‘ “I don’t know whom to suspect,” I said. “Tutti gli Italiani sono ladri, specialmente i gondolieri”—“all Italians are thieves, especially gondoliers.”
‘I shouldn’t have said it, of course, but at the moment I was glad to have said it, I wanted to do him the greatest injury I could. I might have stuck a dagger into his heart if I had had one, and felt the same satisfaction.
‘Antonio went as white as a sheet—the only time I have seen him without colour. His normal complexion was a shade darker than brick-red. I remember his once saying to me, alluding to his complexion, “I am red, I have always been red, and when I am dead I shall still be red.”
‘A moment later he was red again, redder than I have ever seen him. He looked away from me, dashed the bottle down on the mosaic terrazzo, squared his shoulders, turned round, and walked out of the room stiffly, like a soldier.
‘I sat down and laughed weakly. In doing so I too was putting on an act, but to impress myself, not someone else. How long I sat there I don’t know, but suddenly I noticed a strong smell and, looking down, I saw a long rivulet of brandy curling round my feet. Dark fragments of broken glass littered the terrazzo, which I now saw was slightly splintered where the bottle had struck it. What would Giuseppina say to all this? I went to look for her and found her in the kitchen, placidly beating up a zabaione.
‘ “Where is Antonio?” I asked.
‘Her face became expressionless, as it always did when I mentioned his name.
‘ “Isn’t he in the dining-room?” she said, as if the dining-room would be contaminated by his presence.
‘But he wasn’t. The oval dining-table was half laid, the door of the cellarette, from which Antonio had been getting out the drinks, stood open. The room had a provisional, expectant air like a child abandoned in the middle of being dressed.
‘I knew Antonio’s tantrums well. He had always had these moods of being what he called “nero”—“black”—and was rather proud of them. They were manifestations of his proper pride, the “amor proprio” so dear to the Italian heart; they showed that he knew his own value and was not going to be put upon. They lasted sometimes for a day or even two days, after which, and without apology or explanation, he would come out of them and be his sanguine, sunny self again. They must have cost him something, for during these times he ate but little and spoke hardly at all; they were a kind of possession. I used to wonder how his wife, who was devoted to him, stood them; they had a very upsetting effect on me. But perhaps like most Italian women she liked a man to be a man and respected his displays of temperament.
‘To Giuseppina’s unconcealed displeasure—she said she would have much preferred to do it herself—he had decided to wait on me at meals. After the first explosion, when he generally absented himself for a time, he never let his tempers interfere with the performance of what he considered his duties, and I fully expected he would come back to help me through dinner.
‘But he didn’t. Giuseppina served me; she made no comment on Antonio’s absence but stood watching me. Any emotional upset affects my digestion, that is why I avoid them whenever I can, and have got the reputation, no doubt, of being an icicle. If I had given way to all the annoyance I have felt during the last twelve years I should long ago have been riddled with gastric ulcers. Oh yes, I should have, Arthur; you needn’t look sceptical. I should have been well advised that evening to have eaten nothing; but how could I, I ask you, with Giuseppina watching my every mouthful? She was determined I should do her cooking justice, and she never took her eyes off me, or stopped talking, except between the courses. At last I could not help speaking of the subject uppermost in my mind, and asked her where she thought Antonio had gone.
‘ “Oh, him,” she said, and made no other comment.
‘By bedtime the nerves of my stomach were thoroughly demoralized and I knew I was in for a bad night. By half-past five in the morning, with the first summons of the Ave Mary bell, I knew that I was in for fever, too. I kept going over in my mind phrases of forgiveness which should also make it clear that there was nothing to forgive, for I did not doubt that Antonio would come in the morning. But instead it was Giuseppina who called me, bringing my tea-tray but no bottle of brandy. She looked more cheerful than I had ever seen her, and I, misinterpreting the signs, asked her if she had seen Antonio.
‘ “Yes,” she said, “he came at seven o’clock and took the gondola away.”
‘ “Took the gondola away?” I echoed.
‘ “Yes, signore, he said he was not going to serve you any more.”
‘ “Did he say why?” I asked.
‘She hesitated a moment and then said, “He said it was because you would not pay him enough.”
‘My illness was sharp and what was more it was recurrent. It was one of those gastric disorders that visitors to Venice sometimes get, and I expect I should have had it anyway: the row with Antonio only aggravated it. But I had never had it before and didn’t quite know what was going to happen. I didn’t call in a doctor because every day Giuseppina assured me I was better, and in the end she proved to be right. But it did for me what an illness so often does, it changed the orientation of my thoughts. The needle of anxiety pointed to myself, not to Antonio. I could think of him without agitation and without working myself into a state.
‘I thought of him a good deal and remembered his many virtues. What patience he had! He never minded how long he was kept waiting. One of the grand ladies who used to employ him before he came to me, once forgot about him, went home another way, and left him out all night: but he didn’t hold it against her—he thought it reflected credit on her, and was the way a great lady should behave.
‘And what courage he had. Many gondoliers are afraid of the water; a puff of wind or a drop of rain will send them scurrying for shelter. Storms get up very suddenly on the lagoon: we had many picnics there in exposed places miles from Venice; often we had to fight our way home against a head wind (for I rowed, too), and it took hours and was really a little dangerous, for a gondola is a most unseaworthy boat. But Antonio never minded that, or getting wet to the skin. He never reproached me with disregarding his warnings about the weather; he contented himself with saying that no other gondolier would do what he did; he was nothing if not boastful, but this at least was true. He had a great regard for appearances and perhaps he saw himself as Ajax defying the lightning. But in a humbler, less exhibitionistic way, he could be very devoted. Like a policeman, he hated having to run; it upset his dignity. Though amphibious, he was primarily a sea-creature, and though by no means awkward on dry land, he had a stiff-legged way of running—throwing his weight from one foot to the other as if he were reaching out to crush a beetle. He must have known it was inelegant, and it was particularly unsuitable to Venice, where an unguarded movement may easily knock someone over. But he would dash off to the station with my late letters and come back breathless but triumphant, saying “Ho fatto un corso!”—“I ran like the wind!”—and without making any complaint.
‘His dignity! It all came back to that. “Far figura”—how do you translate it? “Keeping up appearances”? Face-saving is at the root of the Italian character. He didn’t mind being a thief, but he didn’t like being called one. Among the popolo in Italy an insult is a thing in itself: un’ offesa, and whether it be well founded or not makes little difference to the gravity of the offence, perhaps none. By taking umbrage he was only acting according to his principles; a less dramatic course would have lowered him in his own esteem. How easy it would have been to treat the whole thing as a joke! And perhaps I could have, if he hadn’t wounded my own self-esteem by believing he could bamboozle me about the bottle—and all to satisfy his artistic sense! I had only to think of his stern accusing face—“What a lot of cognac you and Mr. Gretton drank last night, signore—what a lot, what a lot!” to feel myself getting hot under the collar. Of course I shouldn’t have minded so much if I hadn’t had all those things stolen from me in the war—all my trinkets, my cuff-links, my watch-chains, my travelling-clock—don’t laugh, Arthur!’