Stone's Fall

'I do not know when it happened,' she said. 'Most stories in Venice have no date to them. But, a long time ago, a man was walking down an alley a short way from here. He was thinking of the woman he was about to marry, and his happy thoughts were disturbed by a beggar, asking for money. He was angry, and kicked the man for his insolence, and caught him on the head with his boot. The beggar rolled over into the canal, struck dead, and the young man ran off.

'The wedding day came and eventually the bride and groom were alone in their bedchamber. There was knock on the door. The man, cursing, opened it and saw a horrible apparition. A corpse, flesh dropping from its bones. Eyes staring from their sockets. Teeth protruding where the flesh had been eaten away by fish.

'The man screamed, as you might expect.

' "Who are you? What do you want?" the man cried.

' "I am the beggar you killed. I want burial," the apparition replied.

'Again the man ignored the request. He slammed the door, and bolted it. When he had recovered enough he went back upstairs to the bedchamber.

'But when he walked in the room, he turned pale and fainted.

'"What is the matter, my love?" cried the wife.

'She got up, and began to walk towards him. But as she passed a mirror, she turned to look at herself.

'Her face was white and skull-like, the hair torn out, the eyes staring from their sockets, the teeth protruding where the fish had eaten away the flesh.'

She was talking ever more softly, and I found myself moving closer to her as she told this hideous, fascinating fairy story. When she ended, I was close enough to feel her breath on my face. She looked openly and frankly at me.

'And the moral of the story is, never be unkind to beggars,' I said.

'No,' she replied softly. 'The moral is, do not marry a man who is cruel and heartless.'

I came to myself and stepped back. What had just taken place? I did not know, but it was as though a charge of energy had surged through me; I was in a state of shock. Not the story, but the teller, and the manner of the telling.

It was the way her eyes fixed on me that caused the true shock, so far beyond what was correct, and to which I responded. Or didn't; I initiated it, perhaps. Perhaps she responded to me.

'Now I feel dissatisfied to travel so ignorantly,' I said.

'Perhaps you need a guide.'

'Perhaps I do.'

'You should ask my husband,' she said, and registered the disappointment in my face. 'I'm sure he would allow me to show you the sights of the city.'

Again those eyes.

'Do I need to ask his permission?'

'No,' she said with a touch of contempt in her voice.

'I do not wish to trouble you. I'm sure you are very busy.'

'I could spare you some time, I'm sure. I would enjoy it. My husband is always telling me I should do more out of the house. He knows there is little of my own here, not that he does anything except apologise.'

I could not get the encounter out of my mind, then or later. It grew in me, like my feeling for the city itself, without me even noticing. But I was aware that what I saw and did was blending with my thoughts, almost to the point of not being able to tell one from the other. Although I wished to clear my head, I also wished the strange state to continue. It was luxurious to surrender to the least impulse, to allow any thought to pass through my head, to abandon that careful discipline I had steadily cultivated. To be other than myself, in fact.

I needed company for distraction, but I also wished to discover more about Louise Cort. What was her history, her nature? Why had she talked to me in such a fashion? What sort of person was she?

I had only met her on two occasions by this point, and only for a few minutes in all. Not enough to explain her place in my thoughts; certainly no other woman – and by then I had met many more charming, more beautiful, more notable in all respects – had such a rapid effect on me. For the most part I had forgotten them the moment they had passed from my sight.

I found my way to the restaurant a few days later as I again needed company to fill my hours; the Marchesa was perfectly happy to provide food, at an extravagant extra cost, but her cook was dreadful and she insisted on dining in state in the old dining room. Just her and me, at opposite ends of a very long table. Conversation was difficult, to say the least, and the predominant sound was of clinking cutlery and the noise she made as she ate, for she had false teeth which did not fit very well and which needed to be sucked back into place after every bite.