The hotel sits at the base of Mont Blanc, some distance from Montebianco Castle, in the flats of the Val d’Ayas, near a wide, cobblestone road. The hotel is large and modern, with many rooms, a restaurant, and a casino, where Ambrose plays vingt-et-un until early in the morning, winning and losing as the Lord should have it. The thermal baths are below the hotel, sunk into the rock of the mountain, the clear water bubbling up into pools. One can float for hours there, the warm water filling one with vitality. Attendants bring refreshments to the pools, and there is a room with a wood-burning stove. The heat causes the blood to rush through the limbs with such force that one can hardly move afterward. There is sorbet in glass bowls, champagne, berries, cakes. How civilized it all is compared to our corner of the mountains!
Before Vita’s birth, we took the waters at Pré Saint Didier often, and had formed the habit of spending our evenings with certain families. They will expect the old routines. Champagne on the veranda. Dinner. Walks by the fountain. Surely, they will inquire about our child—the only one the Lord has granted us. But perhaps not. Nothing is quite so boring as discussions of children. I will tell them that Vittoria is with the nurse, ill, in bed with fever. They will forget Vita exists.
We arrived, and the nurse carried Vita directly to the rooms as instructed. I met with the doctors and explained that my child was ill, with malformations of the bone. They believe the water will help relieve her swollen joints. When I requested a private bath, they complied. There is a small bathhouse away from the main source, where I can take her undisturbed. And so, the next morning, I wrapped her in linen sheets and brought her to the pools early, before the sun rose.
What a success it was, Vita’s first bath! At first, she merely sat in the bubbling pool, looking about with her enormous eyes. After some minutes, she began to smile. She began to splash and play, then to sing. The warmth soothed her, producing a wonderful calmness. It was as if the heat from the center of the earth settled her spirit.
But what gave me the most pleasure was the transformation that I saw in my child. Vittoria appeared, suddenly and inexplicably, beautiful. In that pool of Alpine waters, in the lemony light of morning, her abnormal features were radiant. Her pale white skin took on the quality of ice, giving her a regal bearing. I saw it. My daughter has the makings of a noblewoman.
I took Vita to the bath every morning for a week, and each morning she grew more confident in the water. Perhaps this triumph left me blind to reality, because I stayed later and later at the bath, until one day I remained too long and a very fine, very fat lady waded into the pool. I felt myself freeze as she approached, my body stiffening like a statue as she looked Vita over, her eyes showing first confusion, then horror. She screamed in fright, pointing at Vita, her voice rising to such a level that soon the attendants arrived. This unfortunate woman was so undone that they carried her away. And while I cared nothing about the state of this woman’s nerves, I did care about my poor Vita. She understood, with brutal clarity, how very monstrous she is.
In the four and a half years since her birth, she has grown into a stout and strong little thing. The wound along her spine has healed entirely, and as her back is covered in fine white hair, the scar is not visible. Her head is still unnaturally large; often it seems that she will fall over from its weight. But her shoulders and back are beginning to grow sturdy, and she has, in the past months, grown an abundance of lovely blond hair, which her nurse brushes and styles to cover her ears. Indeed, strange as she is, her body is taking on a more normal shape. Her arms and legs grow longer each month. And her eyes, while large and strange, have become intelligent. She sees and understands the world around her.
She has, of late, been learning the rudiments of the alphabet, and it pleases me to know that she has made progress. Victories come slowly with Vita, but it was recently brought to