FIESTA

A story based on Luke Fildes' painting - An Alfresco Toilette

 

This is a story I have written after a visit to the Lady Lever Gallery at Port Sunlight, Wirral. I saw the very beautiful picture, An Alfresco Toilette, by Luke Fildes and one I felt constrained to write about when my writers' group were having a spell there with the idea of writing about a picture that impressed us. Last year, I wrote about a picture of an imprisoned poacher who had been allowed to retain his faithful dog in the cell. About that, I wrote a short story and a long narrative poem. This year, I have written this short story and a sonnet, a form in which I enjoy writing.

 

An Alfresco Toilette, Samuel Luke Fildes, 1844 -1927.

Lady Lever Art Gallery, Port Sunlight.

 

Fiesta

 

They walked through the back ways of Venice, three young men on the loose, first time abroad on their own but friends through most of their twenty-one or so years of life. Their first sight of the city had stunned them; coloured reflections from a sky such as they had only imagined lighting up the iridescence of a shimmering lagoon ablaze with pennants, striped poles and bobbing gondolas. At night, the romantic light of many tons of suspended crystal in the palazzi as they rode the vaporetto along the Grand Canal was something that stirred the souls even of young lads out on the town.

           

Bob voiced the thoughts of them all: This is a place to be explored, lads', he said with enthusiasm. They in return gave a whoop of expectation at the latent delights conjured up by the thought.

 

Andy, Bob and Carl were out and about early next morning. With the enthusiasm of youth, they were determined to cram every moment of their week with interest. They embodied the best in modern youth, being able to be part of the modern 'scene' yet retain the healthy interests outside the restrictions of the ‘Top Ten'. From the small Pensione where they were staying, they emerged full of enthusiasm and were soon embarked on seeing the usual sights visited by tourists starting with the Piazza San Marco and the ritual pigeon feeding. Their spirits were high as they found their way into the magnificent Basilica of St Mark, passing on the way the repetitive splendour of the Doges' Palace with its amazing upside down architecture.

 

All morning they wandered, soaking up the light, life and bustle of a city not simply great, but unique, then looked for somewhere to sit for a sandwich and a quiet beer.

            'Well, we're not going to find it round here’. Carl said. Look at the prices. University life had prepared them already, making them judicious shoppers not likely to be caught in any tourist traps. 'Come on, follow me, and we'll get off the beaten track',

 

Carl was a natural leader with a penchant for getting into and out of scrapes with equal expertise. Life in his company was never dull and they followed with alacrity, walking beside a small branch canal on a narrow, non-too safe parapet, crossing bridges and turning corners that soon had them completely lost. Dross floating in the canal and the overriding smell of stagnation assured them that no crooning gondoliers and romantic couples would ever be found in this backwater. The sky was still blue but appeared only as a narrow strip far above their heads and what had started out as a bright day of adventure and discovery seemed to close in on them with depressing intensity.

            When they turned a comer, emerging into a small square with a solitary, gibbet like tree, devoid of leaf and life, it was with relief. Each in his own mind was incredulous that his spirits could have plunged so quickly,

though was as yet, unaware of the similar feelings of his companions.   As is the way with young men, the situation was soon lifted by some raucous and jocular skylarking as they emerged into a larger square where the sun cast less shadow and the world was bright again.

 

Here they found a Cafe Bar that served cold beer and ham panini. It was a moment frozen in time. The waiter wore a stiff collar and waistcoat and the prices were laughable. They thought of all those poor tourists being fleeced in the Piazza San Marco and chuckled to themselves.

'This is the place to be. These people are real Venetians, none of your fashion plates and posers, just look at their gear,' Andy said as they studied the passers by. It was true. In common with the waiter, they seemed to have stepped back in time. Laughing in amazement, as a knife grinder pushed his apparatus past their table, they watched enthralled as he sharpened the knife that, minutes ago, had sliced their ham from a great shank hanging from the beam in the cafe.

After the brilliance of the morning sun, the light into which they had emerged on entering this square had a tone that they could not readily identify, - soft, warm and golden.   Their eyes took in the houses opposite, merchants' dwellings they decided, though they had seen better days. Each had a porch supported by strong, ridged pillars, which reminded them of the rear of the Pitti Palace, which they had seen the week before in Florence.   Roses grew out of the unpaved earth of the square at the house opposite, climbing over a roughpergola, under which sat three girls of about their own age or perhaps a little younger laughing and conversing with enthusiasm and obvious enjoyment while combing each other's hair. The girls were beautiful. Close by, two younger girls talked and one showed her treasure, a red necklace, to the other.   The girl in an upright chair currently receiving attention was a titian haired beauty.   She had a tablecloth on her lap and was obviously supposed to be working on it because a thread led down to the workbasket at her side.   Her skirt was in a material that looked like denim but wasn't, her pinafore in green and white stripes, her shoes neat and black. Herblouse was hidden beneath a Niagara of tumbling red hair.

 

'She's mine' said Carl and, as the others were also beauties, they deferred to him. It was all in the mind anyway. Andy, who was slightly older than the others said he'd have the hairdresser, much attracted by her full young body under a tieback bandanna and a neatly fitted top.

 

'Look at the swirl on that skirt, he said, just imagine that dancing. The one with the footstool's yours, Bob.'

 

'That's alright by me.' Bob said, then shocked them rigid by walking boldly across the square and starting a conversation. Well 'conversation' was hardly the word. The mouth rested and allowed the hands to do the work. Bob had rapidly acquired the Italian skill of hand language and it is amazing the interchange that can take place between two willing participants with the aid of four eloquent hands and two languages with similar roots.   She was a real Latin beauty, dark hair in a chignon, striped blouse with a seductively draped scarf disguising the true voluptuousness of her figure and a red and gold full-length skirt. Her gaze was direct, her lips full.

 

In an animated, gymnastic display, Bob determined that they were the five daughters of the house and that their father owned a brush factory. Tonight was a fiesta, a fair, and they were preparing for it.

           

'Bellissimo!' cried Bob briefly carried away and burst into what he vainly hoped was Italian.

Back with his friends, he acquainted them with the news. Tonight there's a fiesta and at eight o'clock, the girls would be under the clock in the next square where it was to take place. They must meet secretly as their father would not approve and it had been difficult to get his permission even to attend. They must be back home for eleven o'clock. ‘By the way, mine's called Sophia!'

 

There was a stunned silence, then as one, they rose and half ran to the proposed trysting spot, pausing only to pass close to the girls, now looking demurely away but easily the most beautiful girls they had seen that day. Only the two younger ones showed any curiosity, giggling, as younger sisters will.

 

The boys traced their path back to their pensione noting every turn. It would be a tragedy to be unable to find the place that night. They walked into their room and immediately set about making themselves the smartest men in town, which is difficult from a lightweight walker's rucksack.

           

In good time they set off for their rendezvous and, thanks to careful planning, found the spot without difficulty. The fiesta was already in full swing, with fireworks beginning to shriek and explode, because the light was now gone and the heady Mediterranean night had closed in. The square was a jewel among the dark alleys and canals that surrounded the small locality joyfully celebrating its own patron saint's day. All around were crowds of noisy, friendly people, many in disguise, some simply masked. Balloons were everywhere and the night was punctuated by the bangs as they burst under feet or were pricked to frighten girls, who jumped, thinking they were fireworks. Lanterns hung from balconies and music was everywhere. Not hideous 'Pop', but the music of the Italy of times past. Vivaldi came from an orchestra sitting in the square and the boys came to realise just how bright and cheerful Vivaldi can be. It was the Spring movement from Le quattro stagioni, full of brightness, new life and levity. ‘Primavera!’ they shouted as one. They had seen Botticelli's painting in Florence.

 

Their eyes were on other things however. It seemed everyone had the same idea. 'Meet under the clock', and the lads' eyes were everywhere.

 

‘There!' Carl shouted suddenly, seeing a flash of reddish gold illuminated by a street lamp. A smiling face withdrew rapidly, knowing full well it had been spotted and three figures began to lead the lads a dance through the crowds, each moment allowing them just a little closer until they were caught and whirled by the lads into the dancing which surrounded them.

 

This teasing, flirtatious chase set just the right tone for what followed. Six young people who had little verbal communication joined with good humour and happiness into the atmosphere of the fiesta. The girls were truly beautiful, and the toilette of the afternoon not been in vain. Hot and flushed with the chase, then the dance, they repaired to the table in the next square that they had occupied that afternoon for a beer. How strange that in all the hustle, they were able to sit at just that table and were even served by the same strange waiter, and how daring of the girls to sit opposite their own house. The lads looked long and hard at the house. The girls were an enigma. Their clothes of the afternoon were not those of servants, neither were they those of moneyed Venetians though they carried them as though they came from the couturiers of Paris. The house was in some disrepair but had obviously been in its day, that of people of substance. Each boy, while being attentive to the girl beside him, because of the lack of conversation, was able to let his mind dwell on these things. This was a situation in which not one of them had found himself before. Andy, a practical lad came down to earth.

 

'Hey, I hope their father isn't up in the window with binoculars,’ he said quietly to the others, ‘you know they're doing this on the Q.T.

 

They rose, refreshed, and gently taking the hands of the girls, Andy that of Paola and Carl, that of Rosa, they led them from the hustle of the celebrations and into the quieter surrounds. Walking in pairs along the narrow canal banks they communicated in feelings. Words were not missed. Relationships were being established that were delicate and wholesome. Something to preserve and not put at risk in groping, fumbling attempts to seduce. Carl, with the striking Rosa on his arm, considered his feelings and realized, with surprise, that even his mother would approve. In a tiny, quiet square, no more than a courtyard in fact, beneath a draping bougainvillea and the brightness only of the moon and stars, three young men experienced the tender kisses of three beautiful young women whose lips held the fragrance of honeysuckle on a wonderful Venetian night. Serenissima!

 

The hour of parting approached and reluctantly, they returned to the busy square. The lads thought of glass slippers and pumpkins as they made arrangements with great care to meet again two days hence. To be doubly sure they wrote down the date and time. It was a romantic thought that prompted Carl to say, 'Let's write it down for each other and swap papers.' The girls didn't understand what he said but soon caught on to the suggestion, laughing at the idea of the souvenir. Each group wrote the day, the time and their six names on paper before exchanging them. Such was the moment.

 

And so they parted, not needing a gondola - they walked on air.

 

Next day, having talked long into the night about their experience they woke a little later than normal and decided on a leisurely morning. They strolled as far as the Rialto then made their way back through the Mercerie, looking round the stylish shops of Venice, toward Piazza San Marco then continued to the Arsenale before turning South to the lagoon and taking the delightful walk along the Riva della Schiavoni; There, they looked across to San Giorgio Maggiore. Cruise liners and container ships vied for moorings in the lagoon and the lads argued the viability of the claim that, in its hey-day, the Arsenale could produce a seagoing vessel from scratch in twenty-four hours.

 

'Who cares anyway? Andy interjected. I think I'm in love with a hairdresser.' They laughed because each recognised that they too were only half interested in the unique view before them. They were living in the limbo between retrospection and expectation. The previous night, indeed the whole day, seemed to glow. It had been different, yet all that had happened was that three young men had met three young women. It had happened before - it would happen again - such events kept the world turning and were nothing remarkable. Until they happened to you!

 

That night, they found a little back street restaurant in the area of, but not too near to the house on the square. They ate well and made plans as to what they could do and where they would go on the morrow, then turned in for a night of sweet dreams and fine imaginings.

The day dawned, cloudless, its warmth already heating the room uncomfortably as they rose. Carl and Bob wanted to go away from the lagoon today and Andy had no particular thoughts on the matter.

 

'Let's walk over to Mestre' Carl said. 'What’s there?' the others replied as one.

 

'I haven't a clue but it'll get us away from canals for a few hours,' Carl said. Too much Venice can be heavy going,' he said by way of explanation; so Mestre it was. Beyond the causeway, they lunched in what seemed to be an unspectacular little cafe, where they feasted on the most wonderful pizzas, straight from a wood fired oven, which belied the appearance of the place, Otherwise, it was an unremarkable day, and getting too close for pleasure to the industrial zone which pollutes the skies over the mainland. They managed to catch a bus back and prepared for the evening's assignation.

 

Some time later, they walked once more through the quiet backwaters until they reached the square. They waited for the girls but none came. Surreptitiously, they strolled past the house, but the women sitting outside were not the ones they had hoped for. For two hours, they waited at the bar across the square, their eyes never leaving the old house.

 

‘They've been kept in - someone must have told their father about us,' Bob said, but this time he did not volunteer to go across. It could have made matters worse for the girls. They had hoped that the same starchy old waiter would be on duty, feeling that they could have asked him for information, but tonight's service came from a much younger and more youthfully clad one, whom they had never previously seen. Eventually, slightly drunk, and infinitely miserable, the trio turned for home, hearts heavy and heads down.

 

Next morning, the three sad young men decided to make a sortie into the sunshine to see if the girls had been allowed out and to try to find a way to contact them. They arrived at the square and walked boldly to the front of the house where there were some old women sitting. Bob had by now memorised some helpful phrases and asked if the young ladies were available. This request met with an uncomprehending stare. A very slightly younger woman emerged, who spoke a little English.

 

'No, no young women live here - haven't for years - just us since our father died.'

He looked closely at her necklace. It was red. His eyes moved toward the hair of one of the old crones. It could - just could - once have been red. The same sewing basket was beside her chair and the thread that emerged from it led his eyes to a - - no, to the tablecloth that Rosa had been working on.

 

The eyes of Carl, Tom and Andy had all gone through the same routine when surveying the ancient women. One wore Paola's brooch and the other an ivory hair fastener that Bob seemed to remember from Sophia's fragrant black chignon. The sun in the ancient square today held the brilliance of morning, while the waiter opposite was again youthful, as was his dress. From a window nearby came the recorded strains of Vivaldi - this time, the mournful adagio molto of Autumn.

 

The boys turned and ran. Bob fingered the faded piece of paper the girls had written on and was reminded of yesterday’s unusual, sombre afternoon light. Carl too saw it and voiced the thoughts of them all:

 

'Sepia,’ he croaked – ‘sepia.'

 

 

 

 

 

Reviews

[R J Askew]

I enjoyed this. Liked the description of La Rosa very much. Liked 'Niagra' and smiled at 'fashion plate', an expression I have not heard for some time. The ending surprised and made me think of how many more modern fantasies might end in, if not the same eerie way, with severe disillusionment on the part of the fantasist.

[bluessadmood]

oh just great ,you really took me there ,i was there once and you took me there again to wonderful Venice,the canals even the bad smell adds something to the wonderful nature,you did describe the city so well,and added the wonderful story of the girls and the shy love with the three young men ,very romantic,i could see the night lights there,the fireworks ,the dancing,the sweet kissing from tender lips,everything is so magical you tell about here,you remind me ,if you do not see Venice you can not say you have seen Italy,wonderful romantic Italy,everything in this work is so wonderful and great ,i just loved it all...

[dark and twisty]

a truly unexpected gem of a work.....how'd such a fascinating idea come to you from a painting that is no doubt beautiful but with no hint of the deception in your story..

honestly, at first i was quite sure it was going to be another cliche of a story set in Venice. The names of all the famous places you threw into the story at first made me think so...the way you described it with Vivaldi etc- i was thinking: goodness i hope this isn't just another version of Summertime (the movie with Katherine Hepburn in it set in Venice)

but it turned out to be a pleasant surprise and i personally find your work a rather more apt tale of Venice where everyone allegedly says the opposite of what they mean (coincidentally have been reading City of Fallen Angels recently) and there is always this air of illusion..it is Casanova's city after all..

Essentially this story has won the heart of someone who has long ago lost it to Venice - never been there but always wanted to and hence have loved it from afar, akin to an unrequited love i suppose :)

[emmajoy]

Assolutanente perfezionare, una storia mervigliosa!!!!!

Or, in English - WOWWWWWW !

'The fiesta was already in full swing, with fireworks beginning to shriek and explode, because the light was now gone and the heady Mediterranean night had closed in. The square was a jewel among the dark alleys and canals that surrounded the small locality joyfully celebrating its own patron saint's day.' Oh yes, yes, yes, I understand !

I read this story, then, read it again!. Was smoothly swept through the sights and smells and sounds of Venice which were/are marvellously created. Yessssss! The characters of the young men and, later, the beautiful young women, were so well crafted, 'could really see them. The walk the six had was sweet, charming and warm but, never hit a wrong button.

'In a tiny, quiet square, no more than a courtyard in fact, beneath a draping bougainvillea and the brightness only of the moon and stars, three young men experienced the tender kisses of three beautiful young women whose lips held the fragrance of honeysuckle on a wonderful Venetian night. Serenissima!' - that's sooo romantic, beautifully expressed.

Maybe the ending didn't come as a surprise because there's a gentle almost magical feel about the tale, but, even so, it was a little sad.

To put it simply, I love this story, it appeals to my senses and of course, i love Italy!

It's such a pleasure to share this tale. It's going into Favourites. Thank you