Page 127 of The Collector
General Ferrari signaled the waiter. “I suppose there are worse ways for a story to end. Wouldn’t you agree?”
“Yes,” said Gabriel. “Much worse.”
IlGazzettinoseemed to think there was going to be trouble. The mayor agreed, and beseeched his citizenry to avoid San Marco at all costs. It was all the encouragement Gabriel needed to forbid his daughter to attend. His wife appealed to him to reconsider.
“Please, Gabriel? The child has her heart set on it.”
“Is there no way I can talk you out of this?”
“Said the man who just returned from Russia.”
“But I was saving the world.”
“Now it’s Irene’s turn.”
“Can’t we just have lunch instead?”
“First, we’ll let Irene and her friends save the world. Then we’ll all have lunch.”
“I’ll make a reservation. Where shall we go?”
“We haven’t been to Arturo in ages.”
They rode to San Marco on a Number 1 and arrived at the piazza to find several thousand protesters gathered at the foot of the campanile. Chiara and Irene joined the brightly clothed throng, but Gabriel and Raphael wisely withdrew to a table at Caffè Florian, where they would have a ringside seat if things got interesting. Raphael hadbrought along his math homework, leaving Gabriel with nothing to do except imagine what would happen if a nuclear weapon were to land in the middle of the enormous square. Or on Independence Square in Kyiv. Or Freedom Square in Kharkiv.
He realized after a moment that his son was staring at him with his long-lashed, jade-colored eyes. “What are you thinking about?” asked the boy.
“Nothing at all.”
“That’s not possible,” said Raphael, and resumed his work.
The mayor’s warning notwithstanding, the demonstration was entirely peaceful. Speakers spoke, a chant was chanted, a song was sung, a beautiful rendition of John Lennon’s “Imagine” that filled the piazza from the basilica to the Museo Correr. When it was over, Chiara and Irene made their way to Florian. So did four of Irene’s classmates, all of whom, it turned out, would be joining the Allon family for lunch at Vini da Arturo.
It was located on the Calle dei Assassini. Gabriel telephoned during the walk from San Marco to alert the proprietor that their party of four had unexpectedly grown to eight. The confines of the cramped dining room required adults and children to sit at separate tables. The proprietor suggested a fixed menu for the children that sounded so enticing that Gabriel and Chiara ordered it as well. They scarcely spoke during the meal, preferring instead to eavesdrop on the conversation at the opposing table.
“Do you hear that?” asked Chiara. “Your children have lost any trace of an accent. They’re Venetians now.”
“Are they happy here?”
“They are now that you’re home again. But they were miserable while you were away. Irene, especially.”
“Is it my imagination, or does she have some idea what I was doing?”
“She’s unusually observant, your daughter. And quite serious. They both are. I have no doubt they’re going to lead lives similar to yours.”
“I beg of you not to let that happen.”
Chiara smiled sadly. “Why must you always make light of your accomplishments?”
“Because I’m endlessly bored by people who dwell on theirs. And because I sometimes wish...”
“That you had been born in Berlin and that your name had been Frankel instead of Allon? That you had attended the finest art academy in Germany and had become an important German painter? That your mother hadn’t spent the war in Birkenau and that your poor father hadn’t been killed in the Six-Day War?”
“You forgot to mention Vienna.”
“But that’s who you are, Gabriel.”
“Eli says I have an uncontrollable need to repair things.”
