Gasparo Contarini was a good guy in an age of corruption. He is one of my favorite secondary characters in Line of Ascent. Jake and Katharina stay with Contarini when they visit Venice, and I set several important scenes in his house.

In planning this research trip, I did everything I could to receive permission to visit Contarini’s house. I emailed several tourism departments and private guides. No one could help me. I found an Italian article which seemed to say that the house was owned by a religious order. I called their house in Miami, but got nowhere. The woman I spoke with promised to call me back after she checked into it, but she never did. I searched for contact information on Contarini’s biographer, but I think she may have passed away.

Yesterday, I walked up to the door with an Italian translator–an American woman named Karen Henderson. The sign told us that the house was a home for aged women ran by the sisters of the Cottolengo order–the group I had called in Miami. We rang the bell.

We were invited in, but the little nun, though smiling, was skeptical. In the first place, they did not like to disturb the patients. In the second, there was really nothing left of the original interior. Well, except for the frescos. However, she kept looking at my broken shoulder and bruised face with sympathy, probably calculating whether or not they had a bed for me.

But then, this guy arrived. Massimo Donassio. Massimo volunteers because he’s a good person–he just radiates kindness. He volunteers here partly because he’s a historian and loves the house’s history. A kind man who loves this house. It is as if a tiny part of Contarini’s spirit lives on in Massimo.

More very long discussions in Italian between Massimo, two nuns, and Karen as I stood there trying to look as pitiful as possible, which in my current state of carnage wasn’t hard. At last, the verdict. Yes, Massimo could take me to see the frescos. And on the way, he pointed out the original giant wooden doors set in their frames of mauve marble from Verona, which you can see in this picture. Of course the travertine stairs were original, and yes, the windows.

In Contarini’s time this was a ballroom, though the sisters use it for a chapel, which would please Contarini. As a young man, he was torn between becoming a simple hermit and living in the world. Then, he had a kind of epiphany in which he understood that you can serve God also in the world, and he went on to become an important Venetian statesman and a Cardinal. But he never lost his deep spirituality.

Oh, and by the way, Massimo mentioned, there is another original ceiling. Would I like to see that?

I haven’t had time to research this technique to even know what it was called. The sheet of plexiglass toward the bottom of the photo was how they divided this huge room into a series of modern offices while still preserving the breathtaking expanse of the original ceiling. Brilliant.

Next, Massimo led us into the garden. I have two important scenes set in the garden. It was on the corner of a canal and the lagoon, so it faced the open water.

Inside the gate on the right was the water slip where they would pull up the gondola. The marina you see outside was not there, though farther out in the lagoon the merchant galleys would have been anchored.  Since I have those galleys in my scene, I verified that fact with Massimo.

There was also an artesian well in the garden. I shall have Contarini draw a drink for himself and Jake, and that will show us a lot about him and make use of the living water metaphor. I would never have known about the well if I hadn’t visited.

Although nothing is left of the original except the columns, there was a raised covered terrace here that faced the lagoon. In my scene, Jake and Contarini have an important discussion as they look toward Murano and the neighboring island, which was a monastery.

It was an incredibly emotional experience to stand in a place I had imagined and worked so hard to understand. This visit pointed out a glaring error in my scene. Unlike many of the fine homes of this era, the Contarini house did not have a water floor that allowed the gondola to pull under the house. They disembarked in the garden. I’ll have to rewrite that.

Now, Jake has a real mauve marble doorframe on which to lean. When Contarini’s sister Paola teaches Katharina to walk in chopines, she shall do it in the ballroom beneath the frescoed ceiling.

It took all these people, plus Massimo who made the picture, to give me what seemed like a visit into my own novel. I can’t thank them enough. Hopefully, this will translate into a deeper, more authentic experience for the reader, and he will go away a little enriched by his visit in Contarini’s house. Contarini would be pleased.