The Chef's Apprentice: A Novel Read Online Free PDF

but that didn’t stop him from dreaming. He regularly accosted redheaded prostitutes with a hopeful “Rufina?” and often got slapped for his trouble.
    The thing we never spoke of was that street prostitutes did not live long. The fact that Marco had never seen his mother or Rufina after that last day was ominous. It had been ten years and we all knew prostitutes dropped like flies from diseases, hunger, abuse, drink, and despair. There were few old whores in Venice, onlyyoung ones and dead ones. We all knew it, but no one acknowledged it in Marco’s presence.
    When Marco’s mother left him crying on the docks and walked away with Rufina, it was Domingo who sat next to him and gave him a crust of bread. Domingo said, “You were a sorry sight that day. Weeping, shaking, wailing, ‘Rufina! Rufina!’”
    “I wasn’t crying.”
    “ Boh . You were sobbing your eyes out. And when Rufina broke away, the two of you flew into each other’s arms and held on so tight your mother could barely pull you apart. When she dragged Rufina away the girl was screaming, ‘Marco! Marco!’ You were both pitiful.”
    Marco’s lip quivered. He mumbled, “We were only five.”
    “I know. That’s why I fed you.”
    Domingo taught Marco to survive on the street, just as Marco later taught me. By the time Domingo was about twelve, his dour, pimply face had become familiar around the harbor, and a fishmonger allowed him to clean his stall in return for fish heads and bread. Domingo performed his chores reliably, and the fishmonger, who liked his quiet way, took him as an apprentice.
    That was good for Domingo, but it enraged the fishmonger’s brother Giuseppe, the same wreck of a man who swept the doge’s kitchen and hated anyone who ran into a piece of luck. Giuseppe always stank of wine and sweat; he was lazy, slovenly, and malicious. His hair was streaked with gray and he walked with a slight stoop. His chances had come and gone, and he knew it.
    Giuseppe was one of those sad men so befuddled by drink that they’ve given up and are content to sit back and blame the world. He was pathetic, but too spiteful to inspire sympathy. He flaunted his failures as if they were a license to make his way by any underhanded method he could. He lived a perfect reversal of the chef’s philosophy of personal responsibility.
    The chef tolerated Giuseppe for the sake of the fishmonger, adecent man from whom we often bought the daily catch. Giuseppe had a reptilian face with slit eyes and a hooked nose blasted by broken veins, but his brother looked more amphibian—froggish and friendly. The fishmonger was a peace-loving man, but he couldn’t curb Giuseppe’s bitterness about Domingo’s apprenticeship. Giuseppe often gave Domingo a mean kick to the shin or a hard twist of the nose behind his brother’s back. He called Domingo “bastardo.”
    Marco once asked, “Why does Giuseppe hate you so much?”
    Domingo shrugged and looked away. “That’s Giuseppe.”
    The only subject that made Domingo talkative was the New World. He loved to repeat stories he’d heard on the docks of Cádiz. He said, “The New World is full of golden people who wear nothing but blue feathers in their hair. They live an easy life in a lush green land. Ripe mangoes fall at their feet, and fish jump out of the water into their arms.” Domingo sighed. “Imagine whole days swinging in a hammock, snacking on sugar dates.” He gazed dreamily out to sea.
    Marco reached into his imagination and wove embellishments to titillate. He said, “Women in the New World dance naked and they have three breasts.” Domingo gave him a skeptical look, but Marco went on. “The shores are littered with gold nuggets, and the forests are filled with supernatural creatures who grant wishes.”
    Domingo looked at his feet and laughed quietly. Marco said, “It’s true. I’ve talked to sailors, too.”
    I knew better because I knew Marco. He wanted to entice me into becoming a seaman and