Free The Bellini Card by Jason Goodwin Page B

would be better if Resid did see him. He wondered if the vizier would salute him.
    Sure enough, as the two caïques got within hailing distance, Resid Pasha leaned forward and signaled to his boatmen. The caïques drew level, and the boatmen rested on their oars.
    Yashim touched his fingertips respectfully to his forehead and his chest, while Resid’s hand fluttered briefly to his scarlet fez.
    “How glad I am, Yashim efendi, to see you in our pleasant city!” The young man inclined his head and winked. “Summer is such a
healthy
season to be here, I think.”
    “I followed the counsel of someone experienced, Resid Pasha,” Yashim responded politely.
    The young man smiled pleasantly. “Very well, Yashim. It will suit you, in the long run. Indeed,” he added, clearly enjoying the little joke, “I have heard that certain other cities are positively dangerous to the health at this time of year.”
    “None, I would hope, that are under the mantle of God’s protection,both in this world and the next,” Yashim replied. He was fairly sure that neither rower could understand a conversation spoken in the pompous language of the Ottoman court.
    “No, no, certainly not. Here all is serene. But one hears a great deal about death in, say, Venice.”
    “In Venice?” Yashim echoed.
    “Well, well, it shall not spread. Inshallah.”
    “Inshallah,” Yashim returned automatically. A covey of shearwaters skimmed past, almost touching the unruffled surface of the Horn.
    “Soon, I hope, the time will be favorable for me to visit the esteemed pasha once again?” He wanted to know how long Resid planned to keep him under wraps. He wanted to visit the valide.
    The young pasha nodded. “I will send for you, Yashim. Two weeks from now, I imagine, would be auspicious for us both. I shall be very pleased to see you.”
    He waved a hand at the boatmen, who dipped their oars. “Seeing you, my friend, has given me great pleasure.” He gave a nod, and the caïque pulled away.
    Yashim watched them go. Two more weeks! He gave a signal to his boatman. To his surprise the man was looking at him with something like anger.
    “You should have told him about us, efendi,” he said bitterly. He glanced over Yashim’s shoulder. “You should at least have asked him to save the tree.”
    “Do you think it would have made a difference?”
    The boatman looked at Yashim in his plain brown cloak, then up the Horn at the crimson caïque.
    “Nothing surprises Spyro anymore,” he said.

 
    C OMMISSARIO Brunelli left his house in Dorsoduro early and walked to the
traghetto
, where he stopped for a
caffè
corretto
. On days like these, when his son was more than usually difficult and rebellious over breakfast, the café between home and the Procuratie was his single guilty pleasure. That morning he had been presented with a scowling boy, muttering darkly under his breath, all thanks to a spot of unpleasantness at La Fenice the night before.
    He sighed and leaned his elbows on the counter. La Fenice was the only public place in the city where the barrier between Austrians and Venetians was regularly breached. Austrians occupied the boxes and Venetians pointedly arranged themselves in the stalls, but at least for a few hours the two sides shared the same space and applauded the same artists. Trouble, when it began, generally occurred afterward as the opera lovers streamed out of the tiny theater onto the constricted quay.
    Last night’s affair, if Paolo was to be believed, had involved an Austrian officer commandeering a gondola reserved by a Venetian family. An altercation had arisen, in which the gondoliers themselves had joined, before the officer, according to Paolo’s story, had been driven off with his lady friend, to the universal hissing of the Venetian crowd. No doubt there was another side to the story, as Brunelli had attempted to explain to his son. Even Austrian officers could make a mistake.
    He stirred two sugars into his little cup.