The Foot of Saint Catherine - SS

Literary Review, Spring, 1999 by Thomas E. Kennedy

As Reynaldo stood peering up at the Bridge of Sighs, he felt a hand slip into his pocket and remove his billfold. He turned to see a dark head disappearing into the flow of the crowd, opened his mouth to call out, but coughed instead and groped into his pocket for his handkerchief. His back, beneath his shirt and jacket, was clammy with perspiration. His temples ached. His heart was beating too quickly. He closed his eyes and called forth the image of the foot of St. Catherine in its sleeve of glass and yellow metal. Quickly, he made his way down the bridge, across the plaza, through the narrow damp streetway. Presently he came upon the plaza of the church of St. John and St. Paul. The sun was gone behind the bricks around him now, and the plaza was empty of tourists.

In the church, the white-robed monks all sat in a phalanx before the Madonna with electric halo, muttering prayers. Their backs were to him as he stepped quietly along the marble floor to the opposite side of the church and knelt before the altar of St. Catherine. His heart stopped beating as he reached to the centerpiece on the altar, felt with his fingers around to the back of the glass, located the catch and hinge and opened the cylinder. The flesh of the dead foot was strange against his palm as he lifted it from the altar and deposited it, still in his grasp, into the inner pocket of his jacket.

The monks were still muttering their prayers as Reynaldo hastened on the balls of his feet to the doors of the church, let himself out and crossed the campo again, hurrying toward San Marco. At the mouth of the long narrow streetway, he saw a figure, haloed in the light from behind. He approached slowly. As his eyes became accustomed to the darkness, he recognized the long, thin face, the teeth, the smile. Her eyes were closed as she reached toward him. He pressed his back to the wall to slip past her, but her hand touched his sleeve, and he had no strength to go further. She moved close to him, placed her lips against his ear and whispered a single word, his name, the last syllables of it. "Naldo," she whispered. "Naldo."

"Yes," he whispered back.

Then her face was before him, moving closer, her mouth before his, so close that his own was drawn to it as to a magnet. From the end of the walkway, anyone looking in would have seen the double-backed figure of young lovers in embrace, a common sight in the city of lovers.

He was cold as he left her. His lips were cold, his cheeks, as he limped toward the mouth of the narrow streetway to San Marcos, as he left the quiet and dark to emerge onto the crowded plaza. His hand was still inside his jacket, still grasping the remains of the Saint. He threaded through the crowd to the clock tower, entered the door and began to climb. The ascent was difficult. His power was fading. He paused many times to cough into his handkerchief, to wait for his lungs to subside, to sigh and wait for strength. At length, he emerged atop the tower, stepped out beside the green bronze figures of the Moors with their long hammers, standing mutely beside the green bronze bell casings. He stepped to the edge of the tower and looked across to the campanile. It was sinking, ever so slowly sliding downwards through the island into the marshy depths. His toes overlapped the edge of the tower. He peered down at the masses of people in gaudy clothing thronging to purchase ices, drinks, shiny mementoes of a place that no longer existed; tiny as pigeons, they strutted and clucked.