Read Online Stone Virgin by Barry Unsworth - Free Book Online Page A
Authors: Barry Unsworth
Ads: Link
as he sat there, after the hours of crouching and stretching. Voices came to him from outside, people calling to or shouting at one another, friendly or angry he could not determine. He leaned forward to look out but there was no one on the fondamenta immediately below. A small group of people crossed the bridge over the canal, at the furthest extent of his vision. A family group, father, mother, three children, dressed for some special occasion. He watched them mount the steps, the brickwork parapet for some moments concealing all but the heads of the parents. Then they were again in full view, crossing sedately.
He had forgotten what an intensely processional city Venice was, how people were constantly offering profiles, parading across the line of sight, passing briefly before one, necessary but irrelevant too, somehow. It was a consequence of all the intersections of street and waterway – no other city made one realize quite so much how coincidental human beings are to another, or so encouraged nostalgia for more acquaintance, more knowledge, always frustrated.
He continued looking for some time after the family had disappeared. On the brickwork, immediately above the arch of the bridge, were three stone heads set in a row, humanized lions or leonized men – salt and damp and chemical agents had eroded the differences. Or perhaps, he thought, the travesty was intentional, evidence of that taste for visual jokes the Venetians had always displayed.
It was light still, but the sun was low, too low to reach the surface of the canal. This was dark green and almost motionless. Already on the water and on the damp-darkened brick of the lower walls opposite there was some thicker graining, approach of night; but the upper storeys of the houses were still in sunlight. A covered gondola, moored almost directly below him, was rocking very slowly in the thin shadow of the wall. The prow rail of its nearer side reared up, caught some faint light along the brass, dipped again. Raikes watched the slight pelvic jockeying, as if the boat were gathering itself, then the next strange blind upward motion – strange in effect where there was no sound and little apparent movement of the water.
He thought of the face of the Madonna running with water too copious for tears or rain, her drenched garments; then the alien grain of her body as he brought his face nearer, the ancient indifferent stuff of which she was made … The memory to accompany this came back at once; it had been near the surface of his mind all day; sensation rather than memory, the hush, the sense of sound or echo, not voices but the aftermath of voices, a quivering resonance; the long straight shadow and the two wet bodies standing quite close together. Man and woman? Yes. They were washing each other or putting water on each other. Summer light but indoors … He had been afraid afterwards, not at the time, not exactly afraid but as if he’d escaped something, some danger perhaps.
Raikes stood up abruptly. Nothing wrong with my nerves. Then the idea came to him, an adventure for a man whose nerves were in good order. He had a key to the side door of the church, they had all been given one. He had a torch. He could go out and eat something, then he could let himself into the church and get a good leisurely look at these papers. As soon as this idea came to him he knew he was going to do it. And tonight was the night – delay would only increase the risk of the papers being locked up again or moved elsewhere.
It was not that he really believed he would find anything new about the Madonna. On any sober assessment this was unlikely. Of course there was always the chance that something had been overlooked; people did not always realize the significance of what they saw. However, it was faith of another kind that spurred him on, some sense that he had been given a sign, that a message had been distilled for him from the otherwise tedious talk of the Tintoretto people.
He had forgotten what an intensely processional city Venice was, how people were constantly offering profiles, parading across the line of sight, passing briefly before one, necessary but irrelevant too, somehow. It was a consequence of all the intersections of street and waterway – no other city made one realize quite so much how coincidental human beings are to another, or so encouraged nostalgia for more acquaintance, more knowledge, always frustrated.
He continued looking for some time after the family had disappeared. On the brickwork, immediately above the arch of the bridge, were three stone heads set in a row, humanized lions or leonized men – salt and damp and chemical agents had eroded the differences. Or perhaps, he thought, the travesty was intentional, evidence of that taste for visual jokes the Venetians had always displayed.
It was light still, but the sun was low, too low to reach the surface of the canal. This was dark green and almost motionless. Already on the water and on the damp-darkened brick of the lower walls opposite there was some thicker graining, approach of night; but the upper storeys of the houses were still in sunlight. A covered gondola, moored almost directly below him, was rocking very slowly in the thin shadow of the wall. The prow rail of its nearer side reared up, caught some faint light along the brass, dipped again. Raikes watched the slight pelvic jockeying, as if the boat were gathering itself, then the next strange blind upward motion – strange in effect where there was no sound and little apparent movement of the water.
He thought of the face of the Madonna running with water too copious for tears or rain, her drenched garments; then the alien grain of her body as he brought his face nearer, the ancient indifferent stuff of which she was made … The memory to accompany this came back at once; it had been near the surface of his mind all day; sensation rather than memory, the hush, the sense of sound or echo, not voices but the aftermath of voices, a quivering resonance; the long straight shadow and the two wet bodies standing quite close together. Man and woman? Yes. They were washing each other or putting water on each other. Summer light but indoors … He had been afraid afterwards, not at the time, not exactly afraid but as if he’d escaped something, some danger perhaps.
Raikes stood up abruptly. Nothing wrong with my nerves. Then the idea came to him, an adventure for a man whose nerves were in good order. He had a key to the side door of the church, they had all been given one. He had a torch. He could go out and eat something, then he could let himself into the church and get a good leisurely look at these papers. As soon as this idea came to him he knew he was going to do it. And tonight was the night – delay would only increase the risk of the papers being locked up again or moved elsewhere.
It was not that he really believed he would find anything new about the Madonna. On any sober assessment this was unlikely. Of course there was always the chance that something had been overlooked; people did not always realize the significance of what they saw. However, it was faith of another kind that spurred him on, some sense that he had been given a sign, that a message had been distilled for him from the otherwise tedious talk of the Tintoretto people.
Similar Books
