Deep and Silent Waters

So many people she loved had died she was afraid to love again – yet she yearned for it, for the joy of loving and being loved. Love was like a fire towards which she was drawn, longing to be warmed by it, to be comforted, to belong.

Maybe Domenico would come here soon, to visit his sister. She was aching to see him again.

But as the end of that long, sunny summer term arrived Olivia heard from her brother that he was off to America where he had taken a job as an art lecturer in Calfornia and wouldn’t be at home in Venice when she got back.

‘How long is he staying there?’ asked Vittoria, sick with disappointment.

‘He says a year, maybe two. If he isn’t back by the time I leave school maybe he’ll let me go to America to join him – I’d love to, I’m dying to see America, and if Domenico is there I can live with him.’

Looking back on her two years at Lausanne, Vittoria could remember very little that happened. Too many days were filled with learning social graces which bored her; walking with books on her head to improve deportment, sitting down and standing up as gracefully as possible, learning how to choose clothes and accessories, what colours suited you, what didn’t, making small talk about the latest news, a play she had been taken to see, the weather.

The weather was something she did remember, she was left with a lasting impression of deep, white winters, heavy snowfalls, which meant hours skiing at weekends, freezing temperatures in the bedrooms which made you leap into bed as soon as you could get your nightie on; and long, hot summers of blue skies and flower-filled meadows up in the mountains above the limpid waters of the lake.

They played lazy games of tennis in their crisp whites, swam in the open-air school pool, laughed and splashed in the cool blue water, lay on the lawns reading and studying, revising for their exams or simply sunbathing with closed eyes with a striped umbrella fluttering over their heads, chattered in the dining hall.

They walked into town to eat ice-cream, flirted with local boys and giggled. Some of them met boys secretly – one girl got pregnant and a wave of shock went through them all. She was sent back home in disgrace and for a while the others gave up meeting boys and talking about love, but Vittoria went on day-dreaming about Domenico. She stole a photo of him from the family album Olivia had brought with her. Vittoria kept the picture in her missal, tucked into the leather binding; whenever she was alone she slipped it out and gazed passionately at Domenico, tanned and lithe, in brief black swimming-trunks on the beach at the Lido in Venice. One day she would meet him again she kept promising herself. One day.

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sp; Domenico was still in America, where Olivia was to join him after leaving school. Lying on the grass beside the tennis courts Vittoria listened to her enviously.

‘Over there I shall soon persuade him to let me go to art school. America is very modern, women go to university there as a matter of course. Look at American films! They’re full of women going to college. Domenico won’t be able to say no.’

Vittoria wished she was going to America when the vacation ended a week later, but she would go back to Milan where Carlo would probably let her work in the laboratories of the family factory although he would expect her to marry one day soon. Her heart sank at the thought of an arranged marriage with some man Carlo picked out for her.

Somehow she must find the courage to fight Carlo, refuse to marry anyone. There was only one man for her, not that she would dare tell her brother that. He would laugh at her. Marry Domenico d’Angeli? As if he would ever look at her!

Back home she spent the hot summer of 1949 much as she had in Switzerland; swimming, playing tennis at the homes of neighbours, going to parties, choosing new clothes in Milan’s designer show rooms. The pre-war life had all come back now. Vittoria, like her mother before her, spent hours in the ornate arcade of the Galleria Vittorio Emanuele II.

None of the rich young men she met showed any interest in her. Expensive clothes could not make her any less dumpy or plump. She began to be bored and pleaded with Carlo for permission to start working in the research laboratory.

At first he refused, but she was persistent and eventually he agreed. She suspected he had been trying to arrange a marriage for her but had failed.

Working in the laboratory was absorbing and exciting. Although at first patronising, not to say scornful, the scientist who ran it began to change his manner to her.

‘She has a good mind for this work,’ he told Carlo in her hearing. ‘She’s methodical, patient, very calm and above all she learns quickly. She would be a good research chemist. You could send her to university.’

‘University? Women don’t go to university,’ Carlo growled.

‘Of course they do. More and more women are studying for degrees,’ the head of the laboratory told him with a touch of condescension that made Carlo redden.

‘Not my sister!’ he muttered.

Olivia sent her postcards from the States giving vivid glimpses of her life in California where young women could do anything they wanted.

Towards the spring of 1950, Olivia wrote, ‘We’re coming home in June. Why not come and stay for a few weeks?’

Vittoria wasn’t sure Carlo would let her go. He was finally thinking of allowing her to go to university. ‘The doctors say Rachele will never have a child now. So the company will come to you one day, Vittoria. It will be a tough job for a woman to run a big firm. We’re expanding all the time, and research is expensive. They say you have a talent for it. I want you to know as much as possible about what we do in the factory. When you finish your chemistry degree you must take an accountancy course, you’ll need it if you’re to run the business efficiently. You must focus on the future. Work hard. Running a big company is a duty, not a pleasure. Remember, hundreds of workers’ jobs depend on you. If the company fails, their lives will be ruined.’

She had listened and nodded, so excited she felt sick, then filling with sympathy for her brother. His own life was such a desert; his marriage, which should have brought him joy, had been tragic and lonely. Was that all she had to look forward to?

She broached the subject of visiting Venice, expecting a short, sharp refusal, but Carlo immediately showed approval and enthusiasm.

‘Yes, of course. I will take you there myself. I would enjoy a trip to Venice. I don’t know the city and I feel I ought to. I’ll book a room at one of the best hotels and stay a couple of days.’

Vittoria was uneasy. What if Olivia felt he was trying to wangle an invitation to Ca’d’Angeli for himself? It would be so embarrassing. Why did he want to go, anyway? He had never bothered to escort her anywhere before.

‘You don’t need to take me – I went to Switzerland alone, I can get to Venice without help.’