Talina in the Tower

  It was Ambrogio, his nose full of the scent of courtroom beeswax, who first realized, ‘This is Professor Marìn’s Runic Rain. And it’s putting out the fires for us!’

  ‘You can look at me if you like, now, Ambrogio,’ thought Talina, still caught up in her best-ever rendition of the Fascinating Stoat.

  But Ambrogio was gazing up at the sky with the adoring look he used to reserve for Talina.

  With gentle determination, the rain took possession of the city as fast as the fire had done before it. Once the rain had gently smothered all the flames, it began to restore the buildings back to their former state, if not better. By morning, collapsed roofs were growing back as if they were living things. Fallen walls were reconstructed, brick by brick. Even the towers folded themselves up like fans and sprang back into shape. The glass reappeared in shattered windows. The rain painted the walls and the window-sills and sculpted the heads of the statues that Grignan had cursed to facelessness. Eyes, noses and mouths reappeared, some with the hint of a grateful smile. The painted poles – their blackened stubs poking out of the water like the remains of a forest devastated by fire – grew back to their full height and glory, with their little acorns freshly gilded at the top. The Runic Rain sent a breeze to pick up the bones of the saints from the Company of Christ and the Good Death. It gently carried them back to their smashed reliquaries in their own churches. Then the rain mended the glass of those containers, giving it a final polish too.

  ‘It’s like a great big mother cat’s tongue, licking her kittens!’ observed Drusilla. They were all back at Professor Marìn’s house, including Bidet and her harem, for whom Talina had just baked six trays of her excellent cherry macaroons.

  ‘Venice is ’erself again,’ said Mademoiselle Chouette, ‘la plus belle ville.’

  ‘We haven’t yet put right what is wrong,’ Talina objected. ‘So Grignan still wants to destroy the city, and thinks he has a right to do so.’

  ‘Do you think the Chamber of Conversation is still in session?’ asked Ambrogio longingly.

  ‘It never stops while there is injustice in Venice,’ said Tassini. ‘That is what is recorded in the Archives.’

  ‘Come, ladies,’ said Talina to the female Ravageurs. ‘Let us see if we can end this, once and for all. Bidet, please can you express a clear desire to enter the Chamber?’

  ‘I clearly desire …’ Bidet began.

  ‘Is there a confectioner’s on the way?’ interrupted Ripopette.

  Bique added, ‘Somewhere with Maraschino Cherry Ices, perhaps? Oh, oh, oh, what’s happening? Everything’s going crumbly …’

  ‘And misty!’ cried Ripopette.

  the Chamber of Conversation, May 20th, 1867,

  Saint Bernardino’s Day

  THE SMALL DOGE, the Good Witches and the Righteous Wraiths sat just where they had been when Grignan escaped. Albeit damp and singed, all had smiles fixed on their faces – full of pleasant memories inspired by the Runic Rain that continued to fall lightly inside the Chamber. A wet layer of black ash lay over all the documents, the desks, the chairs and the heads of the mounted animals.

  But the Chamber had resumed its deliberations.

  The female Ravageurs, slightly sticky with ice-cream, quietly filled the empty seats, and sat attentively, each with a cub on her lap. Tassini escorted a round-eyed Signorina Tiozzo to a bench. The professor settled the French mistress on a nearby chair before resuming his own seat next to the small Doge.

  ‘We’ve come back,’ said Ambrogio, ‘for a final ruling in the case of Venice versus the Ravageurs. We have brought with us additional witnesses,’ he pointed to the females and their babies.

  ‘In fact, Counsel, the judgement has just become a matter of the utmost simplicity,’ said the Doge. ‘Certain new facts have come to light in the last few hours.’

  ‘Not to us,’ said Talina. ‘Oh my!’

  She had glimpsed her Great Uncle Uberto in the dock. He looked pale and weak, but he stood upright with a determined expression on his face.

  The Doge rapped his broken gavel reprovingly. ‘Let us recap on proceedings in your absence. We have examined the witness Flangini and have come to our conclusions. Yes, the mud-heaps of Luprio were sold by the Ravageurs to the humans. But the sale was unjust. So we rule that the Ravageurs shall repay the exact price paid by the human Flangini. The mud under the city will again belong to the Ravageurs. But the city they build will belong to the Venetians again.’

  Professor Marìn leant over to shake hands with Uberto Flangini. ‘Well done, sir.’

  Talina’s Guardian hung his head, and murmured, ‘Don’t thank me; no one is as guilty in this matter as me and my family.’

  ‘No doubt!’ shouted Talina. ‘Now someone must tell us, where are my parents?’

  ‘Child,’ said the small Doge, ‘this is something that no one yet knows. I have despatched butterflies and flying cats to survey the outer reaches of the lagoon. Meanwhile, there are matters to arrange. Young Counsel, please instruct your colleagues.’

  Then Ambrogio explained to the female Ravageurs, ‘So we need you to give the Venetians Five Sheep, a Mink Jelly, a Dozen Fancy Pastries, Six Brass Buttons and Ten Fire-buckets of Human Wine.’

  ‘Absolutely,’ said Bidet.

  Bique keened, ‘You can ’ave the Mink Jelly et tout wiz our compliments. But must we really give back the Fancy Pastries?’

  The Doge held up a warning finger, and Bidet hastily said, ‘Of course, we agree with joy.’ She glared at Bique, who lowered her head and her tail with shame.

  Now the Doge inclined his small chin towards Bidet. ‘Are you empowered to make this agreement on behalf of your species, madam?’

  ‘The female Ravageurs are more populous than the males, and we also carry with us, and represent, the young of the coming generation.’ Bidet held up her twin cubs. ‘And we ’ave showed our good will already, by putting out the fire.’

  Talina cried, ‘But Grignan will never agree. He is still at war with Venice!’

  The Doge replied, ‘Then he is an outlaw, and shall be pursued and stopped. Now, madam,’ he turned back to Bidet, ‘what do you say?’

  Bidet smiled, ‘We say, “Of course!”. All we ask is an island of our own, with a flower garden and a sugar-beet plantation. So we can make our own crystallized violets and rose-petal jelly.’

  Talina frowned and opened her mouth. Bidet added hastily, ‘And peas, and rice and tomatoes, too. We shall be learning to cook risi e bisi, rice and peas, properly, you know, with one chicco of riso for every biso.’

  Talina explained, ‘The grannies of Quintavalle have offered to teach them to cook proper healthy food for themselves. It is all agreed. In exchange for having their gardens dug each autumn.’

  ‘Turns out we’re excellent at digging holes.’ Bidet showed her paws.

  ‘Then it shall be done,’ pronounced the small Doge. ‘The relevant goods are to be deposited with the Chamber by tomorrow. And the stolen batteries de cuisine are to be returned to the Venetian bakeries, every single knife and spatula.’

  ‘But,’ said Talina, ‘we don’t quite know what is meant by—’

  ‘While you are at it, sir, dispensing judgements and all,’ Ambrogio interrupted boldly, ‘do you think you could lift the Cake Curse from Rovigo? So that their sponges rise and their cream-pies don’t curdle? Then they won’t need to be Pastry-Bandits any more. If they ever were.’

  The Doge turned wearily to a particularly mischievous-looking witch.

  ‘You’ve had your fun with that rather tedious prank, Griseldina, I think? Six centuries of fun, I believe. Just for one small ducking in a pond! Remember, you are supposed to be a Good Witch. Off you go and disenchant the ovens in Rovigo, dear.’

  The witch pouted, mounted her singed broomstick and whistled up her black cat, who took his position on the brush with great dignity.

  ‘It shall be done,’ ordered the Doge, with a twitch of a smile at his lips, ‘between midnight and cockcrow.’
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  ‘Yes, yes, I’m on my way,’ snapped Griseldina moodily. ‘I’ll even give them my recipe for Ensorcelled Butter Buns. They’ll be flocking in from Chioggia and Padova to buy those.’

  Griseldina departed in a shower of wet black ash.

  ‘Excuse me,’ asked Talina, ‘but can you tell us what Human Wine is, Your Honour? How can the lady Ravageurs pay it back if we don’t know what it is?’

  ‘I believe,’ intoned the Doge, ‘that we may trace this confusion back to some scribal errors in the original inscription. These things happen when the stonemason fails to concentrate, you know. For example, I believe that the ‘“Mink Jelly”’ was in fact ‘Milk Jelly’ – far more palatable.’

  ‘Yes please!’ called Ripopette. ‘Love milk jelly.’

  ‘Well, bless my stars!’ rejoiced a mink.

  The Doge continued, ‘And in the same way, the words following on from “Mink Jelly” should read “Human Whine” – with an “h” – not “Human Wine”.’

  Silence fell on the Chamber.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ said Talina, pacing to and fro in her frustration. ‘But we’re not really any the wiser.’

  Ambrogio guessed, ‘Could it mean “whine”’ as in “tears”? Grignan’s ancestor wanted ten buckets of human tears!’

  ‘Tears,’ observed a Penitent Hag, ‘are an excellent sauce for revenge.’

  ‘But where?’ asked Ambrogio. ‘Where would old Flangini have got ten buckets full of them?’

  ‘If he was anything like his descendant, my Guardian, I suppose he could have locked children up with his storybooks and given them a bucket to cry into. You’d soon get ten bucketfuls that way,’ suggested Talina. She looked at Ambrogio, hoping that he would agree. But Ambrogio was gazing at Great Uncle Uberto.

  The Guardian flinched in the dock, but he was staring over her shoulder towards the back of the Chamber.

  ‘What about tears of happiness?’ asked an unfamiliar male voice, a pleasant low one with an accent from the islands.

  ‘Happy tears flow twice as fast,’ agreed another warm voice, strikingly similar to the first.

  A smell of fresh fish wafted into the Chamber.

  a few moments later

  UNTIL THAT MOMENT, no one had noticed the two identical middle-aged men arrive at the back of the glass room. At their side were two thin Venetians whose faces shone with eager hope.

  Talina, still pacing up and down, had not noticed them. Signorina Tiozzo, caressing the eight cats piled on her lap, had not noticed them either.

  Ambrogio, scribbling copious notes in an exercise book, did not notice them.

  Emilie Chouette, staring tenderly at Professor Marìn, did not notice them.

  But Professor Marìn, briefly removing his own gaze from hers, now cried out, ‘Marco! Lucia! You’re safe!’

  And then Talina was in their arms. And Marco Molin was saying, over and over again, ‘Our little kitten! We have you back!’

  The presiding Doge tolerated a certain amount of hugging and crying – at least one bucketful – and kissing, before he said, ‘The Chamber of Conversation will now hear an explanation of these new developments. The two fishy gentlemen at the back of the room will approach the bench and explain their appearance here.’

  Shyly, the two men shuffled through the room, pausing to shake Marco Molin’s hand heartily.

  ‘Thank you,’ Talina’s father mouthed at them.

  ‘Well?’ demanded the small Doge.

  It tumbled out in fits and starts as the twin brothers interrupted each other frequently. But the story that emerged was this: only that very morning, the two fishermen had been digging for bait at their secret source – ‘Maggot Island – none of the other fishermen know about it!’ – when they heard faint cries from a cave quite freshly sealed up with rocks. They’d dug out the rock, and released the captives.

  ‘This poor lady and gent had survived by licking the damp walls and eating little green shoots they’d grown from the seeds in the seed cake – who’d believe it? But they would talk of nothing but getting back to Venice and finding their daughter who must be with some evil old chap who goes by the name of Uberto Flangini and hangs his hat at some strange tower over on the edge of Quintavalle.’

  The other fisherman concluded, ‘And then this here Marco Molin, who is keeper of Ancient Manuscripts and suchlike, and knows a thing or two, well, he insisted that this here Chamber of Conversation must be in session, and that we must state a desire to be here … then suddenly—’

  ‘Here we are!’

  ‘And you, sir!’ the first fisherman threatened the Guardian, who cowered in the dock. ‘We’ve heard what you did. You betrayed your own kin! You are nearly guilty of a terrible crime. What if these good people had died? Look how thin they are! Like maggots themselves! Seen more fat on a butcher’s knife! And what of their tiny helpless little daughter?’

  ‘Not so tiny,’ protested Talina.

  ‘Or helpless,’ smiled Ambrogio.

  Talina felt hotly happy to hear him say so. She just wished he would look at her when he said it.

  The brothers advanced on the Guardian, their fists raised.

  Signorina Tiozzo rose to her feet, swaying slightly. The mounted animal heads chattered, chirped and barked with alarm.

  Then Signorina Tiozzo cried out, ‘Those strawberry marks on your wrists … are they birthmarks?’

  ‘Where were you born, and when, and who were your parents, gentlemen?’ demanded the Doge. ‘Account for yourselves before the Chamber.’

  ‘Now there’s a thing. Until very recently we would have told you that we were born on the island of Pescatoria,’ answered one of the men. ‘That’s certainly where we grew up. As for our birth, we are told that it was nearly sixty years ago.’

  His brother’s face was wrinkled with anxiety. ‘But we didn’t know the whole truth. Sixty years ago, we have just discovered, we were adopted as infants. Our parents had been unable to have children of their own. So they took us in, and grew us up. They never told a soul about how they got us – they pretended that we were orphaned nephews from the mainland.’

  His brother took up the tale. ‘But, when our mother died, I found a letter from her in the little strongbox she kept in her room. She asked us to forgive her for keeping the secret all those years. The letter explained how she found us floating in a basket on the hottest day of the summer at the fullest ebb of the tide.’

  ‘In a basket?’ gabbled Signorina Tiozzo. ‘A basket?’

  The Doge spoke, ‘Professor Marìn, will you quickly recount the story of Uberto Flangini and his two lost babies.’

  As Professor Marìn’s measured tones told the story of the maid and the greedy cat, the two brothers began to tremble. Then they began to weep. One of them implored, ‘Anyone got any Manitoba Gargling Oil? I believe I’m going to faint.’

  The professor concluded, ‘I believe that if you do the arithmetic …’

  ‘We are doing the arithmetic.’

  ‘Then we must deduce that those lost babies who floated away …’

  ‘Were us,’ sobbed the fishermen.

  ‘Are us, Papà!’ They wiped their eyes and beamed at Uberto Flangini.

  ‘Such a happy conclusion!’ the Doge smiled.

  ‘But what about Grignan?’ cried Talina. ‘What about his plans to destroy Venice? He will never give them up.’

  ‘The outlaw Grignan shall be hunted down by the keenest-eyed of our creatures,’ said the Doge. ‘Owls shall search for him by night. By day, he shall be hunted by the hawks and the falcons. Even on the sea, he shall not be safe, for the calamari shall be on his trail. Meanwhile, the Chamber shall continue its deliberations on his sentencing – deliberations to which all living humans are extraneous. You shall return to your safe place and wait.’

  ‘Wait?’ wailed Talina in agony.

  the crooked house at Santa Croce, May 20th–27th, 1867,

  Saint Agostino’s Day

  TALINA’S PARENTS HAD move
d into the professor’s house – the Guardian had, it turned out, sold the lease on the little house in the Calle del Teatro. Now it stood bolted and empty, though the sills of the oval windows and the entrance hall were piled up with letters, Lucia Molin mentioned wonderingly, addressed to a ‘Principessa Paulina Pessel’. And so Talina had finally told her parents about her work for the Manitoba Gargling Oil Company.

  ‘Though I haven’t had much time,’ she added, ‘for literary productions in the last few weeks.’

  Now Talina’s parents were cosily installed in Professor Marìn’s light-filled airy attic, among a thousand distinguished manuscripts of the professor’s, so Marco Molin felt quite at home.

  Or as cosy and at home as anyone could feel, with the knowledge that Grignan might strike at any moment.

  Grignan tormented them with silence. Days of it.

  Days in which the professor worked in miserable fits and wretched starts on his latest volume of magic, and Tassini scribbled down the events of the last few weeks for a new book of his own, frequently consulting his volumes on Furious Rabies and mange-mites.

  Every so often a whir came from Mademoiselle Chouette’s room – but it was just the French mistress listlessly turning the wheel of her sewing machine. Otherwise the house was melancholy and silent.

  Talina had experience of silence too. It was like when she sent off a wonderful story to an editor and did not receive so much as a ‘thank you’.

  But this time she was not angry. There wasn’t a whisper of a flounce in her now. As the third week of May turned into the fourth and the fourth slumped into the next, Talina quite forgot to be impudent. She had no spirit for it.

  She was deeply, deeply worried.

  Late one afternoon, someone beat lightly at the door of the crooked house in Santa Croce. But when Talina flung it open (perhaps a little too violently, she would realize later), there was nobody there.

  ‘Hello?’ she called. ‘Has someone got news for us at last?’

  The street was empty. Disappointed, Talina closed the door and returned to the cheerless little tea party that was taking place in the kitchen.