coat against those bandits who everywhere preyed upon travelers.
He went to the churches of the small towns. He heard the opera everywhere in the villages and in the cities.
And by the time he left Florence, he had two boys of some talent boarded in a monastery until he should take them back to Naples. They were not marvels, but they were better than all he’d heard so far, and he dreaded the return journey with nothing.
In Bologna, he frequented the cafés, met with the great theatrical agents, spent hours with singers gathered there to pick up an offer for a season, hoping to hear of that ragged boy with a great voice who might be dreaming of the stage, who might want the chance to study in the great conservatorios of Naples.
Old friends now and then appeared to buy him a drink, singers who’d been in class with him. Glad to see him and feeling completely superior to him now, they proudly related their adventures.
But he found nothing.
And as spring came on, as the air grew warmer and sweeter and the large green leaves came back to the limbs of the poplar trees, Guido pushed on, north, to the deepest mystery of all Italy: the great and ancient Republic of Venice.
20
ANDREA TRESCHI DIED in the middle of the worst heat of August. Signore Lemmo’s immediate communication to Tonio informed him that Catrina and her husband were now his guardians. And Carlo Treschi, having been called home by his father as soon as death was certain, had already set sail from Istanbul.
PART II
1
THE HOUSE WAS FULL of death and full of strangers. Elderly men in black robes and scarlet robes, endless whispering. And then from inside his father’s apartments that terrible sound, that inhuman roaring. He heard it commence, he heard it rise in volume.
And when at last the doors had been flung open, his brother, Carlo, stepped into the corridor and met his eyes with the palest, weakest smile. It was shy; it was defeated; it was the thin terrible embarrassed shield of outrage.
He had watched as his brother came up the Grand Canal. He had seen him standing in the prow of the boat, a cape unfurling lightly on the damp breeze, and that black hair, the very shape of the head familiar. He had watched as Carlo stepped on the dock; he had stood at the top of the staircase waiting for him.
Black eyes, black eyes exactly like his own, and that sudden start when Carlo, surely, perceived the likeness. The face, larger, darkened by the sun, suffused so suddenly with feeling. Carlo had come forward, his hands curling in the gesture of welcome, and taking Tonio in his arms, held him so close it seemed Tonio could feel the sigh coming out of Carlo before he had in fact heard it.
What had Tonio expected? Malice here, bitterness? Passion burnt to cunning? It was a countenance so open it seemed the guileless mirror of warmth. And those hands had so boldly caressed his head, those lips pressed to his forehead. There was a loving possessiveness to his touch, and just for an instant, as they stood in each other’s arms, Tonio had felt the most secret and glorious relief.
“You are here,” he whispered.
And his brother had said, ever so soft, so it was a rumble from his massive chest, the name:
“Tonio.”
And then that inchoate roar, that appalling roar, rising, rising, that growl through clenched teeth, that fist coming down again and again on his father’s table.
“Carlo!” Catrina whispered, rising behind Tonio with a rustle of silk, her mourning veil thrown back as the doors opened to release him, her face full of sadness.
Soft noises, whispers. Catrina went behind him down the corridor. Signore Lemmo rushed to and fro on soundless feet. And Marianna in her mourning dress stared before her.
Now and then Tonio saw the glint of the rosary beads moving through her hand, the glint of her eyes should she look up for an instant.
She had not even raised her head when Carlo entered the room. And he from the corner of his eyes had quietly noted her.
When he did bow, it was to the ground: “Signora Treschi,” he said. He was so like his portraits it seemed the burning sun of the Levant had only deepened his color. The hair was dark on the backs of his hands, and a vague Eastern perfume, musky and full of spice, seemed to emanate from him. He wore three