Love Spirits: What Happens in Venice: Book One (What Happens in Venice: The Trinity Ghost Story 1) Read online

  by diana cachey

  Copyright© 2014Authored ByDiana Cachey

  Interior Photographs Copyright© 2014 Diana Cachey

  All rights reserved. This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

  TABLE OF CONTENTS

  From the Top of Our Great Bell Tower

  Uno (1) The Ghost Card

  Due (2) Her Sister’s Keeper

  Tre (3) Prada

  Quattro (4) All Play and No Work

  Cinque (5) Two Many Men

  Sei (6) Venetian Trudge

  Sette (7) Rain

  Otto (8) Ca’ Foscari Clue

  Nove (9) Tiffany Is Not Murano

  Dieci (10) Malfeasance of Matteo

  Undici (11) Phantom Man

  Dodici (12) Fashion and Fantasy

  Book Club Questions

  Have A Venetian Ghost Party!

  From the Top of Our Great Bell Tower

  Saint Mark Square

  Venice, Italy

  Dear wide-eyed tourist,

  Don’t go to Venice.

  But if you do, don’t fall in -- in a canal, in love or into Venice itself. As if you have a choice. Hear us cackling?

  Listen. We came to warn you about La Serenissima, the Most Serene One, as Venice has been called since before the Middle Ages. You will not heed our warning and you will come looking for us. How do we know? It happens every time a Venetian ghost story is told.

  As ancient protectors of the Venetian republic, we ghosts guard her virtues of which she has many. One reason we love her, and you will too, is that she is stuck in time. Did you know Venice functions without motorcars or trucks? We don’t like motorcars or trucks. Hundreds of tiny islands sewn together by foot bridges leaves no need for noisy, fume-spewing vehicles, thankfully.

  We prefer floating.

  Our classic transport is the gondola. Mostly reserved for you tourists now, gondolas are and always have been helmed by the most prestigious oarsmen in the world -- highly trained gondoliers who stand while rowing through the labyrinth of canals. They don’t mind when we ride with or without you while they serenade us with opera, Frank Sinatra songs and romantic favorites.

  Ah yes, romance. As one visitor put it,“It’s their schtick, a Venetian ploy, an act to get sexy with you.” It is true. Venice equals romance equals sex.

  If the shadows of Venice frighten you or you feel like you’re in a dream, have fun with it, float with us. We are watching over you. We want to further your journey to a more magical life because we think a person is charmed by a trip to La Serenissima.

  It could change your soul forever. Just ignore this cautionary tale.

  We remain in your service,

  The Venetian Ghosts

  Uno (1) The Ghost Card

  Venice kidnapped her. It stole her breath, it made her weep, and she forgave it. This trip was no different.

  Palazzos flanked the Grand Canal as if playing the role of soldiers obedient to the eyes of tourists who passed in public boats, water taxis and gondolas. These old palaces sparkled on water like porcelain figurines on a glass shelf. A soft breeze rolled across Louisa’s cheeks and it rippled the reflections and transformed the scene. Mesmerized by the magic, Louisa missed her boat stop.

  No problem, she thought, I’ll find another place for coffee. She refused to drink it alone in her apartment and religiously sipped her brew at one of the little cafes where handsome Venetian men worked. There were many such establishments on her way to police headquarters.

  When she arrived a few weeks earlier, American lawyer Louisa Mangottihoped to spearhead the creation of an essential link between Venice police and the rest of the world. But was she leading the department into the future of global law enforcement as she’d envisioned? No, she sat shackled to a desk where she sorted and translated police data because Interpol sent red alerts and formal requests for information in English or French, not in Italian. Therefore, many unsolved crimes remained ignored in the file drawers of the lagoon city, a thriving metropolis and huge tourist destination. And Louisa? Louisa remained bored in cubicle learning about law and disorder.

  According to recent updates to her sister, Louisa was focused on everything but international law enforcement anyway:

  Ciao Barbara, Remember that lagoon island said to be full of ghosts where patients with the plague were once sent to die? Well many other haunted places exist in Venice too. I don’t believe in ghosts, not like you do, but I am checking out some haunts. I am checking out Venetian men too.

  Because Barbara objected, Louisa promised not to explore the haunted island. But didn’t Barbara object to Louisa going to Venice at all this time? Wasn’t it just like Barbara to try to direct everything, even from afar? How much of the seemingly haunted happenings in Venice could Louisa ignore?

  Blame the postcard, thought Louisa. And as she thought it, a loud bell rang out.

  Louisa took note. In Italy, it is customary to pause and recall whatever you were thinking when a bell chimes, especially this bell, the one that echoed from the famous bell tower, high above St. Mark’s Square. The massive San Marco bell continued to sound in the serene setting, bang, gong, gong, bang, and it reverberated across the piazza, across the lagoon, to the nearby islands of Murano and Lido. It sounded authoritative and mighty. Every day. For centuries.

  What was I thinking about when the San Marco bell rang, wondered Louisa, the postcard?

  Before she left for Venice, Louisa was tugging on the edges of papers jammed into her mail slot when a single postcard fell, one that pictured a gondola floating under the Bridge of Sighs. The card bore a Venetian postmark and was emblazoned with a red wax seal. Inked in elaborate calligraphy, it read: Dear Louisa, Come to Venice but don’t fall in. In a canal, in love or into Venice itself -- as if you have a choice. Listen, we need you and you are curious. See you soon, The Venetian Ghosts. She’d read it many times, could recite it word-for-word. Like a mother, a lover, a provocateur, Venice had sent its special calling card.

  Or did Matteo send that card?

  Years ago, she and her then Venetian lover, Matteo, explored the mazes and alleys of Venice together, such that Louisa knew the town better than many locals who rarely ventured further than two bridges from their homes. She expected to see Matteo when she arrived in Piazzale Roma, the drop-off area where the bridge from the mainland stops, cars and buses meet their final end and visitors or inhabitants abruptly exchange the real world for a dreamland of cobblestone and concrete mazes, dark corners, dancing shadows and rows of houses that stop smack-dab at a canal, much to the dismay of unsuspecting wanderers.

  The familiar whistle she’d heard the day she arrived wasn’t from Matteo but from a porter loading luggage into a barge for delivery to her apartment. In the past, either Matteo hauled her bags or she dragged them herself. Those days were gone now and Louisa, an attorney and more of princess, paid the porter’s price. She didn’t need Matteo anymore. She stared off the back of the boat en route to her morning espresso. Ah Matteo, she sighed, recalling memories of him.

  The San Marco bell rang again and a large hand tapped her shoulder. There he stood, Matteo, beside her in the open air smoking section of the ferry, as if alerted to her presence by the wind. Despite all she’d accomplished since she last saw him, Matteo’s body next to hers changed her back into an insecure romantic, the younger girl who thought life
with this tortured man was possible.

  She watched him take the longest breath of air she’d ever seen a person take then pull a cigarette out of a pack. With villain written all over his handsome face, years after she fell in love with him, Matteo’s dark green eyes lured her over his cigarette. He paused to light it. He moved into her. His physique filled any space between them. Yet below his thickly curled lashes, his eyes urged her even closer. With his uneven lips perched into a one-sided smile, he seemed to have aged in that charming way men age but, Louisa feared, women did not. Bundled in typical Venetian work clothes, a long parka with fur trim and a grey scarf wrapped carefully around his neck, he might as well have been naked. His hair was perfect.

  She fought the impulse to kiss him and he took another one of those bottomless breaths, this time from the cigarette. He steadied it, relished his slow first drag of tobacco, exhaled, and instantly took another firm determined puff, such that anyone near him could see how much he enjoyed smoking, that it relaxed him. Louisa was not at all relaxed by the sight of Matteo and she wanted that cigarette for herself.

  She never felt relaxed around Matteo, who engineered it that way. The insulting, selfish brute mixed with the witty, sensual charmer. Years later, years too late, will I be forever drawn to this man, even though he makes me absolutely miserable?

  He felt it too, the heat between them, her indecision. In an instant, he moved position, stood flat up against her, pressed his body further into hers, right there in the boat.

  Like he owns me. Like his body owns me. God, he smells good, thought Louisa, who couldn’t stop the continued rise of warmth within her.

  “Stop it,” she said out loud, half to herself and half to Matteo’s wandering eyes, while he ran one hand up and down her body and ran both eyes up and down the nearest tightly outfitted woman. With this sort of erratic behavior, Matteo destroyed their relationship years ago but somehow his torrid, Venetian magnetism always allured her. Her sister despised Matteo and referred to him as that drop-dead gorgeous thug. At the moment, Louisa had to agree with her sister’s frustrating description of him.

  To Barbara’s relief, Louisa stayed away from Matteo for years while she went to law school. Never the loyal lover, Matteo pacified his rage over her absence with too much liquor and not enough women. To Louisa, her education meant freedom. To Matteo, it meant war. Yet, she longed for him, wanted him to this day. He’s just a distraction, thought Louisa.

  The public boat, or vaporetto, approached its next stop. She twirled her hair and gazed at centuries-old buildings whose vibrant colors cast their ghosts onto the canal. The boat stopped, and she jumped from Matteo before he could put out the cigarette or remove his eyes from the buxom beauty near them.

  Louisa flew up the aisle, out the open boat gate and off to find a little Venetian coffeehouse.

  **

  Too early for tourists barely awake for tours, not too early for Louisa, she savored the serene scene while Venice settled into its day. Within hours, the lovely Saint Mark Square would bustle with children, musicians, waiters, street artists, Italians, Germans, Brits, Frenchmen, Greeks and pigeons (pigeons being, appropriately, Venetian slang for tourists). The square was the meeting place for everybody who was anybody. All would mingle and gawk, eat and drink, snap and pose for photos and paintings. All would carry on in this fashion until well past nightfall, as they had done for centuries.

  Did the ghosts haunt Saint Mark Square for centuries too? Louisa wondered. A church bell tolled. Bells again, she noted. She pulled out her ghost research and read:

  A member of the Barbaro family married the daughter of GiavanniDario and bought the Palazzo Ca’ Dario. Death plagued the owners of this sinister dwelling, known as the palace that kills.

  Louisa envisioned the impressive and supposedly haunted Ca’Dario palace. Its arched windows and prominent location made it memorable to public boat passengers who regularly viewed it. The Palace that kills, thought Louisa. How many people died there? She read further:

  Many legends hover over Ca’ Dario as do the ghosts of owners such as the Barbaros whose lives were lost or destroyed. Other deaths included suicides of English scholar, Rawdon Brown, and his friend, the homosexual lover of Charles Briggs, who killed himself after Briggs left hastily. Count Filippo Giardano’slover, Raul, bashed in the Count’s skull with a statuette and manager of the rock band, The Who, also died violently there.

  To Louisa, the gilded palace looked nothing like a haunted house, except perhaps for the moldy, cracked plaster created by centuries of flooding and fog, but then again, so were many Venetian houses. She didn’t think she believed in ghosts. But that Interpol job did seem to fall in my lap, she thought. Just like the ghost card.

  A light drizzle forced Louisa to suspend her reflections and tuck the notebook under her coat. She passed through Campo San Maurizio and found Cafe Redentore, one of her favorite places for morning brew. With a cold cheek pressed against the window, she peered inside and saw steam billow up from newly formed peaks of foamed milk. Decorated in typical Venetian cafe style, the cafe’s wood-walls and dark-beamed ceilings reminded her of a sailboat kitchen. Brown and beige ceramic checkered tiles, green marbled counters and brick archways made the cafe quaint and welcoming. It was cozy, meaning tiny.

  From inside the cafe, a waiter recognized Lousa’s familiar face even with her thick cashmere scarf wrapped around it and waved her in.

  “Ciao Marino,” said Louisa to the good-looking Venetian.

  “Come zea, tutto ben?” How are you, asked the waiter in thick local dialect, already preparing her coffee, doppio macchiatone, or large double espresso with a dollop of steamed milk on top, as was her usual.

  “Beh, beh, anca ti?” Very well, she answered back in dialect. She loved practicing her Veneziano and uproarious laughter followed whenever this blond American beauty tried to speak it. The routine had become part of their morning entertainment.

  “Si, si, anca mi,” he answered that he was fine, too. Several other handsome men entered the cafe, all greeting Louisa with ciao veccia. Translated literally, it meant“hello old lady” but in the humorous and often vulgar Venetian dialect, it was a term of endearment meaning simply“dear old friend.”

  “Ciao veccio,” she said, pronouncing it perfectly, and adding to their laughter. In these little Venetian cafes, everybody knew Louisa. All of her mornings in Venice were uncomplicated and joyous like this one -- with no raging traffic commutes, no isolation inside her vehicle, no standing alone in line at a coffee shop where few knew her nor seemed to care. In this lagoon city, like a strange fishbowl, local and long-term visiting fishes watched out for others. A plethora of buon giornos and ciao veccias addressed her while the cafe filled with customers.

  She downed her macchiatone standing at the counter, not only because Venetians charge more for table service, but because locals drank their coffee at the bar. As did she, like a local.

  Why would I go back to America and leave all of this? she thought as she departed the cafe. The moon peeked at Louisa between buildings and reflected on the lagoon as she breezed through the symphony of Venice at dawn.

  She often woke early or stayed up long enough to witness the city’s unique arousal. She loved to watch, amused, as“ping, pang, ping”went the shutters when Venice wearily woke up. Boat throttles chugged, pigeons scattered, early workers trotted along the canals. Her eyes widened and the morning show built to its crescendo. Storefront slates slapped up, kiosks quickly stocked with goods. Foot and boat traffic increased, canals filled with all manner of water craft. A full-fledged water and street performance arrived after dawn’s quiet overture.

  Venice at dawn is wonderful, thought Louisa as she gingerly avoided puddles left by recent rain.

  Puddle after puddle she trudged to St. Mark’s Square, whose symphony had not yet started. In the square, she sat at an empty table carefully chained down for the night and leaned her head back to survey the tall bell tower. When she heard the bell
s chime earlier this morning, no, not a chime, a loud gong,she’d been reflecting on the ghosts. It made her think of the ghost walk she’d taken and stories the guide told, made more eerie by fog and drizzling rain. She shivered and, hoping to shake off the haunting chill, she began her morning Italian lesson while waiting for the San Marco cafe to open.

  She started her Italian lesson by reading the local newspaper and a story about two recently drowned glassmakers turned her thoughts back to Matteo. His sister, Angelica, had married a glassblower from the same factory on Murano Island where the dead glassmakers worked. Angie at one time had even persuaded her husband to hire Matteo to train in the prestigious art of glassblowing. Glassmaking came easy to Matteo, of course, being gifted at most things. He fashioned glass pieces that normally took years of apprenticeship to learn to create. The factory’s Maestro considered seniority a priority so he refused to promote Matteo based on talent. The Maestro did offer him overtime and weekend assistant jobs to help with quick advancement in the company but Matteo wasn’t interested in“working that hard.” He soon bitterly left their employ. Blessed with Venetian good looks and family money, Matteo didn’t need the job. He always spoke disdainfully of glassmakers, and especially“that factory,” after he left.

  According to the newspaper, the police were considering these two drownings suspicious. Possible homicides.

  “Vuoi un altro,” said a waiter dressed in white tuxedo, interrupting Louisa’s musings about dead glassmakers and Matteo. He asked if she wanted another coffee, unaware that Louisa hadn’t ordered one and had only occupied the empty table while waiting for the cafe to open.

  “Macchiatone, per favore,” she said. She scribbled in her notebook: Ask Matteo about Ca’ Dario, the Barbaro family, my ghost card and these glassmakers.

  Another bell rang. Bells again, thought Louis. Ca’ Dario, its curse, ghost letter, glassmakers, all important,she wrote and grabbed her purse. She pulled out the ghost card she’d received in America and waved off the waiter, who hadn’t moved to get her coffee but was instead peering over her shoulder at her notes.