat slip.
“What are you suggesting?” My whisper echoes off the cavernous, damp walls.
“I am suggesting that I am only getting what is rightfully owed to me. There are many things of value inside the painter’s house,” he says.
I remain silent.
“The painter’s wife has a jeweled necklace,” he continues. “Her husband gave it to her, but she never wears it. It now sits in the back of a cabinet; at least that is what I have heard. They will never know that it is gone. But for me it will bring a pretty penny with the secondhand brokers.”
I feel sick, as if I might vomit right there in the boat.
“You cannot expect me to steal from Master Trevisan and his wife,” I whisper loudly. “That is out of the question.”
“Unfortunate,” says the boatman. “Well. Perhaps I might be satisfied with something slightly more meager.”
“Like what?” I say, hoping that dread has not crept into my voice.
His eyes flicker again in the darkness. “I understand that you have a necklace of your own. You might part with that one instead.”
Antonella. That wretched woman has described my golden ingot to the scheming boatman.
I try to stop myself, try to deny the truth of its existence, but it is too late. My fingers have already crept up to protect the battiloro’s gold ingot, where it is hidden beneath my linen undergarments.