Part 1 (1/2)
The Best Of Kim Stanley Robinson.
Kim Stanley Robinson.
Venice Drowned
By the time Carlo Tafur struggled out of sleep, the baby was squalling, the teapot whistled, the smell of stove smoke filled the air. Wavelets slapped the walls of the floor below. It was just dawn. Reluctantly he untangled himself from the bedsheets and got up. He padded through the other room of his home, ignoring his wife and child, and walked out the door onto the roof.
Venice looked best at dawn, Carlo thought as he p.i.s.sed into the ca.n.a.l. In the dim mauve light it was possible to imagine that the city was just as it always had been, that hordes of visitors would come flooding down the Grand Ca.n.a.l on this fine summer morning.... Of course, one had to ignore the patchwork constructions built on the roofs of the neighborhood to indulge the fancy. Around the church-San Giacomo du Rialto-all the buildings had even their top floors awash, and so it had been necessary to break up the tile roofs, and erect shacks on the roof beams made of materials fished up from below: wood, brick lath, stone, metal, gla.s.s. Carlo's home was one of these shacks, made of a crazy combination of wood beams, stained gla.s.s from San Giacometta, and drainpipes beaten flat. He looked back at it and sighed. It was best to look off over the Rialto, where the red sun blazed over the bulbous domes of San Marco.
”You have to meet those j.a.panese today,” Carlo's wife, Luisa, said from inside.
”I know.” Visitors still came to Venice, that was certain.
”And don't go insulting them and rowing off without your pay,” she went on, her voice sounding clearly out of the doorway, ”like you did with those Hungarians. It really doesn't matter what they take from under the water, you know. That's the past. That old stuff isn't doing anyone any good under there, anyway.”
”Shut up,” he said wearily. ”I know.”
”I have to buy stovewood and vegetables and toilet paper and socks for the baby,” she said. ”The j.a.panese are the best customers you've got; you'd better treat them well.”
Carlo reentered the shack and walked into the bedroom to dress. Between putting on one boot and the next he stopped to smoke a cigarette, the last one in the house. While smoking he stared at his pile of books on the floor, his library as Luisa sardonically called the collection; all books about Venice. They were tattered, dog-eared, mildewed, so warped by the damp that none of them would close properly, and each moldy page was as wavy as the Lagoon on a windy day. They were a miserable sight, and Carlo gave the closest stack a light kick with his cold boot as he returned to the other room.
”I'm off,” he said, giving his baby and then Luisa a kiss. ”I'll be back late-they want to go to Torcello.”
”What could they want up there?”
He shrugged. ”Maybe just to see it.” He ducked out the door.
Below the roof was a small square where the boats of the neighborhood were moored. Carlo slipped off the tile onto the narrow floating dock he and the neighbors had built, and crossed to his boat, a wide-beamed sailboat with a canvas deck. He stepped in, unmoored it, and rowed out of the square onto the Grand Ca.n.a.l.
Once on the Grand Ca.n.a.l he tipped the oars out of the water and let the boat drift downstream. The big ca.n.a.l had always been the natural course of the channel through the mudflats of the Lagoon; for a while it had been tamed, but now it was a river again, its banks made of tile rooftops and stone palaces, with hundreds of tributaries flowing into it. Men were working on roof-houses in the early-morning light; those who knew Carlo waved, hammers or rope in hand, and shouted h.e.l.lo. Carlo wiggled an oar perfunctorily before he was swept past. It was foolish to build so close to the Grand Ca.n.a.l, which now had the strength to knock the old structures down, and often did. But that was their business. In Venice they were all fools, if one thought about it.
Then he was in the Basin of San Marco, and he rowed through the Piazetta beside the Doge's Palace, which was still imposing at two stories high, to the Piazza. Traffic was heavy as usual. It was the only place in Venice that still had the crowds of old, and Carlo enjoyed it for that reason, though he shouted curses as loudly as anyone when gondolas streaked in front of him. He jockeyed his way to the basilica window and rowed in.
Under the brilliant blue and gold of the domes it was noisy. Most of the water in the rooms had been covered with a floating dock. Carlo moored his boat to it, heaved his four scuba tanks on, and clambered up after them. Carrying two tanks in each hand he crossed the dock, on which the fish market was in full swing. Displayed for sale were flats of mullet, lagoon sharks, tunny, skates, and flatfish. Clams were piled in trays, their sh.e.l.ls gleaming in the shaft of sunlight from the stained-gla.s.s east window; men and women pulled live crabs out of holes in the dock, risking fingers in the crab-jammed traps below; octopuses inked their buckets of water, sponges oozed foam; fishermen bawled out prices, and insulted the freshness of their neighbors' product.
In the middle of the fish market, Ludovico Salerno, one of Carlo's best friends, had his stalls of scuba gear. Carlo's two j.a.panese customers were there. He greeted them and handed his tanks to Salerno, who began refilling them from his machine. They conversed in quick, slangy Italian while the tanks filled. When they were done, Carlo paid him and led the j.a.panese back to his boat. They got in and stowed their backpacks under the canvas decking, while Carlo pulled the scuba tanks on board.
”We are ready to voyage at Torcello?” one asked, and the other smiled and repeated the question. Their names were Hamada and Taku. They had made a few jokes concerning the latter name's similarity to Carlo's own, but Taku was the one with less Italian, so the sallies hadn't gone on for long. They had hired him four days before, at Salerno's stall.
”Yes,” Carlo said. He rowed out of the Piazza and up back ca.n.a.ls past Campo San Maria Formosa, which was nearly as crowded as the Piazza. Beyond that the ca.n.a.ls were empty, and only an occasional roof-house marred the look of flooded tranquillity.
”That part of city Venice here not many people live,” Hamada observed. ”Not houses on houses.”
”That's true,” Carlo replied. As he rowed past San Zanipolo and the hospital, he explained, ”It's too close to the hospital here, where many diseases were contained. Sicknesses, you know.”
”Ah, the hospital!” Hamada nodded, as did Taku. ”We have swam hospital in our Venice voyage previous to that one here. Salvage many fine statues from lowest rooms.”
”Stone lions,” Taku added. ”Many stone lions with wings in room below Twenty-forty waterline.”
”Is that right,” Carlo said. Stone lions, he thought, set up in the entryway of some j.a.panese businessman's expensive home around the world.... He tried to divert his thoughts by watching the brilliantly healthy, masklike faces of his two pa.s.sengers as they laughed over their reminiscences.
Then they were over the Fondamente Nuova, the northern limit of the city, and on the Lagoon. There was a small swell from the north. Carlo rowed out a way and then stepped forward to raise the boat's single sail. The wind was from the east, so they would make good time north to Torcello. Behind them, Venice looked beautiful in the morning light, as if they were miles away, and a watery horizon blocked their full view of it.
The two j.a.panese had stopped talking and were looking over the side. They were over the cemetery of San Michele, Carlo realized. Below them lay the island that had been the city's chief cemetery for centuries; they sailed over a field of tombs, mausoleums, gravestones, obelisks that at low tide could be a navigational hazard.... Just enough of the bizarre white blocks could be seen to convince one that they were the result of the architectural thinking of fishes. Carlo crossed himself quickly to impress his customers, and sat back down at the tiller. He pulled the sail tight and they heeled over slightly, slapped into the waves.
In no more than forty minutes they were east of Murano, skirting its edge. Murano, like Venice an island city crossed with ca.n.a.ls, had been a quaint little town before the flood. But it didn't have as many tall buildings as Venice, and it was said that an underwater river had undercut its islands; in any case, it was a wreck. The two j.a.panese chattered with excitement.
”Can we visit to that city here, Carlo?” asked Hamada.
”It's too dangerous,” Carlo answered. ”Buildings have fallen into the ca.n.a.ls.”
They nodded, smiling. ”Are people live here?” Taku asked.
”A few, yes. They live in the highest buildings on the floors still above water, and work in Venice. That way they avoid having to build a roof-house in the city.”
The faces of his two companions expressed incomprehension.
”They avoid the housing shortage in Venice,” Carlo said. ”There's a certain housing shortage in Venice, as you may have noticed.” His listeners caught the joke this time and laughed uproariously.
”Could live on floors below if owning scuba such as that here,” Hamada said, gesturing at Carlo's equipment.
”Yes,” he replied. ”Or we could grow gills.” He bugged his eyes out and waved his fingers at his neck to indicate gills. The j.a.panese loved it.
Past Murano, the Lagoon was clear for a few miles, a sunbeaten blue covered with choppy waves. The boat tipped up and down, the wind tugged at the sail cord in Carlo's hand. He began to enjoy himself. ”Storm coming,” he volunteered to the others and pointed at the black line over the horizon to the north. It was a common sight; short, violent storms swept over Brenner Pa.s.s from the Austrian Alps, dumping on the Po Valley and the Lagoon before dissipating in the Adriatic... once a week, or more, even in the summer. That was one reason the fish market was held under the domes of San Marco; everyone had gotten sick of trading in the rain.
Even the j.a.panese recognized the clouds. ”Many rain fall soon here,” Taku said.
Hamada grinned and said, ”Taku and Tafur, weather prophets no doubt, make big company!”
They laughed. ”Does he do this in j.a.pan, too?” Carlo asked.
”Yes indeed, surely. In j.a.pan rains every day-Taku says, 'It rains tomorrow for surely.' Weather prophet!”
After the laughter receded, Carlo said, ”Hasn't all the rain drowned some of your cities too?”
”What's that here?”
”Don't you have some Venices in j.a.pan?”
But they didn't want to talk about that. ”I don't understand... No, no Venice in j.a.pan,” Hamada said easily, but neither laughed as they had before. They sailed on. Venice was out of sight under the horizon, as was Murano. Soon they would reach Burano. Carlo guided the boat over the waves and listened to his companions converse in their improbable language, or mangle Italian in a way that alternately made him want to burst with hilarity or bite the gunwale with frustration.
Gradually, Burano bounced over the horizon, the campanile first, followed by the few buildings still above water. Murano still had inhabitants, a tiny market, even a midsummer festival; Burano was empty. Its campanile stood at a distinct angle, like the mast of a foundered s.h.i.+p. It had been an island town, before 2040; now it had ”ca.n.a.ls” between every rooftop. Carlo disliked the town intensely and gave it a wide berth. His companions discussed it quietly in j.a.panese.
A mile beyond it was Torcello, another island ghost town. The campanile could be seen from Burano, tall and white against the black clouds to the north. They approached in silence. Carlo took down the sail, set Taku in the bow to look for snags, and rowed cautiously to the edge of town. They moved between rooftops and walls that stuck up like reefs or like old foundations out of the earth. Many of the roof tiles and beams had been taken for use in construction back in Venice. This had happened to Torcello before; during the Renaissance it had been a little rival of Venice, boasting a population of twenty thousand, but during the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries it had been entirely deserted. Builders from Venice had come looking in the ruins for good marble or a staircase of the right dimensions.... Briefly a tiny population had returned, to make lace and host those tourists who wanted to be melancholy; but the waters rose, and Torcello died for good. Carlo pushed off a wall with his oar, and a big section of it tilted over and sank. He tried not to notice.
He rowed them to the open patch of water that had been the Piazza. Around them stood a few intact rooftops, no taller than the mast of their boat; broken walls of stone or rounded brick; the shadowy suggestion of walls just underwater. It was hard to tell what the street plan of the town would have been. On one side of the Piazza was the cathedral of Santa Maria a.s.sunta, however, still holding fast, still supporting the white campanile that stood square and solid, as if over a living community.