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Venice

We are on the roof terrace and the gramophone is filling the air with Noel Coward singing ‘Mad Dogs and Englishmen’. Rossi is laughing. He has such a kind face. I find it hard to think of him with those leaders.

‘Il Duce did not think much of Herr Hitler,’ he says to Forster.

‘This is not true. The two men are aligned in thought.’

Rossi sends him a look. ‘They disagreed about as much as they agreed on.’ He like me seems to distrust Forster’s ability to read people.

Forster is so self-obsessed that he notices little around him.

How can people believe he writes such emotive poetry?

They are fools. Katherine, however, misses nothing, even when like tonight she is full of gin and, I suspect, cocaine.

Her eyes are overbright and she is restless.

‘That’s just normal political negotiations.’

‘You were there when they said farewell.’ Rossi puts his glass down and raises both hands. ‘It was positively, how do you say, icy.’

‘Frigid.’ Katherine stands and pours another gin.

‘Not at all. It was simply for the cameras.’ Simon holds out his glass for a refill.

‘When I asked Il Duce what he thought of Herr Hitler, he called him . . . a mad little clown I think is how it translates.’

‘Il Duce would never be so rude!’

But Il Duce spoke the truth for once, and it fits with my own evaluation of Herr Hitler.

They are both terrible, and looking at Rossi right now, I wonder what he really thinks.

He strikes me as a man who does what is expedient.

Currently he is a fascist, but if things would work better for him if he changed his views, he would do so without another thought.

Forster, however, is in love with fascism.

He is wedded to every aspect of it. He even praises the brutality of the Blackshirts.

They’ve been out in numbers these past two days.

‘Let us not disagree about this.’ Forster turns to me. ‘When will we see Katherine’s portrait? I am bored of looking at a sheet in my room.’

‘It can be moved to the dining room tomorrow.’ I wave my hand and decline a refill.

‘This is ridiculous. I am housing you, and paying a good price for this painting – which, if it’s at all like the portrait of the street urchin, will have you swamped with commissions.’

‘Simon, darling, this is wonderful, and you do love launching careers, but normally you wouldn’t witness the waiting period. It would be tucked away in an artist’s studio. Patience is required, especially for genius to bloom.’

‘Hmm.’

She strokes his arm and I look away. She is protecting me, but I don’t want her to touch him at all. Their relationship is finished and ours has begun. Yet I know we must play a game.

‘I do pick geniuses, and I can see the potential in you, Miss Kernow.’ He pauses.

‘But of course, it will be key that you don’t fulfil the role of a true woman and have a child.

If you do that, you will lose your gift.

It is the need for children that makes women creative, and when they can’t have them, they put their energies into creating art. ’

I open my mouth to shout at him.

‘Darling, that is a cruel thing to say.’ Katherine puts her glass down with a thump.

‘It is the truth. Think of your friend Hilda Doolittle.’

‘H. D. is still writing.’

‘But it’s just not as good now she has taken up with this Bryher.’

‘Bryher is a lovely person.’

‘You mean woman. This trend for women to take on men’s names and dress like them . . . Signs of perversion.’

Katherine sends me a look.

‘Take Miss Kernow in her trousers all the time.’ He waves a hand at me.

‘It’s practical for her work.’

‘Hmm.’ He paces and Rossi steps aside. I am concerned that Rossi has seen the looks between Katherine and me.

‘Enough of this, we are due at the Volpis’.

’ Forster looks at me. ‘If you dressed like a woman, one could bring you out into society.’ He walks away and I am left standing with my mouth open.

‘There is one thing he is correct in,’ says Rossi. ‘Your work is genius.’ He bows and follows Katherine off the terrace. I turn to the view. Across the Grand Canal sits the Palazzo Venier dei Leoni, and in this moment I long to see it finished.

* * *

I’m standing by the entrance to the Accademia, waiting for Father Keeney so we can visit the artist who painted my mother.

As I left, Forster reminded me that he wanted the painting out of the bedroom.

Katherine was nowhere to be seen. I heard them come home as the bells were chiming three.

How can he expect her to be creative when the life he is asking her to live is so draining?

Katherine and I have a plan partially in place.

Time alone to work out the finer details is elusive.

Forster is ever present, and I hate it. He must know how I feel about him, but then maybe not, for he seems oblivious to so many things.

Before long, the tall priest appears through the throngs of tourists.

He smiles broadly as he reaches me. ‘So many people, it’s a wonder the city doesn’t sink.

’ He takes my arm and leads me away from the crowds.

We amble through calle after calle and over small bridges, finally coming to an empty campo.

‘I love these quiet spaces,’ I say, noting the almost sleepy feel to the square.

‘I do too. In the past, the campos used to be fields of sorts.’

‘Really?’

‘So they say.’ He shrugs. ‘Roberto’s studio is just over there.’ He leads the way through a gate and a small garden, and up two flights of stairs. He taps on the door, and we enter a room with three large north-facing windows.

‘ Buongiorno ,’ says a small man with a deeply lined face.

His grey eyes appear huge and look like they have seen all the world.

I warm to him. ‘I am sorry to hear that your mother has died.’ His gaze doesn’t leave my face.

‘She was a bright thing.’ He pauses for a moment.

‘Climbing so quickly in her art.’ His hands rise to the sky, then he points to a painting hanging on the wall behind me.

It’s one of my mother’s. Even twenty-one years ago, her style was established.

‘It’s beautiful.’

‘Like she.’ He spreads charcoal sketches out on the table. They depict my mother in many poses, including one where it is clear she is pregnant with me. Grief hits. I am winded by it. Father Keeney rests a hand on my arm.

‘Your parents were very much in love.’ Roberto hands me a hankie and I dab my eyes. ‘How is your father?’ He opens another folder, which contains sketches of him.

‘He has found love again.’ As I say the words, a joy for him fills me along with a longing to see him. He will be a father again any time now. With distance I can see how hard it must have been for them to have a proper life with me moping around all the time. It still stings, but not as badly.

‘Padre tells me that you too are an artist.’ Roberto gathers the sketches.

‘I am.’ The painting of Katherine that Forster hates comes to mind.

‘Would you like to come and work here with me?’

‘Yes!’

He smiles. ‘I hear you are staying with your subject but you have finished the commission.’

I look at Father Keeney. How does he know that?

‘There is a small room.’ Roberto points to a door to the left. ‘You may use it if that would work for you.’

A choice is in front of me. Return to the pensione by the Ponte delle Tette, or come here. ‘I would like that very much.’

‘ Bene. ’ He claps his hands.

‘How do I contact you?’ I ask.

He nods. ‘Just come when you are ready.’

‘Thank you so much.’ I glance at his work, which is classical in every way. So very different to mine, but there will be much he can teach me. Excitement vies with the thought of not being so close to Katherine. But I will need to move on soon, and this is the way to do it.

‘Thank you, Roberto. We will leave you to your work and I will see you soon.’

‘ Sì. Ciao. ’ He waves, and we descend to the garden in silence.

The sketches of my mother and father run through my mind.

What were her thoughts on falling in love?

Her journals begin to tail off once things had picked up with my father.

She only captured the first sparks of love and didn’t enlighten me on what came next.

The journals were never meant for me, or possibly anyone but her.

I came here expecting one thing, and instead found love, in the most inconvenient place.

Falling in love is hard enough, but falling in love with a married woman is even worse.

‘Shall we go and have some lunch?’ Father Keeney asks as he opens the gate.

‘That would be lovely.’

‘I know of a little place.’

‘Of course you do.’ He seems to know far too much of everything. This worries me. Surely he doesn’t mix in social circles with Katherine. But what do I know. Little, it is becoming apparent.

‘You’re very quiet. Seeing the images of your mother was hard.’

‘Grief doesn’t go away.’ I search for the words to express my feelings. ‘They were beautiful. What surprised me was the desire to see my father.’

‘That’s a surprise?’

‘I left, or rather I was pushed out by my stepmother.’ And by Nellie, if I’m honest. They know what I am and what that would mean in our small community.

‘I see.’

Again I’m afraid he might. Maybe I shouldn’t spend time with him. He might work out that I’m in love with Katherine, but perhaps he has already. It strikes me just how foolish this is. If Forster figures out what is happening under his nose, he will be furious.

‘Here we are,’ Father Keeney says, opening a door to a small restaurant, where he is greeted warmly. After a fast exchange in Italian, we are seated by a window.

‘I have taken the liberty and ordered.’

I raise an eyebrow.

‘Well, in truth I was told what we are having.’

I laugh as two glasses of white wine appear, along with a bottle of mineral water.

‘Now, my young friend, tell me what you have been up to now that the portrait is complete.’