The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Land of Cockayne, by Matilde Serao
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Title: The Land of Cockayne
Author: Matilde Serao
Release Date: April 26, 2017 [EBook #54614]
Language: English
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[Illustration]
THE LAND OF COCKAYNE
A Novel
_By_
MATILDE SERAO
AUTHOR OF
"FAREWELL LOVE!" "FANTASY" "THE CONQUEST OF ROME" ETC.
[Illustration]
HARPER & BROTHERS NEW YORK AND LONDON PUBLISHERS--1901
CONTENTS
CHAPTER PAGE
I. THE LOTTERY DRAWING 1
II. AGNESINA FRAGALÀ'S CHRISTENING 23
III. IN THE CAVALCANTIS' HOUSE 47
IV. DR. AMATI 62
V. CARNIVAL AT NAPLES 82
VI. DONNA CATERINA AND DONNA CONCETTA 99
VII. DON GENNARO PARASCANDOLO'S BUSINESS 111
VIII. IN DON CRESCENZIO'S LOTTERY-SHOP 124
IX. BIANCA MARIA'S VISION 142
X. MAY AND SAN GENNARO'S MIRACLE 155
XI. AN IDYLL AND MADNESS 174
XII. THE THREE SISTERS--CHIARASTELLA THE WITCH 197
XIII. THE CONFECTIONER'S SHOP BANKRUPT 215
XIV. THE MEDIUM'S IMPRISONMENT 231
XV. SACRILEGE--LOVE'S DREAM FLED 254
XVI. PASQUALINO DE FEO'S WILL 279
XVII. BARBASSONE'S INN--THE DUEL 294
XVIII. TO LET 308
XIX. DON CRESCENZIO'S TRIALS 316
XX. BIANCA MARIA CAVALCANTI 348
CHAPTER I
THE LOTTERY DRAWING
The afternoon sun crept into the Piazzetta dei Banchi Nuovi,
broadening from Cardone's, the engraver, to Cappa's, the chemist,
lengthening on from there up the whole Santa Chiara Road, spreading
a light of unusual gaiety over the street, which always wears, even
in its most frequented hours, a frigid, claustral aspect. But the
great morning traffic, of people coming from the northern districts
of the town--Avvocata, Stella, San Carlo all' Arena, San Lorenzo--to
go down to the lower quarters of Porto, Pendino and Mercato, or _vice
versâ_, had been slowly slackening since mid-day; the coming and
going of carts, carriages and pedlars had ceased; everybody seemed
to be taking short cuts by the Chiostro di Santa Chiara and the Vico
1^o Foglia towards Mezzocannone Alley, the Gesù Nuovo, San Giovanni
Maggiore. Presently the sun's brightness lit up a street by then
quite deserted. The shopkeepers on the right side of Santa Chiara--as
the left side is only the high, dark enclosure wall of the Poor
Clares' Convent--dealers in old dusty or wretched mean new furniture,
coloured engravings, shiny oleographs, wooden and stucco saints, were
at the back of their dark shops, eating over a corner of wine-stained
tablecloth, with a caraffe of Marano small wine, closed by a twisted
vine-leaf, standing by a big dish of macaroni. The porters, seated on
the ground at the shop entrance, were eating lazily at a small loaf
of bread, cut in two to hold some tasty viand--fried gourd soaked in
vinegar, parsnips in green sauce, pomegranates seasoned with vinegar,
garlic and pepper. The sharp, greasy smell of the quantity of
tomatoes all this macaroni was cooked in, from one end of the street
to the other, mingled with the acute odour of sour vinegar and coarse
spices. From some passing fruitseller, carrying a nearly empty basket
of figs on his head, or pushing a barrow with purple plums, and tough
spotted peaches at the bottom of the baskets, the shopkeepers,
clerks and porters, lips still red from tomatoes or shining with
grease, bargained for a penny-worth of fruit, to finish their
meal; two workmen, in front of the Martello printing-shop, where
the small visiting-card press had stopped, deeply coveted a yellow
melon; and two seamstresses were waiting on a doorstep chattering,
till the seller of _pizza_ passed, which is the shredded rind of
tomato, garlic, and wild marjoram, cooked in the oven, and sold at
a farthing, a half-penny, a penny, the piece. The _pizzaiuolo_ did
pass, in fact, but he was carrying his wooden tray, shining with oil,
under his arm, without a bit of _pizza_; he had sold everything, and
was going off to eat his own meal, down to the Porto quarter, where
his shop was. The two disappointed seamstresses consulted each other;
one of them, a blonde, with a golden aureole round her pale gentle
face, moved off with that undulating step that gives an Oriental
touch to a Neapolitan woman's charm. She went up Santa Chiara Road,
bending her head so as not to get the sun in her face, and went
into Impresa Lane, towards the wine-seller's dark shop--which was
a drinking-shop, too--almost opposite the Impresa Palace; she was
going to buy something to eat for her friend and herself. The Impresa
Lane had got empty, too, after mid-day, when all go back to their
houses and shops to eat, as the summer heat gets greater, and the
_controra_--the time of the Neapolitan day that corresponds to the
Spanish siesta--begins with food, rest and sleep for tired folk. The
dressmaker, a little frightened by the darkness of the cellar, out
of which came a sour smell of wine, had stopped on the threshold;
blinking, she looked on the ground before going in, feeling that an
open underground cave, with a black gaping mouth, was dangerous. But
the shop-boy came towards her to serve her.
'Give me something to eat with my bread,' she said, swaying herself a
little.
'Fried fish?'
'No.'
'A little dried cod with sauce?'
'No, no'--with disgust.
'A morsel of tripe?'
'No, no.'
'What do you want, then?' the boy asked, rather annoyed.
'I would like--I would like three-halfpence-worth of meat; we will
eat it with our bread--Nannina and I,' said she, with a pretty greedy
grimace.
'We don't cook meat to-day; it is Saturday. Only tripe for
unbelievers on Saturday.'
'Well, give me the salt cod,' she murmured, withholding a sigh. Then
she looked into the Impresa court with curiosity, while the youth
disappeared into the black depths of the cellar to get the cod. A
little ray of sunshine coming from the top turned the court golden;
every now and then some man or woman's form crossed it. Antonietta,
the seamstress, went on staring, humming a popular dirge, slightly
swaying on her hips.
'Here is the cod,' said the youth, coming back. He had put it in
a small plate; there were four big bits falling into flakes, in a
reddish sauce strongly seasoned with pepper, the sauce, as it waved
about, leaving yellow oily marks on the edges of the gray plate.
'Here is the money,' Antonietta murmured, pulling it out of her
pocket. But she stood with the plate in her hand, looking at the cod
falling to pieces in the juice.
'If I were to take a _terno_,' she said, as she went on her way,
holding the plate carefully, 'I should like to gratify my wish of
eating meat every day.'
'Meat and macaroni,' the boy called back, laughing.
'Just so--meat and macaroni,' the seamstress shouted triumphantly,
her eyes still fixed on the plate, not to let the sauce fall.
'Morning and evening,' called out the boy from the doorway.
'Morning and evening,' Antonietta answered back.
'You should apply to that youth,' the boy shouted gaily from the
cellar, indicating the Impresa court with his eyes.
'I'll come back later,' said the seamstress from the corner of the
street; 'I'll bring you the plate.'
Again the Impresa Lane was deserted for a long time. In winter it is
much frequented at mid-day by the young students coming out of the
University, who take the shortcut to the Gesù and Toledo; but it was
summer--the students had their holidays. Still, every now and then,
as the hour went on, someone came round the corner from Santa Chiara
or Mezzocannone, and stopped in the Impresa gateway--some with a
cautious look, others feigning indifference. One of the first had
been a shoeblack, with his block--a lame old dwarf, who carried it on
his raised hips; he was bent in two, wrapped up in an old great-coat,
green, stained and patched, a cap with no peak over his eyes.
He had put down his block under the Impresa portico, and stretched
himself out on the ground, as if awaiting customers; but he forgot
to beat those two dry claps with the brush on the wood to claim it.
Deeply engrossed with a long list of ticket numbers in his hand,
the old dwarf's yellow, distorted face was transformed by intense
passion. As the hour got near, people went on passing before him, and
a murmur of hoarse, strident Neapolitan voices rose in the court.
A man, a workman, stopped near the shoeblack; he might have been
thirty-five, but he was wan, and his eyes were dull; his jacket was
thrown over his shoulder, showing a coloured calico shirt.
'Do you want a shine?' the bootblack asked mechanically, laying down
his list of numbers.
'Just so,' replied the other, grinning; '_I_ want a shine. If I
had another half-penny, I would have played a last ticket at Donna
Caterina's to-day.'
'The _small_ game?' asked the shoeblack in a whisper.
'Yes, a little for the Government and a little to Donna Caterina.
They are all thieves--all thieves,' the workman afterwards added,
chewing his black stump of a cigar, and shaking his head with a look
of great distrust.
'You have taken a half-holiday to-day?'
'I never go there on Saturday,' said the other, giving a sickly
smile. 'I go to look for Fortune; I must find her some Saturday
morning!'
'When do you get your week's money?'
'Eh!' he said, shrugging his shoulders--'generally on Fridays: I have
nothing to get.'
'How do you manage to gamble?'
'One can always get it for gambling. Donna Caterina's sister--she of
the _small_ game--lends money.'
'Does she take big interest?'
'A sou for each franc every week.'
'Not bad--not bad,' said the shoeblack, with a convinced look.
'I have seventy-five francs to give her,' said the glove-cutter.
'Every Monday there is a storm. She waits for me outside the factory
door, shouting and swearing. She is really a witch, Michele. But what
can I do? One day or other I will take a _terno_, and I will pay her.'
'What will you do with the rest of your winnings?' Michele asked,
laughing.
'I know what I will do,' cried Gaetano, the cutter. 'In new clothes,
a pheasant's feather in my cap, in a carriage with bells, we will all
go to amuse ourselves at the Due Pulcinelli, at Campo di Marte.'
'Or at Figlio di Pietro, at Posellipo.'
'At Asso di coppe, at Portici.'
'Inn after inn.'
'Meat and macaroni.'
'And Monte di Procida wine.'
'Just so, one only lives once,' the glove-cutter philosophically
concluded, pulling his jacket up on his shoulder.
'I don't get into debt,' the shoeblack added, after a minute's
silence.
'Lucky you!'
'I would get no one to lend me a sou, anyhow. But I play everything.
I have no family; I can do what I like.'
'Lucky you!' Gaetano repeated, with a troubled look.
'Three sous for a sleeping-place, five or six for food,' went on the
shoeblack, 'and who says a word to me? I did not want to marry; I had
a rage for gambling: it stands in place of everything.'
'May he that invented marriage be hanged!' blasphemed Gaetano,
getting clay colour.
Four o'clock was approaching, and the Impresa court filled up with
people. In that space of a hundred metres was a crowd of common
people pressed together, chattering in a lively way or waiting in
resigned silence, looking up to the first-floor at the covered
balcony, where the lottery drawing was to come off. But all was shut
up above, even the wooden shutters, behind the glass of the great
balcony. As other people came up continually, the crowd reached to
the wall of the court even. Women that were pushed back had squatted
on the first steps of the stair; others, more bashful, hid under
the balcony among the pillars that held it up, leaning against a
shut stable door. Another woman, still young, but with a pallid,
worn, fascinating face, rather strange, melancholy black eyes,
hollow-rimmed, and thick black locks loose on her neck, had climbed
on a stone left in the courtyard, perhaps from the time the palace
was built or restored. She looked very thin in her dyed black gown,
that went in folds over her lean breast; she was swinging one foot
in a broken, out-at-heel shoe, pulling up on her shoulders now and
then a wretched little shawl, dyed also. She overlooked the crowd,
gazing at it with downcast, sad eyes. It was almost entirely composed
of poor people--cobblers who had shut up their bench in the dens
they lived in, had rolled their leather aprons round their waists:
in shirt-sleeves, cap over the eyes, they pondered in their minds
the numbers they had played, slightly moving their lips; servants
out of place, who, instead of trying for a master, used up the last
shilling from the pawned winter coat, dreaming of the _terno_ that
from servants would make them into masters, whilst an impatient
frown crossed the gray faces, where the beard, no longer shaven,
grew in patches. There were hackney coachmen, who had left their cab
in the care of a friend, brother, or son, waiting patiently, hands
in pocket, with the stolidity of a cabman used to waiting hours for
a hire; there were letters of furnished rooms, hirers of servants,
who in summer, with all the strangers and students gone, sat pining
in their chairs under the board that forms their whole shop, at the
corners of San Sepolcro Lane, Taverna Penta, Trinità degli Spagnuoli;
having played a few sous taken from their daily bread, they came to
hear the lottery drawn, being unemployed--and lazy. There were hands
at humble Neapolitan trades, who, leaving the factory, warehouse,
or shop, giving up their hard, badly-paid work, clutching in their
worn-out waistcoat pocket the five sous ticket, or bundle of numbers
at the _little game_, had come to pant over that dream that might
become a reality. There were still more unlucky people--that is to
say, all those who in Naples do not live by the day even, but by the
hour, trying a hundred trades, good at all, but unable, unluckily, to
find safe remunerative work; unfortunates without home or shelter,
shamefully torn and dirty, they had given up their bread that day to
play a throw. One read in their faces the double marks of fasting and
extreme abasement.
Some women were noticeable among the crowd--slovenly women, of
no particular age, nor beauty; servants out of place, desperate
gamblers' wives, who gambled themselves, dismissed workwomen, and
among them all Carmela's pale, fascinating face, the girl seated on
the stone--a faded face with big, tired eyes. Later on, as the hour
for the drawing got near, and the noise increased, among the few gray
women's faces and torn calico dresses, discoloured from too frequent
washings, quite a different woman's face showed. She was a tall,
strong woman of the lower class, with a high-coloured dark face; her
chestnut hair was drawn back, elaborately dressed--the fringe on her
narrow forehead had even a touch of powder; and heavy earrings of
uneven, round, greeny-white pearls pulled down her ears, so that she
had had to secure them by a black silk string, fearing they would
break the lobes; a gold necklace and a thick gold medallion hung
over the white muslin vest, all embroidered and tucked with lace.
She pulled up a transparent black silk crape shawl on her shoulders
every now and then, to show her hands, which were covered with thick
gold rings up to the second joint. Her eye was grave and quiet, with
a slight look of quiet audacity, her mouth settled and severe; but on
going through the crowd, on her way to sit on the third step of the
stair, to see and hear better, she kept that bend of the head, rather
coquettish and mysterious, peculiar to the Neapolitan lower class,
and the swaying of her body under the shawl that a Naples woman
dressed in the French fashion soon loses. Still, in spite of the
natural sympathy that womanly figure inspired among the crowd, there
was almost a hostile murmur and something like an indignant movement.
She shrugged her shoulders disdainfully, and sat alone, upright, on
the third step, keeping the shawl up on her shoulders, her ring-laden
hands crossed in front. The murmur went on here and there. She looked
at the crowd severely twice or thrice--rather proudly. The voices
ceased; the woman's eyelids fluttered, as if from gratified pride.
But, finally, over all the others--over Carmela, with her faded
face and great sad eyes; over Donna Concetta, with her ringed
fingers and powdered fringe, the handsome, healthy, rich Concetta,
the usurer, sister to Donna Caterina, the holder of the _small_
game--above the crowd in the court, entrance, and street, a woman's
form stood out, drawing at least one look from the people gathered
together. It was the woman on the first-floor of the Impresa Palace,
sitting sideways behind the balcony railings; one saw her profile
bending over the bright steel fittings of a Singer sewing-machine,
lifting her head now and then, whilst her foot, coming from under
a modest blue-and-white striped petticoat, beat evenly on the iron
pedal, regularly rising and falling. Among the stir of voices, the
conversations from one end of the court to the other, and stamping
of feet, the dull quaver of the sewing-machine was lost; but the
seamstress's figure stood out in profile on the balcony's gloomy
background, her hands pushing the bit of white linen under the
machine needle, her foot untiringly beating the pedal, her head
rising and bending over her work, with no ardour, but no weariness,
evenly on. A thin, rather pink cheek was shown in profile, and a
thick chestnut tress neatly arranged close to the nape of the neck,
the corner of a fine mouth, and the shade of long eyelashes thrown on
the cheeks, could also be seen. During the hour the crowd was pouring
into the court, the young seamstress had not looked down twice,
giving a short indifferent glance and lowering her head again, taking
the piece of linen slowly along in her hands, so that the seam should
be quite straight. Nothing distracted her from her work--neither
angry voice or lively remarks, nor the noise or the increasing
trampling of the crowd; she had never looked at the covered balcony,
where in a short time the drawings would be called out. The people
from below stared at the delicate, industrious white sewer, but she
went on with her work as if not even an echo of that half-covered,
half-open excitement came up to her; she seemed so far off, so
reserved, so wrapped up in a quite detached, different world, that
one could fancy her more a statue than a reality--more of an ideal
figure than a living woman.
But all at once a long shout of satisfaction burst out from the
crowd in all varieties of tone, rising to the most stridulent and
going down to the deepest note: the big balcony on the terrace
had opened. The people waiting in the road tried to get in at the
entrance, those standing there crushed into the court; it was quite
a squeeze, all faces were raised, seized by burning curiosity and
anguish. A great silence followed. Looking keenly, one could see
by the moving of some woman's lips that she was praying, whilst
Carmela, the girl with the attractive, worn face and very sad black
eyes, played with a black string tied round her neck that had a
medallion of our Lady of Sorrows and a forked bit of coral. There
was universal silence of expectation and stupor. On the terrace two
Royal Lottery ushers had arranged a long narrow table covered with
green cloth, and three armchairs behind it for the three authorities
to sit in--a Councillor of the Prefecture, the Lottery Director at
Naples, and a representative of the municipality. The urn for the
ninety numbers was placed on another little table. It is a big urn,
made of transparent metal, lemon-shaped, with brass bands going from
one end to the other, surrounding it as the meridian line goes round
the earth: these shining bands make it strong without spoiling its
transparency. The urn is slung in the air between two brass pegs;
a metal handle by one, when touched, makes the urn twist round on
its axis. The two ushers who had brought out all these things to
the terrace were old, rather bent, and sleepy-looking. The three
authorities, in great-coats and tall hats, seemed bored and sleepy
too, sitting behind the table; the Prefecture Councillor, with his
deep, black dyed moustaches, was drowsy: he looked as if he had
touched them in in brown on his sleepy dark face; it was the same
with the secretary, a youth with a dark beard. These folk moved
slowly, like automatons, so that a common man from the crowd called
out, 'Move on! move on!' Silence again, but a great wave of emotion
when the little boy who was to take the numbers out of the urn
appeared on the balcony.
He was a boy dressed in the gray poor-house uniform, a poor little
fellow from the _serraglio_, as the Naples folk call these deserted
creatures' asylum, a poor _serragliuolo_ with no father nor mother, a
son of parents who from cruelty or want had deserted their offspring.
Helped by one of the ushers, the little boy put on a white woollen
tunic over his uniform and a white cap, because lottery superstition
requires the little innocent to wear innocence's white dress. He
climbed nimbly on to a stool, so as to stand as high as the urn.
Below, the crowd tossed about: 'Pretty lad, pretty lad!' 'May you be
blessed!' 'I commend myself to you and to St. Joseph!' 'The Virgin
bless your hand!' 'Blessed, blessed!' 'Holy and old--live to be holy
and old!' Everyone said something, good wishes, blessings, requests,
pious invocations, prayers. The child was silent, looking from him,
his little hand resting on the urn's metal net. At a little distance,
leaning against the balcony rail, was another _serraglio_ child,
very serious, in spite of his pink cheeks and fair hair cut on the
forehead. It was the little boy who was to take out the numbers next
Saturday; he came to learn, to get used to the working of the urn and
the people's shouts. No one cared about him--it was the one dressed
in white for that day to whom all the numerous exclamations were
addressed; it was the innocent little soul in white that made that
crowd of distracted beings smile tenderly, that brought tears to the
eyes of those who hoped in Fortune only. Some women had raised their
own boys in their arms, and held them out to the _serragliuolo_. The
tender, agitated, distressed voices went on: 'He looks like a little
St. John, really!' 'May you always find grace, if you do me this
favour!' 'Mother's darling, how sweet he is!' Suddenly there was a
diversion. One of the ushers took a number to put into the urn; he
showed it unfolded to the people, called it out in a clear voice, and
passed it to the three authorities, who cast a distracted eye over
it. One of the three, the Prefecture Councillor, shut up the number
in a round box; the second usher passed it to the white-robed child,
who threw it quickly into the urn, into its small open mouth. At
every number that was called out there were remarks, shrieks, grins,
and laughter. The people gave each number its meaning, taken from
the 'Book of Dreams,' or from the 'Smorfia,' or that popular legend
that grows without books or pictures. There were shouts of laughter,
coarse jokes, frightened or hopeful ejaculations--all accompanied by
a dull noise, as if it was the minor chord of the tempest.
'Two.'
'A baby girl.'
'The letter.'
'Bring me out this letter, sir.'
'Five.'
'The hand.'
'... in the face of him who ill-wished me.'
'Eight.'
'That is the Virgin--the Virgin.'
But as every tenth number, enclosed within its little round gray box,
was thrown into the urn by the _serragliuolo_, the second usher shut
its mouth and turned the handle, giving it a spin on its axis that
made the numbers roll round, dance, and jump. From below there were
cries of:
'Spin, turn it round, old man.'
'Another spin for me.'
'Give me full measure.'
The Cabalists did not speak, they did not even look at the urn
spinning: the innocent babe was nothing to them, the meaning of
the numbers, nor the slow lively twirl of the big urn; for them
the Cabal is everything, the obscure but still transparent Cabal,
great, powerful, imperious Fate that knows all, and does all, without
any power, human or divine, being able to oppose it. They alone
kept silence, thoughtful, absorbed, disdaining that loud popular
rejoicing, wrapped up in a spiritual, mystical world, waiting with
deep confidence.
'Thirteen.'
'... that means the candles.'
'... the thick candle, the torch. Let us put out the torch!'
'... put it out--put it out!' the chorus echoed.
'... twenty-two.'
'... the madman!'
'... the little silly!'
'... like you.'
'... like me.'
'... like him that plays the small game--_alla bonafficiata_.'
The people got excited. Long shivers went through the crowd; it
swayed about as if it was moved by the sea. Women especially got
nervous, convulsive; they clutched the babies in their arms so hard
as to make them grow pale and cry. Carmela, seated on the high
stone, crumpled the Virgin's medallion and the forked coral in her
hand; the usurer, Donna Concetta, forgot to pull up the black crape
shawl, which fell over her heavy hips, while her lips gave a slight
convulsive flutter. No one cared any more about the sewing-machine's
dull quaver nor the industrious white sewer. The Naples folks'
feverishness got higher and higher as the dream that was to become
a reality got nearer, getting a livelier, longer sensation when a
popular, a lucky number was drawn.
Thirty-three!
These are Christ's years!
_His_ years.
'... this comes out.'
'... it will not come out.'
'... you will see that it will.'
'Thirty-nine!'
'... the hanged rogue!'
'... take him by the throat--by the throat!'
'... so I ought to see what I said.'
'... squeeze him--squeeze him!'
Unmoved, the authorities, the ushers, the boy in white, went on with
their work as if all this popular noise did not reach their ears;
only the other infant, new to all that extraordinary sight, looked
down from the railing, stupefied, pale, with swollen red lips, as if
he wanted to cry--an unconscious, amazed little soul amid the storm
of deep human passion. The business on the platform went on with the
greatest calm; as every new tenth number was put into the urn, the
usher made it twirl longer, making the little balls jump in a lively
way inside the open network. Not a word nor a smile was exchanged up
there: the fever stayed at the height of the people in the court, it
did not rise to the first floor. Down there the gravest people now
laughed convulsively, in a subdued way, shaking their heads as if the
infection had seized them in its most violent form. The affair seemed
to be hurrying to the end. Renewed shouts received seventy-five,
which is Punch's number, and seventy-seven, the devil's; but loud,
drawn-out applause saluted the ninetieth, the last number, partly
because it was the last, also ninety is a very lucky number: it means
fear, also the sea; it means the people too; it has five or six other
meanings, all popular. All in the court cheered, men, women, and
children, at the great ninety, which is the omega of the lottery.
Then all at once, like enchantment, a great silence fell: these faces
and forms all kept motionless, and the great excited crowd seemed
petrified in feelings, words, gestures and expression.
The first usher, the one who called out the ninety numbers, brought
a long, narrow wooden board with five empty squares to the railing,
such as bookmakers use on a race-course, whilst the other gave the
urn its last twirl with all ninety numbers in it. The board was
turned towards the crowd. Then the Councillor rang a bell; the urn
stopped; another usher put a bandage over the white-clad infant's
eyes; he slowly put his little hand into the open urn and searched
for a minute only, quickly drawing out a ball with a number. Whilst
the ball passed from hand to hand, a deep, dull, anguished sigh came
out of those petrified bosoms down there.
'Ten!' shouted the usher, putting it quickly in the first square.
A murmur and agitation among the crowd; all those who had hopes of
the first drawing were disappointed. Another ring of the bell; the
child put in its slender hand the second time. 'Two!' shouted the
usher, announcing the number taken out and putting it into the second
square. Some muttered oaths mingled with the rising murmur; all
those who had played the second drawing were disappointed, and those
who had hoped to take four numbers, those who had played the great
_terno_ in one, greatly feared to come out badly, so much so that,
when the lad's small hand went into the urn the third time, someone
called out in anguish:
'Search well; make a good choice, child.'
'Eighty-four!' shouted the usher, calling out the number and placing
it in the third space. Here an indignant yell burst out, made up
of oaths, lamentations, angry cries. This third number, being bad,
was decisive for the drawing and the gamblers. With eighty-four,
the hopes of all those who had played the first, second, and third
drawing were frustrated; all those who had played the five sequence,
fourths, the two treys, or these doubled, which is the hope and
joy of Naples folk, hope and desire of all desperate players,
and those that only play once on chance, saw they had missed it.
The _terno_ is the essential word of all these longings, needs,
necessities, and miseries. A chorus of curses arose against bad
luck, evil fate, against the lottery and those who believe in it,
against the Government, against that bad boy with such unlucky hands.
_'Serragliuolo! Serragliuolo!_' was shouted from below, to insult
him, and fists were shaken at him. The little one did not turn to
look; he stood motionless, with his eyes down. Some minutes passed
between the third and fourth numbers; it happened so every week. The
third number brought the frightful expression of the infinite popular
disappointment. 'Seventy-five,' the usher said in a feebler voice,
putting the number drawn in the fourth space. Among the angry voices
that would not be soothed, some hisses sounded revengefully. Abuse
poured on the child's head, but the greatest curses were against
the lottery, where one could never win, never, where everything is
arranged so that no one ever wins, especially against poor people.
'Forty-three,' the usher called out for the last time, placing the
fifth and last number. A last gust of rage among the people--nothing
more. In a minute all the cold lottery machinery disappeared from
the terrace: the children, the three authorities, the urn with the
eighty-five numbers and its pedestal, tables, chairs, and ushers, all
went out of sight, the glass and shutters of the great balcony were
shut in a minute; only the cruel board remained, straight against the
balustrade, with its five numbers--these, these, the great misfortune
and delusion!
Very slowly and unwillingly the crowd cleared out of the court. On
those most excited by gambling passions the wind of desolation had
blown, and overthrown them all. They felt as if their arms and legs
were broken; their mouth had a bitter taste from anger. Those who
that morning had played all their money, feeling no need of eating,
drinking, nor smoking, feeding themselves with vivid visions of
Cockaigne, dreaming for that Saturday evening, Sunday, and all the
days following, quite a bellyful of fat, rich dinners, tasting them
in their imagination, held their hands feebly in their empty pockets.
One could read in their desolate eyes the childish physical grief of
the first pangs of hunger; and they had not, knew they could not get,
bread to quiet their stomachs. Others, the maddest, fallen from the
height of their hopes in a minute, experienced that long movement of
mad anguish in which people will not, cannot, believe in bad luck.
Their eyes had that wandering look that sees the shape of things no
longer; their lips stammered incoherent words. It was these desperate
fools who still kept their eyes on the board with the numbers, as if
they could not yet convince themselves of the truth, and mechanically
compared them with the long list of their tickets. The Cabalists,
to conclude, did not go away yet; they held discussions among
themselves, like so many philosophers or logicians, still wrapped
up in lottery mathematics, where dwell the _figure_, the _cadenze_,
the _triple_, the algebraic explanation of the _quadrato Maltese_,
and Rutilio Benincasa's immortal lucubrations. But with those who
went away, as with those who stayed, nailed to the spot by their
excitement; those who discussed it violently, as with those who bent
their heads, deadly white, courage all gone, without strength to move
or think, the form of the desolation varied, but the substance of it
was the same--deep, intense, making the inward fibres bleed, tending
to destroy the very springs of life.
Michele, the lame shoeblack, still seated on the ground, with his
black box between his crooked legs, had heard the drawing without
getting up, hidden behind people who pressed around him. Now, while
the crowd was slowly going off, he hung down his head, and the yellow
shade of his rickety old face got green, as if all his bile had gone
to his brain.
'Have you got nothing?' asked a dull voice beside him.
He raised his gray eyes with pink lids mechanically and saw Gaetano,
the glove-cutter, who showed in his chalky face the depression of
disappointed hopes.
'No, nothing,' said the shoeblack shortly, lowering his eyes.
'There is nothing for me, either. If you have a few sous for a
combination, old fellow, I will give them back on Monday.'
'Where could I get them? If you get hold of ten, we could make up
five each,' the shoeblack muttered desperately.
'Good-bye, old fellow! Good-bye!' said the glove-cutter in a rough
voice.
While Gaetano was going off under the gateway, Donna Concetta came
alongside of him, slow and grave, her eyes down, the gold chain
waving on her breast and ringed fingers.
'Have you won nothing, Gaetano?' she asked with a slight smile.
'I have been hit by an arrow!' shouted he, provoked to be so near
the usurer, who reminded him of all his wretchedness, annoyed by her
question at such a moment.
'All right--all right,' she returned coldly. 'We see each other on
Monday--don't forget.'
'I don't forget; I keep you in my heart like the Virgin,' he called
out, alongside of her, in a hissing voice.
She shook her head as she went off. She did not come there for her
own interests, because she never gambled; nor even to worry some of
her debtors, like Gaetano. She came in her sister's interest, Donna
Caterina, the holder of the _small game_, for she dared not show in
public. Donna Caterina told her sister which numbers she dreaded
most--that is to say, those she had played most on, for which she
would have to pay the largest sums. Then Donna Concetta sent off a
lad to her sister, who quickly made off, so as to pay no one. Three
times already she had gone bankrupt so, with the gamblers' money in
her pocket. She had fled once to Santa Maria, at Capua, once to
Gragnano, once to Nocera dei Pagani, staying there two months. She
had had the courage to come back and face the cheated gamblers, using
audacity with some and giving a few sous to others, beginning the
game again, while the robbed, cheated, and disappointed gamblers came
back to her, incapable of denouncing her, seized by the fever again,
or kept in awe by Donna Concetta, to whom they all owed money. So the
concern went on. The money passed from one sister to another--from
the one who held the bank and knew how to fail in time, to the
money-lender who was daring enough to face the worst-intentioned of
her debtors. Nor was her flight looked on as a crime, as cheating, by
Donna Caterina and her customers; for did not the Government do the
same thing, perhaps, on a larger scale? A gift of six million francs
has been settled for each drawing for every _ruota_ of eight: when,
by a very rare combination, the winnings go above six millions, does
not the Government fail too, making the entire profits smaller?
But that day there was no need for Donna Caterina to fail, to make
off; the numbers drawn were so bad, perhaps not one of her clients
had won; and Donna Concetta climbed up the Chiara way very easily,
not hurrying at all, knowing it was a desolate Saturday for all
gambling Naples, getting ready for her battle of usury on Monday. All
these unhappy creatures with broken hopes passed near her; she shook
her head wisely over human aberrations, and clutched the hem of her
crape shawl in her ringed fingers. A woman who was coming quickly
down the street, dragging a little boy and girl behind her, and
carrying a baby, touched her in passing on her way into the Impresa
court, where some people were still lingering. She was very poorly
dressed; her calico skirt was so frayed and dirty it filled one with
pity and disgust, and she had a ravelled woollen shawl round her
neck; her face was so lean and worn, her teeth so black, and hair so
sparse, that the children, who were neither ragged nor dirty, looked
as if they did not belong to her. The sucking child only was rather
slight--it laid its head on her shoulder to sleep; but the poor thing
was so agitated she did not notice it. Seeing Carmela, her sister,
still seated on the high stone, her hands loose in her lap, and head
sunk on the breast, all alone, as if petrified in speechless grief,
she went up to her, and said:
'Carmela!'
'Good-day, Annarella,' said Carmela, starting, giving a sickly smile.
'Are you here too?' she asked in a sad, surprised tone.
'Yes, I came,' Carmela answered, with a resigned gesture.
'Have you seen my husband, Gaetano?' Annarella asked anxiously,
letting the baby's head slide from her shoulder to her arm, so that
it could sleep more comfortably.
Carmela raised her big eyes to her sister's face, but seeing her so
dishevelled and ugly from privation and misery, so old already, so
doomed to illness and death, asking the question so despairingly, she
dared not tell her the truth. Yes, she had seen her brother-in-law
Gaetano, the glove-cutter; she had first seen him trembling and
anxious, thin, pale and downcast, but she felt too sorry for her
sister, the delicate, sleeping baby, and the other two who were
gazing around them, and she lied.
'I have not seen him at all.'
'He must have been here,' Annarella muttered in her rough drawl.
'I assure you he was not here, really.'
'You will not have seen him,' Annarella repeated, obstinate in
her sad incredulity. 'How could he not come? He comes here every
Saturday. He might not be at home with his little ones; he might not
be at the glove factory, where he can earn bread; but he can't be
anywhere else than here on Saturday to hear the numbers come out:
here is his ruling passion and his death.'
'He plays a lot, doesn't he?' said Carmela, who had grown pale and
had tears in her eyes.
'All that he can spare and more than he has got. We might live very
well, without asking anything from anyone; but instead, with his
_bonafficiata_, we are full of debts and mortifications; we only eat
now and then, when I bring in something. These poor little things!'
Her voice was so broken with maternal agony that Carmela's tears
fell, overcome by infinite pity. Now they were almost alone in the
court.
'Why do you come to hear this lottery drawn?' Annarella asked,
suddenly enraged against all those that play.
'What am I to do?' said the other in her sweet, broken voice. 'You
know I would like to see you all happy, mother, and you, Gaetano,
your babies, and my lover Raffaele--and somebody else. You know
your cross is mine, that I have not an hour's peace thinking of what
you suffer. So all that is over of my earnings I play: the Lord must
bless me some day or other. I must get a _terno_ then; then I'll give
it all to you.'
'Poor sister!' said Annarella, with melancholy tenderness.
'That day must come--it must,' she whispered passionately, as if
speaking to herself, as if she already saw that happy day.
'May an angel pass and say _amen_,' Annarella murmured, kissing her
baby's forehead. 'Where can Gaetano be?' she went on, care coming
back.
'Say truly,' begged Carmela, getting down from the stone on her way
off, 'you have nothing to give the children to-day?'
'Nothing,' was the answer in that feeble voice.
'Take this half-franc, take it,' said the other, pulling it out of
her pocket and giving it to her.
'God reward you.'
They looked at each other with such mutual pity that only shame of
the passers-by kept them from bursting into sobs.
'Good-bye!'
'Good-bye, Carmela!'
The suffering girl kissed the baby softly. Annarella, with the
languid step of a woman who has had too many children and worked
too hard, went off by the Santa Chiara cloister, pulling her two
other little ones behind her. Carmela, pulling her discoloured shawl
round her, dragging her down-at-heel shoes, went down towards Banchi
Nuovi. It was just there a cleanly-dressed youth, his trousers tight
at the knees and wide as bells over the ankle, with a neat jacket,
and hat over one ear, stopped her with the look of his clear, cold,
light-blue eyes, biting lips, as red as a girl's, under his fair
little moustache. Stopping before she spoke to him, Carmela looked
with such intense passion on the young fellow she seemed to wish to
enfold him in an atmosphere of love. He did not seem to notice it.
'Well, have you won anything?' he asked in a hissing little ironical
voice.
'Nothing,' said she, opening her arms desolately. She held down her
head so as not to weep, looking at the point of her shoes, which had
lost their varnish and showed the dirty lining through a split.
'How do you account for that?' the young fellow cried out angrily. 'A
woman is always a woman!'
'Is it my fault if the numbers won't come out?' the love-lorn girl
said humbly and sadly.
'You should look out for the good ones. Go to Father Illuminato that
knows them, and only tells women; go to Don Pasqualino, he that the
good spirits help to find out the right numbers. Get it out of your
head, my girl, that I can marry a ragged one like you.'
'I know--I know!' she muttered humbly. 'Say no more about it.'
'You seem to forget it. Masses are not sung without money. Let us say
good-bye.'
'Won't you come this evening?' she dared to ask.
'I have something to do. I must go with a friend. Send me a couple of
francs.'
'I have only one,' she exclaimed, quite red and mortified, taking it
out of her pocket.
'May you die in want!' he cursed, chewing his stump of Naples cigar.
'Give it here! I will try to arrange my affairs better.'
'Won't you pass by the house?' she begged with her eyes.
'If I do pass, it will be very late.'
'It does not matter; I'll wait for you on the balcony,' she said,
persisting in her humiliation.
'I can't stop.'
'Well, give a whistle. I'll hear you, and sleep quieter, Raffaele.
What trouble will it be to whistle in passing?'
'All right,' he agreed indulgently. 'Good-bye, Carmela!'
'Good-bye, Raffaele!'
She stopped to look at him as he went away quickly in the direction
of Madonna dell' Aiuto. The patent-leather shoes creaked as the youth
walked in the proud way peculiar to the lower-class _guappi_.
'May the Virgin bless every step you take,' the girl said to herself
tenderly as she went off. But as she went along she felt discouraged
and weak. All the bitterness of that deceptive day, the sorrow she
bore for others' grief--for her mother, a servant at sixty; for
her sister, who had no bread for her children; her brother-in-law,
who was going to ruin; her affianced, that she would have liked to
make rich and happy as a lord, and who never had a franc in his
pockets--all these sorrows, and still deeper ones, the greatest of
all, the most afflicting grief, her own powerlessness, poured into
her mind, her whole being. It was not enough for her to work at
that nauseating trade at the tobacco factory for seven days a week;
that she had not a decent dress to wear, nor a pair of whole shoes,
so that she was coldly looked on at the factory. She fasted four
times a week to give her mother a franc, Raffaele two, her sister
Annarella half a franc; what was over went to the lottery. It was no
use, she never could do anything for those she loved; her hard work,
wretchedness, hunger, did no one any good.
She felt so miserable as she went down San Giovanni Maggiore steps
at Mezzocannone, getting nearer as she was to her saddest charge,
that she could have killed herself for being so helpless and useless.
Still, she went on into an out-of-the-way court in the Mercanti,
that looked like a servants' yard, then stopped and leant against
the wall as if she could go no further. It was a dirty place, with
greasy water, fruit-skins, and a woman's broken old hat thrown into
a corner. Three windows of the first-floor had half-open green
jalousies, just letting in a ray of light--mean little windows and
faded jalousies, on which dust, rain, and the sun had left their
mark; then a little doorway, with a damp step broken to bits, and a
narrow black passage like a gutter. Carmela looked inside, her eyes
wide open from curiosity and fear. Rather an old woman, a servant,
came out, holding up her skirt not to dirty it in the gutter. Carmela
knew her, evidently, for she turned to her frankly:
'Donna Rosa, will you call Filomena?'
The woman looked to see who it was; then, without going into the
house again, she called from the courtyard towards the first-floor
windows:
'Filomena! Filomena!'
'Who is it?' a hoarse voice answered from inside.
'Your sister wants you--come down.'
'I am coming,' said the voice more gently.
'Thanks, Donna Rosa,' said Carmela.
'Glad to serve you,' said the other briefly as she went off.
Filomena kept her waiting two or three minutes; then a regular beat
of wooden heels came along the passage, and she appeared. She wore
a white muslin skirt, with a high flounce of white embroidery, a
cream woollen bodice, much trimmed with knots of velvet ribbon at
the wrists and waist. She had a pink chenille shawl round her
neck; patent-leather shoes with high heels, and red silk stockings
showed under the skirt. In face she was like both her sisters, but
her well-dressed hair, with light shell pins, and the rouge on her
colourless cheeks, made one forget the likeness to Annarella, and
made her much more attractive than Carmela. The two sisters did not
kiss nor shake hands, but they gave each other so intense a look that
it sufficed for everything.
'How are you?' asked Carmela in a trembling voice.
'I am well,' said Filomena, shaking her head, as if her health did
not matter. 'How is mother?'
'Just as an old woman always is.... Poor mother!'
'How is Annarella?'
'She is full of trouble....'
'Wretched, eh?'
'Yes, she is wretched.'
They both sighed deeply as they looked at each other; a blush and a
pallor altered their faces.
'I bring you bad news to-day, too, Filomena,' Carmela said at last.
'Have you won nothing?' Filomena asked.
'No, nothing!'
'My luck is bad,' Filomena said. 'I have made many vows to the
Virgin--not, indeed, to the Immaculate one; I am not even worthy to
name her--but to our Lady of Sorrows, who understands and pities my
disgrace; but nothing has come.'
'Our Lady of Sorrows will grant us this grace,' Carmela said softly.
'Let us hope that next Saturday----'
'We will hope so,' the other answered humbly.
'Good-bye, Filomena!'
'Good-bye, Carmela!'
Filomena turned her back and disappeared into the passage, her wooden
heels making her steps rhythmical; then Carmela was going to rush
after her to call her, but she was already in the house. The girl
went off, wrapping herself convulsively in her shawl, biting her
lips not to sob. All the other bitternesses--all, even going without
bread--were nothing in comparison to what she left behind: that came
by itself, a constant poison, an eternal shame, to her heart.
* * * * *
At half-past five the Impresa court was quite empty and silent; no
one came in, not even to look at that solitary board with the five
numbers: they had already been put up at all the lottery-shops in
Naples; there was a group of people before each, all through the
town. No one went into the Impresa court; the crowd would only come
back in seven days. Then there was a noise of footsteps. It was the
lottery usher, leading the two poor-house children by the hand--the
one who had drawn the numbers, and he who was to draw them next
Saturday. The usher was taking them back to the asylum, where he
would leave the twenty francs, the weekly payment the Royal Lottery
gives to the child that draws the numbers. The two boys trod on each
other's heels behind the usher, chattering gaily. The white sewer,
working at her machine, raised her head and smiled at them. Then
she began to beat her foot on the pedal and pull the bit of linen
straight under the needle; she went on quietly, indefatigably, a pure
humble image of labour.
CHAPTER II
AGNESINA FRAGALÀ'S CHRISTENING
'Agnesina Fragalà, papa's lovely daughter,' said the young father,
leaning over the brass cradle that shone like gold, holding open
the lace curtains with rose-coloured ribbons, and petting with
words, glances, and smiles the pink new-born babe that was placidly
sleeping. 'Agnesina, Agnesina,' he went on saying playfully, 'I think
you are very pretty.'
'Be quiet, Cesare; you will wake the baby,' the mother said in a
whisper, from the toilet-glass she was sitting at.
'She will have to be wakened later on, at any rate; ought we not to
show her to our guests?'
'Yes; I just hope she won't begin screaming in the drawing-room!' the
young mother replied, smiling, half from nervous fears, half from
motherly pride.
'Bah!' said the young father, leaving the cradle and coming near to
his wife. 'The guests will be taken up eating cakes, sweets, and
ices. You will see a gourmandizing, Luisella!'
The light edifice of Luisa Fragalà's intensely black hair was
skilfully and prettily arranged; some curls shaded her short brown
forehead, with its black eyebrows in the youthful oval face; and the
long Eastern eyes of sparkling gray, soft and piquant, the rather
long, broad, though well-shaped nose, and baby mouth, pink as a
carnation, had a charm of youth and freshness that made her still
enamoured husband smile with pleasure.
Cesare Fragalà was young and handsome, too--rather effeminately
handsome, perhaps; his skin was as white as a woman's; his chestnut
hair curled all over up to the temples, showing in places the white
skin underneath; his face was round, rather boyish still, in spite
of his being twenty-eight; but his close-shaven cheeks had a warm
Southern pallor that was quite manly, and a thick curly moustache
corrected that effeminate, boyish look. Both of them of burgher
rank, of no degenerate race, they had the characteristics of
Neapolitan youth. The man was strong, but indolent; good-looking and
rather inclined to care for his appearance; his softness was visibly
mixed with roguishness, from the contrasts in his face, where a
coarse look was tempered by good-nature. The woman, dark and elegant,
with that blood that seems to have dull flashes, that resoluteness of
will in the profile and chin that shows a secret latent force in a
woman's heart, ready for passion and sacrifice.
The surroundings were like themselves, from the rather vulgar luxury
of pink and cream brocade that covered the furniture and the bed, the
French paper on the walls of much the same design, the toilet-glass
draped in white lace--precious work done by the bride's own hands
before the wedding--to the great wardrobe of dark wood, with gold
lines and three looking-glass doors, the height of luxury at that
time; from the numerous images of saints--Saint Louis in silver,
the face in wax; a Saint Cesare of stucco in a monk's habit, with
rosaries, reliquaries, and Easter candles, forming a trophy, on each
side of the bed--up to the silver lamp, lighted, before the Infant
Jesus, in a niche; and in the same conjugal apartment, from plebeian
tenderness, and that strong patriarchal feeling of Neapolitans, was
the cradle, gay with ribbons, where the little one of a month old
was sleeping. Everything was striking, even their clothes. Cesare
Fragalà, expecting his guests shortly, had on his coat already, a
handkerchief stuck in his shirt, and his curly hair smooth by dint
of hard brushing; but his watch-chain was too bright, his studs too
large, and his necktie was white silk instead of white batiste. Luisa
looked very pretty in her yellow silk, with a white muslin wrapper
over it while her hair was done, but she sparkled too much from
diamonds in her ears, on her neck, and on her arms. Just then the
hair-dresser put a brilliant star in front as a finish.
'Is nothing more needed?' she asked, rather thinking she had too few
ornaments.
'No,' said the hair-dresser decisively; 'the fewer things put in the
hair, the better.'
'Do you think so?'
'Let yourself be guided by one who knows his trade,' the artist
added, gathering up his combs and curling-irons.
'You look very nice,' the husband whispered, on an inquiring glance
from his wife. He looked at her tenderly, carefully, to see if
anything was wanting. 'If my combination comes off,' Cesare added,
whilst the barber took leave silently, so as not to waken the baby,
after getting five francs and one more as a tip--'if my combination
comes off, Luisella, I will buy you a string of diamonds for your
neck.'
'What combination are you speaking of?' she asked, as she put some
powder on her bare arms. She frowned, with a woman's sudden suspicion
of all affairs she does not know about.
'I will tell you afterwards,' he said, stammering.
'Tell me now,' she demanded, standing with her long gloves in her
hand.
'There is nothing really yet to tell, Luisella,' he said, rather put
out at having let out something.
'Promise me never to decide on anything without asking me first,' she
said, raising one hand.
'I promise,' he said with deep sincerity.
She was appeased, and sat down reassured, putting on her gloves,
while her husband stood before the looking-glass twirling the points
of his moustache, smiling at his own image and at life. The Fragalà
family counted up no less than eighty years of commercial prudence
and rising fortunes. Cesare's grandfather had begun with a wretched
shop in Purgatorio ad Arco Street in the Pendino quarter, rather
worse, said the envious, for he was a wandering salesman of cakes
at a half-penny each, heaped on a wooden board carried on his head,
under the arm, or by a leather band round the neck. In fact, either
on the board or in that shop, these sweets were made of middling
flour, sugar of third quality, eggs of doubtful freshness, and very
often cooked in rancid lard, filled oftener with apples or quinces
roasted under ashes than peach or black-cherry preserve. But what
did it matter? All Southerners, men and women, young and old, love
sweets, spicy cakes and biscuits sprinkled with aniseed and sugar;
the pastry at a half-penny appeared and disappeared in Fragalà's
shop, also sticky coloured caramels and cakes called _ancinetti_.
Grandfather Fragalà soon managed, by dint of heaping up halfpence, to
produce pastry at three-halfpence, the so-called _sfogliatella_, of
which there are two qualities--the _riccia_, broad, thin, and flat,
that falls into fine flakes, crackling under the teeth, whilst the
cream in it melts on the tongue; and the _frolla_, thick and fat, two
fingers' width of pastry that powders as you eat it, a thick layer of
cream inside that covers your lips and jaws. It is true Grandfather
Fragalà was accused of mixing a lot of dirty noxious ingredients in
his _sfogliatella_: starch, gum, raw sugar, beef-fat, strong glue,
and even bran. But what did it matter? On Sundays and all the other
appointed feasts the _sfogliatella_ sold like bread, or, rather, more
so, from nine to two o'clock in the afternoon; then Fragalà shut his
shop, because he had no more to sell, however many he had made, also
because he was a God-fearing man. He quietly opened another shop in
San Pietro a Maiella, putting in one of his sons; then, later on,
another shop at Costantinopoli Street, towards the Bourbon Museum,
with another son; and, finally, at his death, his eldest dared to
aspire to Toledo Street, but in the upper part, opening a pastry-shop
with _three doors_--that is to say, three shops--at the corner of
Spirito Santo, a gorgeous place. The pastry-shops of Purgatoria ad
Arco, San Pietro a Maiella, and Costantinopoli Streets still exist,
owned by the younger brothers, all more or less black and dirty,
full of buzzing flies, but giving out that intoxicating smell of
burnt sugar, apples, fruit, and crumbling pastry that all Naples
boys, women, and old men long for. Even at Purgatoria ad Arco the
tarts were sold at a penny, halfway between grandfather's price and
the three-halfpence of the modern shop. But the three shops in one
in Toledo Street rejoiced in the inscription '_Founded in 1802_,'
in gold letters on black marble--it was all white marble, shining
plate-glass windows full of coloured sweets, bright metal boxes, and
clear glasses with biscuits, tall round vases of pastils, strong
and sweet, for disordered stomachs or for coughs, and glass shelves
with all kinds of pastry in rows. Via Toledo confectionery was
superb, but among its innovations it had not neglected the safe old
Neapolitan speciality, _sfogliatella_, always popular and long-lived,
in spite of innovations in sweetmeats, in its two forms of _riccia_
and _frolla_; on Sundays, all the patriarchal families that come out
from Mass from so many churches round--Spirito Santo, Pellegrini, San
Michele, San Domenico Soriano--bought in passing some six or eight
_sfogliatella_, to give the final festive touch to the Sunday dinner.
Cesare Fragalà's father had added to the _sfogliatella_ all the
other specialities in sweets eaten by Naples folk at all the feasts
in the year: almond or royal paste at Christmas; _sanguinaccio_ at
Carnival; Lenten biscuits, the _mastacciolo_ and _pastiera_, at
Easter; _l'osso di morto_ (dead men's bones), made of almonds and
candied sugar, for All Souls' Day; the _torrone_ for St. Martin's;
and others--_croccante_, _struffoli_, _sosamiello_--all Parthenope's
sweets, made of almonds, sugar, and chocolate, delightful to
the palate and heavy to digest; but they are the joy of Naples
crowds--they are sent into the provinces, every holiday, in all
sizes of boxes by the waggon-load. Still among the Fragalàs' jealous
rivals there were some whispers about the mysterious ingredients in
these sweets; but it was harmless malignity, to which customers paid
no heed; even if they believed it, they cared little about it. The
Naples philosopher, Peppino, Fragalà's customer, said: 'If one knew
what one was eating, no one would wish to eat anything.' The Fragalà
house was solid: Cesare had inherited a good fortune and unbroken
credit from his father.
It is true he had, as a rich citizen, an instinctive contempt
for his uncles' and cousins' dark shops, where the flies buzzed
annoyingly, as if cloyed and ill with indigestion from the bad sugar
and honey; but he was prudent too--he did not scorn his origin, he
willingly received his relations at family dinners, and when he had
to make changes in his Toledo shop, he thought them over, and took
advice--mostly from his wife. Luisa thought of all this as she put
on her gloves slowly, whilst her husband went to the kitchen to see
if the refreshments were ready, and that the extra servants, hired
for the occasion, were properly dressed. She rose, and, picking up
her yellow train, went to lift the lace curtain of the cradle, and
passionately gazed on her daughter Agnesina. Never, never would her
husband do anything without consulting her; he had married her for
love, without a half-penny, against everyone's wishes, and he treated
her like a lady, as if she had brought twenty thousand ducats as a
dowry. Now that there was Agnesina too, father's lovely daughter, as
he said playfully, it was impossible he would ever hide anything from
her, his child's mother. Who knows? Perhaps it had to do with the
pastry-shop in San Ferdinando Piazza, in the centre of the richest
part of Naples, quite a modern shop, that Cesare had been dreaming
about opening for some time past without daring to risk so much
capital. Perhaps if was that, and the fresh, pleasant-faced mother
blessed the little one, and prayed God would bless her father's plans
and her mother's hopes.
On leaving the room she met her husband.
'Where is nurse?' she asked.
'In the room next the kitchen with Donna Candida.'
'Let us go and see them,' she said, going forward, followed by her
husband. They crossed to the back part of the house, where were the
servants' rooms, and came to the pantry. The wet-nurse from Fratta
Maggiore, a fine, stout woman, with pink cheeks, great prominent
eyes, and a calm, serene expression, wore her pale blue damask dress,
trimmed with a broad yellow silk band, which went in such deep folds
she seemed to swim at every step she took--it was stiff like a stuff
building. She wore a white crape handkerchief, and a gold necklace of
three rows of big hollow beads over it; the front of her dress was
covered by a batiste apron, over which she spread her well-ringed
hands. Her chestnut hair was tightly held back by a silver comb, from
which fell a big bow of blue ribbon. Donna Candida, the midwife,
was beside her, a guest who had to be asked; she had put on her red
silk dress for big christenings, the portrait of her late husband,
Don Nicodemo, in a brooch, and a red cotton camellia in her gray
hair. Both she and the nurse, most important people, were waiting
patiently, saying a few words to each other.
'I wish you all happiness,' called out the old nurse on seeing her
patient.
'Thank you, Donna Candida. You have come early. Does waiting not
bore you? Will you take something, nurse?' Luisella's voice showed
tenderness for her little one's nurse.
'As your excellency pleases,' said the nurse, raising her soft,
oil-coloured, rather stupid eyes.
Cesare went off, and brought a waiter with marsala and cakes for the
women. The husband and wife stood looking at them quite touched, and
when they stopped eating Luisella pushed the tray towards them. Donna
Candida, who was a polite woman, held up her first glass of marsala,
and called out:
'To Donna Agnesina's health!'
'To my little one's health!' said the other, laughing.
The husband and wife looked at each other with happy tears in their
eyes, nodding their thanks. Suddenly the mother said:
'Nurse, the baby is crying.'
The nurse hurriedly dried her lips, put down the candy she was
eating, and rushed off with a great rustle, opening her bodice as she
went with an instinctive maternal movement.
But the guests were already coming into the reception-room, which
was furnished with couches and easy-chairs in pomegranate brocade,
their woodwork gilded; large _carcels_, placed on gray marble and
gilt brackets, as well as big gilt-bronze lamps with crystal pendants
cut in facets, lighted it up. Those who knew each other had joined in
groups, and spoke to each other in a lively way under their voice,
to look like people of spirit, society folk, and did not even look
at the unknown guests; these had got into the corners by families,
and brought easy-chairs and seats together to make a fortress for
themselves, from whence they cast shy, inquisitive glances on the
people and the furniture, suddenly dimmed by lowered eyelids if they
felt themselves caught staring.
The family of Don Domenico Mayer (a clerk in the Finance Department)
were like that. They lived in an apartment on the fifth floor in the
Rossi Palace, a tall, deep building at Mercatello Square that looks
on to four different streets, where the neighbours often do not know
each other even by name, and can live for years without meeting, two
large stairs besides two smaller ones make it such a puzzle. Don
Domenico Mayer, with a misanthropic look and bureaucratic overcoat,
led in a misanthropic family, composed of his wife, with flabby,
colourless cheeks, always suffering from neuralgia; his daughter
Amalia, a tall, stout girl, with prominent eyes, thick nose and lips,
and heavy black tresses, who suffered from hysterical convulsions;
and Alfonso, the son, called Fofò by everyone, who was troubled by a
growing silliness and a huge appetite. The misanthropic family had
formed into a square; the women pulled in their poor though tidy
gowns round their chairs, and father and son sat at the edge of
theirs stiff and silent. Like them, other families held themselves
apart--clerks, little tradesmen, managers--with serious looks,
keeping their elbows to their sides, passing their hands mechanically
over their shiny, not to say glazed, beavers; whilst on the other
side were all the Fragalàs, and with them the Naddeos, great ironware
dealers at Rua Catalana; the Antonaccis, prosperous cloth merchants
at the Mercanti; and the Durantes, great dealers in dry cod at
Pietra del Pesce--the men in broad-cloth, the women in brocade or
silk, with jewels, especially bracelets, like Luisella Fragalà.
Her charming presence in the drawing-room was hailed by a general
movement: all rose; the boldest or most intimate left their places
and surrounded her, while the shy ones kept at a little distance,
waiting composedly till they were seen and greeted.
All rejoiced with her on her restored health, calling her 'Mama,
Mama,' wishing her in the Southern style this _and a hundred_ others,
all in good health--that is to say, a hundred more children, no
less. She got pink with pleasure, bent her head in giving thanks,
which made the diamond star in her hair sparkle: it was a subject
for comment to the other Fragalàs, the Naddeos, the Antonaccis, and
Durantes; it was the secret-sighing admiration of all the other
humble guests, the so-called _mezze signore_. Then, while Cesare
Fragalà chattered with the men, laughing, passing his gloved hand
through his curly hair, there was a general return to the couches and
easy-chairs: all sat down.
Luisella Fragalà, standing in the middle of the room, went to meet
each lady that she saw coming in at the door, greeted her smilingly,
and led her to an easy-chair, making a large feminine circle, where
fans waved slowly over opulent bosoms encased in brocade. Only the
middle couch remained empty--it was the post of honour; all were
looking at it and towards the door, waiting the unknown guests who
were to sit there: for they knew the party would not really begin
without them, and no refreshments would be offered till the guests of
high rank appeared; in fact, Luisella and Cesare as the time passed
gave each other inquiring glances. Suddenly, as a couple came into
the room, Luisella made a quick, joyful gesture, effusively embraced
the lady, and pressed the gentleman's hand smilingly; a whisper
went through the room, someone got up, a name was breathed. It was
really him, Don Gennaro Parascandolo, the famous Don Gennaro, a tall,
strong, agreeable man, with a countenance breathing honesty, good
faith, good temper; his hand-shake was hearty, his smile cheered
the most low-spirited people, his glance put life into one; a very
rich man--in short, little Agnesina's godfather, a rich man with no
children.
He had had children--he and his sickly wife with the grayish hair and
sad eyes. She liked to stay shut up in her sumptuous silent house,
and when she went about with him looked like a woman's shadow, a
living image of grief. They had had three lovely children, two boys
and a girl, healthy and strong, for whom Don Gennaro Parascandolo had
worked at his cold terrible trade of aristocratic usurer to make them
rich. He never lent less than five thousand francs or more than two
hundred thousand at one time, always at 10 per cent. a month--cruel
for his children's sake. But diphtheria had come into his house,
furtively, irremediably; in twenty-five days the most distinguished
doctors' science, father and mother's despair, money poured out,
were found useless: nothing could save the three children. All died
choking in such a painful way that Signora Parascandolo's reason
seemed to give way for a time. Even the strong man seemed to reel for
a moment; he only recovered very slowly. He travelled a great deal,
he showed at all first nights, gave flowers and jewels to famous
dancers--all with the greatest indifference, not as if he was bored,
but with no brightness nor gaiety. Now and then, very seldom, his
wife went out with him, a colourless taciturn creature, incapable
of distracting her thoughts even for a moment from her three dead
children; but at these times Don Gennaro got gay: he came out with
a heavy commercial wit to which his wife responded with a slight
distracted smile.
As Don Gennaro Parascandolo had persuaded his poor shadow to leave
the shade that evening, he was quite lively; whilst Luisella led the
signora to the divan of honour, he went about, followed by Cesare,
joking and laughing; all made a chorus to him wherever he passed,
with that tendency to worship riches that all, and Southerners in
particular, are apt to have. The Naddeos, Antonaccis, Durantes,
and Fragalàs were rich people; but things may change in this world
from one day to another. And Don Gennaro was so rich he really did
not know what to do with his money! As to the little people in the
room--clerks, tradesmen, managers--they looked respectfully at him
from afar, impressed by his broad shoulders, deep chest, and leonine
head. His name was whispered here and there, with comments in a lower
voice: 'Don Gennaro Parascandolo.'
But Cesare and Luisella seemed to get an electric shock when the
third person they were waiting for arrived. She was an old lady, who
came forward solemnly, in a very old maroon silk, stiff as a board,
made in the fashion of thirty years before, with organ-pipe pleats
and very wide sleeves. She wore a black lace shawl that was very old,
too, fastened with a turquoise and ruby brooch, black lace mittens
on her old, withered hands, that clutched a black velvet bag worked
in point stitch--on one side a little dog on a cushion, a peasant
woman with a broad straw hat on the other. Luisella, pulling up her
train, ran to meet her, made a deep curtsy, and stooped to kiss the
hand that the old woman held out; she had an old coquette's peevish
expression, with round gray eyes and a drooping nose. Another whisper
went through the room: 'The godmother, the Marchioness.' No one said
she was the Marchioness of Castelforte; she was the godmother--that
was all. There was only one Marchioness godmother in the Fragalà
family; she was Luisella's godmother and patron, a lady respected and
feared by the whole connection--in short, a Marchioness, a titled
person, of superior race. Even Don Parascandolo, who had no need of
anyone, as all knew, went to bow before her, while the old woman
closely examined him.
Now there was no more room on the seat of honour. Luisella sat in
the middle, the Marchioness on her right, and Signora Parascandolo
on her left, in Parisian costume, covered with magnificent jewels,
but bowing her head under the weight of remembrances, always and
unfailingly. As all got seated, there was perfect silence for two
minutes. All were waiting, still looking at the door furtively,
pretending to think about something else. Ladies hid a little yawn
behind their fans; girls had that sleep-walking look that makes them
seem detached from all human interests; men twirled their moustaches;
and the boys had that absolutely idiotic look of which Fofò Mayer was
the highest exponent.
But Cesare Fragalà disappeared. Refreshments came in two minutes
after that silence. Then all set to talking, loudly, noisily, to
have an easy bearing, pretending not to care for refreshments. But
they came in from all sides continuously, spreading through the
room, to the delight of all who longed for sweets--men and women,
boys and girls. To ices thick and round as a full moon, so hard the
teaspoon had to be pressed down, followed Portuguese cream, fruit,
strawberries, white and Levant coffee, chocolate; smaller ices of
all shapes, prettily arranged in pink or blue glass shells with gold
rims; sponges--half cream and half ice, of different flavours:
chocolate, mandarin punch, pistachio, strawberries and cream, honey
and milk. After sponge-cakes, the delight of women and boys, followed
peach and almond tarts, and coffee and lemon ices, served in milky
white porcelain glasses. For ten minutes nothing was heard but the
rattling of plates, spoons, and glasses; but when the ladies saw the
trifles coming, they cried out enthusiastically about their lovely
colours, with the white foam in the middle, and held out their hands
involuntarily, whilst others, quieter and more active, ate up one
thing after the other to compare them.
Conversation got animated with such joy. Gentlemen ran here and
there, fetching a plate or glass, serving the ladies and themselves
too, speaking from a distance, asking questions, calling up the
waiters with the trays, making them lose their heads in the confusion.
'A sponge-cake for Signora Naddeo.'
'Would you like an almond tart?'
'Take a glass of champagne punch. There is nothing better for
digesting the rest.'
'Who will change a strawberry ice for a coffee ice?'
'I assure you it comes to nothing, after all; the ices are water
really. What shall it be--strawberries?'
'I have one.'
'Mama, give me the cream.'
Quite pleased, Cesare ran from one side to the other, leading the
waiters, as every tray came up, towards the Marchioness, who was
always the first to take some. Signora Parascandolo was the next;
but she hardly took a spoonful, when she put down her plate and cast
down her eyes again distractedly, as if she neither saw nor heard
what was going on around her. The Marchioness, on the other hand,
without hurrying, ate slowly of everything with her fallen-in mouth
and toothless gums, her jaw going continually and her hooked nose
trembling over her upper lip.
'My lady, try this pistachio. Would you like mandarin better, my
lady?'
She nodded 'Yes,' like an old Chinese idol. Her withered hands had
let go the bag, after taking a big white handkerchief out of it to
put under her plate.
Very happy, Luisella tossed her head, laughing at all that cheerful
noise. Every now and then her husband stopped before her.
'Won't you take something?'
'No, no! Help the other ladies.'
'Take something, Luisella.'
'No; I like looking on better.'
The view all around was so interesting! The ladies, who were more
affected in their greed, sipped the sherbet delicately, keeping
the plate on the point of their gloved fingers, raising the little
finger every time they put in the spoon, keeping a lace handkerchief
on their knees, and biting their lips after each spoonful. Some men
quietly followed the waiter's tray step by step, so as to make a
good choice, after which they went into a corner to eat comfortably.
Little children put their ices on a chair, covering themselves
with cream up to their eyes, and stuck out their pink lips, their
innocent eyes showing their delight as they slowly licked the spoon;
whilst the sleepy-headed-looking girls refused this and that, and
ended by taking a little of everything, leaving the half of it, not
really fond of eating yet. Even the Mayer family had got over their
misanthropy; the lady thought no more of her neuralgia, and Don
Domenico hesitated between a sponge and an ice, whilst Amalia and
Fofò exchanged ices, to get the taste of each.
In the other rooms, everywhere, in the passages, even in the cook's
bedroom and the kitchen, the same jingling of glasses and spoons went
on, and the joy was even greater. The servants from every floor in
the Rossi Palace had run in. The porter came up; the hair-dresser
returned; the nurse's husband, the Naddeos' and the Antonaccis'
coachmen--for they kept carriages--came in; even the newspaper boy
of the Tarsia corner and the postman, still in uniform from his last
round, with letter-bag round his neck, stood beside Gelsomina and
Donna Candida. All these humble common folk that love sweets and
sherbet had a feast, by the master's orders, and he came out every
now and then to the kitchen, delighted to see them enjoy themselves.
He replied to the servants' congratulations, speaking to them
familiarly in dialect.
Now there spread a feeling of gastronomic repose; people quieted
down, got a composed look, and smiled happily after the first burst
of gourmandizing. Conversation, languid at first, had taken the mild
tone of quiet, easy people, full of good breeding. The ladies smiled
slightly; the girls waved their fans; men set mild discussions agoing
solemnly--about their affairs, about the small politics of the day,
the stagnant state of trade, from which all suffered. They stood in
groups, gesticulating and solemnly nodding.
The Marchioness had picked up her velvet bag and crossed her
hands over it--a torpor came over her, and she looked like an old
sleeping mummy; whilst Signora Parascandolo, with her head down,
gazed abstractedly at her fan, a precious antique her husband must
have got from some desperate debtor by forced sale. Luisella began
to feel very much bored between these two silent women; her lively
temperament made her feel inclined to get up and speak to her friends
and relations, still more to go and see what Agnesina was doing, and
what was going on in the kitchen and the dining-room to cause such a
noise; but her post of honour was on the divan--it would have been a
breach of etiquette to leave it; so she went on being bored, smiling
to her friends at a distance, and waving her gold-spangled fan. All
at once, she called her husband--she could stand it no longer--and
whispered to him; he nodded assent and went off to arrange the
procession. The guests, knowing the usual programme, understood, and
began looking towards the door, occasionally, for another part of
the show to begin. Some affectionate smiles began already; a slight
whisper ran along. The procession appeared at the chief door. Little
Agnesina, in a white cap with pale blue ribbons that made her face
quite red, wore an embroidered batiste robe that covered the pink
little hands. She was laid out on a _portabimbi_ of pale blue silk
and lace, her head raised on a cushion; this forms a bed, a cradle,
a bag, and a garment, all in one; it lay on the strong arm of the
Fratta Maggiore nurse, Gelsomina, who carried it with the deepest
devotion, as a cleric carries the missal from one end of the altar
to the other, not taking her eyes off Agnesina, who stared placidly
at her with the clear crystal eyes of a new-born infant. Beside her
was Donna Candida, all in the gravity of her office; to mark its
continuity she laid her hand on the baby's pillow; then followed the
father, Cesare Fragalà, and a little further back the waiters with
trays of candy, sweets, and dried fruits, caramels, jujubes, then
other trays with marsala, malaga, Lunel; and farther back still,
venturing to peep in, some inquisitive servant gazing with open eyes.
The christening-party was not unexpected; the guests all knew the
baby would be shown, so long, noisy applause greeted it, with a
clapping of gloved hands, and a chorus burst out:
'Long live Agnesina!'
'May you grow up holy!'
'How lovely, how sweet she is!'
'Agnesina! Agnesina!'
'Cheers for Agnesina's papa and mamma!'
In the meanwhile the baby was carried straight to her godmother, the
Marchioness, to be kissed; she had held her at the font that morning,
and now kissed her lightly on the forehead, while she put a white
paper into the nurse's hand, with a discontented movement of her long
nose over her fallen-in mouth.
Applause followed the Marchioness's kiss. Then, bending down, Don
Gennaro, the godfather, kissed her; his broad face was rather pale
and contracted as by some evil thought: perhaps other christenings,
his sons', passed through his mind. But he recovered quickly, and
received the company's still noisier applause with a smile. After the
mother had kissed the baby there was a long minute's silence among
the joyous party; she kept her head down over the baby's face, as if
inhaling its breath, blessing it, calling down on it blessings from
heaven. A great noise followed; as baby was carried triumphantly
round the room, the women gave little screams of motherly emotion,
and kissed her enthusiastically, which made her whimper. Raising her
head, Luisella suddenly noticed a queer figure leaning against a
door-post; she did not know who he was; her curiosity was aroused.
She tried to remember ever having seen him before, but vainly: it
was someone new. Who could he be? Perhaps he had been brought by a
friend or relation, without asking leave, with that calm familiarity
that from the Naples populace rises to the highest classes. It was
certainly someone unknown.
Whilst the overkissed baby went on whimpering, the nurse and the
ladies trying to console it by loving little words in a singing tone,
and the room was again filled with the joy of eating, Luisella,
curiously interested, possessed by an inward feeling, could not keep
her eyes off that queer, motionless figure. He was a man of between
thirty-five and forty, with the pallid, cadaverous face of one who
has made a long, disastrous voyage; a rather curly, ill-kept black
beard on his sickly red-streaked cheeks hid all traces of linen
or necktie; the forehead showed the same bloodless pallor, and two
deep lines formed at every movement of the eyebrows; his chestnut
hair was thrown back untidily, leaving the temples bare, it being
rather sparse there, and a network of rather swollen blue veins
showed to an observing eye. When he moved his head, the muscles of
his lean neck stood out like a dead fowl's sinews; his loose-hanging
hands were fleshless, too. The man was very poorly dressed: his
pepper-and-salt trousers were too short, showing the ill-brushed
shoes tied by a rusty ribbon; his waistcoat and jacket--yes, really a
jacket--were of dark maroon. The man's whole appearance was sickly,
mysterious, wretched, and mean; his dull eyes wandered here and there
without settling a minute on the same spot; even his expression was
mysterious and ignoble.
'Who can the ragged fellow be?' Luisella said to herself with an
angry, frightened feeling.
All were rejoicing again round the sweet-trays, the choicest sweets
in the Toledo Street shop. To a natural love of sweets was added
curiosity to taste new kinds they had often admired in pretty boxes.
Dates and pistachio cream, to which a glass of malaga gives such a
good flavour; while comfits of roses, with a dash of lemon-peel to
excite the palate, suits marsala best, they found; all that soft,
attractive, enchanting odour of vanilla from the chocolates and
creams, the sharp flavour of mint, cooling and exciting, for it burns
the mouth and causes thirst--all these things, pleasant to the eye
and palate, delicious in odour, gave a new excitement to the party,
to which freely-poured-out wine added a slight intoxication.
'Who can that dirty fellow be?' Luisella was still saying to
herself, feeling hurt in her pride as mistress of the house, in her
love of tidiness, by that sickly, wretched, dirty man. She got up
mechanically to find out from someone about that queer, ragged fellow
who had got into her house, leaving the Marchioness, who again spread
out her handkerchief and heaped all kinds of sweets on it, munching
at them slowly; leaving the rich, unhappy Signora Parascandolo, who
was following little Agnesina about with her eyes full of tears. Just
then Luisella Fragalà overtook the little retinue where her baby
was now shrilly crying, having nearly made the round of the room.
Gelsomina was going to stop before the queer individual as if she
wanted to make him kiss the baby, but as he came forward to do so
Luisella broke in instinctively and sharply, and scornfully eyeing
the unknown, she said to the nurse, putting her hands on Agnesina's
pillow to protect her:
'Go away, nurse; baby is crying too much.'
The nurse went out at once, followed by Donna Candida, whilst the
mother looked at them through the door as they went off through the
other rooms, as if still to protect her from some unknown evil. As
she went back into the room the sight of the carpet amused her; paper
cases of candied fruit, gold and silver paper, were scattered over
it; the seats, tables, and brackets had little heaps of sweets from
the pillaged trays; ladies had taken off their gloves to hold the
bit of candy or caramel they were eating; men were leading from one
tray to another children who whimpered, all covered with sugar and
chocolate; others, having asked leave of Cesare Fragalà, who granted
it laughingly, gathered up the sweets in a handkerchief, taking care
not to crush them; whilst others, including Cesare himself, sent for
paper to make into bags to hold what was left in the trays. All hands
were sticky and mouths shiny. On the tables were red or yellow rings
from glasses of wine put down, and a loud continuous clatter went on
through the devastation.
'Cesare!' called out Luisella to her husband.
'What do you want, darling?' he answered, while tying a
three-coloured string with the knack of a professional.
'Tell me one thing.'
'Two if you like.'
'Who is that man there, near the door?'
'That one?' he said, peering as if he did not see well; 'it is
Giovanni Astuti, the money-changer.'
'No, no! I know him--that other one.'
'Oh, it is somebody or other,' he said, rather embarrassed.
'Who is it?' said she severely.
'A friend of mine.'
'A friend--that ragged fellow a friend?'
'One can't always have rich friends,' was the answer, with rather a
forced laugh.
'I know; but that is no reason for bringing a dirty fellow among
decent people, even if he is your friend.'
'How excitable you are, dear! Be charitable.'
'Charity is one thing, decency is another,' she replied obstinately.
'Don't you see how untidy he is?'
'Untidy!' he muttered, with his usual good-nature; 'he is a
philosopher--he does not care about clothes.'
'Well, I want him to go away.'
'How can it be done?' he asked, confused and mortified by his wife's
persistence.
'Tell him so!'
'I'll first give him a glass of wine; be patient, then I will make
him go away.'
In fact, Cesare went up to the unknown to offer him sweets and wine,
speaking in a whisper, and looking him in the eyes. He agreed,
with a smile on his discoloured lips. He began to eat slowly, with
a little grimace, as if he could not swallow well. The mysterious
person looked at the sweets Cesare offered him with an undecided
air, before putting them into his mouth; but he made up his mind to
eat them at last, still with that nervous, pained look of having a
narrow swallow. He was standing with that embarrassed shame of his
own person that is some people's constant unhappiness; and he broke
an almond noisily, gulped over big mouthfuls of Margherita paste,
gazing vaguely around, as if he dared not lower his eyes on his
legs and shoes. Then he slowly went on eating; for Cesare had had a
tray put on a table beside him, and went on handing him chocolates,
vanilla almonds, mandarins in syrup. A tray of wine-glasses was set
down also; the queer fellow took three glasses, one after the other,
without taking breath between, lifting his pale, streaked face and
hospital convalescent's sickly beard. Cesare Fragalà, with a set,
preoccupied smile, looked in the man's eyes, as if he wanted to read
his soul, all the time this feeding went on.
In the meanwhile Luisella, to amuse herself, to calm the impatience
that had burst out so suddenly, wandered about, chattering and
laughing with her relations and friends. Now came a rumour that the
diamond star in her hair was a gift from the baby's godfather, one
worthy of so rich a man. In their hearts all the merchants' wives
thought Luisella had been very sly, under cover of politeness, to
choose so rich a godfather; they made up their minds, with their
next babies, to do the same, to choose a godfather who knew his
duty and would do it like that dear Don Gennaro. Malicious little
aphorisms ran around: 'Those who think out a thing well are not
sorry afterwards.' 'A gentleman is always a gentleman.' 'Live with
someone richer than you, and get him to pay.' As Luisella Fragalà
got near, this was all changed into a chorus of admiration of the
magnificent jewel. She acknowledged it, and bent her head, blushing
proudly, as the star sparkled in her black hair. The women gave that
long, admiring murmur that flutters the giver and receiver--full
of gratified pleasure, self-satisfied affection, whilst their eyes
languished or flashed. Some, to be still more amiable, even if it was
humbug, asked: 'Is it from the godfather?' 'Yes,' said Luisella, with
a slight sigh. 'It could not be otherwise,' the other whispered, as
if she had guessed well. Elsewhere Luisella had twice been obliged
to take the pin out of her hair, because ladies wished to hold
the precious star in their hands. A group formed, women's faces
bent over, full of curiosity and that love of jewellery that is at
the bottom of every woman's heart, however modest and obscure she
is. There were shrieks of admiration; questions and interjections
arose at the flash of the brilliants. Someone got to asking the
price, even; but Luisella gave a shrug to show her ignorance, which
increased the stone's value; this mystery, this unknown cipher,
acquired a breadth in the feminine mind that imposed respect. So that
at a certain point eight or ten ladies surrounding Luisella, with a
growing burst of enthusiasm, called out, 'Hurrah for the godfather!'
Don Gennaro Parascandolo, pretending to hear nothing, ran up eagerly,
with the easy good-nature of a travelled Neapolitan. He modestly
disclaimed compliments: it was a nothing at all--two insignificant
stones, bits of glass; the ladies, in lively contradiction, praised
him, and overwhelmed him with civilities, from a deep womanly
instinct that makes them profuse in words and smiles, knowing
something may come of it. When he said Donna Luisa Fragalà was worthy
of a starry crown, applause drowned his voice. In the meanwhile the
mistress of the house had given side-glances now and then towards
the shabby fellow who was so much on her nerves; but he went on
evenly eating and drinking, with that slow movement of the muscles
of his neck that was like a hen's claw. However, something more
extraordinary was going on around, which Luisella had to give heed
to, at the time the phenomenon burst out in the room. Whilst the
horrid fellow pillaged the sweets, making a circle of cut-out paper
round his feet, and prune-stones as well, he had drawn the attention
of those who had finished eating ices. In these gourmands' vague
hour of digestion, quite satisfied with a packet of sweets to carry
home, having nothing to do, their eyes wandered round, and they
noticed that queer beggar Cesare Fragalà was feeding so attentively;
gradually one pointed him out to the other: by that glance, a poke
with the elbow, raised eyebrows, or a smile, that makes the most
expressive of languages, they showed each other that silent devourer,
who began when they were finished, but looked as if he would never
finish until he had demolished the last sweet and drunk the last
glass of wine. Some looked at him rather admiringly, sorry they
could not imitate that continual guzzling; some smiled indulgently;
others had a compassionate look in their eyes for an unlucky fellow
that seemed never to have eaten or drunken enough. Some phrases,
here and there, jocular and good-natured, were repeated from one to
another: 'What a digestion!' 'It is St. Peter's Church!' 'Health
and protection to him!' 'I would make him a coat rather than feed
him!' 'Santa Lucia keep him his sight, because he has no need of an
appetite!'
But they were the usual rather coarse remarks about a great eater.
Some man in search of amusement had come close to Cesare and the
silent gobbler to watch them. Little by little, all now in the
drawing-room had their eyes on the great eater. Luisella blushed with
shame to think that everyone had now noticed the wretched ragged
fellow her husband had brought into the house, that she had to submit
to having in her room. Vainly she tried, by going about talking and
laughing, joking and waving her fan, to distract attention: it was
useless.
The people brought together in the drawing-room had eaten and
drunken, praised the baby, the diamond star, and the giver of it;
now, not knowing what else to do, they had fixed their attention on
that queer ragged fellow, who was certainly out of place in Luisella
Fragalà's drawing-room. She was a good woman, but very proud; though
charitable, she would never have brought a pauper into her room. It
was useless for her to fly in a passion, feeling tears come to her
eyes. Now all had noticed the beggarly gobbler, all were looking at
him, even the women and the sleepy-headed girls who looked as if they
never saw anything. The same compassionate, laughing, tolerating
smiles were on the women's faces as on the men's, except that their
stronger curiosity could not constrain itself. Signora Carmela
Naddeo leant forward behind her fan, and asked Luisella:
'Who is that starving fellow, my dear?'
'Who knows?' said the other impatiently.
'Cesarino certainly does; he is handing him glasses of wine.'
'Cesare gathers these wretched people up by the cart-load,' said she,
shaking with rage.
But suddenly a subdued whispered word ran from man to man, woman
to woman--a syllable breathed rather than pronounced. Who first
said this hissing word? Who was it that recognised him, and softly
breathed it in his neighbour's ear? Who had let it out, the unknown
secret? No one knows! But in a second, quick as a flash of gunpowder,
all knew and repeated the mystic word throughout the crimson room.
It came back on itself, its letters making a magic circle that
went round, and everyone with it. When they all knew who the man
was, they were seized with stupefaction; the lamps seemed to be
suddenly lowered, their lively faces got pale, even the covers of the
furniture lost colour; there was a deep silence, where the magic word
still lingered feebly: 'The medium--the medium.'
Luisella herself, the intrepid, grew pale; her hands trembled as they
grasped her fan. The medium had given up feeding; now he was resting
quietly, casting his vague, uncertain glances about, not knowing what
to do with his lean yellow hands. A little blood had risen in his
pale cheeks, under the black beard; but it was in streaks, a sickly
colour, the effect of fever. Still, ugly, dirty, miserable as he
was, all attention was concentrated on him--inquisitive, wheedling,
obsequious glances were directed on him, in which was combined
fantastic fear, especially on the women's part. For even the women,
in a nervous tremor, said to one another, 'It is the medium.' A
circle gradually surrounded him, getting nearer, as if by a strong
natural attraction--rather anxious faces, where one could notice
the vivid working of Southern imaginations, in this land of dreams
and fantasies. Shy folk were now joining the bolder ones who had
come near at first, overcome, dreaming of the train of ministering
spirits, good and bad, who are ever warring around the medium's soul.
Don Gennaro Parascandolo, one of the first to come up, found himself
so hemmed in that he turned to Cesare Fragalà, and said, smiling
rather sceptically:
'Cesarino, introduce me to this gentleman.'
Cesare was much embarrassed, but, seeing no way out of it, he caught
at this request, and said quickly:
'Don Gennaro Parascandolo, Pasqualino De Feo, a friend of mine.'
The medium smiled vaguely and held out his hand, which Don Gennaro
found icy cold, though damp with perspiration, one of those repulsive
hands that make one shudder. But not a word was said. The women
standing outside the circle, not daring to come near, asked each
other, troubled by a deep longing:
'What does he say?'
'He says nothing,' Donna Carmela Naddeo answered; she was nearest,
and never took her eye off him.
The women bit their lips, the men's presence intimidated them; too
bashful to go near, they shivered with impatience to hear the fateful
words of the man living in constant communication with the world
of spirits, who heard all the hidden truths of life from the good
spirits, who was told by them every week five, or at least three, of
the lottery numbers.
What was he saying? Nothing. For long hours these people stand
concentrated, lost, perhaps, in a great interior conflict, listening
to the high voices that speak to them. Now and then, torn from
their visions, they pronounce some fateful phrase that contains the
secret, wrapped up in mysterious words, often without form, that
those of strong faith and hope can miraculously understand. All, men
and women, overcome by a great dream, suddenly shaken out of daily
realities into the ardent, burning region of visions, forgetting the
present moment, listened to the medium as if to a superhuman voice.
Don Gennaro Parascandolo certainly kept up a well-informed
traveller's smile; he had a large, secure fortune, but in the bottom
of his heart the old Parthenope instinct, for big gains, illicit,
if not guilty, costing no trouble, unforeseen, owed to chance,
combination, or getting the better of Government, all came so
naturally to a man who knew the secrets of hidden things. Certainly
all these, Fragalàs, Antonaccis, Naddeos, Durantes, were accustomed
to sell stale sweets, rough earthenware, moth-eaten cloth, and
stinking cod, in dark shops, in cold storehouses in Via Tribunali,
Mercanti, Petra del Pesce, Marina; they were used to all the dulness,
vulgarity and meanness of commerce, where year after year, by putting
one penny on another, after two or three generations, a fortune came;
they all knew the value of money, of work, of economy, of industry:
but what did that matter? To be able, by means of a mysterious
phrase that only cost the trouble of picking up, of interpreting,
to gain big sums with a small stake, get in one day the gains of
twenty years' trade in dry cod, or forty years' trade in sugar and
sandy coffee, was so delightful a gift, so dazzling a vision, to
middle-class ideas!
Certainly all these clerks and tradesmen looked forward to a modest
future. They had lived on nothing; they were living on very little;
they wanted to have a little more, only that: humble in their wishes,
even. But the sight of the medium, a shabby fellow, yet so powerful,
who spoke every night with supernal and infernal spirits, suddenly
threw them into a fantastic world, where poor folk get miraculously
rich, where they, obscure working people, might become gentlemen.
Ah! Don Domenico Mayer, the nephew, son, brother, and uncle of
clerks, had faith only in sacred bureaucracy--a cold career of silent
suffering. Still, buttoned up in his overcoat, he left his family in
the corner and joined the group round Pasqualino De Feo, the medium,
and his anxious, severe expression wavered as he, too, waited for
the phrase that was to draw him away in a day from the sepulchral
atmosphere of the Finance Department. But the women's imaginations
were the most feverish. Certainly at least ten of them, by birth,
marriage, by their own efforts, or by their relations or husbands,
were rich; their fortunes were easy, their children's future secure.
Ten at least enjoyed the middle-class luxury of brocaded sofas,
jewels, any amount of linen. All the others, by their modesty, good
sense, and economy, by their own virtues or their parents', had
everything that was necessary; but a lively passion for dreams had
awakened and burned in them. Their souls were filled with visions of
comfort, riches, luxury; they flew through the regions of desire with
womanly tremblings, with the force and intensity the quietest women
put into these sudden follies. An overwhelming wish to know the great
secret seized them; crumbling pyramids of gold and jewels lit flames
in their eyes. Even the old Marchioness of Castelforte, so crooked,
such a ruin of a woman, a solitary remnant, the only one of her
family, with no relations or heirs, seventy years old, and nothing
but the tomb in front of her, got up, carrying her velvet bag, and
set her coquettish profile between two men's shoulders. Even Donna
Carmela Naddeo strained her ears, trembling with curiosity, rich and
lucky as she was, whispering to herself: 'If he tells me the numbers,
I will buy a diamond star like Luisella's.'
The medium still kept silence, so that Don Gennaro Parascandolo,
feeling the impatience of the whole room behind him, risked a
question:
'Have you enjoyed the party, Don Pasqualino?'
He opened his mouth; at last a low, feverish voice came from the thin
blue lips.
'Yes,' he said; 'it is a fine christening. The baptism of Christ on
the Jordan was fine, too.'
At once there was an agitation in the room, commenting on the phrase,
trying to explain it. They formed into circles and groups, the women
discussing it among themselves, whilst the number thirty-three, the
Redeemer's number, ran from mouth to mouth.
Placidly, as if he was taking a note of a bill of exchange, Don
Gennaro Parascandolo put down the remark in his note-book. Don
Domenico Mayer took it, too, hiding behind a curtain, without losing
his bureaucratic and misanthropic gravity. The old Marchioness, who
was deaf, went about asking wildly: 'What did he say? What did he
say?' She ended by asking Luisa Fragalà, who sat motionless with
staring eyes beside the melancholy Signora Parascandolo. Luisa could
only say: 'I don't know, my lady; I did not hear.' However, Don
Parascandolo was not satisfied; he went on:
'Did you enjoy the sweets, Don Pasqualino? I noticed you seemed to
like them.'
'Yes,' he muttered; 'I eat, but I don't masticate.'
'Have you no teeth?'
'No, I have not.'
He cast his eyes around vaguely, without meeting anyone's glance,
as if he saw things from _beyond_, and made a sign with his hand,
leaning three fingers on his cheek.
Again the same murmur and agitation; there was uncertainty, too. The
phrase was ambiguous, very. What did the motion with three fingers
mean? Even Don Gennaro Parascandolo, whilst taking a note, stopped
to think. The mystery of that second phrase, of the gesture, let
loose all these already shuddering fancies of a supernatural world.
Faith, faith, that was what was needed to understand the medium's
words! Everyone, calling together all the powers of his soul, tried
to have a sublime burst of faith, to know the truth, how to translate
it into numbers, to exchange it into lottery money.
* * * * *
Late at night, when the house was emptied of people, Cesare Fragalà,
with the sleepy servants, went putting out the lights, shutting the
doors, as he prudently did every evening. When he came back to the
bedroom, he found Luisella sitting half dressed in the shade.
Agnesina's cradle had been taken into the nurse's room; the couple
were alone. Fatigue seemed to keep them silent. Still, on coming up
to his young wife, he saw she was crying quietly, big tears rolling
down her cheeks.
'What is the matter, Luisella? what is it?' kissing her, trembling
with emotion himself.
'There is nothing the matter,' she said, still weeping silently in
the shadow.
CHAPTER III
IN THE CAVALCANTIS' HOUSE
Prostrate on the dark old carved wood kneeling-desk, her elbows
resting on velvet cushions, head slightly bent, her face hidden in
her hands, Donna Bianca Maria Cavalcanti seemed to meditate after
praying. As long as twilight lighted up the little private chapel
the girl went on reading a chapter of the 'Imitation of Christ,'
attentively, in her usual thoughtful attitude. But the shadows had
grown deeper round her, first faintly purple, then gray, enfolding
the little altar and a figure of Our Lady of Sorrows, with seven
silver swords radiating from her heart, hiding a three-quarter
figure of Jesus Christ bound to the column, the Ecce Homo, crowned
with thorns, and bleeding in the face, hands, and side, blotting out
Bianca Maria's slender, neat figure. Then she quietly closed the
torn volume, put it on the cushion, and hid her face in her hands.
Only the faint light before Our Lady of Sorrows shone on the white,
clasped hands and the knot of dark brown hair on her neck. She kept
so motionless for some time that the white figure in the shadow of
the little chapel looked like one of those praying statues that
medieval piety placed on tombs to kneel in constant prayer. She
seemed not to feel the hours passing over her nor the faint, cold
breath the autumn evening brought into the chapel. Gazing through her
fingers at the Virgin's sad face, she seemed to go on praying and
meditating as if nothing could wrest her from it.
Still, as evening came on the little chapel got very gloomy. In the
daytime it was a poor, cold place, being only a narrow inside room,
badly lighted by a window looking into a narrow court of the Rossi,
formerly the Cavalcanti Palace. Once a wretched carpet covered the
floor, but it was so old and dusty that Bianca Maria had it taken
away. The floor was bare now, of shiny, icy bricks. The little altar
was painted dull blue, an ecclesiastical shade, covered by a rather
fine bit of linen, though yellow with age, as was also the lace
round it. Everything was old and shabby--the candle-sticks, the
printed prayers in metal cases, the red-leather-covered missal, the
poor silver sprays of leaves placed as sacred ornaments, and the
little gilt wooden door, behind which was the Pyx. By day Our Lady
of Sorrows, in black silk, embroidered in gold, with a batiste nun's
head-dress, and the seven swords in her heart, looked wretched and
poor, carrying a lace and batiste handkerchief in her pink stucco
hands. The great Ecce Homo, too, life size, of wood and stucco,
looked as poor as its surroundings. In spite of the carved wood
chairs, with the Cavalcanti crest on the velvet cushions, the chapel
had a look of frozen wretchedness, showing by daylight faded colours,
tarnished metals, stains in the velvet. Even the two lamps that
burned night and day before the Virgin and the Saviour were only two
yellow sputtering tongues of flame.
But at night--and that night, curiously enough, only one lamp was
burning, that before the Virgin--the wretchedness disappeared; only
great fluttering shadows filled the chapel. One could not see the
colour of the wood and metal; only the white altar-cloth was visible.
There were no sparks of brightness, only in the trembling light
Mary's sad face seemed agonized; and as the flame, shaken by an
invisible breath of wind, bent to the right or left, Jesus' hands and
side seemed really to bleed.
Bianca Maria was deep in thought, and, accustomed to the chapel, she
felt neither the cold nor the gloom. Suddenly she trembled, thinking
she heard a great noise in the room. It was then she noticed the lamp
before Christ was out. She shivered with cold and fear. The Virgin
seemed to weep over her bleeding Son's agony. Bianca Maria went
quickly out of the chapel, taking her book with her, crossing herself
hurriedly as if followed by some evil spirit.
In the antechamber an old servant in the Cavalcanti livery--dull
blue, piped with white--sat reading an old newspaper by the light of
one of those old brass lamps with three spouts one still sees in the
provinces and in very aristocratic houses. He rose as he heard Bianca
Maria's light step, looking her in the eyes.
'Giovanni,' she said, in her pure harmonious voice, 'in the chapel
the lamp before the Ecce Homo has gone out.'
The old servant looked at her, and hesitated a little before
answering.
'I did not light it,' he then muttered, casting down his eyes, and
crushing up the paper in his lean hands.
'Perhaps you had no oil?' she asked, with a little tremor in her
voice, turning her anxious face towards him.
'No, my lady, no,' the servant eagerly answered at once. 'There is
lots of oil in the pantry. It was by the Marquis's orders I did not
light the lamp.'
'Did he give you such an order?' she asked, amazed, arching her
eyebrows.
'Yes, my lady.'
'For what reason?'
But she regretted the question at once. It seemed to fail in the
profound respect she owed her father. Still, the word had rushed out.
She would have liked to go away and not hear the answer, whatever it
was; but she feared to make matters worse, and listened with open
eyes, ready to restrain her astonishment and fear.
'The Marquis is in a rage with Jesus Christ,' the servant said, in
that humble but familiar tone in which the common folk in Naples
often speak of the Deity. 'Last Saturday he asked a great favour
of that miracle-working Ecce Homo, but he did not get it. Then the
Marquis gave orders the lamp was not to be lighted again.'
'Did the Marquis tell you that?'
'Yes, my lady; but if you like, I will go and light it.'
'Obey the Marquis,' she murmured coldly, as she went on towards the
drawing-room.
As she wandered about alone in the spacious room, ill-lighted by a
petroleum-lamp, she searched for her work-basket and could not find
it, though she passed it twenty times without seeing it. She still
bitterly repented having asked the servant that question, since
throughout the ever-increasing family decay what most embittered her
was to be obliged to judge her father before servants or strangers.
It was in vain she shut her eyes so as not to see, that she spent her
days in her room, the chapel, and the Sacramentiste convent where her
aunt was; in vain she kept silence, trying not to hear what others
said: Margherita, who was the maid, and Giovanni's wife's remarks,
her aunt the nun's uneasy questions, and the hints of some old
relations who came to see her now and then; they spoke so pityingly,
it brought tears to her eyes. She had to lower her eyes, for she
could not help judging her father inwardly as they shook their
heads, pitying her. What shook her most throughout the financial
difficulties she vainly tried to hide in that decent poverty that
could not be kept secret much longer were her father's unexpected,
vexatious, often wild, eccentricities.
Now, quieted down a little, seated by a square baize card-table,
where the single lamp was placed, she worked at her fine pillow-lace,
moving the bobbins and thread quickly over the pinned-out pattern.
Perhaps she would have liked better to call in Margherita to work
with her at mending the house linen, which the old woman blinded
herself at in her little room. But Don Carlo Cavalcanti, Marquis
di Formosa, was very proud; he never would have allowed a servant
in the drawing-room, nor permitted his daughter to stoop to such
humble work. Bianca Maria would have liked to spend the evening in
her own room reading or working, but her father liked to find her
in the drawing-room when he came in every evening. He called it the
_salone_ pompously, not noticing its bareness; for the four narrow
sofas of discoloured green brocade, the twelve slight hard chairs
put along the wall, the couple of painted gray marble brackets, and
two card-tables, with small bits of carpet before each sofa and
chair, being lost in the immensity, increased the deserted look. The
petroleum-lamp, too, just lit up the table Bianca Maria was sitting
at, and her hands, whiter than the thread, as they moved over the
dark pillow-lace. She stopped sometimes, as if an engrossing thought
occupied her; the hands fell down as if tired; the young, thoughtful
face gave a quiver.
'Good-evening,' said a strong voice at her elbow.
She got up at once, put down the pillow-lace, went up to her father,
and bent down to kiss his hand. The Marquis di Formosa accepted the
homage; then he lightly touched his daughter's forehead with his
hand, half tenderly, half as a blessing. She stood a minute waiting
for him to sit before she did; but seeing he had begun to walk up and
down through the room, as he had a habit of doing, she looked at him
for permission. He gave it with a nod, and went on with his walk. On
sitting down, she took up her work, waiting to be addressed before
speaking.
The Marquis di Formosa's still springy, firm step filled the empty
room with echoes. He was a fine-looking man, in spite of his sixty
years and his snow-white hair. Tall, graceful, dried up rather
than thin, even at that advanced age there was much nobleness and
strength in his head and his whole person, but sudden flushes over
his face gave him a violent look. The gray eyes, strong nose, the
thick white moustache and ample forehead inspired respect. It was
said that when the Marquis di Formosa was young he had made more
than one woman of Ferdinand II.'s Court to sin. He was said to have
been a successful rival to the King himself with a Sicilian dame,
and that in the bloodless strife of gallantry he had got the better
of the greatest gallant in the Bourbon Ministry, the Don Juan of
his day, the celebrated Minister of Police, Marquis del Carretto.
His imperiousness certainly, which had increased with age, gave the
Marquis a hard look, and rather a disagreeable expression sometimes.
But his family's antiquity, that boasted descent from the great Guido
Cavalcanti, his high position and natural haughtiness authorized some
imperiousness. Now the Marquis was growing old: his sparkling glance
was often dulled, his tall majestic figure stooped in spite of his
leanness. Still, he imposed great respect. His daughter Bianca Maria
gave a respectful shiver when she saw him coming, and all her own and
other people's unfavourable judgments on him went out of her mind.
'Were you at the convent to-day?' asked the Marquis on passing near
his daughter.
'Yes, father.'
'Is Maria degli Angioli well?'
'She is quite well. She would like to see you.'
'I have no time now; I have important business--most important,' he
said, with a wave of his hand.
She kept silence, working diligently to keep herself from asking
questions.
'Did Maria degli Angioli complain much of me?' he asked, without
stopping his excited walk.
'No,' she said timidly; 'she would like to see you, as I said.'
'To see me--see me? To recount her woes, and hear all about mine? A
fine way of filling up the time. Well, if she liked, if she chose,
our woes would soon be ended.'
Bianca Maria's trembling hand entangled the thread round the bobbins
and pins of the pattern.
'These holy women,' the Marquis di Formosa went on slowly, as if he
were speaking in a dream--'these holy women, who are always praying,
have pure hearts; they are in God's favour and the saints'; they
enjoy special protection; they see things we poor sinners cannot.
Sister Maria degli Angioli might save us if she liked, but she won't.
She is too saintly, she does not care for earthly things. Now, our
sufferings don't signify to her; she knows nothing about them. She
never will tell me anything; never--never.'
Bianca Maria looked up, let the work fall from her hands, and gazed
at her father, her eyes full of wondering pain.
'You have never asked her for anything, have you, Bianca?' he said,
stopping beside his daughter.
'For what?' she asked, wondering.
'Maria degli Angioli loves you. She knows you are unhappy; she would
have told you everything, to help you. Why did you not ask her?' he
went on in an excited voice, a storm of rage rising in it.
'What should I ask?' she repeated, still more frightened.
'You pretend not to understand!' he shouted, in a fury already.
'These women are all alike, a flock of sheep, silly and egotistical.
What do you speak about by the hour together in the convent parlour?
Whose death do you weep over? Think of the living! Don't you see the
Cavalcanti family is going down to misery, dishonour, and death?'
'May God avert it!' she whispered, crossing herself devoutly.
'Women are selfish fools!' he shouted, enraged at her softness, at
finding no resistance; 'and I who think of nothing else from morning
till night, who kneel before the holy images morning and evening, for
the preservation of the Cavalcanti! And you who, by asking your aunt
the secrets of her dreams, could save me and the name by a word--you
pretend not to understand! Ungrateful and treacherous, like all
women!'
She put down her head and bit her lips, so as not to burst into sobs.
Then, in a trembling voice, she replied:
'I'll ask her at some other time.'
'Ask her to-morrow,' her father retorted imperiously.
'I will do it to-morrow, then.'
Quickly his rage fell, suddenly calmed. He came up to her and touched
her bent forehead, with his usual caress and blessing. Then, as if
she could not help it, feeling her heart bursting, she began to cry
silently.
'Don't cry, Bianca Maria,' he said quietly. 'I have great hopes. We
have been so long unhappy, Providence must be getting ready a great
joy for us. It is not given to us to know the time, naturally, but
it can't be far off. If it is not one week, it will be another. What
are hours, days, months, in comparison to the great fortune getting
ready for us in secret? We will be so rich, all this long past of
privation and obscurity will seem a short dream of agony, an hour of
darkness faded in the light of the sun. Who knows what instrument
Providence will use?--perhaps Maria degli Angioli, who is a good
soul. You will ask her to-morrow, won't you? Perhaps some other good
spirit among my friends who _see_ ... perhaps myself, unworthy sinner
as I am--but I feel Providence will save us. But by what means? If
I could only know!' He had started walking up and down again, still
speaking to himself, as if he was accustomed to think aloud. Only now
and then, in the midst of his excitement, he noticed his daughter,
and took up his obstinate harping on one idea with her again: 'Where
else, Bianca, can rescue come from? Work? I am old; you are a girl.
The Cavalcantis have never known how to work, either in youth or old
age. Business? We are people whose only business was to spend our own
money generously. Only a large fortune, gained in a single day....
You will see, we'll get it. I am sure of it; a thousand dreams and
revelations have told me so. You will see. You will have horses and
carriages again, Bianca Maria: a victoria for the promenade on the
Chiai shore, where you will take your place again; an elegant shut
carriage to go to San Carlo in the evening. You'll see. I want to buy
you a pearl necklace--eight strings joined by a single sapphire--and
a diamond coronet, as all the women of the Cavalcanti family have
had, till your mother.' He stopped as he mentioned her, as if a
sudden emotion seized him; but gazing on his dream of luxury and
splendour quickly distracted him. 'Open house every day. We will
think of the poor and starving--so many want help; we will pour out
alms--so many suffer. I have made a vow, too, to give dowries to
honest poor girls. I have made so many other vows so as to get this
favour.'
He stopped speaking, as if gazing through the room's darkness on
fortune's splendid mirage that excited fancy brought before his eyes.
His daughter got calm and thoughtful again as she listened to him.
Her father's voice in the usual rhapsodies of his overheated soul
sounded in her heart with anguished echoes, like a slow torment.
It is true she did not believe in the visions, but her father's
impetuous, angry, tender phrases frightened her every evening. She
could not get accustomed to these bursts of passion that made her
peace-loving soul start and shiver.
'Signor Marzano,' Giovanni announced.
A little bent old man came in with a rough, pepper-and-salt
moustache, his eyes piercing and at the same time soft. He was very
plainly dressed. On passing near Bianca Maria he greeted her gently,
and silently asked permission to keep his hat on. He held his Indian
cane, too. Falling into step with the Marquis, the two walked up and
down together, speaking in a very low voice. When they passed near
the light, one saw the advocate's eyes sparkling with satisfaction,
and his rather military moustache moving as if he was making mental
calculations. Sometimes Bianca Maria, who busied herself more and
more in her work so as not to hear, caught involuntarily some
cabalistic jargon of her father's or Marzano's.
'The _cadenza_ of seven must win.'
'We might also get the two of _ritorno_.'
'Playing for _situazione_ is too risky.'
'A _bigliettone_ is needed.'
They went on speaking, quite absorbed, their eyes flashing, lost in
these fancies that falsely take the precision and fascination of
mathematics, when Giovanni again came in, to announce, 'Dr. Trifari.'
A man about thirty came in, strong-limbed and stout, with a big head,
too short a neck, a red curly beard that made his face even redder
than it was, swollen lips, and blue, staring, suspicious eyes that
did not inspire confidence. He was roughly dressed: a tight collar
rasped his neck, a big sham diamond pin shone in his black silk tie,
and he still had a provincial air, in spite of his University degree.
He hardly greeted Bianca Maria, put his hat on a side-table, and went
to the Marquis di Formosa's other side. All three marched up and down
more quietly. Sometimes Dr. Trifari said a word, or gesticulated
violently, speaking in a whisper all the same, his squinting glance
questioning his audience and the shades around as if he feared to be
betrayed.
The learned Marquis di Formosa kept up his vivacious look like a
headstrong old man; Marzano persisted in laughing good-naturedly with
his cunning, gentle eyes; whilst Dr. Trifari went about cautiously,
as if he always feared being cheated. When the two old men raised
their voices a little, he quickly signed to them repressively,
pointing at the doors and windows; he went so far as to point to
Bianca Maria. The Marquis waved his hand tolerantly, as if to say she
was an innocent creature, when again Giovanni came in, to announce,
'Professor Colaneri.'
At once on seeing him, one guessed he was an unfrocked priest. A
thick black beard had grown on his shaven cheeks; but the hair cut
short on the forehead, and growing thinly over the tonsure, kept the
ecclesiastical cut. The shape of his hand, where the crooked thumb
seemed joined to the first finger; the way he settled his spectacles
on his nose; his trick of putting two fingers in his collar to widen
it, as if it was the tight priest's collar; his way of making his
glance fall from above--his features and movements altogether were so
clerical, one quickly understood his character.
Formosa received him rather coldly, as usual; the apostate gave
his religious mind a repulsive shudder. Colaneri, too, spoke very
cautiously; four could not walk about without speaking aloud, so they
stood in a dark window recess. It was there Ninetto Costa came to
join them, a dark, handsome fellow, showing the whitest of teeth in
a continuous smile; he was one of the luckiest stockbrokers on the
Naples Exchange.
Last of all, Giovanni announced one man in a whisper, negligently,
'Don Crescenzio,' a type between a clerk and an agent, who slipped
into the room rather timidly; still, he was treated as an equal. The
discussion between the six men grew warm in the window recess, but
they kept their voices low.
Bianca Maria went on working mechanically. She felt dreadfully
embarrassed; she dared not go away without asking her father's
permission, and she felt she was out of place in the room. This
mysterious talk, in an incomprehensible, mad jargon, all so excited
and eager, rolling their eyes about so sternly; a growing madness in
their glances; their faces pale and then flushed from making such
violent gestures, disturbed her at first, and ended by frightening
her. Her father especially seemed lost in the midst of all these
madmen, some of them coldly, others wildly, interested, and all
extremely obstinate. She looked at him sometimes in despair, as if
she saw him drowning, and could not take a step or give a cry to
help him. Just then the six men came slowly filing out of the window
recess, and sat down round another card-table, where there was no
light. They drew in their chairs to get closer together, put their
elbows on the table, leaning their heads on their hands, and all
began talking at once in the half-light, whispering in each other's
faces, breathing out the words, looking each other straight in the
eyes, as if they were using magic and charms.
Bianca Maria could stand it no longer. Making as little noise as
possible, she wrapped up her lace pillow in a strip of black linen,
got up without moving her chair, so as not to make a sound, and went
out of the big room quickly, as if she feared to be called back,
with a frightened feeling as if someone were following her. She was
slightly reassured only as she got into her own room. It was plain
and clean, rather cold-looking, a good, pious girl's room, full of
holy images, rosaries, and Easter candles. Margherita, the servant,
came to join her, having heard her step. With humble affection she
asked if she was going to bed.
'No, no; I am not sleepy. I will wait. I have not said good-night to
my father.'
'The Marquis will sit up till all hours,' the maid muttered. 'You
will get tired waiting here all alone.'
'I will read. I wish to wait.'
The old servant obediently disappeared.
Bianca Maria took from a little shelf a religious novel of Pauline
Craven's, 'Le Mot de l'Énigme,' a pious, consolatory book. But
her mind would not be soothed that evening by the French author's
gentle words. Sometimes the girl listened intently to find out if
her father's friends were going away or if others were coming. There
was nothing--not a sound. The great weekly mysterious conspiracy was
going on, breathed out from face to face as if it was a frightful
piece of witchcraft. This impression grew so on Bianca Maria's mind,
that now even the silence frightened her. She tried again two or
three times to read the charming book, but her eyes rested on the
printed lines without seeing them. The sense of the words she forced
herself to read escaped her. Her whole mind was taken up listening
to the noises in the drawing-room. Silence still, as if not a living
soul was there. She shut the book and called the servant, not feeling
able to bear that solitude full of ghosts.
Margherita hastened in, and silently awaited her young mistress's
orders.
'Let us say the Rosary,' she whispered.
Sometimes, when the hours seemed longest to the lonely scion of
the Cavalcanti, when sleeplessness kept her eyes open, when her
fancies got too lugubrious, she loved to pray aloud with her maid to
cheat time, hours of watching, nervousness. She dreaded speaking to
servants--her natural pride made her avoid it; but praying together
seemed to her only a simple act of Christian humility.
'Let us say the Rosary,' she repeated, seating herself by her white
bed.
Margherita sat near the door, at a respectful distance. Bianca Maria
said the first prayers, the Mystery, and half of the _Pater Noster_;
Margherita said the other part. The same with the _Ave Marias_: the
first part Bianca Maria said; Margherita took it up and finished
it. They prayed in a low tone, but one could easily distinguish the
voices, always taking up their part of the prayer in time. At every
ten _Ave Marias_, or Stations of the Rosary, they piously crossed
themselves, and bent their heads low in reverence to the Holy Ghost
at every _Gloria Patri_.
Thus, between mystical absorption in prayer, the natural emotion
these familiar, but poetical supplications aroused, and the sound
of her own voice, the girl forgot for a little the great drama
developing round her father. The whole Rosary was said thus, slowly,
with the piety of real believers. Before beginning the Litany to the
Virgin she knelt at her chair, with her elbows on the seat, and the
maid knelt in her corner. The girl invoked the Virgin in Latin, with
all the tender names her devotees use, and the servant answered 'Ora
pro nobis.' But from the beginning of the Litany a rising sound of
voices reached from the drawing-room. This noise disturbed Bianca
Maria's prayers. She tried not to listen to it by raising her voice
more; but it was impossible now to abstract herself from that clash
of voices getting excited and angry.
'What can it be?' she said, stopping in her intercessions.
'It is nothing,' said Margherita. 'They are speaking about lottery
numbers.'
'They seem to me to be quarrelling,' Bianca Maria timidly replied.
'They will make friends again on Saturday evening,' Margherita
muttered, with her commonplace philosophy.
'How so?' the girl asked, letting herself be drawn into the
discussion.
'Because none of them will win anything.'
'Let us pray,' said Bianca, raising her eyes to the ceiling, as if
gazing on the starry firmament.
It was impossible now to finish the Litany. The discussion in the
drawing-room had got so warm, they heard it all, the voices coming
near and going off, as if the Cabalists had risen from the table and
were walking up and down again, with the need excited people have of
going backwards and forwards and round about.
'Shall I shut the door?' asked Margherita.
'Shut it; we are praying,' Bianca Maria said resignedly.
The voices did not come in so distinctly. They could follow the
Litany to the end without interruption. But the girl's mind was no
longer in the words she was saying. She was quite distracted, and
hurried through the finishing _Salve Regina_ as if time pressed.
'The Madonna bless your ladyship!' said Margherita, getting up after
crossing herself.
'Thank you,' the young girl answered simply, sitting down again
beside her bed, where she spent so many hours of the day thinking and
reading.
Margherita had left the door open as she went away. Now the voices
burst out angrily. The enraged Cabalists argued furiously with each
other, each one boasting loudly of his own way of getting lottery
numbers, his own researches, his own visions, each one trying to
take the word from the other, interrupting, screaming louder, being
interrupted in turn.
'You don't believe in Cifariello the cobbler's talent?' Marzano the
lawyer shouted with the white fury of very gentle, good-natured
people. 'Perhaps because he is a cobbler, and perhaps because he
writes out his problems with charcoal on a dirty bit of white paper!
Here it is, here it is! Twenty-seven has come out second instead of
fourth, but it came out! Here is eighty-four, that turned round
and became forty-eight, but it did come out! Here is the _ambo_
made up of fourteen and seventy-nine I was so unlucky as to give up
playing; it came out three weeks after I gave it up. These are facts,
gentlemen--facts, not words!'
'They are the sixty francs a month you give him to leave off cobbling
and work out numbers for you!' Dr. Trifari interrupted sharply.
'Cifariello is ignorant, but sincere; he gave me fourteen and
seventy-nine, and I did not go on with it.'
'Father Illuminato gave me fourteen and seventy-nine, too,' Dr.
Trifari retorted, 'but it was the right week.'
'And you won without letting your friends know?' the Marquis di
Formosa asked excitedly.
'I won nothing. I divided it into two different tickets. I did not
understand what a fortune Father Illuminato was giving me. He is the
only one that knows numbers. He holds our fortunes, our future, in
his hands. It is a queer thing. When I felt his pulse to see if he
had fever, I went trembling all over.'
'Father Illuminato is an egotist!' Professor Colaneri hissed out in a
sarcastic, biting voice.
'You say that because he turned you out of his house one day. You
tried to get the numbers out of him by force. He won't give them
to priests who have thrown off the habit. Father Illuminato is a
believer.'
'I see the numbers myself!' Colaneri called out shrilly. 'It is
enough for me to take no supper the night before, when I go to bed,
and to meditate an hour or two before sleeping: then I see them, you
know.'
'But they don't come out right!' shouted the Marquis di Formosa.
'They don't come out right because my mind is clouded by human
interests; because I can't free myself from a longing to win; because
one must have a pure soul, lay aside disturbing passion, raise one's
self into the region of faith, to see clearly. I see them, but often,
almost always, a malignant spirit darkens my sight.'
'Look here,' said Ninetto Costa, the smart, rich stock-broker,
loudly. 'I have done more. I knew that a young woman, a milliner that
lives in Baglivo Uries Lane, had the name of giving good numbers. She
can't play them, as you know; they can't do so without losing the
power. But she gives them. I made up to her, pretended to fall madly
in love with her, gave her presents. I see her morning and evening. I
have even got to promising her marriage.'
'Has she given you any?' the Marquis di Formosa asked anxiously.
'Nothing yet. She changes the subject, when I mention it, timidly;
but she will give them--she will.'
How Bianca Maria wished that the Rosary she had recited so
absent-mindedly was still going on, so as not to hear this mad talk,
that she caught every word of! It made her brain reel, as if her soul
was drawn into a whirlpool. How she would have liked not to hear the
ravings of their disturbed brains so set on one idea! Now the Marquis
di Formosa was speaking resoundingly.
'The cobbler's simple science, Father Illuminato's saintliness, our
friend Colaneri's dazzling visions, are all very well; but what is
the result? What comes of it? We who play our collar-bones every
week, drawing money from stones, all of us, winning in a hundred
years or so a wretched little _ambo_, or, worse still, one single
number. Stronger hands are needed! a higher strength is needed! We
need miracles, gentlemen. We must induce my sister, the nun, to
give lottery numbers. My daughter must get her to do it. We need my
daughter herself, an angel of virtue, kindness, and purity, to pray
to the Supreme Being for numbers!'
A deep silence followed these last words. The entrance-door bell
rang. Bianca Maria, shaking all over, dragged herself to her
door-curtain and saw a wretchedly-dressed man pass, mean-looking,
with pale, red-streaked cheeks, the beard like a hospital
convalescent's. It was a painful, alarming vision. In spite of the
extraordinary man going into the room, the silence was unbroken, as
if the unknown had brought in a mysterious tranquillity.
Bianca Maria strained her ear anxiously, leaning on the door-post.
Perhaps the Cabalists had gone back to their little table, taking the
new arrival with them. The silence lasted a long time. Motionless,
almost rigid, she clutched at the doorposts, not to fall; what she
had heard was so sad and cruel it broke her heart. She was seized
with humiliation and anguish, as if she could feel nothing but this
sorrow. She suffered every way in her natural pride and outraged
maidenly reserve, and from her father throwing her name about in a
mad dispute. She felt ashamed for him and for herself, as if he had
boxed her ears in public. Her anguish nearly suffocated her; it rose
to her brain, and seemed to burn her in its hot embrace. How long
she stood, how long the silence went on in the drawing-room, she
could not tell; only, through her distress, she heard her father's
friends pass behind her curtain and go out cautiously, like so many
conspirators. Then, mechanically, she left her room to look for him.
But the drawing-room was dark, so was the study, where the Marquis di
Formosa sometimes consulted an old book of necromancy. Bianca Maria
searched anxiously for her father. In the end a light guided her. The
Marquis di Formosa had gone into the little chapel, filled up the
lamp before the Virgin, and lighted the lamp before the Ecce Homo,
put out by his orders, also the two wax candles in the candelabra,
and set them before Jesus Christ. Not satisfied with that, he had
carried the big lamp into the little chapel. In that illumination
he had thrown himself down despairingly before Christ, trembling,
shaking, sobbing. Praying aloud, he said to the Redeemer:
'O Lamb of God, forgive me! I am ungrateful and ignorant, a miserable
sinner. Forgive me, forgive! Do not make me suffer for my sins.
Do me this grace for the sake of my languishing, dying daughter.
I am unworthy, but bless me for her sake. O sorrowful Virgin, who
hast suffered so much, understand and help me! Send a vision to
Sister Maria degli Angioli. O blessed spirit, Beatrice Cavalcanti,
my saintly wife, if I caused you sorrow, forgive me! Forgive me if
I shortened your life! Do it for your daughter's sake: save your
family. Appear to your daughter--she is innocent and good; tell her
the words to save us, blessed spirit! blessed spirit!'
The girl, who beard it all, was so frightened she fled with her
eyes shut, holding her head. When she got to her room, she thought
she heard a deep, sad sigh behind her, and felt a light hand on her
shoulder. Mad with terror, she could not cry out; she fell her whole
length on the ground, and lay as if she were dead.
CHAPTER IV
DR. AMATI
Not once for a month past had Dr. Antonio Amati seen that thoughtful,
delicate girl's face between the yellowish old curtains in the
balcony opposite his study window, which looked into the big court
of Rossi Palace, formerly Cavalcanti. Two years had passed from the
day that one of the youngest, though one of the most distinguished,
Naples doctors had come to take up his abode there alone, with one
man-servant and a housekeeper, but bringing a crowd of old and new
patients after him, filling the spacious, but rather dark, stairs
with a going and coming of busy, preoccupied people. From the very
first day he had noticed opposite his study window in passing that
pure oval, the faintly pink, delicate complexion, those proud, soft
eyes, that touched the heart from their gentleness. He saw all that
at once, in spite of the windows opposite being dull from old age
and her appearing for a short time only. He was a quick observer;
in fact, a great part of his medical skill was owing to his quick
glance, his lively, true, deep intuition.
'A heart with no sun,' he said to himself, turning round to put
his heavy scientific volumes into his carved oak shelves. Nor was
he surprised when the Rossi Palace door-keeper, humbly consulting
him under the portico, as he got into his carriage for his round of
afternoon visits, about a feverish illness that had inflamed her
spleen, told him, amongst a flood of other gossip, that that angel
opposite his balcony was Lady Bianca Maria Cavalcanti, a lady of
high birth, but reduced in circumstances, poor girl, not by her own
fault.... 'But perhaps she will become a nun,' the woman ended up. 'A
heart with no sun,' Dr. Antonio Amati thought again as he went away,
after prescribing for the sickly, talkative door-keeper.
But he had no time to remark or think of aristocratic ladies
come down by bad luck, or their parents' sins, to obscurity and
wretchedness; he could not let his fancy linger long on that
melancholy life alongside of his, but so different from it. He was
a silent, energetic man of action; a Southerner not fond of words,
who put into his daily work all the strength other Southerners put
into dreams, talk, and long speeches, accustoming himself to this
self-government, calling up every day the violence of his fiery
temper to conquer it by strength of will, and make use of it for
scientific practical work, keeping always in touch with life, books,
and suffering humanity, which at thirty-five had made him famous. He
was proud of his great reputation, but not conceited, though lucky
fortune had not made him mean or lowered him. No, he could not dream
about Bianca Maria's lily face; too many around him were ill of
typhus, smallpox, consumption, and a hundred other severe, almost
incurable, illnesses that required his daily help and energies. Too
many people called to him, implored him, stretched out their hands
for help, besieging his waiting-room and the hospital door, watching
for him at the University and other sick people's doors patiently and
submissively, as if waiting for a saviour. Too many were suffering,
sick and dying, for him to dream about that slight apparition, and
admire the pale, thoughtful face bending under the weight of black
tresses.
Still, through that life of useful work for himself and others,
through the seeming hardness, hurry, even scientific brutality of
his constant activity, which was made up for by his noble daily
sacrifices, that silently attractive figure pleased Dr. Antonio
Amati's fancy. Gradually it took its place each morning among the
things he admired and liked to find in their places every day: his
books, old leather note-books, some mementos of childhood and youth,
a wax model of his dead sister's little hand, an old photograph of
his mother, who lived in Campobasso province, a local accent he had
not lost, in spite of living eighteen years in Naples and his travels
in France and Germany.
Bianca Maria came into this harmonious atmosphere, that gently
satisfied this strong man's eyes and heart. Antonio Amati did not
try to see her oftener, nor to know and speak to her; it was enough
to see her in the early morning, behind her balcony windows, look
down vaguely into the dull, damp court, then disappear as slowly as
she came--a quiet, solitary figure, not sorrowful, but not smiling.
Between one patient going and another coming, Dr. Amati got up
from his desk, and went as far as the balcony; in one or other of
these little walks, that seemed to serve him as a pause, a rest, a
distraction between one bit of work finished and another begun, he
caught sight of Bianca Maria's pale, thoughtful face; and for two
years that satisfied him. It is true that sometimes in these two
years he had met her on the stairs, or in the Rossi Palace dark
entrance, with her father or Margherita; he took off his hat, and she
acknowledged his bow unsmilingly. She, too, knew him well, seeing him
every day; but she looked him in the face frankly, with none of that
extreme reserve, half smile, half sham indifference, or any of the
little coquetries of commonplace girls. Frankly and innocently she
looked at him a minute, returned his bow, and then her proud, gentle
eyes took their vague thoughtful expression again.
They did not make daily appointments to see each other--he was
too serious, too engrossed in duty to do so, and she was a simple
creature, living too solitary an inward life to think of it--only
they saw each other every day, and got accustomed to it.
'But perhaps she is to be a nun,' the door-keeper repeated sometimes.
She had got over her illness, and employed herself over other
people's ailments, moral and physical.
But the doctor walked on without replying, thinking of the sad chorus
of lamentations that went on around him, from rich and poor, for
real, present, imminent sorrows, almost hopeless to cure, but worthy
of his courage and talent to attempt. Still, in that damp, south-east
wind this autumn morning, whilst bad coughs, heart complaints, fevers
came by turns dolefully in his list of cases, this sickly atmosphere
of bad weather in Naples making them worse, he had, as usual, filled
up his leisure by going to the balcony; and not seeing Bianca Maria,
he felt annoyance of a latent, indefinite kind, which every new
country or suburban patient made him forget; but it came back when
the patient left. The forenoon passed in the gloom of the great
writing-table, covered with maroon; of these colourless, anxious
faces held up to him; these weak, complaining voices; lean breasts,
or flabby with unhealthy fat, that were bared for him to find traces
of consumption or atrophy, with wheezing, funereal coughs. Never had
he felt the disagreeables of his profession so much as that day.
Bianca Maria did not appear.
'She is ill,' he thought momentarily. Having thought of this, he felt
as sure as if someone had told him or if he had seen her ill himself.
She was sick. He at once thought of helping her, with that instinct
to save life all great doctors have. He thought it over a minute; but
his mind came back to the realities of life at once. It was folly to
be taken up about a person he did not know, and who probably did not
care to have him. If they needed his skill, they would have called
him. For all that, he was sure Bianca Maria was ill.
But another patient came into the room. There were two, rather--a
youth and a girl of the lower class. He recognised the girl at once
from her hollow, worn face and sad, black-encircled eyes, the lock of
untidy hair. He had cured her of typhoid at San Raffaele hospital,
when the epidemic was raging in Naples.
'Is it you, Carmela?'
'Good-day to you, sir,' said the girl, rushing forward to kiss the
doctor's hand, which he quickly drew back.
'Are you ill?' he asked.
'As if I was ill,' she said, smiling, in a faint, melancholy way,
while the doctor was trying to recognise the young fellow's face. 'I
am going to have a misfortune that is worse than an illness, sir.'
She turned to her companion as she spoke, and called out: 'Raffaé!'
Then Amati saw the young fellow in all the _guappesca_ style of
bell-trousers, small folded cap, silver chain with a bit of coral,
shiny squeaking shoes, and the half-scampish, impudent look of a lad
of twenty who has given up the knife, the traditional _sfarziglia_
of his ancestors in the Camorra, for the modern revolver. 'This is
my lover, sir,' she said, humbly and proudly, whilst Raffaele looked
straight before him, as if it was not his business. She gave the
youth so intense a look, so full of tenderness and passion, that the
doctor had to restrain an impatient shrug.
'Is he ill?' he asked.
'No, sir; he is very well, thank God! But he has--that is to say,
we have--another misfortune coming on us; or, indeed, it is my
misfortune, as I must lose him. They want to take him for the levy,'
said she, in a trembling voice, her eyes filling with tears.
'That is natural enough,' answered the doctor, smiling.
'How can you say so, sir? It is infamous of the Government to take a
fine lad that ought to marry. If you won't help me, sir, what will I
do?'
'And what can _I_ do?'
Raffaele, in the meanwhile, stood with one hand at his side, hanging
his hat between two fingers; sometimes he looked Carmela up and down
absent-mindedly and haughtily, as if it was out of mere good-nature
he allowed her to look after his affairs; then he cast an oblique but
dignified glance on the doctor.
'You are so kind, sir,' Carmela murmured. 'I want you to give
Raffaele a medicine to make him ill, and get him scratched off the
list.'
'It is impossible, my dear girl.'
'Why so, sir?'
'Because there are no such miraculous medicines.'
'Oh, sir, you mean you don't wish to do me this kindness. Think if
they take him for three years!--three years! What could I do without
him for three years? And, then, he won't go, sir! If you knew what he
says----'
'I told her,' Raffaele interrupted emphatically, pulling down his
waistcoat, a common _guappa_ trick, 'that if they take me by force,
we will hold a little shooting; someone will be wounded, they take me
to prison, and what happens? A year's imprisonment at most. I must go
to San Francesco some day, at any rate.'
'Don't speak that way--don't say that!' she called out in admiring
terror. 'Beg the professor to give you the medicine.'
'Are you to be married soon?' asked the doctor, who no longer
wondered at anything, from knowing the people so well.
'Very soon,' Carmela answered by herself, while Raffaele looked
before him.
'When are you to be?'
'When we get the _terno_,' she retorted, quietly and with certainty.
'Then, not for some time yet,' the doctor replied, laughing.
'No, no, sir; Don Pasqualino De Feo, the medium, has promised me a
safe number. We will be married very soon. But you must get Raffaele
off.'
'There is no need of my services. Raffaele will be rejected, because
he has a narrow chest,' concluded the doctor, after looking carefully
at the dandy.
'Do you say so, really?'
'Really it is so.'
'God bless you, sir! if I had to have this sorrow too, I would die.
So many sorrows--so many,' she said in a low tone, pulling up her
shabby shawl on her shoulders; 'I am the mother of sorrows,' she
added, with a sad smile.
'Good-day, sir,' said Raffaele. 'When you come to Mercato or Pendino
district, ask for Raffaele--I am called Farfariello--and let me serve
you in any way I can.'
'Thank you--thank you,' replied the doctor, sending them off.
The two again repeated their farewells on their way out--she with a
smile on her suffering face, he with the look of a man that despises
women. Other patients came in requiring his medical skill up to
twelve o'clock, when the time for receiving visits was over. Bianca
Maria had not appeared. She was ill, therefore.
He took breakfast very hurriedly, and ordered the coachman to bring
round the carriage to go to the hospital at one o'clock. The day
was getting more and more unpleasant, from the scirocco's damp,
ill-smelling breath. He went out quickly, as he was rather late, and
on the stairs, half in shadow, he met Bianca Maria going down also,
with Margherita, her maid.
'Then, she is not ill,' thought the doctor.
But with the sharp eyes of an observing man, who finds out the truth
from the slightest symptoms, he saw the girl was walking undecidedly;
her face, as she looked up to bow, was intensely pale, so that again
his medical instinct was to help her. He was just going to speak,
to ask her brusquely where the pain was, but her proud, gentle eyes
were cast down again absent-mindedly; her mouth had that severe
silent look that imposes silence on others. She disappeared without
his saying anything. Dr. Amati shrugged his shoulders as he got into
the carriage, and buried himself in a medical journal, as he did
every day, to fill up even the short drive usefully. The carriage
rolled along silently over the thin layer of mud; the damp obscured
the windows, and the doctor felt the scirocco in himself and in the
air. Even the hospital could not soothe the doctor's discomfort,
though to take his thoughts off it he went deeper into practical
medical work and scientific explanations to the pupils than usual.
He went backwards and forwards from one bed to another, followed by
a crowd of youths, taller than any of them, with an obstinate man's
short forehead, marked by two perpendicular lines, from a constant
frown, showing a strong will and absorption in his work; his thick
brush of black hair was roughly set on his forehead, with some
white tufts showing already. So great was his activity of thought,
words, and action, one expected to see the smoke of a volcano coming
out. His orders to the assistants and his class, even to the nuns,
were given harshly; they all obeyed quickly and silently, feeling
respect for the iron will, in spite of his rough commands, mingled
with admiration for the man who was looked on as a saviour. Even the
room he had charge of looked more melancholy and wretched that day
than ever; the dulness of the air saddened the invalids, the heavy,
evil-smelling damp made them feel their pains more. A whispered
lament, like a long, laboured breath, was heard from one end of the
room to the other, and the sick folks' pale faces got yellow in that
ghastly light; their emaciated hands on the coverlets looked like wax.
In spite of trying to stun himself with work and words, Dr.
Amati felt the disagreeables of his profession more than ever.
Through that long, narrow room, full of beds in a row, and yellow,
suffering faces, and the constant smell of phenic acid; through
the scirocco mist and damp, that made even the nuns' pink cheeks
bloodless-looking, he had a dream, a passing vision of a sunny,
green, warm, clear, sweet-smelling country place, and his heart ached
for this idyll, come and gone in a moment.
'Good-bye, gentlemen,' Amati said brusquely to the students,
dismissing them.
They knew that when he so greeted them he wished to be left alone;
they knew, they understood, the Professor was in a bad humour;
they let him go. One of the ambulance men brought him two or three
letters that came while he was going his rounds; they were summonses,
urgent letters from sick people longing for him, from a father who
had lost his head over a son's illness, from despairing women. He
shook his head as he read them, as if he had lost confidence--as if
all humanity sorrowing discouraged him. He went--yes, he went; but
he felt very tired, which must have come from his mind, for he had
worked much less than usual. He was going along absent-mindedly,
when a shadow rose before him on the hospital stairs. It was a
poor woman, of no particular age, with sparse grayish hair, black
teeth, prominent cheek-bones, her clothes torn and dirty, whilst the
slumbering babe she carried was clean, though meanly clad.
'Sir--please, sir!' she called out in a crying voice, seeing the
doctor was going on without troubling himself about her.
'What do you want? Who are you?' the doctor asked roughly, without
looking at her.
'I am Annarella, Carmela's sister--you saved her life,' said Gaetano
the glove-cutter's wretched wife.
'Your sister in the morning, and now you!' the doctor impatiently
exclaimed.
'Not for me, sir--not for me,' the gambler's wife said in a low tone.
'I can die. I don't signify. I do so little in the world I can't even
find bread for my children.'
'Get out of the way--get out of the way.'
'It is for this little creature, for my sick son, sir;' and she bent
to kiss the little slumberer's forehead. 'I don't know what is the
matter, but he falls off every day, and I don't know what to give
him. Cure him for me, sir.'
The doctor leant over the little invalid, with its pretty, delicate,
pallid face, purple eyelids, hardly perceptible breathing, and lips
slightly apart; he touched its forehead and hands, then looked at the
mother.
'You give it milk?' he asked shortly.
'Yes, sir,' said she, with a slight smile of motherly content.
'How many months old is he?'
'Eighteen months.'
'And you still suckle him? You are all the same, you Naples women.
Wean him at once.'
'Oh, sir!' she exclaimed, quite alarmed.
'Wean him,' he repeated.
'What am I to give him?' she said, almost sobbing. 'I often want
bread for myself and the other two, but never milk. Must this poor
little soul die of hunger too?'
'Does your husband not work?' asked the doctor ponderingly.
'Yes, sir, he does work,' she said, shaking her head.
'Does he keep another woman?'
'No, sir.'
'What does he do, then?'
'He plays at the lottery.'
'I understand. Wean the child. He has fever. Your milk poisons him.'
After gazing at the doctor and her child, she just said 'Jesus' in a
whisper, and a sob burst out from her motherly breast.
Amati wrote out a prescription in pencil on a leaf of his
pocket-book. He went down the stairs, followed by Annarella, whose
tears fell over the child's face, her dull sobs following him in
lamentation.
'This is the prescription; here are five francs to get it with,' said
the doctor, motioning to her not to thank him.
She looked at him with stupefied eyes while he crossed the big cold
hospital court to his carriage; she began to cry again when she was
alone; gazing on the baby, the prescription in her hand shook--it was
so bitter for her to think of having poisoned her son with her milk.
'It must be cholera,' she kept saying to herself, for among Naples
common folk stomach disorders are often called cholera.
Dr. Amati shook his head again energetically, as if he had lost
confidence altogether in the saving of humanity. As he was opening
the carriage door to get in, a woman who had been chattering with the
hospital porter came up to speak to him. It was a woman in black,
with a nun's shawl, and black silk kerchief on her head, tied under
the chin. She had coal-black eyes in a pale face--eyes used to the
shade and silence. She spoke very low.
'Sir, would you come with me to do an urgent kindness?'
'I am busy,' the doctor grumbled, getting into his carriage.
'The person is very, very ill.'
'All the people I have to see are ill.'
'She is near here, sir, in the Sacramentiste convent. I was sent to
the hospital to find a doctor. I can't go back without one ... she is
so very ill....'
'Dr. Caramanna is still up there--ask for him,' Amati retorted. 'Is
it a nun that is ill?' he then added.
'The Sacramentistes are cloistered; they can't call men into the
convent,' said the servant, pursing her lips. 'It is someone who got
ill in the convent parlour, not belonging to the convent....'
'I will come,' Amati said quickly.
He pushed the servant into the carriage, got in and shut the door.
The carriage rolled along the Anticaglia road, which is so dark,
muddy, and wretched from old age; and they did not say a word to each
other in the short drive. The carriage stopped before the convent
gate; instead of ringing the bell, the servant opened the door with
a key. The doctor and she first crossed an icy court overlooked by a
number of windows with green jalousies, then a corridor with pillars
along the court; complete solitude and silence was everywhere. They
went into a vast room on the ground-floor. Along the white-washed
walls were straw chairs, nothing else; at the end a big table, with
a seat for the porter lay Sister. A crucifix was nailed on one wall.
Along the other were two narrow gratings with a wheel in the middle,
to speak through and pass things to the nuns. Near this wall, on
three chairs, a woman's form was stretched out; another woman was
kneeling and bending over her face. Before the doctor got as far as
the woman lying down, the servant went up to the grating and spoke:
'Praise to the Holy Sacrament----'
'Now and for ever,' a very feeble voice answered from inside, as if
it came out of a deep cave.
'Is the doctor here?'
'Yes, Sister Maria.'
'That is well;' and a long, feverish sigh was heard.
In the meantime Dr. Amati had gone up to the fainting girl.
Margherita was bathing her forehead with a handkerchief steeped in
vinegar, and whispering: 'My darling! my darling!'
The doctor put his hat on the ground, and knelt down too, to examine
the fainting girl. He felt her pulse, and gently raised one eyelid;
the eye was glassy.
'How long has she been like this?' he asked in a whisper, rubbing her
icy hands.
'Half an hour,' the old woman replied.
'What have you done for her?'
'Nothing but use the vinegar. They gave it to me through the wheel;
they have nothing else; it is a convent under strict rules.'
'Does she often faint?'
'Last night ... she had another swoon. I found her on the ground in
her room. I called my master.'
'Did she recover of herself ... last night?'
'Yes.'
'Had she got a fright?'
'I don't know ... I don't think so,' she said in a hesitating way.
They were speaking in a whisper, whilst the servant stood right at
the grating, as if mounting guard.
'Is she better?' the feeble voice inside asked.
'Just the same,' replied the servant in a monotonous voice.
'Oh God!' the voice called out in anguish.
Meanwhile the doctor bent down to hear the breathing better. He
seemed thoughtful and preoccupied. Margherita looked at him with
despairing eyes.
'Did she get a fright, half an hour ago, in here?' he began again to
ask, whilst he carefully raised Bianca's head and placed it against
his breast.
'No! ... certainly not!' Margherita whispered. 'I was in church. I did
not hear what was said; they called to me.'
'Who is that nun?' he asked, pointing to the grating.
'It is Sister Maria degli Angioli--the aunt.'
Then he got up and went to the grating. The serving Sister pursed up
her lips to remind him of the cloistral rule, almost as if she wanted
to prevent any conversation between him and the nun.
'Sister Maria----' he said very gently.
'Now and for ever,' the feeble voice said hurriedly, hearing a man's
voice.
'Has your niece had a fright?'
Silence on the other side.
'Did she tell you of anything disagreeable that had happened to her?'
'Yes, yes!' the voice breathed out, trembling.
'Can you tell me what it was about?'
'No, no!' she went on quickly, still trembling. 'Something very
sad ... I can't tell you.'
'Very well--thank you,' he whispered, getting up again.
'How is she? Are you giving her anything?' the Sister's voice asked.
'We are going to take her to the house. Nothing can be done here.'
'We are poor nuns,' the Sister murmured. 'How will you carry her?'
'In the carriage,' he said shortly. Then, going up to Margherita, he
went on in a low, forcible voice: 'I am coming with my coachman just
now. She can't stay here; I can't do anything for her here. We will
carry her out to the carriage and go home.'
'In this state?' she asked undecidedly.
'Do you want her to die here?' he interrupted brusquely.
'Please forgive me, sir.'
He had already gone out, without his hat and overcoat, across the
passage and icy court. After a minute he came back with the coachman,
who had evidently got his orders.
The doctor gently raised the fainting girl's body from under the
arms, resting her head on his breast, while the coachman raised
her feet. She was almost rigid and very heavy. The coachman had
a frightened look; perhaps he thought he was carrying out a dead
woman, all in black, through that bare parlour, deserted corridor,
and chilly court; and although the sight of physical suffering was
not new to him, being in a successful doctor's service, the idea of
carrying a young woman's cold body, a corpse perhaps, gave him such
a shudder he turned away his head. Old Margherita, coming behind,
looked yellower, more like wrinkled parchment than ever, in the
bright court. The procession of the anxious doctor, the frightened
man, the rigid figure in black, and the old servant sadly bent by
a strange new anguish, moved silently across the silent, tomb-like
cloister, like a funeral. Gently, with the care needed not to waken a
sleeping baby, the two men placed the poor lifeless creature in the
carriage, her head against the cushions and her feet on the opposite
seat. She had not given a sign of life whilst she was being carried;
the two lines deepened between Dr. Amati's eyebrows, lines showing
a strong will and deep thought, but which gave him an absent-minded
look. Margherita still gently tried to rearrange the girl's loosened
tresses that had fallen down, but she did not manage it, her lean
hands trembled so; she, too, had got into the broad landau; she
gathered up her mistress's hair caressingly, and the doctor heard her
mutter, 'My darling! my darling!'
He had lowered the blue blinds against indiscreet eyes; the carriage
went at a foot-pace; and in that bluish, misty shade the slow pace
kept up the idea of a funeral still more. However, the carriage
stopped at one point; after a little the coachman opened the door,
and handed in to the doctor a hermetically sealed phial, which he
held to the unconscious girl's nose. A sharp smell of ether at once
spread through the carriage, which was still going very slowly.
Bianca Maria never moved; after a little there was one sign of
feeling: her closed eyelids got red, big tears burst out between the
lashes and ran down her cheeks. The doctor did not take his eyes off
her for a minute, keeping her hand in his. She went on weeping, still
unconscious, without giving another sign of life: as if she still
felt sorrow through her unconsciousness, as if through her loss of
memory one bitter recollection still remained--only one. She did not
recover consciousness.
When they got to the Rossi Palace courtyard, hardly was the door
opened when a murmuring noise broke out, gradually growing stronger,
impossible to restrain. Beside the carriage door the porter's wife
called out and screamed as if the girl was dead. All the windows
looking into the courtyard, all the landing-place doors, had opened
to see the poor, fainting, pale creature in black, with hair hanging
down, taken out of the carriage. The doctor vainly tried to insist on
silence, but the cry of surprise and compassion grew louder, rising
in the heavy air.
On the first-floor landing-place Gelsomina, Agnesina Fragalà's nurse,
came out, holding the pretty, healthy infant in her arms; the happy
mother, Luisella Fragalà, came behind her, dressed to go out, with
her bonnet on. But she lingered, leaning on the iron railing, smiling
vaguely at her baby, and looking pityingly on the strange escort. She
had felt rather tired and preoccupied for some time past, for she had
been going every day to the Santo Spirito shop, from an instinct, a
presentiment, that was stronger than her pride, tying up the parcels
of sweets and cakes with her ring-covered, white hands.
'Poor thing! poor thing!' Luisella Fragalà muttered; her compassion
had a deeper, acuter feeling in it than the other people's had.
Raising the heavy yellow brocade curtains behind her double
windows on the first-floor, Signora Parascandolo's bloodless face
appeared--the rich usurer's wife who had lost all her children.
She seldom went out; she stayed shut up in her gorgeous apartment,
full of rich furniture now quite useless and dreary, as she never
received anyone since her sons died; only she looked out of the
window now and then in a silly kind of way that had grown on her.
On seeing Bianca Maria carried up in that way, the poor woman, who
took an interest in nothing usually, opened the window, and her voice
was added to the rising tumult, crying in prayer and supplication,
'Jesus, Jesus, help us!' All Domenico Mayer's misanthropic family
came out on the third-floor landing, leaving their three-roomed
little flat that looked on to the Rossi Theatre. First came the
father's long, peevish face, and, having just left some copying
work brought home from the Finance Office, he had sleeves on to
save his coat; then Donna Christina, the mother, who had got rid of
the tooth-ache but had a stiff neck instead; next Amalia, with her
staring eyes, thick nose and lips, and sulky look of a girl who has
not yet got a husband; and Fofò, still afflicted by the hunger which
his relations said was a mysterious illness. The whole family nearly
threw themselves over the railings out of curiosity, and shrieked out
in a chorus: 'Poor girl! poor girl!' A woman in a muslin cap and a
man in a blue sweeping-apron were at the window--even the doctor's
housekeeper; nor did they stop gazing when their master came up, so
overpowering was the excitement in all the Rossi Palace.
That carrying up the stair, amid the noisy compassion of all these
different people, the frightened, pitying shrieks, that had a false
ring about them, seemed endless to Dr. Amati; as for old Margherita,
she shook with annoyance and shame, as if that noise and publicity
were insulting to her mistress.
When the door was shut behind them, she asked Giovanni in a fright:
'Is milord not in? Milady is ill.'
'No,' he said, making way for the bearers.
Margherita shook her head despairingly. She went with the doctor and
his man into Bianca Maria's room; the girl was laid on the bed. The
man-servant went away. The doctor again tried to bring her back with
ether--no result. He bit his lip; he said twice or thrice, 'It is
impossible!' Once again he raised the violet eyelids, looking at her
eyes. She was alive, but she did not recover consciousness.
'Where is her father?' he asked, without turning round.
'I don't know,' the old woman muttered.
'There will be some place he goes every day; send for him.'
'I will send, as you order me to,' she said, still hesitating; and
she went out.
He sat down by the bedside, and laid down the ether bottle,
convinced now it was useless. That bare, cold little room, with a
look of childish purity, had calmed somewhat the scientist's dull
anger at not being able to cure nor find out the reason of the
illness. He had seen, a hundred times, long, queer fainting fits;
but they were from nervous illnesses, from abnormal temperaments,
out of order from the beginning, and ordinary methods had overcome
them. The colourless young girl seemed to be sleeping heavily, and
she might remain so for many hours, wrapped up in the dark regions of
unconsciousness. He armed himself with patience, turning over in his
mind medical books that spoke of such fainting fits. Twice or thrice
Margherita had come back into the room, questioning him with an
agonized look; he shook his head, 'No.' Then he asked her for brandy.
She stood hesitating; there was none in the house. Amati told her to
go and ask for it in his flat next door. With a teaspoon, a wretched
one that had lost its plating, he opened the girl's lips, and poured
the strong liquor through her closed teeth, with no result. Again, he
asked Margherita, who was fidgeting about, to heat flannel cloths;
seeing her still embarrassed, he told her to go to his house, and ask
the housekeeper for some.
Whilst she was away, Giovanni came back out of breath; he panted as
he spoke.
'I have not found the Marquis anywhere, not at Don Crescenzio's
lottery stand, nor at the Santo Spirito assembly, nor in Don
Pasqualino the medium's house, where they meet every day.'
'Who meet?' asked the doctor distractedly, hardly listening to what
he said.
'The Marquis's friends.... But I left word wherever he is to come
back to the house, because her ladyship is ill.'
'Very good; send out this prescription,' said the doctor, who as
usual wrote it with a pencil on a leaf from his pocket-book.
The old servant's pale face looked disturbed. The doctor, always
taken up about his patient, did not notice him.
'Go, and get it,' he said, feeling Giovanni was still there.
'It is because ...' the poor man stammered out.
Then the doctor, just as he had done for Annarella, the
glove-cutter's wretched wife, pulled ten francs out of his purse and
gave them to him.
'... the master not being in and not being able to tell the
mistress,' Giovanni muttered, wishing to account for the want of
money.
'Very good--all right,' said the doctor, turning to his patient.
But a loud ring at the bell sounded all through the flat. A
resounding step was heard, and the Marquis di Formosa came in. He
seemed only to see his daughter stretched out on the bed. He began
kissing her hand and forehead, speaking loudly in great anguish.
'My daughter, my daughter, what is the matter with you? Answer your
father. Bianca, Bianca, answer! Where have you the pain? how did it
come? My darling, my heart's blood, my crown, answer me! It is your
father calling you. Listen, listen, tell me what it is! I will cure
you, dear, dear daughter!'
And he went on exclaiming, crying out, sobbing, pale and red in the
face, by turns, running his fingers through his white hair, his still
graceful, strong figure bent, while the doctor looked at him keenly.
In a silent interval the Marquis noticed Amati's presence, and
recognised him as his celebrated neighbour.
'Oh, doctor,' he called out, 'give her something--this daughter is
all I have!'
'I am trying what I can,' the doctor said slowly, in a low voice, as
if he was chafing against the powerlessness of his science. 'But it
is an obstinate faint.'
'Has she had it long?'
'About two hours. It came on in the Sacramentiste parlour.'
'Ah!' said the father, getting pale.
The doctor looked at him. They said no more. The secret rose up
between them, wrapped in the thickest, deepest obscurity.
'Do something for her,' Formosa stammered, in a trembling voice.
But he was summoned; Giovanni whispered to him; the Marquis was
undecided for a minute.
'I will come back at once,' he said as he went off.
The doctor had wrapped the invalid's little feet in warm clothes; now
he wanted to wrap up her hands. All at once he felt a slight pressure
on his hand: Bianca Maria with open eyes was quietly looking at him.
The doctor's forehead wrinkled a little with surprise just for a
moment.
'How do you feel?' he asked, leaning over the invalid.
She gave a tired little smile, and waved her hand as if to tell him
to wait, that she could not speak yet.
'All right, very good,' the doctor said heartily. 'Don't speak;' and
he made Margherita, who was coming in, keep silence, too.
The servant's poor tired eyes shone with joy when she saw Bianca
Maria smiling.
'Are you better? Make a sign,' the doctor asked tenderly.
She made an effort, and very low, instead of a sign, she pronounced
the word 'Better.' The voice was low, but quiet. With a medical man's
familiarity, he took one of her hands in his to warm it.
'Thank you!' said she after a time.
'For what?' he said, rather put out.
'For everything,' she replied, smiling again.
Now, it seemed, she had quite got back the power of speaking. She
spoke, but kept quite still, only living intensely in her eyes and
smile.
'For everything--what do you mean?' he asked, piqued by a lively
curiosity.
'I understood,' said she, with a profound look.
'You were conscious all the time?'
'All. I could neither move nor speak, but I understood.'
'Ah!' said he thoughtfully. He sent Margherita to let the Marquis
know that his daughter had recovered consciousness.
'Were you in pain?'
'Yes, a great deal, from not being able to come out of my faint. I
wept; I felt a pain at my heart.'
'Yes, yes,' he said. 'Don't speak any more--rest.'
The doctor made a sign to the Marquis, who was coming in, to keep
silence. Formosa leant over his daughter's bed and touched her
forehead with his hand, as if he was blessing her. Her eyelids
fluttered and she smiled.
'Your daughter was conscious during her swoon--the rarest kind of
fainting fit.'
'Was she conscious?' the Marquis asked in a strange voice.
'Yes; she saw and heard everything. It comes from sensitiveness
carried to excess.'
Then he poured out more brandy in the teaspoon for Bianca Maria to
take. Don Carlo Cavalcanti's face twitched. He leant over the bed,
and asked:
'What did you see? Tell me--what did you see?'
The daughter did not answer. She looked at her father in such sad
surprise that the doctor, turning round, noticed it and frowned. He
had not heard what the father asked his daughter, and he again felt
the great family secret coming up, seeing Bianca Maria's gentle, sad
glance.
'Don't ask her anything,' the doctor said brusquely to the Marquis di
Formosa.
The old patrician restrained a disdainful shrug. He brooded over his
daughter's face, as if he wanted to get the secret out by magnetism.
She lowered her eyelids, but suffering was in her face; then she
looked at the doctor, as if she wanted help.
'Do you want anything?' he asked.
'There is a man at my door: make him go away,' she whispered in a
frightened tone.
The doctor started; so did her father. In fact, outside the door,
in his invariable wretched waiting attitude, was Pasqualino De Feo,
dirty, ragged, with unkempt beard and pale, streaky red cheeks. The
Marquis had left him in the drawing-room, but he slid along to Bianca
Maria's room with the timid, quiet step of a beggar who fears to be
chased from all doors.
'Who is that man?' said the doctor in that rough tone of his, going
up to the door, as if to chase him away.
'He is a friend,' the Marquis answered, hurrying forward in a vague,
embarrassed way.
'Send him away!' the doctor said sternly.
Outside the door the Marquis and Don Pasqualino chattered in a lively
whisper. Bianca Maria looked as if she could hear what her father
said outside; at one point she shook her head.
'Do you want that man sent away from the house?'
'Leave him,' she said feebly. 'It would annoy my father.'
Ah! the doctor knew nothing at all. Even now, on coming back to
stern realities, he blamed himself for the sad, dark romance coming
into his life; but an overmastering feeling entangled him, which he
thought was scientific curiosity. Hours were passing, evening was
coming on; he had made none of his visits, and he stayed on in that
poor aristocratic sick lady's room, as if he could not tear himself
away.
'I ought to go,' he said, as if to himself.
'But you will come back?' she asked in a whisper.
'Yes ...' he said, determined to conquer himself and not come back
again.
'Do come back!' in a humble voice, beseechingly.
'I am here--just next door. If you are in pain, send for me.'
'Yes, yes,' she replied, quieted at the idea of being protected.
'Adieu, madame!'
'À Dieu!' she said, pointedly separating the two words.
Margherita went with him, thanking him softly for having saved her
mistress; but he had again become an energetic, busy man, inimical to
words.
'Where is the Marquis?' he insisted on knowing.
'In the drawing-room, Professor.'
And she took him there. It was just so. Don Carlo Cavalcanti, Marquis
di Formosa, and Pasqualino De Feo were walking up and down silently.
It was almost dark: still, the doctor examined the medium with a
scrutinizing, suspicious eye.
'How is Bianca Maria?' asked Formosa, coming out of a dream.
'Better now,' the doctor replied in a short, cold tone; 'but she has
been struck prematurely, owing to a growing want of balance, moral
and physical. If you don't give her sun, movement, air, quiet, and
cheerfulness, she may die--from one day to another.'
'Don't say so, doctor!' the father cried out, angry and grieved.
'I must tell you, because it is so. I don't know the reason of
to-day's illness--I don't want to know it; but she is ill, you
understand--ill! She needs sun and peace--peace and sun. If you want
a doctor, I am always near; that is my profession. But I have made
out a prescription. Send your daughter to the country. If she stays
another year in this house, only seeing you and going to the nunnery,
she will die, I assure you,' he persisted coldly, as if this truth
ought to be announced decisively, as if he wanted to convince his own
unwilling mind also.
'Doctor, doctor, do not say that!' Formosa moaned, asking for mercy.
'She is ill; she will die. To the country--the country! Good-evening,
Marquis!'
He went off, as if trying to escape. The Marquis and the medium, who
had not said a word, went on again with their silent walk. Now and
then Formosa sighed deeply.
'The Spirit that helps me----' the medium breathed out.
'Eh?' the other cried out, starting.
'Warns me that Donna Bianca Maria has had a heavenly vision ... and
that she will tell you it in an allegory.'
'What do you say? Is it possible? Has the Supreme Being granted me
this favour? Is it possible?'
'The Spirit does not deceive,' the medium said sententiously.
'That is true--it is true!' Formosa murmured, looking into the
darkness with wild eyes.
CHAPTER V
CARNIVAL AT NAPLES
From the first days of January, Naples was taken with a mania for
work that spread from one house and shop to another, from street to
street, quarter to quarter, from fashionable parts to the poorest,
with a continuous movement, rising and falling. A stronger noise of
saws, planes and hammers came from the factories and workshops: in
the shops, with doors left ajar, and in the houses they sat up late:
the smallest as well as the big industries seemed to have got a
mysterious impulse, a breath of new life, into their half-dying state.
The demand for gloves had increased beyond bounds, especially white
and dove-coloured ones: the humblest general shops kept them. In
the artificial-flower shops, that compete with the French trade
with growing success, a great quantity of boughs, bunches, wreaths
of flowers, and ferns were got ready; big and small bouquets of
bright, warm-coloured flowers to take the eye--the finest intended
for ladies' hair and bosoms, the coarser for decorating houses,
shops, horses and carriages. Roses, camellias, pinks, were most
in request. At all the tailors' and dressmakers', satin, velvet,
gauze, crape, were draped in all styles, made into dresses, mantles,
hoods, and scarves; whilst at the shoe-makers', binders spent ten
hours a day making pink, blue, white, gray, and lilac shoes, fancy,
gold-embroidered boots, and some bound in fur. The glove, flower,
dress, and shoe makers' work began the first hours in the morning
and ended at eleven at night; but the only others that came up to
them were the cardboard shops. Here paper, in men and women's hands,
was bent into a thousand shapes and sizes. It was painted, cut out,
twisted, even curled up; it was made up with straw, metal, and rich
brocade stuff, starting from the twisted paper that holds a sweet or
cracker to the big expensive box. From the little chocolate-box,
made of cardboard and a scrap of satin, to the handsome, neat satchel
with a second cardboard lining; from the roll, made of two or three
old gambling cards, a little Bristol board, and bright-coloured
pictures, to straw cornucopias, covered with ribbons; from ugly,
mean things to lovely and expensive ones, the work was never-ending.
All this paper-work was arranged on large boards; the colours were
dazzling and took the eye. Every day they were sent off to the
sweet-shops, where they were filled with confetti, dainties, sweets,
and sugar almonds.
Yes, the work was hardest, always, in the confectioners', from
the humble Fragalà of San Lorenzo quarter and the gorgeous but
middle-class Fragalà of Spirito Santo up to the exquisite fashionable
confectioner in Piazza San Ferdinando. Above all, there was a
grand making of caraways, white and coloured, of all sizes, with
caraway-seeds and a powdery sugar covering; there were whole stores
of them in tins, canisters of all sizes, overflowing baskets
made like canisters, all kept carefully from damp, which ruins
caraways. Such a stock!--if it had been gunpowder, there would have
been enough to conquer an army. The other heavy work was getting
sausages and black-puddings ready, all covered with yellow bits of
Spanish bread--pig's blood, that is to say--made up with chocolate,
pistachios, vanilla, lemon, and cinnamon, so presented as to hide the
coarseness. In the back-shops they weighed cinnamon, sliced lemons,
crushed pistachio nuts, boiled sweets of all colours and kinds;
ovens roared, stoves were made red-hot, kettles boiled and gurgled,
and workmen, in shirt-sleeves and caps, with bare arms and necks,
stirring with big ladles, beating pestles in marble mortars, looked
like odd figures in purgatory, lighted up by the furnace flames.
All trades were busy: advertisements were put up; whole sheets of
them were spread on the city walls. Fashionable barbers took on
new lads; the three celebrated Naples _pizzaiuoli_ of Freddo and
Chiaia Lanes, of Carità Square, of Port Alba, informed the public,
which loves _pizza_ with Marano and Procida wine, that they would
be open till morning. The Café Napoli, the Grande, and the Europa
covered their windows with thick cloths, and held a grand cleaning
up all through the rooms; the theatres announced four times more
illuminations, whilst at the door of fancy shops, the windows of
miserable or fashionable bazaars, were shown black velvet masks,
wax noses, and huge cardboard heads, three times the natural size,
and much uglier than Nature; network masks, to protect the face from
caraways, ladles for throwing them, long tongs for handing up sweets
or flowers to the balconies, scarves and ribbons, fantastic ballroom
decorations, and entire costumes of tissue-paper. Along the streets
in Monte Calvario quarter, across and parallel to Toledo, in the
darkest old-clothes shops and retail dealers', dominos hung on wooden
pegs for the popular balls: Mephistopheles costumes in red and blue,
Spanish grandees in cotton velvet, harlequins made up of old carpets,
Sorrento peasant women's dresses in gay colours, Pulcinellos, and
almost white dress; above all, shining helmets, with cuirass of
cardboard to match, and wooden swords. Masquerading costumes were on
hire everywhere for a few francs; they gave a jocular tone to these
dull lanes, hanging even from the first-floor balconies, sticking out
in a row from the damp, dark shops with grinning, devilish masks, or
showing sickly faces of white or greeny-blue satin.
Wherever one went, in lower class neighbourhoods as well as in
aristocratic parts, one could see a lively movement, cheerful labour,
a noisy bustling about, a never-ending activity, a daily and nightly
ferment of all forces, the constant, lively, energetic action of
a whole peaceful, laborious town, intent upon one single piece of
work, given up to it heart and mind, hand and foot, using up its
nerves, blood, and muscles in this one tremendous work. Everywhere,
everywhere, one guessed or knew it; it caught the eye; it was written
up what this great work was--'_For the coming carnival festivities_.'
Nothing else but the carnival. The great city gave itself over to
that impetuous, joyous exertion, not for love of work in itself--for
work that is the cause and consequence of well-doing, which in itself
is the ground-work of goodness and respectability. The great town
had not given itself over to that lively activity for any immediate
civic reason, for hygienic improvements, industrial art exhibitions,
changing old quarters or making new ones: it was for the carnival
only--a carnival by official decree of the Prefecture and of the
Municipal Palace; a carnival warmed up by committees, associations,
commissions, set agoing by thousands of people, arranged and carried
out as a great institution, widely spread in the minds of the whole
five hundred thousand inhabitants, made to resound as far as the
southern provinces, echoing even to Rome and to Florence, putting
in the place of any other project, initiative or work, this of
the carnival; nothing but the carnival--enthusiastically, even
deliriously.
But, as at the bottom of all joyous things in this land of Cockayne,
there is an ever-flowing vein of bitterness. This carnival, that
turned all the gravest persons and things in the town into fun and
masquerade--this carnival was a merciful thing. From autumn to
January the damp, grievous scirocco had blown in Naples' streets,
overcoming the energies of healthy people, and making invalids'
maladies worse. The winter crowd of foreigners was smaller than
usual. Many works had been stopped for a time, and those just
starting had been delayed, so that many poor people slept on the
church steps under San Francesco di Paola portico and the Immacolata
obelisk in Piazza Gesù. A great wind of fasting had blown with the
scirocco, so that the official carnival, carried out by the desire of
thousands, was intended, if it succeeded, to satisfy for ten days at
least a lot of starving people, from shoe-binders to flower-makers,
from tailors to shop-clerks, from wandering salesmen to the small
shopkeepers. Twenty days' carnival!--that is to say, ten days'
bread, and a relish with it. The idea had been taken up at once. All
helped, even the least enterprising, knowing they were putting out
their money at good interest. Carnival, carnival, in the streets and
balconies, in the gateways and houses!
On that Shrovetide Thursday the damp winter scirocco had got a spring
softness. Toledo Road, where the carnival spread from one end to
the other, both in its popular and fashionable form, had put on an
extraordinary appearance. All the big shops were shut. The tradesmen
and their ladies wished to enjoy the day's outing, also they were
nervous about their plate-glass windows. All the signs were covered
with linen or tow, as were the gas-lamps. As to the common smaller
shops, they had taken out the glass and put up wooden platforms, and
the owners, with their friends and children, sat with a store of
caraways, having to do battle almost face to face with the people on
the pavement; but they bravely flourished their ladles all the same.
The balconies on the first floor were all differently draped with
bright, cheap muslins, put up with a few nails or pins, with a very
Southern and rather barbarous love of gay colours, some in the style
of church decorations, blue, red, white, and gold, some tucked back
with big camellias, roses, and dahlias, to make the balcony look like
an alcove, an actress's room, a saint's niche, or a wild beasts' show
even. The finest and smartest hangings began near Santa Brigida. Some
Swiss gentlemen had had a chalet put up in their balcony, and the
ladies wore simple, rather silly costumes, with hair down, a big cap,
and gold crosses at their necks. Just after that, at Santa Brigida, a
great man's natural son had hung his balconies with dark-blue velvet,
covered with a silver net, which might represent the firmament, the
kingdom of the moon, or the sea, but, at any rate, it surprised the
good Naples folk. A balcony near the Conte di Mola Lane was made into
a kitchen, with a stove, kettle, frying and stew pans, and eight or
ten youths of good family worked as cooks and scullions, with white
caps and aprons. A famous beautiful woman, whose beauty brought her
wealth and led her into deadly sin, had changed her balcony into a
Japanese hut, all stuffs and tapestries. Now and then she appeared
wrapped in flowing, soft robes, just gathered in at the waist, with
her black hair caught up in a shiny knot held by pins, her eyebrows
arched in an unvarying look of surprise.
The common people smiled admiringly as they passed. They said, with
their vague one idea of the East, 'The Turk, the Turk!' All these
balconies, draped from one end of the street to the other, and the
shop decorations, began to make one dizzy with bright colours,
firing the imagination, giving that quick feeling of voluptuous joy
Southerners get from outside impressions. Towards eleven, wandering
salesmen began to go about, shrieking out their wares. They sold
little boxes of inferior sweets made in bright colours--red bags,
green and white boxes, lilac and yellow horns, carried in big, flat
baskets in one hand. They sold artificial flowers also, made into
sprays, cockades, and bunches, tied on to long poles. Real flowers
were sold, too--white camellias and perfumed violets, from big
baskets; also masks, ladles, linen bags for caraways, red and yellow
paper sunflowers, that twirled round at every breath of wind like
wild things. They sold a bad quality of caraways, bought cheap,
intended to be sold dear in the blind, furious time of the battle.
At mid-day the traffic in sweetmeat-boxes, flowers, musks, and
windmills began. Already the crowd began to fill the balconies and
pavements, running up hurriedly from all the side-streets. On the
first-floor windows and balconies a living, many-coloured hedge of
women swayed about. There was a shimmer of girlish forms brightly
dressed; their faces gently moved up and down like big pink and
white flower-heads, with a blood-red touch now and then from an open
parasol or scarlet hat. The balconies and windows of the second
story were filled with still more excited people, whilst on the
fourth children and girls here and there had thought of letting down
a basket tied to a long bit of ribbon to fish with, smiling from
above on some courteous unknown, who put a flower, some sweets, or a
chocolate-box into the baskets of these smiling beings so near the
sky. The people increased everywhere. Traffic with the hawkers went
on from the balconies to the streets, with loud discussions, offers,
and rejections, making the noise twice as great.
Caraways were not to be thrown before two o'clock, by the committee's
express order, but some stray fights were started already. At San
Sepolcro corner a peasant nurse, slowly swinging her petticoats, was
fired at by some school-boys at close quarters. A grave gentleman,
in top-hat and long great-coat, was violently assaulted in Carità
Square. He tried to go at them with his stick, but he was hissed.
Then he called for the police, announcing pompously he was Cavaliere
Domenico Mayer, a State functionary; but the police would not help,
saying it was carnival, and that he should not tempt people with
his top-hat. And then the misanthropic Secretary of the Finance
Department, full of bitterness, had gone into the San Liborio Lane to
escape. A lady in a broad-brimmed hat, not able to move from one spot
in the pavement near San Giacomo, had a continuous shower of caraways
poured on her by a child on the third story. She heard it fall on her
felt and feathers without daring to move or raise her head, in case
she got the caraways in her face.
At two o'clock exactly a cannon-shot was heard in the distance. Then
there was a sigh of relief from one end of Toledo to the other, from
the street to the upper stories, and the crowd swayed about.
The four Rossi Palace balconies, first floor on the right, looking
into Toledo, were draped in blue and white linen, caught back by
big red camellias. Luisella Fragalà and her guests had thought of
white and blue dominoes, with high, ridiculous hats and red cockades,
and all the Naddeos, all the Durantes, all the Antonaccis, fat or
thin, young or old, wore dominoes made in the house themselves
to save their clothes from white powder, and, according to them,
give an elegant look to the balcony. Some looked like big bundles,
others like long ghosts; but the carnival madness had overcome these
middle-class women. Besides all, trade was flourishing in these
days. So many goods were sold; the men came back to the house in
high good-humour, whilst all winter had been one complaint, and
economy had got narrower and harder to bear. How happy they were,
all these placid, industrious little women! In this time of carnival
excitement they could share, in their blue and white fancy dresses
and red cockades. Luisella Fragalà had thought out the costume, and
that monkey Carmela Naddeo took up the idea at once and made others
follow suit. They were all there, ladles in hand, guessing what sort
of carriages were to appear, exaggerating, contradicting, shrieking,
laughing, hanging over the railings to see if any carriages were
coming round by the Museum. Only sometimes a cloud came over Luisella
Fragalà's face; some unhappy thought was behind her brown eyes.
Perhaps she was troubled by the thought that the balcony hangings
would be spoilt by the confetti. Perhaps she would have liked to keep
the shop open even on that profitable Carnival Thursday, her love of
selling having instinctively grown so great, as if by that alone she
saw a chance of being saved from imminent peril. Perhaps she secretly
regretted Cesare Fragalà's absence. He was often away lately, and had
disappeared early that Thursday, too. But these clouds were fleeting.
Luisella was going about from one balcony to another with her hood
down, vainly looking for places for the Mayer family, who had come
without being invited. All quietly snubbed them, so as not to give
up their places, saying to each other that the mother and daughter
had no dominoes, and they made a false note on the balcony. They set
themselves in the third row, the mother, as usual, rheumatic, and
wrapped in flannel to the finger-tips; the girl's big eyes still
dully misanthropic, as were her swollen, discoloured lips; the
brother, as usual, very hungry.
'We will not get even a chocolate-box,' they grumbled one after the
other, muttering with their unending rage against humanity.
But the great carnival wave, with ever-increasing force, swallowed
up their rage against mankind also. The noise among the carriages
got tremendous. The confetti war had begun between them and the
pony-carts, done up with myrtle as an attempt at decoration, all
being well filled with masqueraders of both sexes dressed in
bright-coloured calicoes. The Parascandolos, who lived on the other
side of the Rossi Palace, kept their balcony shut, for the Signora
considered herself in mourning; but Don Gennaro Parascandolo, in a
Russian linen dust-cloak and cap, with a bag of sweets hung round his
neck, after walking along Toledo, greeted from hundreds of balconies,
where his past, present, and future clients were, had gone to his
club at Santa Brigida, and from there, amid a group of young and old
boon companions, made a life of it, as they said there. They joked
about him, asked him how many cars he had lent money for, and if
it was true his collection of bills was increased by many princely
autographs. Ninetto Costa, the smart, lucky stock-broker, who had his
own reasons for making a fuss with him, said, to flatter him, that
not a handful of caraways was thrown that day he was not interested
in either providing or scattering. Don Gennaro Parascandolo laughed
paternally, not denying it. He answered those who asked him for
coppers as a joke, 'I have had to get the loan of forty pounds from a
friend to hold carnival with.' Others around shouted, whistled, but
always flattered him. One never knew when one might fall into his
hands. He stood out among them all by his great height and the little
cap oddly set on his big head, throwing ladlefuls of caraways at the
carriages and pony-carts.
Slovenly, in her black dress, grown greenish, and her torn
shawl-fringe, Carmela the cigar-maker had set herself at the corner
of D'Affitto Lane, looking at the passing carriages with her hollow
eyes, her fine fresh mouth working impatiently, the only feature that
was still young in her worn face. Handfuls, ladlefuls of caraways
often new from the balconies and the street, frequently hitting her
face or back; but she only moved a little to avoid it, smiling at the
annoyance, and cleaned her face with a corner of her shawl.
She was waiting there to see her lover, Raffaele, called
Farfariello, pass. He was in a carriage with four others, all dressed
alike; and, indeed, to get this dress, she had had to sell some
copper pans, a chest of drawers, and two long branches of artificial
flowers under a glass case, all things she was keeping for her
marriage. How it tore her heart to sell these things, bought bit by
bit by dint of hard saving!
But Raffaele had insisted on having forty francs--blood from a
snail--because he was in despair at making a poor appearance among
his friends; and she, getting white when she heard him swear, had
sold all these things, and, like a fool, was quite pleased at heart
when she handed him the money, because he had smiled and promised to
take her and her mother to an inn at Campo the last Carnival Sunday
if she took as much as even an _ambo_ on Saturday. She, quite proud
of this fantastic promise, kept down her heart's bitterness, and went
as slovenly as a beggar that carnival day, her hair falling on her
neck, without a sou in her pocket, to see her handsome lover passing
proudly in a carriage, smoking a Naples cigar, in new clothes and
hat on one side, with that intensely indifferent look characteristic
of the _guappo_, or aspirants to it. She waited patiently, thinking
only of him, not caring about her day's work, as there was a holiday
at the factory. She quietly bore all the pushing about that noon-day
carnival that she took no part in, for she was wrapped up like a
Buddhist in contemplation of her lover.
On the people went, on foot and in carriages, through the clouds of
caraways, flowers, chocolates, through the shower of coloured paper
from the upper stories, where, as they were not able to take part in
the caraway war, they amused themselves in that way. The noise got
clamorous, swaying about sonorously, rising to the skies that gentle
scirocco day.
Carmela, confused by the noise and wild sights that noon-day,
when Naples' rejoicing became epic, screwed up her eyes, not to
lose sight of the two-horse carriages going along at a foot-pace,
white with powder. Now and then one of the large cars appeared.
There was the Parthenope Siren, a huge, pink lady with blonde hair
hanging down. She was made of cardboard, and the body ended up
in blue waves. This Siren was dragged along on a car full of men
dressed as fish--oysters, carp, bull-heads. One car represented a
merchant-vessel, a Tartana. The ship had rigging and sailors dressed
in pink and white stripes, also in blue and white with long red
caps. There was a car with eight or ten Jacks-in-the-box, from which
gentlemen dressed in satin burst out in the midst of flowers. On
one car all the Neapolitan masks were shown: Pulcinella, Tartaglia,
Don Nicolai, Columbrina, Barilotto the clown, the _guappo_, the old
woman--even to the newest mask of a pretentious, fast youth, Don
Felice Scioscimocca.
When these cars passed, very slowly, almost quivering on their
wheels, showering down caraway, confetti, and presents, they were
much applauded. The Siren excited rather risky jokes; the Tartana
was thought picturesque; the Jacks-in-the-box luxurious and smart;
and the Naples masks were hailed with shouts of recognition and
quick-flying dialogues from all the balconies in dialect, which the
masks replied to in a lively way. There was one swaying movement from
the top to the bottom of Toledo, both in the balconies and the crowds
round the carriages.
Carmela looked and looked. She saw the two sisters Concetta and
Caterina, pass in a carriage, the horses covered with flowers stuck
in the shiny brass harness. She owed Donna Concetta thirty-five
francs since ever so long, and managed to give her a few francs now
and then just for interest, and she had often staked on the _small
game_ with Donna Caterina when she had not enough money for the
Government Lottery, or, perhaps, only one penny left. The sisters
were in full dress, the hair done up like a trophy on the top of the
head with gold chains, and they wore heavy necklaces, pearl earrings,
thick rings, keeping up their usual discreet, severe expression,
casting oblique glances, and pursing up their lips. Two men were with
them in workmen's Sunday attire, with shiny long hair, hat over the
ear, in black jackets, with a spent cigar in a corner of the mouth.
The four, silent and solemn, looked at each other now and then with
serious, pleased glances of gratified pride, shaking their heads to
get rid of the caraways off their hat-brims, smiling at the people
who threw them. They looked to right and left haughtily, just like
rich, common people.
Carmela bit her lips on seeing the two calm, ferocious heapers-up of
other people's money, but immediately after the usual words came from
her heart to her lips:
'It doesn't matter, it doesn't matter.'
But a very original car was coming down from the top of Toledo,
raising a colossal laugh, from right to left, up and down. It was
a great bed, with a bright pink cotton quilt, such as are used in
Naples. It had an open canopy, with images of the Virgin and patron
saints on the hangings. In bed, tucked in with white sheets, were two
people, with huge pasteboard heads, one an old man in a night-cap,
the other an old woman in a mob-cap. Very caressing, affected old
people; they nodded their great heads, pulled the coverlids from each
other with that selfish, shivering habit old people have; offering
snuff to each other, bowing, sneezing, and stretching themselves
out; greeting people in the balconies, thanking them for the shower
of caraways they got, and shaking them off the bed-clothes. It
was not found out who they were, but they displayed that familiar
caricature--a corner of a bedroom--without anyone thinking it too
risky; for Southerners are used to sleeping in the open air, they
live so much in public in this warm, easy-going country.
What about it? Everyone laughed. Even the people in Don Crescenzio's
shop at Nunzio Corner, just beyond Carità Passage, laughed. It was
really the lottery bank, No. 117, a shop usually shut from Saturday
at noon till Tuesday, the crush beginning on Thursday up to Saturday
at twelve o'clock.
Don Crescenzio, the lottery banker, a handsome man, with a red beard,
worked there with his two lads, who were anything but lads: one, an
old man of seventy, bent, half-blind, his nose always on the gambling
register, made people say their lottery numbers three times, to
make no mistakes, and wrote them very, very slowly. The other was a
colourless type of no particular age; his face had undecided lines,
his beard was an indefinite colour, one of those queer beings that
are employed as witnesses by ushers, as middlemen at the pawn-shop,
as distributors of handbills, and agents for furnished rooms. Don
Crescenzio lorded it over his two _young men_. That Thursday he had
quite changed his shop, putting up a gallery in it draped in white
and crimson, to which he invited his best customers. Yes, they were
all there, those that came every week to put down the best of their
income--money hardly earned, either snatched from domestic economies,
or got by cunning expedient, bold at first, and then shameful.
All were there at the lottery shop, turned into a stand. The Marquis
di Formosa, Don Carlo Cavalcanti, with his lordly air; Dr. Trifari,
red of face, hair, and beard, bloated as if he were going to burst,
a suspicious look in his false blue eyes; Professor Colaneri, more
than ever that day, clearly showed the indelible marks of a priest
who has given up the Church; then Ninetto Costa, come from his club
in Don Gennaro Parascandolo's company, felt drawn by a powerful,
irresistible desire to his haunt; and other eight or ten--a court
judge, a steward of a princely house, a sickly painter of saints,
and Cozzolino the barber, who was a great Cabalist, down to the
shoeblack Michele, in a corner on the ground, a hunchback and lame,
his wrinkled old face full of irrestrained passion; beside him was
Gaetano, the glove-cutter, more worn and pale than before, his eyes
burning with discontent, uneasiness in every line of his face. Don
Crescenzio's clients held their carnival in the shop dear to their
ruling passion, and as they were tormented to buy caraways, they,
too, threw them at the carriages, but mostly at the passers-by, among
whom they found acquaintances sometimes. No one was surprised to see
such different sorts of people together--a Marquis, a stock-broker,
a court judge, a doctor, a professor, down to a workman. Carnival,
carnival! The gentle popular madness had seized all brains; the
warmish day, the bright colours, the whims in the thousands
of vehicles passing, the clamour of a hundred thousand people
overpowered even those suffering from another fever, which was pushed
back for a time into a corner of the mind.
When Cesare Fragalà passed on foot, laughing and shouting, in a
Russia-linen dust-cloak and travelling-cap, two long bags of caraways
at his sides, which he emptied against balconies of his acquaintance
and went filling again at every corner of the street from wandering
salesmen, joking with everyone, fat, strong, and jovial, needing an
outlet to his spirits--when he passed before Don Crescenzio's shop
there was a chorus of greetings. Under the Rossi Palace, before
his own balconies, he had already had half an hour's fight from
below with his wife and her friends. Luisella, Carmela Naddeo, the
Durantes, and the Antonaccis had thought Cesare's idea so original
and he so charming that they had knocked him down by dint of caraway
showers; he had been obliged to run away, laughing, keeping down his
head, pulling his cap over his ears. There were noisy greetings,
therefore, from Don Crescenzio's shop, and calls for him to come in.
Was he not a customer, too, always hopeful of getting eighty thousand
francs hard cash to open a shop in San Ferdinando? But Cesare was
too satisfied wandering about alone, laughing and shrieking with
everyone, buffeted by the caraways, red, panting with health and fun.
He went among the carts and carriages, borne by the crowd, through a
burst of excitement, which the time of day made keener. The quietest
did silly things now. Those standing on the cars, at first only
merry, looked like so many demons. Raffaele, nicknamed Farfariello,
loving Carmela's betrothed, passed in a carriage; to be seen better,
he and his friends had made up their minds to sit on the roof. From
there they waved white silk handkerchiefs, tied to sticks like flags,
at the crowd. Alas! he did not see her, the girl who waited so many
hours for him at the corner of D'Affitto Lane. She, having cried out,
waved her arms and a bit of white stuff, felt stunned at the neglect,
but whispered to herself as a consolation, 'It does not matter.'
But she still stayed there, hemmed in by that growing carnival
frenzy. A thicker crowd closed in under the balcony where the lovely
lady dressed as a Japanese was. She, getting excited, began to send
down a shower of confetti by handfuls and boxfuls, as if she had a
store in the house, a servant handing them to her. A shout of rogues
and enthusiastic common folk rose to the skies, whilst she from
above, quite serious, but a pink flame in her cheeks, recklessly
flung down confetti, sweets, and chocolate-boxes. On the balcony
draped with blue and silver net, the exalted personage's son had
thought of the joke of tying a bottle of champagne, a game pie or a
big chocolate-box, to a long rod, and letting it down to the level
of the crowd's outstretched hands, pulling it up, dancing it about,
amidst the longing cries, uplifted hands, and open mouths of the
people below, until a shout of triumph announced some lucky one had
carried off the prize of the new Cockayne. The rod was pulled up,
and the young fellows, who had taken a mad fancy to the game, tied
on some other eatable or drinkable--a bottle of bourdeaux, a cheese
wrapped in silver paper, or a bag of confetti, and the game started
again, with an unutterable row and obstruction to traffic. The men
in the cars now, having taken in new stores as the evening went on,
danced, sang, and threw things, behaving like demons.
It was at this most exciting time of the day that a new cart came
out from a side-street of Toledo, arriving late, the horses drawing
it at a foot-pace. It was queer and fantastic, being a philosopher's
chemical laboratory, where a wretched old Faust sat cursing all
human things in a frozen, melancholy way. It formed a dark room,
with two shelves of books, a furnace, and an alchemist's retort, and
there was an open Koran on a carved wooden desk. A bent old man in
a black velvet skull-cap, with a long yellowy-white beard, tottered
about the car, throwing boxes of sweets shaped like books, retorts,
alembics, furnaces, to the crowd in the streets and balconies, each
having a figure of Mephistopheles. But they were good sweets. Then
a chimerical touch got into the carnival fury. The sorcerer's car
seemed quite supernatural. The old man, whom the laughing women
in the balconies called the Devil, his bald head in the skull-cap
quivering, threw out things, magically producing them from beneath
the car. Now and then amid the clamour of the populace a shrill voice
called out to the decrepit sorcerer, 'Give us lottery numbers! give
us tips!'
Having got to San Ferdinando, Faust's car turned to go back the same
way up Toledo, when a most curious, indescribable thing happened. The
old man took out of a copper alembic, beside the boxes of sweets,
long, narrow strips of yellow paper and threw them to the crowd, who
rushed furiously on them. A shout went before, and followed Faust's
car, 'These are _storni, storni_!'
To carry out a new, splendid, eccentric generosity pleasing to the
people, the old man threw lottery-tickets of two or three numbers,
ready paid for next Saturday, at two sous each. They are called
_storni_. He nobly threw handfuls of them to the people, laughing in
his thick, white beard, forgetting he was old, holding his head back
with ferocious gaiety.
What a shout everywhere, from the streets and windows up to the sky
paling at sunset! What a lengthened shout of desire and enthusiasm!
The whole population raised their hands and arms as if to seize the
promised land. They cast themselves on the ground and kicked each
other, so as to snatch a lottery-ticket, with its conditional promise
of ten or two hundred francs gain. What joyous excitement among
men, women, boys, rich and poor, needy and comfortably off! What
an irresistible rush, that from holy fear respected the sorcerer's
car; they made a triumph for him of glorious shouts from one end of
Toledo to the other! But when he had thrown ten thousand tickets to
the crowd he disappeared, no one knew where or how.
* * * * *
Antonio Amati met Margherita the maid on the staircase as she was
going in, too, rather tired. Brusquely, as if he would have preferred
not to speak, perhaps, he asked her:
'How is your mistress?'
'She is better,' the old domestic said in a low voice. 'Why have you
not been to see her, sir?'
'I have a lot to do,' the doctor muttered, without, however, knocking
at his door.
'That is true; but you are so kind, sir.'
'And then there was no need of me,' he added in a hesitating tone.
'Who can tell?' Margherita retorted in a still lower and mysterious
voice. 'Why don't you come in now, sir?'
'I will come,' he said, with his head down, as if he was giving in to
a superior will.
She put a key in the lock and opened it, going before the doctor
into the quiet house, right on to the drawing-room, and he, though
accustomed to keep down his own impressions, felt at once the cold
silence and emptiness of the big room. He found the girl in black
before him, smiling vaguely, holding out her hand--a long, cold, tiny
one, which he kept a minute in his, more as a doctor than a friend.
'Are you quite well again?'
He spoke in a low voice, feeling the oppressive surroundings.
'Not altogether,' she said in her clear, tired voice. 'I had another
fainting-fit one night; but very short--at least, I think so.'
'Did no one come to your help?' he said regretfully.
'No; no one knew about it; it was at night, in my own room.... It
doesn't matter,' she added, with a slight smile.
'Why did you not go to the country?'
'My father hates the country,' she said. 'I will not leave him here
alone.'
'But why do you not go out? It is carnival to-day; why did you not go
to see it? Do you want to die of melancholy?'
'Signora Fragalà did ask me, but I hardly know her. I think I would
have had to wear a mask. My father does not like such things; he is
right.'
She spoke in a gentle, pretty voice, with a tired sound in it. Amati,
who had been working all that day by sick-beds while others enjoyed
the carnival, felt rested by that harmonious voice and the tired,
delicate calmness of the young girl. They were alone, facing each
other--around them was a great silence; they hardly looked at each
other, but they spoke as if their souls had long lived together, in
joy and sorrow.
'Where were you a little ago?' Antonio Amati asked brusquely.
'I was in the chapel,' Bianca Maria answered, taking no offence at
the question.
'Do you pray a great deal?'
'Not enough,' she replied, raising her eyes heavenwards.
'Why do you pray so much?'
'I must do it.'
'You don't sin,' the unbeliever muttered, trying to make a joke of it.
'One never knows,' she said gravely. 'One must pray for those that
don't pray themselves.'
So saying, she gave him a passing glance. He bent his head.
'You spend too many hours in the cold church. It will do you harm.'
'I don't think so; and, then, what does it matter?'
'Don't say that,' interrupting her quickly.
'Few things can hurt me,' she replied in a tone he understood and did
not want to inquire into.
'Let us go and see the carnival from Signora Fragalà's windows. She
asked me, too;' and he got up promptly to carry her off.
'Let us stay here,' Bianca gently retorted. 'Here at least there is
peace. Don't you think this calm and silence good for one, too?'
'You are right,' Amati owned, sitting down again quite subdued.
'My father has gone out with his friends to see the carnival,' she
went on quietly. 'Everyone in the palace is out on the balconies that
look on Toledo; no noise reaches here, you see.'
They looked at each other frankly. That strange hour of
unconsciousness, when he saved her, and she knew he was saving her,
had set up something like an inward life between them. What she felt
was a humble need of protection, help, and counsel; his feeling was a
very tender pity. He could not keep back a question that rose to his
mind.
'Is it true you wish to be a nun?' he asked in rather a choked voice.
'I would like it,' she said simply.
'Why should you?'
'Just because,' she replied with a woman's favourite answer.
'Why should you be a nun? No one wants to be a nun nowadays. Why
should you do it?'
'Because, if there is one single person in the world that should go
into a convent, it is I; because I have neither desires, nor hopes,
nor anything before me. As that is so, you see, I must at least have
prayer across this void desert and the desolation that comes before
death.'
'Don't say that--don't say it!' he implored, as if for the first time
fatality had breathed on his energy and destroyed it.
CHAPTER VI
DONNA CATERINA AND DONNA CONCETTA
The two sisters, Donnas Caterina and Concetta, were sitting opposite
each other at the dinner-table. They were eating silently, with
their eyes down; and occasionally they bent down to wipe their lips
on a corner of the tablecloth that was all marked with bluish wine.
A large deep-rimmed dish stood on the table between the two, full
of macaroni cooked in oil, salted anchovies, and garlic, all fried
lightly in an earthen pan and thrown over the boiling pasta; the two
women plunged their forks now and then into the shiny oily macaroni,
put some in their plates, and began to eat again. There was a big
loaf of white underbaked bread, too--the _tortano_: they broke
off bits with their hands to eat the macaroni with. A greeny-blue
glass bottle full of reddish wine, that made bluish reflections,
stood on the tablecloth; big glasses, and a salt-cellar, also of
glass--nothing else. The sisters used leaden forks, and coarse
knives with black handles; they sometimes broke off a bit of bread
and dipped it in the fried oil at the bottom of the dish. Caterina,
who was the roughest and saw fewest people--she lived furtively
almost--put her bread into the macaroni dressing with her fingers;
Concetta, who was more refined, from always going about and seeing
people, put the bread neatly on her fork to dip it in the garlic, and
nibbled at it after examining it. At one point, indeed, Concetta,
finding a burnt bit of garlic, put it aside with a frown. Otherwise
the sisters were exactly alike in gestures, way of speaking, and
style of dress, though not so much so in features. Both had their
hair dressed by the same woman at two sous each: it was drawn up to
the top of the head, the coil fastened by big sham tortoise-shell
pins, and the fringe slightly powdered over the forehead. Both
wore the dress of well-to-do Naples common folk--a petticoat with
no jacket, merely a trimmed bodice, that keeps the Spanish name
_baschina_; and they never went without a thick gold chain round
the neck--it was the sign of their great power--and they wore high
felt boots, with noisy wooden heels. It being dinner-hour, they had
left their usual work--a great coverlet of calico, pink one side and
green the other, stuffed with cotton-wool--stretched over a big loom,
where they stitched at it in wheels, stars, and lozenges, working
quickly, one on each side of it, their heads down and noses on the
pattern, pulling the needle out and in monotonously. The loom was
pushed into a corner; the displaced chairs were noticeable. Now a
little servant of fourteen came in, red-haired, white-faced, and
marked with freckles, carrying the second course--a bit of Basilicata
cheese, like a dry cream cheese, called _provola_, and two big sticks
of celery. She glanced at Donna Caterina to know what to do with the
macaroni left in the dish.
'Keep two bits for Menichella,' said the holder of the _small game_,
as she cut a big slice of cheese.
'Yes, ma'am,' the girl said as she went out.
Menichella was a poor old thing of sixty; her son, in the Municipal
Guard, had been killed in a fight with Camorrists in Pignasecca
Square by a revolver-shot in the stomach. She lived on alms, and
every Friday arrived at the Esposito sisters' house, where she got
a hot dish, half a loaf of bread, and some scraps. The Espositos
did this out of devotion to our lovely Lady of Sorrows, whose day
is Friday. On Wednesday they gave the same alms to a blind beggar
called Guarattelle, because for many years he kept a puppet-show;
this charity they dedicated to the Virgin of the Carmine, Wednesday
being her day. On Monday, too, they fed a deserted boy of ten, that
the whole Rosariello di Porta Medina Road were taken up about and
fed, while the Esposito sisters helped him that one day for the
sake of souls in Purgatory, their day being Monday. A beggar seldom
knocked at their door any day without getting something. 'Do it for
St. Joseph; his day has come round.' 'The Holy Trinity be praised!
to-day is Sunday; give alms.' Something to eat, a glass of wine, some
scraps, beggars always carried off--money never. The sisters had too
great a respect for sous to give them away. It was better charity,
they explained, to give food, than encourage vice by giving money.
The beggars stayed on the landing; the sisters never let them in,
fearing always for the valuables in the house; they used to carry out
the dish of macaroni, vegetables, or salad. Sometimes the beggar ate
it on the stairs, muttering blessings. They had now eaten the smoked
cheese and bread, slowly, moving their jaws rather voluptuously,
tearing the celery off in strips, and munching it noisily, like
fruit, to take the taste of oil out of their mouths. When they were
done, they kept still for a little, gazing at the blue stains on
the tablecloth, with their hands in their laps, silently digesting
and making long mental calculations, as women of business. The
servant-girl, Peppina, carried off everything in a trice; the clatter
of her old shoes was heard in the kitchen next door, as she went
backwards and forwards to wash a few plates, stopping now and then to
turn her macaroni in the pan; she had set it to fry again, seeing it
was cold.
Now the sisters got up, shook the crumbs out of their laps, and
went to take their place at the loom again, bending over it, the
right hand, covered with rings, rising methodically, the left held
under the loom, to stitch through. There was a ring at the bell;
the sisters glanced at each other, and quickly took up their work.
Besides what they earned from it, it served as a screen, morally and
physically.
Two girls, dressmakers, came in, pushing each other forward. The
first, the bolder, was Antonietta, who worked with a dressmaker in
Santa Chiara Street, the same that went to buy lunch for Nannina and
herself at the wine-seller's opposite the lottery office. Both of
them were, wretchedly dressed, in poor woollen skirts, a gaudy but
shabby jacket of another colour, and a little black shawl, which they
liked to let slip down on their arms, to show their bust; a bunch
of red ribbon was tied at the neck. Nannina, the smallest, was a
relation of the Espositos; she had a holy terror of her aunts, with
their money and jewels, for they always received her with pensive and
intentional coldness. Still, they let her kiss their hands.
The two girls were still standing near the loom, looking on at this
alert industry as if they were put out.
'Have you not gone to work to-day?' Donna Caterina asked Nannina.
'I have been at it,' the girl at once volubly answered, being prodded
by Antonietta's elbow. 'But our mistress sent us to buy some things
near here, and, as this friend of mine wants to ask a favour from
you, we came....'
'Who do you want this favour from?' said Donna Concetta, raising her
head from her work.
'From you, aunt,' stammered the niece.
'You don't say so!' her aunt exclaimed, in an ironical tone, smiling
and shaking her head.
The girls said nothing; they looked at each other: from the start the
thing was going badly.
Caterina, as she took no interest in the subject now, cut the tacking
with a pair of scissors, where it had been already stitched, which
covered her maroon bodice with white threads.
'Have you lost your tongues? What is it about?' Donna Concetta asked,
laughing.
'Well, now I will tell you, ma'am,' the blonde began, biting her lips
to make them red. 'I would like a new dress for Easter, a pair of
boots, and cotton to make three or four chemises. If I was frugal,
and made them myself, after my day's work is done, forty francs would
do. I have not got it; it would take a year to save it. Knowing you
are good and kind to poor folk, I had an idea you might lend me these
forty francs.'
'It was not a good idea of yours,' said the money-lender freezingly.
'Why? I can pay off the debt at so much a week. I earn twenty-five
sous a day; I don't owe a penny to anyone. Ask Nannina; she is my
guarantee.'
'Nannina ought to find a security for herself,' Donna Concetta
grumbled. 'But why do you need this dress? Is what you have on not
enough? If one has no money, get no dresses. When my sister and I had
no means, we got no clothes. You are all mad, you girls, nowadays!'
'Aunt, aunt, do her this favour; she has a lover, and she is ashamed
to go ill-dressed,' the niece begged for her friend.
'I have had a lover too,' Donna Concetta answered; 'he was not
ashamed when I was ill-dressed.'
'Men nowadays are quite different,' Antonietta murmured. 'So do me
this favour.'
'I don't know you, my dear.'
'I work for Cristina Gagliardi, at No. 18, Santa Chiara, the
first-floor. I live at No. 3, Strettola di Porto; you can make
inquiries.'
Silence followed, and the girls again gave each other an alarmed look.
'At most--at most,' said Donna Concetta, looking up, 'I can give you
stuff to make a dress on credit, and cotton for the chemises....
I will ask a merchant that knows me--a good man; but you will pay
dearer for your clothes.'
'No matter, it doesn't matter,' Antonietta quickly interrupted; 'do
so.'
'What colour is the stuff to be?' Donna Concetta asked maternally.
'Navy blue or bottle green; I like navy blue best.'
'It will suit you best--navy blue; you look well in it,' said
Nannina, in an important way.
'It does not discolour so easily,' Donna Concetta settled it by
saying. 'How many yards do you need?'
The girl counted to herself, moved her fingers as if she was
measuring, looked at her figure, and counted over again.
'Ten metres--yes, that would be enough.'
'Ten metres; Jesus! so you want to be in the fashion.'
'Donna Concetta, be forbearing,' Antonietta answered smilingly.
'Very good--very good; for each chemise four metres is
needed--sixteen in all.'
'And the shoes?' the girl asked hesitatingly.
'I know no shoemaker, my dear.'
'You will give me the rest of the forty francs in money?' the sewing
girl risked saying.
'Listen, my dear,' said Donna Concetta: 'I am going to-morrow, or
Saturday, to the dressmaker's to ask if you really get over a franc
a day, and if you have taken any money in advance. Then I'll arrange
with the dressmaker that, instead of giving you your whole pay for
the week, she keeps back two francs for me as interest on the forty
francs.'
'Two francs?' the girl cried out, alarmed at this long story.
'Of course. I should get four, a sou a week for each franc; but you
are a poor girl, and I really wish to help you. The dressmaker gives
me the two francs for interest. You pay off the rest of the debt as
it suits you, five or three francs at a time. Do you understand?'
'Yes, ma'am, yes,' the terrified girl cried out.
'The quicker you pay the better for you, and it will suit me.
However, I warn you, if you were to get the dressmaker to pay you in
advance, go away, or play any trick of the kind, I'll come to you,
my dear, and let you see who Concetta Esposito is. I would think
nothing of going to the galleys for my heart's blood.... Have I made
it plain?'
'Yes, ma'am, yes,' Antonietta stammered, with tears in her eyes.
'There is still time for you not to do it,' Donna Concetta ended up
icily, bending down again to stitch the coverlet.
'No, no!' the girl screamed out--'whatever you like. Promise me to
come to-morrow to Santa Chiara Road.'
'We see each other to-morrow,' said Donna Concetta, taking leave of
her.
'You will bring the things and the money?'
'I must think over it.'
'Good-bye, aunt,' Nannina murmured, pale and more frightened than her
friend.
'The Virgin go with you,' answered the Espositos in a chorus,
beginning to work again.
The girls went off quite silently, with their heads down, not able to
speak or smile. A woman coming up, hurriedly, knocked against them;
and with a quick 'Excuse me!' she went to ring at the Espositos'
door. It was Carmela, the cigar-girl, with her big, sorrowful eyes
and worn face. Before going into the house she sighed deeply, and her
face flushed.
'May I come in?' she said from the lobby, in a weak voice.
'Come in,' was the answer from inside. 'Is it you, good soul?' said
Concetta, on recognising her; 'are you really come to give me back
that money? your conscience pricked you at last? Give it over here.'
'You are joking, Donna Concetta,' said the poor thing, with a pale
smile. 'If I had thirty-four francs, I would give as many leaps in
the air.'
'It is thirty-seven and a half francs, with last week's interest,'
the money-lender coldly corrected her.
'As you like: who is denying it? As you say, it is thirty-seven and a
half, I am sure you are right.'
'You have brought the interest, at least?'
'Nothing, nothing,' the girl said desperately, holding down her head.
'I am eaten up by misery: I have got to earning a franc and a half a
day; now I might live like a lady, but----'
'Why do you waste your money?' asked Donna Concetta, giving in to her
fad of preaching prudence to her debtors. 'You are a beast, that is
what you are!'
'But why,' Carmela cried out desperately--'why should I not give a
bit of bread to my old mother? When my sister is dying of hunger with
her three children, and one of them wasting away piteously, can I
refuse her half a franc? When my brother-in-law, Gaetano, has nothing
to smoke, for all his vices, should I deny him a few sous? With what
heart could I do it?'
'It is Raffaele that sucks you out--it is Raffaele!' the money-lender
sang out, threading a needle with red cotton.
'What about that?' the girl cried out, throwing out her arms; 'he was
born to be a gentleman. In the meanwhile, if I don't pay the landlord
on Monday, he will turn me out. I owe him thirty francs: but I might
at least give him ten! If you would just do me this charity!'
'You are mad, my dear.'
'Donna Concetta, what are ten francs to you? I'll give them back, you
know: I have never taken a farthing from anyone. Don't have me thrown
on the streets, ma'am. Do it for the sake of your dead in paradise!'
'No, no, no!' sang out the seamstress.
'Listen, look here,' the other went on sorrowfully: 'these earrings
I am wearing my godmother paid seventeen francs for; I give them to
you--I have nothing else. You will give me them back when I give you
the ten francs.'
'I never take a pawn,' Donna Concetta replied, glancing at the
earrings.
'But it is not a pawn; it is a favour you are doing me. If I were
to pawn it, I would get five or six francs; they would take the
interest beforehand, with the money for the ticket, the box, and the
witness, and only three or four francs would be left. Do it only this
once, ma'am--the Virgin from heaven preserve you!' She convulsively
took out her rather worn earrings, rubbed them with a corner of her
apron, and put them gently on the coverlet, still looking at them
earnestly, taking leave of them. Donna Concetta took them with a
scornful grimace, and glanced at her sister, who just raised her head
and signed 'Yes,' with a wink. Donna Concetta got up stiffly; without
saying anything, she carried the earrings into the next room, where
the sisters slept; a noise of keys in locks was heard, an opening and
shutting of strong boxes, with silent intervals. Then Donna Concetta
came in again. She carried two rolls of yellow paper in her hand.
'They are sous: count them,' she said shortly, putting them down
before Carmela.
'It does not matter-they are sure to be right,' said the poor little
thing, trembling with emotion. 'The Eternal Father should give it
back to you in health, the kindness you do me.'
'Very good,' Donna Concetta finished up with, sitting down again to
work. 'But I warn you I'll sell the earrings if you don't pay.'
'Never fear,' Carmela murmured as she went off.
For a little the sisters were alone, stitching.
'The earrings are worth twelve francs in gold,' said Caterina. She
had sharp ears.
'Yes,' said Concetta; 'but Carmela will pay; she is a good girl.'
Again they heard the bell tinkle.
'It sounds like the midwife's bell,' Caterina remarked.
A dragging noise was heard, the sound of a box put down in the corner
of the stair, and Michele, the shoeblack, came in with his hip up, as
if he was still carrying his block. He greeted them in the Spanish
style, saying, 'La vostra buona grazia' (I am your humble servant),
whilst the thousand wrinkles on his rickety boy's face, grown old,
seemed to breathe out malice. The sisters looked patiently at him,
waiting till he spoke.
'Gaetano Galiero, the glove-cutter, sends me----'
'Fine honest fellow he is!' exclaimed Donna Concetta, putting a strip
of paper in her thimble--it had got too large.
'If you don't make people speak, you can never get to understand each
other,' the hunchback rejoined philosophically. 'Gaetano is under
great obligations to you; but you are a fine woman, not wanting in
judgment, and you will forgive his failings. What does not happen in
a year comes the day you least expect it. Gaetano is here with the
money.'
'Yes, yes,' the sisters said, grinning.
'You will see him afterwards. But I have come to speak of an affair
of my own. I, thank God, work at a better trade than Gaetano does; I
stand beside the Café de Angelis in Carità Square. I don't say it out
of boasting, but I polish the shoes of the best nobility in Naples. I
can earn what I like; I laugh at ill fortune. When it rains, I stand
under the archway of the café door; the dirtier it is in the streets,
the more shoes I polish. My good woman, if I had a clear head, I
would be a gentleman now. But now, to carry out a big affair that
may bring me my carriage, I need a little money; and as you oblige
people that way, I have come to propose the business to you. Forty
francs would do for me; I would pay it off by three francs a week
until I have managed the _combination_; for then I will give you back
capital, interest, and a handsome present.'
'Don't put yourself about,' said Donna Concetta ironically.
'If you won't lend me money, who do you lend to?' the hunchback
asked audaciously. 'If I stand all day in front of the café, I
earn two francs, do you know. Not even a barber's lad can say as
much. So that stand is my fortune, my shop; if I go away from it, I
don't earn a half-penny, so I can't run away. Do you see? Ask the
coffee-house-keeper who Michele is. Your money is safe in my hands.
You will hear all about me from the café-owner.'
'If he guarantees you, I'll give you the money,' Donna Concetta said
at once.
'In that case, he would give it himself' the hunchback objected. 'No,
no, Michele has no need of a guarantee. Come to-morrow, Saturday,
at nine, to the café-owner; you will hear what he says; you will
willingly give me sixty instead of forty francs. I am an honest man;
I am subject to public scrutiny.'
'Good; we see each other to-morrow. You know what the interest is?'
said Donna Concetta.
'Whatever you like,' the hunchback gallantly answered; 'you can
have a cup of coffee, too, and a roll inside: I am master at the
coffee-house! Can I do anything for you?'
'We wish for your prayers always,' the two women said in a low tone,
as he was going away. After working a little, Caterina observed:
'You said yes to him too soon.'
'I will make the coffee-house-keeper guarantee him. He is a
hunchback, too; that brings luck,' Donna Concetta replied.
'If it brings luck, it ought to bring an end to this hard life of
ours,' Caterina began again. She liked to complain of her luck.
'Oh,' the other sighed, 'we have no man to give us a helping hand,
ever; so we have to do justice for ourselves always. Ciccillo and
Alfonso are simpletons. It is no use....'
'What can we do?' sighed the other.
The two sisters gave up working, let their hands fall idle on
the red coverlet, and began to think of their secret sorrow--the
tormenting pain they confessed to no one--of their betrothed lovers,
two good workmen, brothers, at the arsenal, Jannacone by name, who
loved them, but would not marry them, either of the two, because of
their trade. The struggle between love and money had gone on for
three years, but Ciccillo and Alfonso Jannacone would not hear of
marrying a gambler or a money-lender; the whole arsenal would have
taunted them. They were good workmen, rather simple, very silent,
who did not spend their day's wages; they had some savings, and came
to spend the evening with the two sisters. Obstinate on that idea,
one of the few that got into their heads, neither love nor avarice
could overcome it. Several times the sisters, being keen on gain
and bitterly offended at that refusal, had quarrelled with their
lovers and chased them out of the house; but only for a short time:
peace was made, Concetta and Caterina naturally promising to give
over their business. The women must have made a lot of money, but
they never spoke of it, and, in spite of their love for Alfonso and
Ciccillo Jannacone, they themselves put off the marriages so as to
gain still more money, not knowing how to break through that round
of money-lending business. They did not wish to give up old loans,
and could not resist making new ones; they did not understand why
their lovers were so ashamed, and complained of it as an injustice.
The sisters thought themselves humane to lend money at usury; to
give lottery tickets at a sou or two seemed an act of charity to
them, because the Naples poor--skinned and flayed as they were
when they took money from Concetta to give it to Caterina and the
Government--thanked and blessed them with tears. When they were quite
alone, in expansive moments, the two complained of their fate; anyone
else but the Jannacone brothers would have been happy enough to have
such industrious, hard-working wives with dowries. But the workmen
would not given in; they persisted they would never marry unless that
way of gaining money was given up. Ciccillo especially, Caterina's
betrothed, was hard as a stone; indeed, he said to her sometimes:
'Caterina, one day or other you'll go to prison.'
'I'll pay for bail and get out. Then the lawyer will get me off.'
She knew the law and its intrigues.
'If you go to prison, you don't see my face again,' Ciccillo
retorted, lighting his cigar.
Yes, when they were alone the sisters despaired. But love of money
was so strong, it made them put off the time for the double marriage.
The two workmen waited patiently, slowly buying furniture with their
savings to set up house together, as they never left each other.
'Wait till Easter,' the sisters said, thinking of ending up all their
affairs by then.
'Good; at Easter,' the brothers agreed.
'We will be ready by September,' said they in April, being more than
ever involved in a network of sordid business.
'In September, then,' the workmen complied.
Always when they were alone the women complained of being badly
treated by Fate, and of being misunderstood by the men they loved,
ending up with: 'Ciccillo and Alfonso are fools.'
But they were not long alone that day, either. The wretched trade
went on till evening. There came a painter of saints, so far an
artist that he painted the face, hands, and feet of all the wooden
and stucco saints in Naples and its neighbourhood's thousand
churches: a sickly man, who asked for money, and only got it on
condition he brought a statuette of the Immaculate Conception in
blue, covered with stars, next day, that Madonna being Concetta the
money-lender's patron. Annarella, Carmela's sister, came in to ask
for a loan, being desperate: 'just two francs for the day, just as
a charity.' She wanted to make a little broth for her sick child. A
horrible scene followed: the women would not believe her; she just
wanted to fool them again, for Gaetano and she had a big debt, and
were not ashamed to take poor folk's blood and not give it back.
Annarella screamed, wept, and cried out that she would go and get
her baby, all burning with fever, to show to them. A stone would
pity him. Then she sobbed out that they said what was quite true;
but to pity the poor little thing, who was not to blame, and now
that he was weaned, she could take another half-day service, which
the Virgin would help her to find. At last, as Concetta felt bored,
to get rid of the crying and weeping she gave her the two francs,
cursing and taking her oath they were the last, as true as it was
Friday in March--perhaps the day our Lord died, as it is not known
what Friday in March Jesus died on. Other people, either embarrassed,
furious, or sorrowful, came to pay up old interest, to offer goods
in pledge, or ask for more money. The debtors went on from humility
to bitterness, from threats to beseeching, from solemn promises to
mean tricks. Concetta continued working opposite her sister through
the disputes, quarrels, and threats till evening came. She never got
tired, and always had an effective retort ready or some lucid remark,
finding out a good or bad payer at once. Only for one neatly-dressed,
discreet caller, shaved like a good class of servant, she got up and
went into the next room, where they chattered in a low tone for some
time. The usual noise of keys creaking in the locks, and opening and
shutting of strong boxes, was heard; the servant went out, still
looking reserved, followed by Concetta.
'Is that the Marquis di Formosa's steward?' Caterina asked when he
had gone.
'Yes, it is,' said Concetta, without adding more.
That hard, fatiguing Friday came to an end. Now it was getting dark
the sisters had given up stitching the coverlet. Caterina, for
Saturday, her great day, got ready some thick registers, written in
shapeless characters, all ciphers, which she understood very well.
She leant over it under the oil-lamp, thinking whilst her lips moved;
and Concetta, seeing her deep in her important weekly work, kept
silence out of respect to that sagacious preparation, feeling sure
that next day money would be flowing in to them.
CHAPTER VII
DON GENNARO PARASCANDOLO'S BUSINESS
With the odorous smoke of a Tocos cigarette filling the little
room, Don Gennaro Parascandolo was deeply wrapped up in the study
of his little pocket-book, turning over the pages of a ledger, and
comparing the long rows of figures in it with the dark, enigmatic
ciphers in the note-book; then he took the pen and wrote something
occasionally--one word or a figure--on the full side of the ledger.
He was working very placidly in that little room of his flat in San
Giacomo Street, opposite the door of the Exchange. He had rented it
from time immemorial, and he called it the _study_; there he began,
unravelled, and finished all his business, with a discretion and
secrecy he kept up even with his wife. She was far off, isolated
for whole days in that sad, solemn, splendid suite of rooms in the
Rossi Palace. When it was said Don Gennaro Parascandolo was at his
_study_, all was said. Those who said it and those who heard it felt
respectful terror; a fearful vision of riches always increasing, a
magical flow of money running to money by enchantment, rose before
them. The study was the place where Don Gennaro Parascandolo, strong,
wise, audacious, and cold in his audacity, made his fortune grow
by leaps and bounds. It was composed of two rooms: one big one,
with two balconies, was quite full of valuable things gathered in a
queer way--pictures by good artists, foreign furniture, gilt-bronze
candelabra, curious antique pendulums, rolls of carpet and of
linen-cloth, terra-cotta statuettes, even a trophy of antique and
modern arms.
It was quite a museum, that room. Salvatore, Don Gennaro's
confidential servant, spent half the day trying to keep it
clean, and it required the greatest care not to spoil or break
anything. Occasionally, some rarity left the museum, either sold
advantageously, exchanged for another, or given away in a fit of
calculated generosity. But the empty place was soon filled by a new
article, or by some of the things heaped on each other in the strange
museum.
When Don Gennaro was alone, he sometimes opened his writing-room
door and stood on the threshold, smoking his everlasting cigarette,
to give a look over what he called his _omnibus_. But he did not
venture to go in, the accumulation was so great. The other room was
prettily enough furnished with the respectable pleasant luxury of
easy-chairs, sofas, small tables with smoking accessories, and a
writing-desk that seemed placed there purposely to make the name
'study' appropriate. The hangings were bright, but not gaudy; on the
desk were dainty knickknacks that Don Gennaro Parascandolo often
played with. Whoever came in there felt calmed; even if he had an
incurable sorrow in his mind, he was reconciled to existence for a
time. Don Gennaro Parascandolo's own genial face, clouded sometimes
by melancholy, his lively, frank manner, managed to give a benignant
look to the surroundings that overcame all fears, difficulties, and
prejudices, and gave a weak, morally defenceless guest into the
host's hands, vanquished beforehand. The whole round of Don Gennaro
Parascandolo's business was regulated by the minute hieroglyphics in
his pocket-book, and a ledger thickly written in also with names,
ciphers, and remarks.
Whenever a caller was announced, Don Gennaro, without hurrying, shut
up the ledger in the safe, and put the note-book back in his pocket;
every trace of business disappeared. An inkstand of gilt bronze and
rock crystal, shaped like a jockey's cap, with racing accessories,
made a good show on the desk, as well as a silver paper-weight like a
book, with five seals made of old guineas, an ash-tray shaped like a
woman's shoe, and a long, carved ivory Japanese wand that Don Gennaro
trifled with.
So that Friday in March, after breakfast, he went on smoking
his Tocos cigarette, gazing at the smoke; but when the faithful
Salvatore, clean-shaven and in black, like a high-class servant, a
discreet, silent fellow, came to say Signor Cesare Fragalà wished to
come in, Don Gennaro quickly shut up the ledger and put the note-book
in his pocket.
'With your permission,' said Cesare Fragalà, coming in smiling.
'My honoured patron, how are the wife and child?'
'Very well indeed, Don Gennaro. They are Fragalàs, a strong house,
with no bad luck. You keep well, do you not?'
'Quite well; but Naples bores me. Cesare, this is a beggarly country.
In a week I go off to Nice and Monte Carlo; after that I go to Paris.'
'Do you play at Monte Carlo?' Fragalà asked, with a scrutinizing look.
'Yes, a little. I often win; I have luck; I am learning to play.'
'How will that serve you?'
'It is good to know everything,' Parascandolo answered modestly.
'Have you never been there?'
'No,' said Cesare thoughtfully, 'I have a wife and daughter; still,
it is a fine thing to gain twenty-five or a hundred thousand francs
in an evening!' One could read in his eyes, that filled at once with
melancholy avarice, a great passion for heavy, immediate gains,
depending on luck, and for the most part unlawful.
'What would you do with it?' asked Don Gennaro, taking another
cigarette, and offering Cesare one from an elegant engraved-silver
Russian cigar-case.
'What would I do with it? First of all I would let fifty thousand
melt away to enjoy life a little with my friends. I am not selfish,
and fifty thousand would do to open a shop with in San Ferdinando
Square. I will never gain it in the San Spirito shop,' Cesare ended
up low-spiritedly.
'Still, in the carnival you must have made great profits,' said Don
Gennaro slowly, shaking off his cigar-ash.
'Yes, yes, enough! but Monte Carlo, or something else, is needed; if
not, one must vegetate, and Agnesina's dowry won't be ready. Then I
am always pushed to it--so many calls.... Why, yesterday I should
have given you back those five hundred francs you lent me without
security--you know I am always punctual--but I could not.'
'For one day it does not matter,' Don Gennaro said coldly, setting
his face like a stone the moment Cesare spoke of the debt, gazing at
his cigar-smoke as if not to look his friend in the face.
'But I can't even pay you to-day,' said Cesare quickly, as if he
wanted to get rid of his worry all at once. 'I have had to take a lot
of sugar out of bond, and then----'
Don Gennaro, quite indifferent to all this chatter, said not a word.
'Be neighbourly, and complete the favour. I have a little bill due
to-morrow,' Fragalà said, passing through a sharp momentary agony;
'it is five hundred francs, and I have not got it. You might lend
them to me, and I will give you a thousand francs next Saturday ...
it is a great favour ... and you can be sure of my being punctual.'
'I can't,' Don Gennaro said icily.
'Why, you have the money,' Cesare cried out ingenuously.
'Of course; but I can't lend it.'
'Then, you think I am not solvent?'
'Not at all; it is to carry out a rule. With intimate friends and
relations, people like you, I always lend five hundred francs; often,
nearly always, I get it back again. Then I willingly lend it a second
time; but once it has not been paid I never lend any more, so I can
only lose five hundred francs.'
'But I am to give you back a thousand,' said the other in alarm.
'He who can't give back five hundred is very unlikely to give back a
thousand. A man that fails to keep his word once may do it again,'
said Don Gennaro ponderously.
'Still, I did not believe you would refuse such a favour to a
friend,' Cesare muttered. 'You put me into great embarrassment.'
'I think I do well not to give you that money,' said Parascandolo,
opening a gold matchbox like Dellachà's paper ones, with
figure-painting on it. 'I think you are going a bad road; you
frequent very queer company....'
'I have done some idiotic things, I allow,' said Cesare, with his
big-boy's honesty; 'but I did it with good intentions. Besides,' he
added, as if speaking to himself, 'that Pasqualino De Feo is always
needing some hundred francs. He is a poor man, with no profession nor
trade. The spirits torment him--beat him at night. I have to have
Masses said and prayers to appease them; if not, they drag him to
death. If I have thrown away some hundred francs, I had my reasons.
This business with spirits is important! You are clever, and have
travelled a lot; but if you knew all, you would see it is worth
knowing about.'
'It may be,' nodded Don Gennaro assentingly; 'but you are going a bad
road.'
'No, no!' cried out Cesare; 'something must be settled. Either in or
out. Perhaps we will get it this week--that is to say, to-morrow; or
it may be necessary to sacrifice some more, next week, and then win.
Really, you should oblige me,' he added, going back to his trouble.
'I can't,' retorted Don Gennaro.
'As a fact, I am an honest trader: anyone would do business with me!'
Cesare called out, beginning to get angry.
'If it is business, that is another thing,' said Don Gennaro, giving
in suddenly.
'Well, let us treat it as business,' said Cesare, calming down at
once.
Then Don Gennaro quietly opened the safe and drew out a blank bill,
of a thousand francs' value. Taking a finely-carved wooden pen, with
a gold nib, he wrote the sum in figures and words, and asked, without
raising his head:
'To fall due in a month?'
'Yes, in a month,' agreed Fragalà. Don Gennaro handed the promissory
note to him. It was headed 'Domenico Mazzocchi.' 'Domenico
Mazzocchi--who is that?' asked Fragalà, astounded.
'He is the capitalist I work for,' Parascandolo answered icily.
Seeing that after Fragalà signed he was going to put down his
dwelling-house, he stopped him warningly. 'Put down the address of
the shop.'
'Why so?'
'In business and commercial affairs it is better to take action at
the firm's address.'
Fragalà felt a chill down his back.
'There will be no need,' he thought it necessary to say, to
reassure himself. He gave back the promissory note to Don Gennaro
Parascandolo, who read it over carefully, twice; then he opened
another safe and took out bank-notes, and counted three hundred and
eighty francs twice over: he handed them to Fragalà, saying:
'Three hundred and eighty francs. Count your money over again.'
'Three hundred and eighty only?' asked the other, again astounded.
'Twelve per cent. interest is taken off,' explained Don Gennaro.
'Is that by the year?' asked Fragalà stupidly.
'No; by the month.'
Then there was silence. While Fragalà was counting the money
mechanically, he thought, but dared not say to Parascandolo, that
the interest had been calculated on the first five hundred francs,
too, that he, Don Gennaro, had lent him, and not the capitalist
Mazzocchi. He said nothing about it, though; indeed, in the innocency
of his soul, he remarked, as he got up to go away:
'Thank you!'
'Why thank me? It is business. Only, think of when it falls due.
Mazzocchi stands no nonsense--he is an ugly sort.'
'Never fear,' said Fragalà, with a sickly smile. After taking leave,
he went off, with a colourless face and bitter mouth, as if he had
been chewing aloes. At once Don Gennaro set himself to his accounts.
But it was only for a few minutes, as Salvatore came to say Ambrogio
Marzano, the lawyer, was there, with another gentleman, wanting to
come in. He expected them, evidently, as he frowned slightly and
looked stiff. Marzano came in, with his usual gentle smile--he was
a lively, excitable old fellow; the one that looked put out was his
companion, a gentleman of about forty, fat but pale, with very clear
eyes that rolled vaguely and sadly.
The greetings were short. For a fortnight Marzano and Baron Lamarra
had kept coming to San Giacomo Street to see Don Gennaro, on money
business. They talked it over, made suggestions, accepted and then
refused, then started the arguments over again. Baron Lamarra, son
of a sculptor, who had become a contractor by dint of chiselling in
the open air, and rich by dint of laying one son on another, had left
his son a lot of money, though he was now trying for a loan of three
thousand francs. He kept up his beggar-on-horseback airs at first,
but as the days went on, and difficulties came in the way, he dropped
them, and did nothing but play with the charms on his watch-chain;
his conceited blue eyes got to have a despairing expression, which
Don Gennaro studied sagaciously--perhaps it was for his benefit
that he looked so cold. Only Don Ambrogio Marzano went on smiling,
obstinate in his good nature.
'The Baron is rather anxious to finish up the business now we
have talked it over for days,' said the little old man, trying to
encourage his client.
'Let us finish it, then,' Don Gennaro answered, without lifting his
eyes.
'You have not thought out a better arrangement?' Baron Lamarra
murmured.
'No, I have not,' said Don Gennaro.
The two looked at each other, hesitating; the Baron made the lawyer
an energetic sign to go on.
'How would it be?' Marzano asked.
'Here it is. My capitalist, Ascanio Sogliano, has no funds; but he
can dispose of about forty dozen Chiavari chairs at six francs each,
seventy-two francs the dozen, over two thousand seven hundred francs
in all. He would give these goods, which are easy to dispose of, on
a three months' promissory note, with the Baron and the Baroness
Lamarra's signatures, each bound for all, with the usual interest, in
advance, of three per cent; three times three, nine--that is to say,
ninety francs a month; three times ninety, two hundred and seventy
francs for three months.'
'And you said there would be a buyer for these Chiavari chairs, did
you not?' Marzano replied, keeping up his frank tone.
'Exactly so,' said Don Gennaro, still very cold.
'Buyer at how much?' asked Baron Lamarra rather anxiously, knowing
the answer quite well, but almost hoping for a different one.
'I told you: at two thousand francs.'
The lawyer shook his head; the Baron fumed with rage.
'It is too great a loss, far too great!' he cried out; 'and, then, my
wife's signature, too!'
'Excuse me, Baron,' Don Gennaro remarked, 'you seem to be under
a wrong impression. I am doing you a favour, finding a tradesman
and a buyer. I am not taken up about this business. I often have
as good aristocratic names as yours on bills, I can tell you. This
is to clear up the position. You come here shouting as if you were
in brigands' hands and your ears were being cut off. Here we don't
cut off ears. If the affair does not suit you, let it go. It is
indifferent to me, I repeat.'
As a sign of the greatest indifference, he lighted a Tocos cigarette,
and began smoking, looking up to the ceiling. Baron Lamarra, whose
face got flabbier and more unhealthy-looking in that annoying
struggle, was disturbed. Silence followed. Marzano shook his head
gently, as if he was lamenting over human weakness; he gazed at the
silver top of his cane, without saying a word. The Baron ran his
fingers through his black locks flecked with white; then he made up
his mind, and drew out a thick black pocket-book, took out a paper,
and put it on the table opposite Don Gennaro.
'It is settled,' he said, in a choked voice. 'Here is the promissory
note.'
Don Gennaro only fluttered his eyelids in assent. He opened the note
and looked at it a long time, the figures, dates, and signatures,
reading in a low voice, 'Maddalena Lamarra--Annibale Lamarra.
All right,' he ended up aloud, casting a scrutinizing glance at
the Baron, whose face got livid from suppressed rage or some
other feeling. 'Do you want to see the goods?' he then remarked
punctiliously.
'What does it matter to me?' the Baron said sulkily, shrugging his
shoulders. 'Give me the money to use.'
Don Gennaro nodded assent. As usual, he opened the middle drawer,
shut up the promissory note in it, opened the side drawer, took out
bank-notes, and counted them methodically.
'Count your money over,' he said, handing the bundle to the Baron,
who had watched the appearance of bank-notes with a flashing eye.
But he did not count; he put the notes into his pocket-book, and,
without saying a word, rose to go away.
Marzano vaguely stammered some words of thanks and farewell, but the
Baron was already on the stairs, and the old man ran after him, not
to let him elude him. When he was alone, Don Gennaro Parascandolo
opened the drawer again and took out the Lamarra promissory note;
he studied the signatures a long time, saying over the syllables
ironically: 'Maddalena Lamarra ... bound for whole amount ...;
Annibale Lamarra for himself and the conjugal authorization.' He
ended up with a smile, and pushed it into the drawer again.
Ninetto Costa had come in without being announced, and the dark,
lively, elegant stock-broker, in a suit of English check, a flower in
his buttonhole, ebony stick in hand, and big iron ring on his little
finger as a seal, seemed the pattern of happy youth. He stretched
himself in an arm-chair, threw his leg over, and lit a cigarette,
humming.
'Good settling-day Monday was, eh?' Don Gennaro asked.
'It was bad--bad!' sang out Ninetto Costa.
'You don't seem much put out. It will be bad for your clients then,
and not for you,' said Parascandolo.
'It is bad for me; I have thirty to forty thousand francs at stake,'
said the stock-broker, beating his trouser-leg with his stick in an
elegant way.
'And how are you to pay?'
'I will pay,' the other ended up by saying, in a vague way.
'You have had several bad settling-days, it seems to me.'
'So, so. It is Lillina that takes away everything,' he muttered, with
a not perfectly sincere gesture of regret.
'Lillina? She says "No," 'remarked Don Gennaro.
'Did she tell you so? She is the greatest liar among women! You can't
think what a liar she is, Gennaro!' and he cried out more against
her, rather in a sham rage. 'Have you got these jewels?' he added
anxiously, though he tried to seem indifferent.
'Yes. Are they for Lillina?'
'Yes--that is to say, I am not certain; she is too great a liar!
Besides, I have someone else in my eye.'
'You are a devil, Ninetto!' Don Gennaro said laughingly.
From the same drawer from which he had previously taken the money,
Parascandolo took out a leather case and opened it. The jewels
twinkled on the white velvet: there were a pair of solitaire
earrings, a row of diamonds, a bracelet, and an ornament for the
hair. Ninetto Costa looked at them, beating his lips with the knob
of his stick. He went further off, to judge them better. He did this
very gracefully; but a twitching of the muscles now and then made his
smile unpleasant.
'They are fine, eh?' he asked Parascandolo.
'I think so,' said the other modestly.
'You would give them? You are a man of taste.'
'I would give them--according to the woman. Not to Lillina.'
'I don't know if I will give them to her--I don't know,' Costa burst
out again hurriedly. 'You think,' he added timidly--'you think they
are worth twenty thousand francs?'
'It is not what I believe; Don Domenico Mazzocchi, who sold them to
you, thinks they are. I don't know about them. Besides, you can get
them valued. Remember, they will ask two per cent. for the valuation.'
He said all this in such a cold, disdainful way that Ninetto Costa
tried to interrupt him more than once, without managing it.
'Are you mad? What valuation? I would not do such a thing, with you
and your friend Mazzocchi. To take so much trouble! I would not
dream of it. It would be offensive to a friend--two friends.'
'Have you noted the terms of payment?'
'Yes, yes! at three, four, five, and six months--five thousand francs
at a time, with a consignment on my mother's revenues, and all the
necessary papers. All is going right. Do you wish nothing on the
Exchange? I'll buy for you.'
'I don't do business; I have retired,' said Parascandolo, smiling and
bowing, as Costa went off, carrying the jewel-case.
When he had gone, the other, being now alone, looked at the clock.
It was getting late. San Giacomo Street is dark naturally, and
already, at four o'clock, it looked as if the day was failing. Don
Gennaro was thinking whether he had given an appointment to anyone
else, and if he could go away, having finished his day's work, one
of those hard-working Fridays for all that provide money--bankers,
money-lenders, pawnbrokers. No, he thought, he had not given an
appointment to anyone, and he could go away. He felt sure his
coachman had brought round his carriage to take him to Carracciolo
Street. But once more the faithful Salvatore came in to say three
gentlemen wished to come in.
'Are there three?' asked Don Gennaro, pondering.
'Yes, three....'
'Let them in,' his master said, recollecting.
Dr. Trifari came in, fat, thick, red of beard and face, embarrassed
and suspicious, taking off the high hat he always wore, like all
provincials settled in Naples. Professor Colaneri was with him;
he had a false look behind his gold spectacles, and bowed in the
ecclesiastical style. A student, a fellow-countryman of Trifari's,
and Colaneri's pupil, was the third one--a youth of twenty-two, with
sticking-out teeth, a tartan necktie, and a decidedly silly look. The
two, while keeping an eye on each other, glanced now at Don Gennaro,
then at the embarrassed provincial lad, who seemed not to know what
to do with his teeth, quite unhappy at not being able to shut his
mouth. There was a curbed ferocity in Trifari's suspiciousness--it
was palpable in him morally and physically; while Colaneri's was
oblique, sly, cold, and hypocritical. The student looked like a fly
between them--a stupid little fly held between two spiders, one
cruel, the other treacherous.
Don Gennaro looked at them with a smile, guessing all that. Only
to look at the wicked intentness of Dr. Trifari's eyes on the shut
desk, Professor Colaneri's humble but dishonest look, the student's
silliness--for he seemed to see nothing, or saw and heard without
understanding--explained Salvatore's hesitation. But Don Gennaro
Parascandolo, who loved artistic things, had taken up a long Japanese
carved-ivory scabbard, and half drew out, as if by accident, a
knife's shining blade. It was a book-cutter, though there was not a
shadow of a book on the desk. With a click he sheathed it and laid it
on the desk, but his fingers trifled with it. He smiled, smoking his
everlasting cigarette, without offering one, however, to his three
visitors.
'So we have come on that business, Signor Parascandolo. What has
been done?' Dr. Trifari questioned, with a sham politeness that
ill-covered his roughness.
'Yes. What do you refer to?' Parascandolo said.
'The money--the bank bill,' the plethoric doctor burst out.
'It is an ordinary affair enough,' remarked Parascandolo with an easy
air.
'What do you say? With three signatures--mine, Professor Colaneri's,
and Signor Rocco Galasso's--you call it an ordinary affair? Whose
signature do you want--Rothschild's?'
'Certainly I would prefer Rothschild's to all signatures,' was said,
with a mocking little smile. 'Business is business,' he added in his
solemn way.
'We are honest men, it seems to me,' Professor Colaneri yelped out.
'I have the highest respect for you,' said Parascandolo with
exaggerated politeness. 'But signatories must be solvent; that is
all. I have made inquiries on account of my principal, Ascanio
Sogliano. You will understand, I must prevent him making any loss,
as I make use of his money. Now, Dr. Trifari, here is an excellent
young fellow--he will become a light in the scientific world--but
his signature is not good for a thousand francs, nor is Professor
Colaneri's....'
'This is infamous!' Dr. Trifari cried out. 'I did not come here to be
insulted, by Jove!'
'These are slanderous statements!' shrieked Colaneri the hypocrite.
'Where did you make inquiries?' Trifari asked, yelling.
'In your own neighbourhood,' answered Parascandolo coldly.
'Of course, in my own neighbourhood.... It is political hatreds ...
election struggles!' Colaneri and Trifari shouted in chorus.
'That may be,' said Parascandolo; 'I cannot know about that, and
it does not matter to Sogliano. So there remains this worthy youth
here, Rocco Galasso; he is solvent. So, instead of three thousand
francs, Sogliano will give a thousand, with your three signatures as
a precaution.'
'It is impossible for us to agree to that!' Trifari thundered, purple
with rage.
'Impossible!' shrieked Colaneri, quite livid.
'As you like,' said Parascandolo, getting up to go out.
But the most dumfounded of the three was poor Rocco Galasso, the
student. He turned his stupefied eyes from Colaneri to Trifari and
gasped, as if his saliva choked him. The two left the office in
confusion, without saying 'Good-bye,' talking to each other, and
shoving the student before them like a silly sheep. Parascandolo
quietly called Salvatore to brush his great-coat. It was done
silently, while he filled his case with cigarettes.
All at once, without being announced, the three burst again into the
room, looking queer: Colaneri and Trifari as if forcibly restraining
their rage, and Rocco Galasso, pale and humiliated, behind them, like
a beaten dog.
'We are to do the business,' Trifari muttered, as if he was
swallowing the wrong way. 'One thousand francs, as you said.'
Professor Colaneri agreed. Then the usual scene was repeated: The
money-lender pulled out a blank promissory note for a thousand francs
from the drawer and put it before Rocco Galasso, who dared not take
it, but went looking Colaneri and Trifari in the eyes one after the
other. The two, as if they were putting him to the torture, made him
sit at a corner of the desk, and bent over, one at each side, to give
him directions, and they dictated the formula word by word. He put
his nose down on the paper, being short-sighted and knowing nothing
about the business, never having signed a promissory note before.
Then, crushed down by the two leaning on his shoulders, he got
confused and frightened, and held his pen up hesitatingly. The work
took a long time. The poor fellow was just going to mis-state the
time of its falling due, when Trifori was down on him with a shout:
'At two months!'
At last the work was ended, and the student's forehead dropped sweat
as he raised it that cool March day. Don Gennaro in the meanwhile
pulled money out of his drawer and counted it.
'Seven hundred and sixty francs,' he said, holding out the bundle of
notes to Rocco Galasso. 'Count your money.'
But the latter dared not take it. He looked again at his tutors.
Colaneri put out his fat, cold hand and pocketed the money quickly,
while Trifori glared at him.
'You take the interest in advance?' asked Trifori with a sneer.
'Yes, in advance.'
'Could you not add it to the promissory note?' Colaneri retorted,
putting his hand in his pocket over the money.
'No, I cannot,' said Parascandolo dryly, getting up again.
The three went out silently. Colaneri rushed on in front; Trifori
followed precipitately, forgetting Rocco Galasso, who was now of no
use, while his greatest torment was that Parascandolo had made him
write his address at Tito di Basilicata; and the thought that his
father would know about it one day or other brought tears to his eyes.
In spite of Don Gennaro's wish to go out, he had to wait five minutes
more. A little old woman, neatly dressed in black, a lady's-maid, had
arrived, bringing an introductory note from Signora Parascandolo.
Looking around her, she spoke to Don Gennaro in a whisper, and he
listened with a fatherly, amiable smile. Then she timidly showed
him something in a case, wrapped first in black cloth and then
paper, which he would not even look at. He pushed it away, but not
contemptuously. Then, after a few words to the old woman, he signed
to her to keep silence, as she wished to begin her speech again, and
he went to the desk, took out money, counted it, and handed it in an
envelope to her. She waited to thank him, but he, to cut her short,
asked:
'How is Lady Bianca Maria?'
'Not very well,' the old woman said, with a sigh.
In a few minutes the victoria bore easy, contented Don Gennaro
Parascandolo to the Carracciolo promenade, where all his debtors,
past, present, and future, greeted him with smiles and raised hats;
and he smiled and bowed in return.
CHAPTER VIII
IN DON CRESCENZIO'S LOTTERY-SHOP
Donna Bianca Maria Cavalcanti read that letter over eight or ten
times before putting it in her pocket. She was working at her lace
alone in the bare large room, thinking over what was in it, for she
knew the words by heart already. She saw it before her eyes, going
over its meaning in her mind. So the slender bobbins slipped from her
hands while she dreamt.
The letter was honest and frank. It said that, as a doctor and
friend, he once more advised her to leave that lonely old house where
she just vegetated. He begged she would deign to accept a humble,
plain offer of hospitality in the country, in the village and home he
was born in, where his mother lived alone piously. Donna Bianca Maria
Cavalcanti should not despise this offer so frankly made. She could
go down there with Margherita. The air was good, the country around
fresh and green; it was an agreeable solitude. Dr. Amati could not go
because of his work; but his mother would be sure to be very fond of
her. She would be quite cured down there in that lifegiving, bright
air. He implored her tenderly not to say 'No,' to believe in his
devotion. He could not hide the real state of her health from her.
Travel and country air were necessaries of life to her.
So the great doctor wrote in that short, precise style of his,
honest, like his face and voice; a deep, sincere vein of feeling ran
through each phrase. Feeling this, Bianca Maria shut her eyes to keep
down her emotion. When Margherita brought her the letter, she guessed
at once who it came from on seeing the clear, straight, precise
writing. She opened it quickly, without hesitation or false modesty.
After reading it, a country landscape, poor and humble, but bright
and perfumed with green, rose before her eyes with the sweetness of
an idyll; a flow of heat enlivened the slow blood in her veins; a
desire for life and happiness gnawed at her heart; a first rush of
youthful eagerness came. Antonio Amati's letter, read so often, was
fixed in her mind. As she thought it over that fresh Friday evening
in March, the blood rushed to her heart and her eyes filled with
tears.
The Marquis di Formosa came in that evening, about eight o'clock.
He also was more excited than usual, with a quiver in his limbs and
features, which he got every week on Friday evening, as if he shortly
expected a great sorrow or a great joy. But his daughter took no heed
at first. She was distrait; though she went on working mechanically,
the good, decided words of the letter that begged her to save herself
buzzed in her mind, delightfully disturbing.
'Well, is there nothing yet?' asked the Marquis.
'What are you asking about? I do not understand,' she said, coming
back to herself.
'What am I asking about? Why, the revelation the spirit is to make to
you. Perhaps you don't wish to tell it? Why not? You must tell me; I
expect to hear it from you.'
'Dear father, I know nothing about it,' she answered, growing pale,
but trying to keep her voice steady. 'I will never know anything of
what you imagine.'
'I don't imagine!' he cried out. 'They are truths and religious
mysteries. Don Pasqualino is a pious soul. He _sees_. You could see,
too, if you liked, but you don't want to. Tell the truth: you sup
before going to bed?'
'No, I do not,' she said, keeping down her head, resigned to the
torture of the inquiry, touching Amati's letter in her pocket.
'A full body is impure; it cannot have heavenly inspirations,' he
said in a mystical way. 'What do you do before sleeping?'
'I pray.'
'Do you not ask for this favour with all your strength? Do you ask
for it?'
She looked at her father, and opened her mouth to say 'No.' She did
not utter it; but he understood her.
'It is natural the vision does not come--quite natural. Faith is
needed,' said he, with deep disdain. 'But what do you pray for? What
do you ask for, unloving heart?'
'I ask for peace,' she said gravely, waving her hand.
He shrugged his shoulders disdainfully.
'I will make Don Pasqualino pray,' he added. 'You will get the
vision, whether you like or not; the spirits will insist on it. They
command, you understand. They are masters in this world and the next.
You will have the spirit by you when you least expect it; you will
see it....'
'God help me!' said she, crossing herself with an uncontrollable
shiver.
'Are you afraid?' he asked sneeringly, no longer, in his mad
excitement, seeing how she suffered.
'Oh yes, I am,' she said feebly, as if she were fainting.
She clutched Antonio Amati's honest, affectionate letter
convulsively, as if to get strength from it. But the Marquis paid
no more heed to his daughter. He had rung the bell, and Giovanni
came in in his old livery. He looked undecidedly at his master as he
handed him his hat and stick, as if he were alarmed to see him go
out earlier on that than on other Fridays. But what he dreaded was
unavoidable, because the Marquis said to him, 'Come with me,' going
towards his bedroom, a poor, bare room like the rest of the house.
Giovanni lighted a wretched candle to hold their conversation by. The
servant respectfully stood right before his master, who kept up his
aristocratic bearing and natural haughtiness, which even vice could
not subdue.
'Giovanni, have you any money?' he asked in a lordly way.
The servant bowed; he did not dare to answer 'No' exactly, so he said
nothing.
'You must have some,' the Marquis went on rather sternly. 'I gave it
to you two weeks ago. Have you spent it all? You waste the little I
have left.'
'My lord, last Friday you took it almost all. We must live. You
would not like her ladyship to die of hunger,' said Giovanni in a
complaining voice.
'Very good, very good; I understand,' the Marquis interrupted,
irritated, but concealing his rage. 'I need at least fifty francs.
I have a debt of honour to pay this evening. Then to-morrow
evening'--emphasizing the words--'I will give it to you back. I will
give you other money, too, a lot of money, so that you will not
accuse me of letting my daughter die of hunger.'
'You are master, my lord; but if you knew what money it is----' And
he took a torn note-book from his pocket.
'What is it you refer to?' said the Marquis, casting devouring eyes
on the pocket-book.
'Nothing, my lord;' and he respectfully handed his master a
fifty-franc note.
He did it in such a way as to try and prevent the Marquis seeing a
second one he had; but the old gentleman dared not ask for it just
then.
'You can go,' he said to the servant, who went off.
He walked up and down the room impatiently; then he rang the bell
twice. Margherita came forward in the same trembling, almost
hesitating way as her husband. The old nobleman, descended from Guido
Cavalcanti and ten generations of gentlemen, now stooped to cheat
like a rogue.
'Margherita, do you know if Bianca Maria has money?' he asked
absently.
'Who would give it to her? The few francs she gets from Sister Maria
degli Angioli and her godfather at Christmas she gives to the poor.'
'I thought she had some,' he said, putting on his great coat. 'I am
much embarrassed; I have to pay a debt this evening, and I supposed
Bianca Maria would help her father. I am very much annoyed. Perhaps
you have some money, Margherita?'
'I have money,' said she, not daring to deny it, out of respect and
fear of her master.
'Can you give me some? I'll give it you back to-morrow evening.'
'Really,' she replied, 'I have some money, but I wished to buy a
dress for her ladyship. Your lordship does not notice it; but at
twenty, and as lovely as a queen, my mistress has only had two
dresses in two years--one for summer, the other for winter. She does
not even notice it herself, poor soul!... I had thought of buying one
for her. Your lordship could have given me back the money at your
leisure.'
'Sister Margherita, give me that money now, and _to-morrow evening_,
I promise you before God, Bianca Maria will have money for ten
dresses.'
'Amen,' said Margherita sadly and resignedly.
She could not resist the emotion in her master's voice. Pulling out
a silk purse from her bodice, she detached a hundred-franc note from
a roll of notes. He took it and hid it at once in his purse, and
went out, saying with wild joy, in a queer tone of certainty, 'Till
to-morrow evening.' And he said 'Till to-morrow evening' again as he
passed through the drawing-room, standing by his daughter at a window
which she had opened to get fresh air to try and recover from her
moral and physical weakness.
The Marquis di Formosa went down the steps quickly, lively as a lad
going to a love-tryst. Someone, in fact, was waiting for him, walking
up and down before the door. It was Don Pasqualino De Feo, the
medium. His sickly, mean look was not changed at all; he still wore
his torn, dirty clothes, but that evening his eyes were sparkling
in his thin face. He put his hand on the Marquis di Formosa's arm.
Formosa, who had not noticed him, greeted him with a smile.
'Have you the money?' asked Don Pasqualino, lowering his eyelids as
if to hide the flame alight in his eyes.
'Yes; how much is needed?'
'Four Masses must be paid for in four parishes to-morrow morning. We
will make it five francs each Mass. I must spend the night in prayer.
The _spirit_ told me to shut myself up in San Pasquale at midnight.
I have promised a gift of ten francs to the sacristan; otherwise it
would not be allowed. We agreed to light four candles before San
Benedetto's altar; it is his day to-morrow. Ten francs--forty; yes,
forty francs would be enough.'
He made his calculation coldly, keeping his eyes cast down, but his
queer, mysterious talk was unusually clear. The Marquis di Formosa
agreed with a nod to every new expense that the medium enumerated,
thinking it reasonable.
'And how much for yourself?' he asked, after counting forty francs
into Don Pasqualino's hands.
'You know I need nothing,' said the other, waving it off.
'When do we meet?'
'To-morrow morning after my vigil, if the spirit leaves me alive.
Friday last I was so beaten I thought I was dying,' the medium said
emphatically, but in a whisper.
'I trust in you,' Formosa murmured.
'Let us trust in _him_,' retorted the other fervently, showing the
whites of his eyes.
'Pray to him--pray to him!' the Marquis implored.
They separated after the Marquis had pressed two soft, wet fingers
that Don Pasqualino held out to him. De Feo went up again towards
Tarsia; Formosa went down towards Toledo. He was going to the
lottery bank, No. 117, at the corner of Nunzio Lane, where the
handsome, chestnut-bearded Don Crescenzio was the banker, and where
Formosa and his friends were in the habit of staking. The shop,
lately white-washed, glittered with light. Three gas-jets were
burning at full cock above the broad wooden counter and high wire
grating that cut off the bottom of the shop from one wall to the
other. Behind this counter, seated on three high stools in front
of openings in the grating, Don Crescenzio and his two clerks were
working, his lads, so called, though one of them--Don Baldassare--was
seventy, and might have been a hundred, he looked so decrepit; though
the other had one of those colourless faces, with indefinite lines
and colouring, that might be any age.
They kept a big register open before them, called '_To mother and
daughter_'--that is to say, with double yellow slips of paper. They
wrote the numbers on them with heavy, sharp-pointed pens, so as to
have a clear, strong hand-writing, putting down each number twice;
one could see their lips move as they repeated it. Then they cut the
ticket with a dry click of the great scissors held in the right hand,
passed it quickly through a wooden saucer of black sand to dry it,
and, after taking the money, handed it to the gambler. Don Crescenzio
had the fine contented look of a good macaroni-eater, smiling in his
dark beard; whilst Don Baldassare, so bent he seemed hunchbacked,
his crooked nose drooping into his toothless mouth, worked very
phlegmatically. Don Checchino, the pale clerk, wrote hurriedly, so as
to finish and go away.
When the Marquis di Formosa came in about half-past nine, the shop
was full of people putting down their stakes. The game began feebly
on Friday morning, increasing at mid-day, and in the evening it got
to the flood. The Marquis di Formosa beckoned, and Don Crescenzio
opened his little door and attentively handed him a chair. The
Marquis always spent Friday evenings there, seated in a corner,
watching all the people gambling. He tried to get up an excitement
by the sight, and succeeded to a great extent. He had the lottery
numbers and the money in his pocket; but he never played when he
first came in. He tasted the joy a long time, from seeing others do
it.
The shop was full of people. They came in by two wide-open doors,
one in Toledo Street, the other in Nunzio Lane. The flood rolled
in and out, beating against the wooden counter, which was shiny
from human contact. The crowd was of all ranks and ages, with every
variety of the human face: good-looking and ugly, healthy and sickly,
gay, sorrowing, stupefied, and dull. The crowd came from all the
streets around, from Chianche della Carità and Corsea, San Tommaso
di Aquino cloister and Consiglio ward, Toledo and San Liborio Lane.
Certainly there was another lottery bank a short distance off, one
in Magnocavallo Street, and another in Pignasecca Road. In a few
hundred steps' radius there were several, all flaming with gas and
overflowing with people. But if a lottery bank was opened for every
three other shops in Naples, from Friday to Saturday, each would have
its crowd. Besides, lottery banks go by favour, like other things;
some are popular, others are not. The one in Nunzio Lane, like the
Plebiscito Square and the Monte Oliveto Road ones, had a great name
for luck. Large sums had been gained there. Many people, therefore,
came from a distance to stake a franc, five francs, or a hundred, at
the bank.
The three groups in front of the wickets in Don Crescenzio's lottery
bank melted into one, for ever flowing and ebbing; and the Marquis di
Formosa, his hat a little back on his head, showing his fine forehead
with some drops of sweat on it, looked on this sight with enchanted
eyes, holding his ebony stick between his legs. Sometimes, on
recognising a friend or acquaintance before one of the openings, his
eyes shone with delight, much flattered that so many distinguished
worthy people shared his passion. He opened his eyes wide to see it
all, to take in the ever-changing picture, stretching his ears to
hear the conversations and soliloquys--for lottery gamblers speak
to themselves out loud, even in public--to find out which number
among so many mentioned came oftenest into people's mouths, so as to
play it that night or next morning. It was warm, and the light was
strong in that crowded little shop. But the Marquis di Formosa felt
a curious pleasure, a full wide sensation of vitality; he felt young
again, and in the pride of health and strength.
In the meanwhile the crowd was not getting smaller; it increased.
While in front of white-faced Don Checchino's wicket a lot of
students made a row, calling out their own numbers, laughing, and
pushing each other, at old Don Baldassare's, in front of the humble
crowd were two or three great gamblers, who gave a whole string of
numbers, staking tens and hundreds of francs on them. The old clerk
wrote slowly, phlegmatically, and read them out before handing
the tickets. At Don Crescenzio's, where the work was got through
quicker, the scene changed every minute: the clerk came after the
soldier-servant sent to stake for his Colonel, a sulky workman gave
place to a stupid-looking country nurse, the old lay Sister stuck
herself behind the retired magistrate--all were chattering, looking
ecstatic, or deeply, sadly engrossed. That was how Don Domenico Mayer
looked, the misanthropic Under-Secretary of Finance. He was now
standing before Don Crescenzio, his eyes cast down, his cavernous
voice dictating ten _terni_, _terni secchi_, on which he boldly
played two francs each, to win ten thousand francs, less the tax on
personal estate. At the third _terno_, he asked fiercely:
'How much is the tax?'
'Thirteen and twenty per cent,' Don Crescenzio replied playfully,
waving his fat white hand in a graceful style.
'Cheat of a Government!' a shrill voice called out behind Don
Domenico.
It was Michele the shoeblack, waiting to play his small Friday
evening game. He was to play higher stakes next day, when he got the
money from Donna Concetta. In the meanwhile he tasted the delight of
being there as he waited his turn. At the third _terno secco_ Don
Domenico explained his game.
'I don't care about taking the _ambo_; fifteen francs are nothing to
me.'
'Indeed!' said complacent Don Crescenzio.
He took the twenty francs, folded the coupons neatly, and handed them
to him. Getting on tiptoe to reach the wicket, the lame hunchback was
already dictating his numbers. He gave the explanation of each.
'This I have played for twenty years ... this is Father Giuseppe
d'Avellino's _terno_ ... this is the _ambo_ of the day ... this is
the _terno_ of the man killed in Piazza degli Orefici.'
But they were small stakes, seven or eight francs in all, and
those waiting behind him got impatient. By a curious attraction,
big gamblers went to Don Baldassare, the old man. Ninetto Costa,
in evening dress, just showing under his overcoat, his _gibus_
hat rather askew on his curly, scented hair, his very white
teeth uncovered by smiling red lips, handed his list over to the
accountant, while he smoked a Havana calmly, cheerful as usual. He
satisfied Don Baldassare's inquiries pleasantly. The sum staked had
to be repeated to him as a precaution, not because he wondered at the
largeness of it.
'On the first ticket seventy on the _terno_, twenty on the
_quaterna_?'
'Yes, that is it;' and he puffed out odorous smoke.
'On the second _terno secco_ a hundred and fifty is it?'
'Yes, a hundred and fifty.'
'On the third the whole ticket, two hundred and forty francs. Is that
right?'
'Two hundred and forty--that is right.'
The Marquis di Formosa, who had exchanged a smile with Ninetto Costa,
strained his ears to hear the ciphers. He quivered, touched with a
little envy, regretting he had not so much money to stake. When he
heard the whole amount, six hundred and fifty francs, and saw Ninetto
Costa pull out this sum lightly to hand to Don Baldassare, he grew
pale, thinking how much he could win with so high a risk. He went
out, almost choking, to get air at the door. There Ninetto Costa
joined him. Both gazed down Toledo, on its crowd and lights, without
seeing them.
'You are lucky,' stammered the old nobleman; 'you have money.'
'If you knew all!' said the other, grown grave suddenly. 'I pawned
jewels I paid twenty thousand francs for, and I only got five
thousand. The pawnshops keep down the loans on Friday and Saturday;
they get such a lot of things.'
'What does it matter?--you will win,' said the old man, rolling his
eyes, excited by the vision of success.
'On Monday I have a settlement on the Exchange--twenty thousand
francs' loss, and not a penny in my pocket. If I don't take
something, where will I put my head?'
'You have good numbers?' Formosa asked anxiously.
'I have staked everything. Pasqualino De Feo wanted fifty francs
to soothe the spirit. He gave me three _ternos_, two _ambos_, and
a _situato_. Then that common girl I pay court to, I gave her a
watch. She gave me some numbers, but under a symbol. You understand?
Then there are the Cabal numbers we play together, and Marzano's
cobbler's ones, and so on. I know if I don't win, Marquis, and a big
sum, I must go bankrupt;' and the thoughtless stock-broker's voice
trembled tragically. 'I am going to a dance--good-evening,' he said
then, lighting his cigar again; and he went off with his nimble step.
Excited by this talk, the Marquis di Formosa went into the
lottery-shop again. Now, before the pale, flabby Don Checchino's
grill, leaning her elbow on the counter, Carmela, the cigar-girl,
using the ten francs Donna Concetta gave her for her earrings, was
saying her numbers, faintly, with pauses, playing three or four
popular tickets.
'Six and twenty-two--put half a franc on that; eight, thirteen,
and eighty-four--two sous for the _ambo_ of it, eight sous for the
_terno_; then eight and ninety, on the _ambo_ another four sous.'
She stopped now and then, as if other sad thoughts distracted her; a
flush coloured her delicate cheeks. When Don Checchino made up the
account, four francs forty centimes, she took out a roll of copper
money and began to count slowly.
'Hurry up! hurry up!' an impatient woman's voice cried out.
She turned round and recognised the woman, an old servant, Donna
Rosa, she that served in the house where her unfortunate sister
lived. They spoke in a whisper.
'Oh, Donna Rosa, and how is Filomena?'
'She is well; but she is in distress. She sent me to play this
number--three girls are playing it, rather, as there has been a wound
given, unluckily.'
'Oh, Jesus! God bless her, poor sister! And you--where do you come
from?'
'I live in Chianche Road, and I am going home.'
'Greet her for me,' Carmela whispered eagerly.
Pulling her shawl round her, she went away, with her head down, as if
overpowered by tiredness. Next to Rosa, the unfortunates' servant,
came Baron Annibale Lamarra, fat, pale, panting with his hurried walk
from one lottery bank to another. He played many tickets of twenty,
fifty, a hundred francs each; but, fearing to be spied on by his
miserly wife, whose dower he wasted, in spite of terrible scenes,
afraid of being caught by his father, a self-made man, he had got up
the fraud of playing a ticket at each place. He ran panting from one
lottery to another, trying to believe he would win on Saturday and
take back the promissory note from Don Gennaro Parascandolo, the one
that had his wife's signature. The thought of it made him shiver with
fright. When he got out of Don Crescenzio's lottery-shop he breathed
again, and reckoned up mentally. Of the two thousand francs, he had
given two hundred to Ambrogio Marzano, the cheerful old lawyer, for
arranging with Parascandolo; then he had staked one thousand six
hundred francs in different banks. He had two hundred francs left.
He would stake them next day, for perhaps he would dream of some
good number at night. It was no use risking it all at once. In the
meanwhile, from the other door, just as he got out, Don Ambrogio
Marzano came in. He stopped to talk with the Marquis di Formosa.
'Have you some good lottery numbers?' Formosa asked anxiously. He
clung to the pleasant old man as a bearer of luck.
'I have a forty-nine _secondo_ that is a love, my lord!' whispered
the enthusiast, so as not to be heard.
'Ah! and what else?'
'Twenty-seven, you know, is the sympathetic number at the end of the
month.'
'I have it, too. What do you say of the fourteenth?'
'It is _very good_, my lord; but do you wish really to know the
lightning, the dazzling number?'
'Tell me--tell me!'
'I tell you in brotherly love, because when I have a treasure I can't
be selfish with it, and keep it to myself. You may have it as a proof
of affection--it is thirty-five!'
'Ah!' said the Marquis in a stupor of admiration.
In the meanwhile, still quite serene, Don Ambrogio Marzano went to
place his stakes with Don Crescenzio. It is true he had had to give
the usual fifteen francs to his Cabalist cobbler. He had given ten to
Don Pasqualino, though he did not believe in him much, and a journey
to Marano, to take Father Illuminato a tortoise-shell snuff-box, had
cost him thirty francs; but he had taken them from a prepayment of
law expenses he got from a client, so that the two hundred francs was
intact, and he paid it all. Gaetano the glove-cutter, Annarella's
husband, whose child was dying, was waiting his turn to stake; but
it was a hard week, he had not got the loan of a sou, and had had
difficulty in getting an advance of five francs from his master. He
staked four of them, keeping back one for the numbers he might think
of on Saturday morning.
Now, as night came on, Don Crescenzio and his tired, stupefied clerks
had a sort of confused look, like those that have sat too long at
musical and dancing entertainments, with dazzled eye and deafened
ears; but they went on working. It was the grand weekly harvest,
a gathering in of thousands, hundreds, and tens of francs for the
Government. Don Crescenzio got a percentage of it, and on good
weeks he gave his 'lads' a little extra. Even the people coming in
constantly to stake had a queer look. Some were uneasy, some were
looking round them suspiciously; others dragged along in a tired way,
or their eyes were distracted, as if they were out of their senses.
There were those who had just found out numbers, or got money to
stake; servants, their day's work over, had run off to the lottery
before going to bed; shop-lads, that had just shut up shop, and
youths who had run out between two acts at the Fiorentino Theatre,
were coming in; and Cabalists from the Diodati Café, or the wine-room
of the Testa d'Oro Café, who were all Don Crescenzio's customers, and
after long discussion now ended by risking all they had that evening;
then a magistrate, weighed down by children and poverty, on his way
back from a game of _scopa_, at a sou, ventured the twenty francs
that was to feed them for four days; and the pale, sickly painter
of saints, having insisted on getting the money for a Santa Candida
beforehand, came in just then to stake it, and he was certain to play
next morning what Donna Concetta had promised him for the statue of
the Immaculate Conception.
Even a very elegant little street carriage stopped, and a hand in
pearl-gray gloves, studded with diamonds at the wrist, handed a
paper and money to a gallooned footman. The Marquis di Formosa, who
had left his seat out of nervousness, and was wandering among the
gamblers who came out and in, recognised the profile of a lady of his
own set, the Spanish Princess, Ines di Miradois.
'It is true, then, that Francesco Althan takes everything from her,'
the old lord thought to himself.
He joined Dr. Trifari and Professor Colaneri as they now came in,
still quivering with rage. They quarrelled by the hour about dividing
poor Rocco Galasso's seven hundred and sixty francs. Trifari made
out he had induced his fellow-villager, Rocco Galasso, to sign, and
he wanted five hundred francs. Colaneri made out that Rocco Galasso
had signed the promissory note so as to get the examination papers
from him beforehand, and by giving them he had gravely compromised
himself; he might lose his post through it; therefore the five
hundred francs were his. The struggle had been tremendous. They
nearly came to blows twice; but Trifari very unwillingly, choking
with rage, gave in, because he knew Colaneri had revelations at
night--a thing he, a full-blooded heretical blasphemer, did not have.
And Colaneri gave in because Trifari brought him many students to do
business with for the examinations--a most dangerous thing to do, and
he himself was afraid of the risk, but he yielded to temptation to
satisfy his vices. In short, they divided the seven hundred and sixty
francs. They had met the medium, who asked them in an inspired tone
if they wished to do alms of five francs to St. Joseph. They gave it,
thinking the question meant numbers, and that they ought to play five
for the money and nineteen for St. Joseph's number. All the medium
says on Friday evening and Saturday morning means lottery numbers.
So that Trifari and Colaneri, after making their game on their
favourite numbers, came down at once to play these less probable
ones, according to them; then they played the popular numbers, which
were three and four, just in case; and at last, leaning on the great
wooden counter, they looked in each other's faces with an idiotic
grin, still thinking out if they had forgotten anything.
In spite of the late hour, people went on crowding up Don
Crescenzio's lottery bank. He would get a large profit this last
Friday in March, owing to a flowing back of malignant fever, one
of those wild, gathered-up rushes of the slow disease that eats up
Naples' fortunes. There were people coming out of theatres who had
thought all evening about what ticket to play; they did not wish to
put off doing so till Saturday, for fear of forgetting it in the few
morning hours left. There were night-cabmen who stopped before the
shop, came down from the box, and waited their turn to play, the
inseparable whip in hand, with the patient eyes of those accustomed
to long waiting; there were those ragged, wretched, wandering
night-hawkers, shadowy figures, who shivered with fright in the
bright warm gaslight--vendors of newspapers, fritters, pickers-up
of cigar-ends, sellers of _pizze_, of beans, of grass for the horses
of night-cabs passing from time to time, calling out their wares;
and they, too, stopped at the lottery-stand, and went in, not able
to resist playing a franc, half a franc, a few sous. The driver and
two porters of the omnibus that takes travellers by the last train to
the Allegria Hotel came in; whilst the bus-conductors and drivers in
Carità Square, as soon as their day's run was over, which must have
made them dead-tired, had come to stake on the lottery before going
home.
Formosa had not made up his mind to play yet, with that sort of
dallying with time all lovers and excitable people go in for. In a
corner of the entrance, so as to let people pass, he conversed with
Trifari and Colaneri, who did not want to leave either, though they
had nothing left to stake. They stood to enjoy that light, warmth,
and crowd, the money flowing in, the lottery-tickets going out,
pledges of fortune and riches, and to muse over which of them was the
right one. Which? which? Here was the tremendous, delightful doubt,
the immense, burning unknown, the mystery that smiled through the
veil that cannot be lifted.
After taking a little walk through Toledo, being unable to resist the
attraction, Ambrogio Marzano, the lawyer, had come back, too, and
joined his little group of Cabalist friends, conversing with them
by fits and starts. Quite incapable of not mentioning his number,
his crowning stroke, he told them of thirty-five, so that Colaneri
and Trifari went in to play it, and he, Marzano, went in to play
seventy-three, which Colaneri had given him. No, Formosa was not
going to stake yet. But the end of his enjoyment was drawing near; he
felt the great moment coming on, and in one of his fervent, mystic
bursts he prayed silently to the Lord, the Casa Cavalcanti Madonna,
the Ecce Homo he worshipped in his family chapel, to enlighten and
inspire him, to do him the one great favour he had asked for years.
His friends, after tasting this other drop of pleasure, came out
again, and chatted vivaciously about numbers, getting excited with
the big shadows that now filled Toledo, broken by that square of
light the lottery lamp cast on the pavement. Just then they saw
Cesare Fragalà go in. After shutting his shop, the gay confectioner
always spent a couple of hours at his club to play dominoes with
other tradesmen--grocers, drapers, oilmen, fishmongers--putting down
a sou a game. On Friday evening he played these long games, too, but
rather distractedly, nervous, in spite of his youthful gaiety, and he
made off rather early to go to his dear Don Crescenzio's to make his
weekly large stake.
Really, there was a little crabbedness in his gambling ardour,
something like a feeling of remorse, of shame at throwing away his
money in that way, so he came late to the lottery bank, when there
were fewer people about to see and know him. He was put out that
evening on Formosa greeting him; it annoyed him to be seen by his
neighbour. Then he shrugged his shoulders, and stood by his dearest
friend Don Crescenzio, who went on writing, stroking his fine beard,
making a lot of fine flourishes with his pen. He began to dictate his
numbers to him on and on, showing his white teeth in a smile. Don
Crescenzio wrote on quite unmoved. For the six months that Cesare
Fragalà played at his bank the stakes had gone on increasing. In that
flood of numbers dictated, Don Crescenzio, with his peculiar memory,
recognised the medium's numbers--that is to say, his symbols, that
everyone had interpreted differently, so that Formosa, Colaneri,
Trifari, Marzano, Ninetto Costa, Cesare Fragalà, and all who took
their luck on Don Pasqualino's words, played different numbers, and
a great many of them, and thus they all managed now and then to make
some small hazardous gain--fifteen or twenty crowns over a _situato_,
six hundred francs over an _ambo_--very seldom, it is true, but
often enough to fan their passion and make them all slaves to Don
Pasqualino's cloudy phrases. So with a slight smile, while he was
adding up the sum, Don Crescenzio said:
'You, too, are one of Pasqualino De Feo's clients?'
'You know him?' asked Fragalà anxiously.
'Eh, we are friends,' Crescenzio muttered.
'He knows the numbers, does he not?' Fragalà asked, with a quiver in
his throat.
'Often he gets them right.'
'How often?'
'When his client is in God's favour,' the agent answered
enigmatically. Wishing to end the conversation, he politely handed
over the tickets, saying: 'Five hundred and forty francs.'
Fragalà paid stolidly with a tradesman's calm, without changing
expression. But when he got out of the lottery-shop, at the door,
his smile faded; he remembered he had made his first debt to a
money-lender that day, and that he had given security on the shop
funds, having also taken out the whole balance to make up the big
sum he had staked. It was to get away from these sad thoughts that
he joined the group of Cabalists. At one in the morning, standing in
front of the gambling place, they neither felt the hours passing,
the lateness, nor the penetrating damp; for they burned with that
constant inward fire that flamed up from Friday to Saturday. They
began the same stories again, at great length, for the thousandth
time, interrupting each other, getting heated and excited, staring at
each other with wild, humid eyes, as if they were possessed. Cesare
Fragalà listened, trying to get the same fever, but not succeeding;
for he was only a weak soul, not mad, nor subject to nerves. When
they all went over the reasons that made them gamble, such and such
material and moral needs, urgent and impelling, that the lottery
alone could satisfy, he listened in a melancholy way. At one point he
said:
'I--I need sixty thousand francs to open a shop towards San
Ferdinando, and make a marriage portion for Agnesina.'
A deep sadness overpowered him. Good, honest, incapable of lying
about anything to his wife, he had deceived her for months, like a
cheat; he took the ledgers she often stopped to turn over out of her
hands, and with hourly caution he tried to hide his vice from her,
thus destroying his good temper and ease.
'If it were not for this shop, if it were not for Agnesina----' he
muttered, a prey to inconsolable bitterness.
Now, about half-past one, the time came to shut the lottery bank,
as the customers became fewer and fewer; and at last the Marquis di
Formosa made up his mind to go and stake. Notes in hand, he said the
lottery numbers slowly over to Don Crescenzio. There was a slight
tremor in his voice, and his eyes stared at the string of figures
on the paper, as if he was enjoying himself. The gambling-shop was
deserted now. His Cabalist friends, Colaneri, Trifari, Marzano,
bringing Fragalà with them, who was in very low spirits, got behind
the Marquis di Formosa to listen to his numbers, and either winked
approval or shook their heads unbelievingly--in short, they served
at Formosa's by no means short gambling operations with the gravity
of priests taking part in a Bishop's service. Don Baldassare, the
decrepit old man, and pale-faced Don Checchino, stood motionless
behind the counter, their eyes half shut, dead-tired with that ten
hours' gabbling, thinking of having to go through the same thing next
day, from seven till noon, with great heat the last hour. Only Don
Crescenzio kept up his calm, placid, Neapolitan felicity, that has
its plate of macaroni secure, and serenely watches others' excitement
from behind a phantom plate of macaroni, many plates of it in the
great imaginative country of Cockayne. The Marquis di Formosa,
greatly excited, played high. He put down what Giovanni got from
Concetta the money-lender, what the lady's-maid got from Don Gennaro
Parascandolo, and seventy francs he got from the pawn-shop for two
artistic antique gilt-bronze candle-sticks, found in a lumber-room in
his house--two hundred and twenty francs in all. He was still pallid,
discontented, and melancholy, suddenly mistrustful of the value of
some numbers, sorry not to be able to risk more on others, in despair
at the end at not being able to stake on all the others, all that
were in his calculations.
So the lover, after a long-wished-for interview with his lady, having
got it, sees the moments fly past with frightful rapidity, and is
afterwards deeply grieved at not having said to the lady a word of
what he felt. This old man, whose ruling passion was not dulled by
age, bent his head, crushed suddenly, as if he had lived ten years
in a minute. He went out slowly and silently with the others, slow
and silent, too, through the dark street leading to his house. They
were all cold at that late hour. They shivered, and pulled their
great-coats round them, holding their heads down, not speaking to
each other. Thus they got as far as Dante Piazza, under the Rossi
Palace, where the cabalistic talk began again. They went two or
three times up and down the piazza, while the poet's stern white
statue seemed to scorn them with its blank eyeballs. They took poor
Fragalà with them, eaten up now by overpowering remorse for having
thrown away so much money that belonged to his family. But it was no
use. He gambled because he was a weak, cheerful creature, pricked on
by commercial ambition. He would never be a Cabalist. The others'
madness sadly surprised him, and they never could have infected him
with it. Still, he stayed with them, feeling that he had not the
strength to go home and lie by his wife's side with this remorse on
him for having thrown away five hundred francs. He began to look
distractedly and fixedly at the shadows, as if he saw some frightful
vision. At one point Marzano bowed and went off towards Porta Medina
archway, for he lived in Tribunale Road. But the others continued
to walk up and down, raving, in the darkness and cold, which they
no longer felt. The Marquis di Formosa was the most fervent of all.
His eyes sparkled, his figure stood out in the gloom, strong and
vigorous, like a man of thirty. Then Colaneri and Trifari took leave.
They both lived in a poor house in Cavone Street. Then Formosa went
on, with a monologue, speaking to Fragalà, the shadows, or himself.
They were going down very slowly towards Toledo once more, when a
quiet voice greeted them:
'Good-night, gentlemen!'
'Good-night, Don Crescenzio,' said the Marquis. 'Have you shut up,
eh? Was it a good day?'
'Thirty-two thousand five hundred and twenty-seven francs was the sum
staked,' said the banker, all in one breath.
Silence followed.
'Do you not play, Don Crescenzio?' Fragalà asked.
'No, never. Good-night.'
'Good night.'
He went off smartly, and they, seeing the lottery bank was shut now,
turned back heavily. It was with a sigh that they knocked gently at
the palace gate. They were sorry to go home. They parted on the first
landing with a hand-shake and a smile.
CHAPTER IX
BIANCA MARIA'S VISION
Both the gamblers went upstairs very quietly, like evil-doers or
timid young fellows who have disobeyed their father's orders; each
carried a latchkey, and shut the door without any noise. On going
into his apartments and his own room, Cesare Fragalà, taking a
fit of penitence, shook like a child; only his sleeping wife's
placid breathing calmed him a little. He was afraid of awakening
her, in case she questioned him, and guessed the truth with that
extraordinary alarming intuition women have. He undressed by the
slender light of a lamp before St. Agnes, and got into bed with the
greatest caution, trembling--yes, trembling--lest he should wake his
wife; and in his humble, contrite, desolate heart he swore not to
stake another sou. Only this oath and his healthy constitution freed
him from sleeplessness, which sits at the bedhead of all gamblers.
Sleeplessness had visited Formosa's pillows. He had vainly tried to
read Rutilio Benincasa's mathematical table, to calm his wandering
thoughts; the figures danced in a ring before his eyes. He vainly
tried to say the rosary, to fix his mind on prayer, to humiliate his
heart before the Eternal Will; prayer came coldly and haltingly from
his lips. A strong fever of fancy held him, and put his nerves on
the rack; it made him start up in his bed, quivering like a violin
string: a madness took hold of him, and, from the black darkness and
solitude, made itself all-powerful over his thoughts and feelings. He
could not stay in bed; in spite of the cold, he got up and dressed,
and began to walk about in his freezing room. He did not feel cold;
his hands and head were warm; the candle-flame seemed a great blaze
to him. All was silent in the house; he never allowed anyone to wait
up for him. The two poor old servants--Giovanni and Margherita--whom
he had despoiled of their money got on loan, to keep Bianca Maria
alive, were sleeping in the closet--tired and sorrowful, perhaps.
Bianca Maria was asleep in her cold room many hours ago certainly.
But the Marquis di Formosa, devoured by his gambling folly, hoping
and despairing of winning from one moment to another, implored God,
the Virgin, the saints, the souls of his dead, his guardian angel,
Fortune, all the powers of heaven and earth, to help him to win, to
get the victory; he forgot his fears as a man and a Christian so far
as to ask it from evil spirits, even. Formosa, burning with such
madness, could not bear that all in the house should sleep quietly,
placidly, while he was torn with anguish and hope. Ah no! he was not
afraid of solitude and night, little noises from old furniture, old
creaking ceilings, or noisy doors; he was afraid of nothing in that
icy house where his wife died of languor and sorrow, where her meek
shade still seemed to linger. Fear! He asked, he implored a voice,
a revelation, a vision; he would have been pleased, happy, and not
frightened, if he had seen something. But his soul was too stained
with sin, his heart was unclean from earthly desires; a white soul, a
virginal heart, was needed to get this heavenly grace, by which one
_saw_ what other human eyes were not allowed to see. Bianca Maria
was sleeping; she slept, cold creature! though so near to Grace,
and still refused to satisfy her father's wishes. He left his room,
crossed the passage in front of the drawing-room, and stopped at his
daughter's closed door. He listened--no sound. She was sleeping,
cold-hearted girl! She had no pity for her father's tortures, and
would not pray God and the Virgin for a vision. A dull rage mingled
with his Friday madness; he went up and down the passage more than
once, trying to go away from his daughter's room; but he could not
manage it: his curiosity was so strong to know from her the spirit's
revelation that she certainly must have had that night; it could not
have failed to come. Don Pasqualino, the medium, after a three days'
voluntary fast, after two nights' flagellation on his shoulders and
bare, thin breast, had heard from the spirit who helped him that
Bianca Maria would get the revelation. The spirit does not lie. Then
involuntarily, as if pushed by a force he must obey, he took hold of
the door-handle; it creaked, the door opened. But a sharp cry from
inside answered to the noise--a girl's cry, whose light, watchful
sleep had been disturbed. She rose up in bed, in her white nightgown,
her black hair loose on her shoulders, eyes wide open, and hands
clutching the coverlet.
'It is I, Bianca--it is I,' the Marquis di Formosa murmured, coming
forward.
'Who--who is it?' she asked, shaking with fear, not daring to move.
'I--it is I, Bianca,' he repeated, getting impatient.
She sighed deeply without saying anything, but her breathing was
still alarmed. The Marquis had got to his daughter's bed, guided by
the faint light of a lamp before a small image of the Virgin.
The girl fell back on the pillows and looked at the ceiling. The
Marquis sat down by her bed, and his nervous fingers played with the
white fringe of the coverlid.
'Why were you so frightened?' he asked, after a long silence.
'I don't know; it is stronger than I am.'
'When one is in the Lord's grace there is no need for fear,' he
remarked sententiously and severely. 'Have you some mortal sin on
your conscience?'
'No ... I don't think so, at least,' she said, hesitating.
They kept silence. The Marquis di Formosa looked into the shadows.
'Has the spirit come?' he asked afterwards, in a whispered,
mysterious tone.
'Oh, do not speak of that,' she said, sighing again, shutting her
eyes, and hiding her face in her hands.
'Has it come?' he insisted; a gambler's cruelty was raging in him now.
'For mercy's sake, if you love me, don't speak of that!' she said,
taking his hand and kissing it, so as to move him more.
'Tell me, has it come?' he again repeated implacably.
She, feeling she could not escape that persecution, looked
despairingly towards the Virgin, then hid her face in the pillows.
'Tell me, tell me, if it has come!' he cried out, bending over the
pillows, as if to breathe his magnetic curiosity into his daughter's
face.
'No, it has not,' she said, in a thread of a voice.
'You are lying.'
'I am not.'
'You are lying. The spirit has been here, I feel it.'
'Be good to me; say no more about this,' she said, trembling
dreadfully.
'How did you see it? Awake? dozing? sleeping? It was a white figure,
was it not, with lowered eyelids, but smiling?... What did it say to
you? A very weak voice, wasn't it? Something you alone could have
heard?'
'Father, you want to kill me,' she uttered desolately.
These are womanly fears,' said he disdainfully. 'Who ever died
through a communication from on high? The meeting of soul and spirit
is a spring of life. Bianca Maria, don't be ungrateful, don't be
cruel; tell me all.'
'You are trying to kill me,' she repeated, desperately and resignedly.
'You are a fool! Do you wish me, your father, to pray to you? Well, I
will; there is nothing else to be done. Children are ungrateful and
wicked; they give back cruelty for our love. I pray to you, Bianca, I
beg of you, as if you were my patron saint, to tell me all.'
'I will die of this, father,' she murmured, her voice choked in the
pillows that helped her to curb her crying and sobs.
'Listen, Bianca,' he went on coldly, keeping in his anger; 'you must
believe me. I am a man, I am sane, I am in my senses, I can reason.
Well, it is an article of faith with me, as clear as the light,
as the sun, that you have had to-night, or will have, a spirit's
apparition. It will come to bless our family; it will tell you words
of happiness. If it has come, so much the better; your duty as an
obedient, loving daughter of the House of Cavalcanti is to tell me
all, at once.'
'I know nothing,' she said dryly.
'Do you swear it?'
'I swear that I know nothing.'
'Then this vision will come in the succeeding hours of the night. I
am going into the chapel, to pray. I am a sinner, but sinners, too,
can ask for grace. I will pray that you may see and feel the spirit.'
'No, don't go away!' she cried out, getting up in her bed and
catching hold of his arm with a despairing clutch.
'Why should I not?'
'Don't go away, for the love of God! If you have any affection for
me, stay here.'
'I must go and pray, Bianca,' he exclaimed, carried away by
excitement, not understanding his daughter's convulsive state.
'No, no--stay; I can't be left alone here, or I'll die of fright.'
She spoke restlessly, quite pallid, her trembling hands still
clutching her father's arm. She dared not look round. With her head
down on her breast, she shut her eyes and bit her lips; while he, in
his mad obstinacy, looked fixedly at his daughter, thinking he saw
in her that spiritual disorder that must, by a fatality, go with the
great miracles that have to do with the soul.
'How do you feel?' he questioned, very deeply and intensely, as if he
wished to tear the truth from her soul.
'Stay here, stay here,' said she, her teeth chattering with terror.
'You see something?' he asked suggestively, with an intensity in his
voice and will that was bound to influence that fragile feminine
frame, broken as it was by the nervous shock.
'I am afraid to see--I am afraid!' she said, very low, leaning her
forehead on her father's arm.
'Don't be afraid, dear; don't fear,' he whispered tenderly,
paternally caressing her black hair.
'Be silent; keep silence,' said she, with a quick shiver. She
continued to lean on his shoulder, hiding her face, shrinking all
over. The Marquis put his arm round her waist, to keep up her
quivering, feeble body; she hid more, clinging to her father as to a
raft of safety. He sometimes felt her quiver all through her nerves.
'What is the matter?' he asked then.
'No, no!' she said, more by gesture than voice.
'Look, look--don't be frightened,' suggested the deluded man.
'Be silent!' she answered, shuddering. He held her up, waiting with
a madman's patience that would wait for hours, days, months, years,
provided the truth of his delusion were proved.
'Bianca darling,' the Marquis murmured, sometimes encouraging
her tenderly. She answered with a sigh, that seemed a lamenting,
suffering child's sob. Holding her against his breast, Formosa
felt the strong rigidity of that young sickly frame shaken by long
shivers. When she trembled all over, he felt the rebound. It seemed
to him the implored revelation was imminent. He again said to her,
obstinately, pitilessly, 'How do you feel?' She waved her hand, in an
alarmed way, as if she wished to chase away a frightful thought or a
dreadful vision. What did the agony of that young breast matter to
him, the fatal want of balance in the nerves? In that chilly virginal
room, a circle of light on the ceiling from the Virgin's lamp alone
breaking the shadow, with the quivering form in his arms, the soul
trembling before Divine mysteries, he felt it a solemn moment;
time and space were not. He, Formosa, was facing at last the great
mystery. From his innocent daughter's lips he would know his life's
secret, his future: the fatal ciphers that contained his fortune--the
spirit would tell Bianca Maria everything, and she would tell him.
'Bianca, Bianca, implore _him_ to come and tell you whether we are to
live or die. Pray to him, because _he_, the spirit, comes forth from
the Divine, to tell you the divine word; pray to him, if he is here
near you, or in you, if he is before your eyes or your fancy; pray to
him, Bianca, pray to him. Our life is at stake. Save us, Bianca, save
us!'...
He went on speaking, incoherently, invoking the spirit's presence,
addressing the wildest, saddest prayers to her and to him. The girl,
trembling, shivering, her teeth chattering with terror, clung on her
father's neck, like a suffering child, fastened like a vice. She
said no more, but it was evident the hour, the surroundings, and her
father's voice increased her nervousness. A stifled sob came from her
breast, and a very faint, constant lament, like a dying child's, from
her lips. He spoke to her all the time, but when he got more urgent,
almost wrathful in his sorrow, he felt her arms twitching with
despair. Then gradually a change came. To begin with, Bianca's hands
and forehead were, as usual, icy cold; she was so bloodless, she had
lost her vital heat. Indeed, in that spasm the deluded old man had
felt that her whole body was frozen. Suddenly, at intervals, when
her teeth stopped chattering and her arms relaxed through debility,
he felt a slight heat rising under the skin on her hands and up to
her forehead. It seemed a current of heat spreading all through her
young body, which filled her impoverished veins with warm blood, and
made her forehead and hands burn. He beard her breathing get more
distressed; sometimes her breast rose with a long sigh, as if she
needed air. Twice he tried to put her head down on the pillow, but
she gave a frightened shiver.
'Don't leave me alone, for the love of God!' she stammered, like a
baby.
'I won't leave you. Tell me what you see,' he repeated, indomitable
and implacable.
'It is dreadful, dreadful!' Bianca stammered, going on trembling,
trembling as if she had the body of an old woman of seventy.
'What is dreadful? Speak, Bianca, tell me everything; tell me what
you have seen.'
'Oh!' lamented she despondingly.
Now the teeth had given up chattering, her short breathing came from
her throat faintly, she burnt all over, and her quick respiration
scorched her father's neck where her head leant; besides this, her
temples and pulse beat rapidly, but her father, possessed altogether
by his madness, in the mysterious half-light of that chilly night,
close to the poor drowsy soul in the tortured body, lost all sense of
realities. His sick fancy keenly enjoyed the hour's drama, without
taking in how cruel it was. He was quivering with joy, indeed, as he
believed the great moment of the spirit's revelation had come; the
fortunes of the House of Cavalcanti were to be decided that moment.
His daughter's uneasiness, terror, spasms, broken words, were easily
explained; it was the Favour drawing near. So much time, so long had
gone by in unhappiness and wretchedness; now all was to be changed.
To-morrow he and his daughter would be rich--have millions! Oppressed
and uneasy, Bianca Maria had slid down from her father's breast on to
the pillows; her whistling breath was very audible, her eyes shone
curiously. Nailed to the spot by his unhealthy curiosity, the Marquis
stood by the bed, watching his daughter's every movement by the
lamp-light, struck down as she was on that bed of sorrow. Suddenly,
as if by an electric shock, her hands clutched the coverlet wildly; a
hoarse cry came from her throat.
'What is it?' the Marquis cried out, shaken also.
'It is the spirit--the spirit!' she stammered, her voice changed to a
deep cavernous tone.
'Where is it?' the father said in a whisper.
'In the doorway! Look at it; it is there!' she said firmly and
forcibly, staring at the door.
'I see nothing--nothing! I am a poor sinner!' Formosa cried out
despairingly.
'The spirit is there,' she whispered, as if she heard nothing.
'How is it clad? What is it doing? What does it say? Bianca, Bianca,
pray to it!'
'It is clad in white ... it does not move ... it says nothing ...'
she murmured in a dreamy way.
'Implore him--implore him to speak to you. You are free from sin,
Bianca.'
'It does not speak ... it will not speak!'
'Bianca, pray in God's name, by His strength and power.'
They kept silence. The Marquis di Formosa kept his whole attention on
the door where his daughter alone saw the spirit, his whole soul in
prayer. She lay still more restless; her burning hands clutched the
folds of the sheet between her fingers.
'What does it say?'
'It says nothing.'
'But why will it not speak? Why has it come if it will not speak?'
'It does not answer me,' she replied, still in the same voice that
seemed to come from a distance.
'But what is it doing?'
'It looks at me ... looks at me steadily ... the eyes are so sad, so
sad. It looks pityingly at me, just as if I were dead. Am I dead,
then?'
'Now it will go away without telling you anything!' Formosa shouted
out. 'Ask him what numbers come out to-morrow.'
She gave an agonized moan.
'I think it is weeping now, as if I were dead; it looks so to me.
Tears fall down its cheeks.'
'Tears, sixty-five,' Formosa said to himself, as if he feared someone
would hear him.
'It raises its hand to greet me....'
'Look how many fingers it lifts--look well; make no mistake.'
'Three fingers. It bows to me; it wants to go away....'
'Tell him to come back; pray him to--pray....'
'He signs "yes,"' Bianca Maria went on after a pause. 'It is going
away--it has gone; it has disappeared....'
'Let us praise God!' Formosa cried out, kneeling at the foot of the
bed. 'The fingers three, the hand five, tears sixty-five; we must
find out the number for the dead girl. Let us thank God!'
'Yes, yes,' the girl murmured in a queer tone; 'we must find out the
number for the dead girl--we must find out....'
'We will find out,' exclaimed Formosa, laughing like a madman.
He thought no more about his daughter, who was now in a state of
high fever with the violence of the _effimere_, that carries off
a life in twenty-four hours. She panted, drinking in the air with
her open mouth, like a dying bird. The blood beat so wildly in her
veins it seemed it would burst them; her whole slender form burned
like red-hot iron. But the Marquis di Formosa only felt a youthful
impatience; he had gone twice to the window to see if day was
breaking. No; he had still some hours to wait before he could play
the spirit's numbers. It occurred to him he had no more money. How
could he play? Not a franc. It was a cruel thing, this continual
thirst nothing could satisfy. But he would find the money, if he had
to sell the last of his furniture and pawn himself. He would get it,
by Gad! now he had got the revelation--now the ministering spirit had
deigned to enter his house. His fortune was in his hands; he would
put everything on the spirit's numbers.
'Oh, Ecce Homo! Ecce Homo of Cavalcanti House! it was you did us
this favour. A new chapel must be added for you, and four lamps of
massive silver, always kept lit, in remembrance of what you have done
for us.' The Ecce Homo would help him to get the money too. Good and
powerful Ecce Homo, the family protector, give money--money to gamble
with!
Overmastered by his fervent, passionate thoughts, the Marquis di
Formosa spoke aloud, gesticulating with his hands through his hair,
wandering about the room like a madman.
Bianca Maria went on raving in a whisper, because her breath was
failing, softly, vaguely speaking of Maria degli Angioli, or with
deep melancholy of a fresh, laughing, green country place she would
like to live in, down there far, far off. But the old man, carried
away by his thoughts, no longer listened to her, and as the cold dawn
of March burst forth, two deliriums were confused together in that
room--father's and daughter's tragically.
* * * * *
In the livid cold light of dawn the Marquis di Formosa wandered in a
shaky way, with wild-looking eyes and pallid face, through his flat,
searching his empty drawers and sparse furniture for something to
sell or pawn. He found nothing. He opened the drawers with trembling
hands again, and groped in them, shaking them hard, then he looked
around with madness in his gaze, thinking he would like to sell or
pawn the bare walls of the house that had once been his. Nothing,
nothing! Little by little, eaten up by the lottery, valuable jewels
had disappeared, heavy antique and modern silver plate, pictures by
great masters, precious books, artistic rarities in bronze, ivory,
carved wood--the house was stripped, only the furniture that it would
have been disgraceful to part with was left. Alas! nothing could be
found to turn into money so as to play the spirit's number. He wrung
his hands despairingly; he had left Bianca Maria in a feverish,
oppressed stupor, a few confused words still came from her lips,
and the servants were still sleeping. He even went into the chapel,
wildly; but the lamps burning there were brass. He had bought the
altar vases himself when he sold the real silver ones, and had got
imitation silver instead. He thought a moment of taking the silver
crown from the Virgin's head, and the seven swords in her heart that
represent the great agonized Mother's sorrows, but a mysterious dread
restrained him.
He went out without being able to say a prayer even, the night's
delusion and Saturday morning's feverish haste held him so strongly
that dawn. He thought who he could borrow money from, but could
not find anyone; he held his beating temples to keep his thoughts
together, so as to get what he wanted. All friends of his own
rank and his great relations kept away from him after his wife's
death; but only after he had laid them all under contribution for
his gambling. His present friends? They were all gamblers, all
making desperate attempts that morning to go on staking; they would
certainly not lend money--each one thought of himself, looked out for
himself. New friends? That passion prevented him from finding any,
except that morbid set of madmen, damned like himself. A great deal
of money was needed, as the spirit had deigned to reveal himself; a
fortune must be made that day or never. Suddenly a flash of light
struck him: a name came to his mind. He could give him the money;
he was a man of honour; he had a lot of money; he would not refuse
a Formosa a small loan. While he wrote to Dr. Antonio Amati at his
desk, on a leaf torn from a book full of ciphers, he thought he need
not feel ashamed to ask a loan from a stranger, for he would give it
back that very evening. After he had written, one thought made him
tremble: if Amati said 'No'? He was a mere acquaintance, a stranger;
money hardens all hearts.
'Take this letter to Dr. Amati, and bring the answer back,' he said
to Giovanni, who came in, hardly awake, on being rung for.
'He will be asleep....'
'Take it!' Formosa ordered. He bit his lips, certain now that Amati
would refuse; he felt a blush of shame come to his cheek. But he
must have money--he must, at whatever cost! He flung himself in the
easy-chair, looking at the ciphers on bits of paper scattered on the
desk without seeing them; he felt overcome by that irrepressible rage
of his ruling passion, at war with realities.
'When he awakes he will give the answer,' said Giovanni, coming in,
silently waiting his master's orders.
'Giovanni, give me the rest of the money you have,' said Formosa
sullenly.
'I haven't got any, sir,' the other answered, shaking all over.
'Don't tell lies; you have other fifty francs. Give me them at
once....'
'My lord, I took the loan of it from a money-lender. I must give it
back at so much a week; don't take it from me....'
'That does not matter to me,' Formosa said haughtily.
'Don't take it from me, my lord. If you knew what it was needed
for....'
'It does not matter to me' the Marquis said fiercely. 'Give me the
fifty francs....'
'They are for getting food for her ladyship....'
'That does not matter to me!' Formosa yelled.
'As that is so, I obey,' said the old servant despairingly, and he
took out the other fifty-franc note. The Marquis snatched at it like
a thief, and put it quickly in his pocket.
'Your wife has money, too; get it from her,' Formosa went on again
coldly.
'Where could my wife get it?'
'She has some. Make her give it to you, and bring it here. Spare me
a scene. If your wife denies it, you can leave the house at once,
both of you.'
'No, my lord--no; I am going at once,' said the servant humbly.
But a scene followed in there; there was long, agitated talk between
the husband and wife. The woman did not wish to let her money be
carried off; she cried, wept, and sobbed. Silence at last, and then a
moaning.
Giovanni came in again, with his old face distorted, and bent more,
as if struck by paralysis. As he put another fifty francs down on
the desk, silently, his eyes red with the rare, burning tears of old
age, the Marquis was so struck by his appearance that he suddenly
relented, and said good-naturedly:
'It is three hundred francs, between yesterday evening and to-day.
This evening you will get it all.'
'How am I to get to-day's dinner?'
'I will see about it--at _four o'clock_,' the Marquis said vaguely.
'Her ladyship is ill; she will want a little soup this evening,' the
servant muttered.
Then, searching his pockets, with a miserly grimace, the Marquis di
Formosa gave three francs to the man, following them with a greedy
look.
There was a knock. Formosa started. It was Dr. Amati's answer. It
did not matter now if he said 'No.' But as he got the envelope in
his hands, he knew by touch that the money he wanted was there,
and, red with delight, he put the envelope in his pocket without
opening it. He went out now, at eight in the morning, as if carried
by an irresistible breath of wind; he went without turning back to
look at his sick child, his bare house, his weeping servants, who
had given him everything, the neighbour whose visits he had not
paid for, and yet dared to ask a loan of money from--he went off,
taking three hundred and fifty francs with him, to put it all on the
spirit's numbers, while he had left his poor old servants fasting,
and had haggled over a little soup for Bianca Maria. No one in the
house saw him again till mid-day. His daughter lay in bed, in a
burning fever, breathing with difficulty, often asking for something
to drink--nothing else. Margherita sat down by the bed, saying the
Rosary over to herself to pass the time. She often put her hand
on the invalid's forehead, alarmed at its being so hot. The sick
girl said nothing; she was sleeping, breathing uneasily. Suddenly,
opening her eyes, she said distinctly to Margherita:
'Call the doctor to me.'
'He won't be at home now.'
'When he comes back, then.' And she shut her eyes again.
The doctor only came at half-past four. He stood at the door of the
little room, scenting the feverish air.
'You might have called me before,' he said to Margherita roughly.
'Oh, sir, if I could tell you----'
He told her to hold her tongue. The invalid was looking at him, her
lovely, gentle eyes wide open, her hand held out to him. The strong
man, with the massive head, the good-natured, ugly face, got a look
of great tenderness before the fragile creature Affection welled up
from his heart. He felt at once that the fever would soon be over: it
was falling already, with the suddenness of malaria; but the thorn of
that miserable existence, trembling between life and death, victim
of a disease he could not find out the meaning of, would stay in his
heart.
'Now I am going to order a medicine for you,' he said gently to the
sick girl, holding her hand in his.
'No, do not,' she said softly.
'Don't you want any?'
'Listen, listen!' she said, pulling him to her to let him hear
better--'take me away!' She trembled as she said this, and Antonio,
paling suddenly, struck by an indescribable emotion, could not even
answer. 'Take me away!' she added humbly, as if imploring him.
'Yes, dear--dear,' he stammered; 'wherever you like--at once.'
'To the country--far off,' the poor thing whispered, 'where one
sees no ghosts in fever, where there are no shadows nor frightful
spectres.'
'What do you say?' said he, surprised.
'Nothing; take me away to the country, to greenness and peace with
your mother ... before God.'
'Oh dear, dear!' He could say nothing else, this great man, in the
supreme emotion, the sweetness of the idyll.
'Far away take me,' she still whispered, looking at him with great,
good eyes.
Alone, very sweetly and modestly, they spoke of love without using
words.
CHAPTER X
MAY AND SAN GENNARO'S MIRACLE
Gentle April opened all the flowers in the gardens, terraces, and
balconies in Naples; wherever there was a little earth warmed by the
sun, bedewed with rime, a flower sprang up. Common, uncultivated,
popular flowers, quite a humble flora without refinements, having
no exquisite colouring or scents, but bright, warm, bursting from
the earth with profuse vegetation and plump, full petals. April made
the big, sweet-smelling, blood-red roses blossom, and the pinks,
beloved of the people--white, pink, variegated--_written on_ as they
poetically call them, as if these stripes were mystic words; then
single and double stocks--white, yellow, red--that the town girls
love; they grow them on the damp north balconies of Foria Street; and
the mallow with green, perfumed leaves and little pink flowers; but
above all, everywhere, roses and pinks--magnificent, velvety, almost
arrogant roses, and rich, close pinks bursting their green envelope.
In the damp, dark squares of the low-lying quarters, from Santa Maria
la Nova to Porto Piazzetta, from San Giovanni Maggiore to Santi
Apostoli, in all these half-popular and cloistral, middle-class
and archæological quarters, rose-sellers wandered about; some
queer-looking hawkers with big baskets full of cut roses or slips,
the root wrapped in a cabbage-leaf, giving such pathetic drawn-out
cries that they reached the hearts of sentimental girls. The
rose-girl comes into one of these little squares that are always
soaking, dripping with dirty, black water, puts the basket on the
ground, and sings on in a melancholy, drawn-out voice: 'Roses,
lovely roses!' Then women's heads stick out of shops, balconies and
gateways, attracted by the long, sad chant, full of melancholy,
almost painful, voluptuousness.
Whoever has a few sous, or only one, buys these roses, the slips for
the balconies, or cut ones to put before the Virgin, and to scatter,
when faded, in the linen drawers. The girl, having sold part of her
merchandise, lifts the basket on her head, and goes off, taking up
her melancholy cry in the distance, dwelling on the roses' beauty.
That warm May-day all the seamstresses going errands, who found their
lovers by chance at the street corners, carried a rose in their
hands; all the common folk walking about in the narrow streets round
Forcella wore pinks on their white muslin camisoles; the children out
from school playing in the streets had flowers; even the servants had
flowers on their market-baskets, laid on the provisions wrapped in a
white towel.
Really, poetic sentiment was not the only reason that scattered
flowers everywhere--at the street corners, in women and children's
hands, on washing baskets, flour-sacks, fruit and tomatoes, in the
big frying shops at Purgatorio ad Arco, and the old-clothes shops
at Anticaglia; it was the quantity one could get for a penny: for
a smile, a word, and flowers are so precious to humble folk, who
love colour and are intoxicated with the slightest perfume. May-day!
In that noon-day sun many dull, gloomy houses of Trinità Maggiore,
Forcella, Tribunali, San Sebastiano, San Pietro a Maiella Streets,
besides the flowers in the balconies, had put bright-coloured flags,
old red damasks, yellow, bright, buttercup curtains, blue silk
hangings edged with gold and silver, and many coloured stuffs, kept
up in boxes for years, outside the railings for drapery.
The people that live in these tall, black, melancholy palaces, that
only get the sun on the terraces, are patricians of old clerical
families, very devout and pious, under the influence of all the great
old churches around: the Gesù Nuovo, Santa Chiara, San Domenico
Maggiore, San Giovanni Maggiore, Pietra Santa, the Sacramentiste,
the Girolomini, San Severo, Donna Regina; and finally the influence
of the old minster, the grand cathedral, so old, they say, it was
a temple of the Sun in Naples' pagan times--or, rather, its early
pagan times. There are rich, stern old middle-class families also
in the high, dark houses who keep up the customs of their citizen
forefathers, and have rigid monastic tendencies. These people, that
bright May-day, had taken out of camphored chests silk draperies they
had bought at the great factory Ferdinand of Bourbon set up at Terra
di Lavoro, or from San Leucio, with its bright, gay factories, for
weddings and baptisms held in their private chapels and oratories. A
pious folk, that inherits faith in its blood, they are born, live,
and die without doubting for a moment. They put all the repressed
strength of fancy into that grand mystic dream that rises from the
terrors of Hell to the supreme ecstasies of Paradise, having a horror
of Purgatory, as if the flesh felt its warm flames; and, dreaming
and dreaming on, they come to the last moment with eyes shut in
invincible hope.
Besides the May roses and the hedge of pinks blooming on the
balconies, in spite of want of sun, these pious folk had put out for
rejoicings this May-day their brocades, damasks, and watered silks.
May-day! The darkness of old Naples' streets was brightened up by
that general wealth of sweet-smelling flowers, with petals scattered
on the gray Vesuvian lava stones; and there being so many flowers
everywhere, it seemed the sun must be there too. Its presence was
felt up there, where the two narrow lines of tall palaces ended in a
clear streak of soft blue sky--spring's thin azure. It seemed as if a
white sun was down in these narrow openings, Tribunali and Forcella
Streets, because so many coloured stuffs, such vivid draperies, waved
from the balconies, windows, and terraces. In San Domenico Maggiore
Square, especially, the ancient De Sangro and Carigliano Palaces
had magnificent brocades; even San Severo Palace, that hides in a
dark lane its gloomy vestibule, was dazzling with ancient stuffs.
The fresh flowers in the shops, in the tiny balconies of poor houses
that come by turns in old Naples with magnates' palaces, on the flat
roofs and terraces, out in the air, between earth and heaven; the
flowers carried by women, children, humble working people, artisans,
beggars even--fresh flowers--formed the people's festival in honour
of Naples' protector. That was the explanation, too, of the silk
draperies, the gold and silver damasks, the tapestries; it was all
the tribute of the old Naples' nobility and burghers to Naples' great
patron.
May-day is lovely in Naples, from the air's caressing breath, from
the vivid streak of blue sky that manages to make the darkest,
most villainous streets gay. May-day is lovely, from the roses
that bloom on all sides, seeming to grow from women and children's
hands even, as well as all the common garden and field flowers. It
is miracle-working San Gennaro's day. It is on May-day his relics
are carried from the cathedral crypts--called _Succorpo_, or San
Gennaro's Treasury--to Santa Chiara Church, so that the saint may
deign, on the prayers of the people, to do the miracle of liquefying
his blood. The Bishop of Pozzuoli's head, which was cut off by the
executioner's axe, is set in an old gold mask. It bears the Bishop's
mitre, enriched with precious stones, and sparkles with a thousand
fires. The other relic is the coagulated blood, kept in a very
fine crystal phial: through the cold dark clot of blood a straw is
visible, going across it and immovable. It was gathered by pious folk
present at the Bishop's martyrdom, and religiously preserved. This is
the day, the fourth of the flowery, sweet-smelling May calends, that
these relics go, borne in triumphant procession, from the cathedral
to Santa Chiara Church.
Now, that year 188- it seemed as if the flower of faith grew more
vigorously in the people's heart--that devotion to the city's patron
burst forth more brightly; for since two in the afternoon the crowd
had been rushing along to old Naples, obstructing the narrow streets,
lanes and blind alleys. San Gennaro is profoundly popular in Naples,
much--a hundred thousand times--more than the real first Bishop of
Naples, Sant' Aspreno. But who remembers _him_? He is one of the
forgotten ones of the martyrology, which has its shipwrecks in the
sea of oblivion, such as happen in other seas.
Sant' Aspreno's little church stands in a lane in the Porto quarter,
and is underground; one goes down thirty steps, below the level of
the soil; it is merely an oratory, rude, dark, damp, and alarming,
where Sant' Aspreno's stick is adored, the pastoral staff of Naples'
first pastor. But who goes to Sant' Aspreno's? A few devout people
and some lovers of archæological things. San Gennaro, before all
the other saints--before Sant' Anna, the powerful old woman, or
San Giuseppe, the patron of a good death, next in order to the
Immaculate Virgin and the Eternal Father, who are worshipped in
Santa Chiara. San Gennaro has the devotion of all lowly Neapolitan
hearts to himself. Above all, he was a Neapolitan, born in that
black, evil-smelling quarter, Molo Piccolo, where it seems his
descendants still live, and take great pride in such an ancestor.
He came of Naples common folk, and his family consists of some old
working-women, who spend their time between work and prayer, carrying
out the _spiritual life_--trying, at least, to reach their great
ancestor's perfection in piety. Glorious San Gennaro, the Bishop who
suffered martyrdom! His head was cut off by infidels at Pozzuoli, on
a great marble stone, which is still preserved: it has a large scar,
and three streaks of blood running down; the severed head, being
cast into the sea, swam from Pozzuoli to Naples, the face keeping a
deathly pallor from loss of blood.
Nor from that day that the saint's head was picked up and preserved,
and the coagulated blood put into a phial, to this, has the saint
ever ceased to protect Naples. In the maritime suburb, on the
Maddalena Bridge, where the little stream Sebeto has to go under a
stone arch, the patron saint's statue in marble looks at Vesuvius
close at hand, and stands with two fingers raised in a commanding
attitude. By that gesture the saint has prevented lava from coming
into Naples during Vesuvius' tremendous eruptions; never will the
lava dare to pass that limit. San Gennaro, with uplifted finger,
says: '_Thou shalt go no further!_' From the most ancient times,
twice a year--in soft September, when his name-day occurs, and in
flowery May--San Gennaro does the miracle of liquefying his blood
before the people. Whilst here at Naples the blood in the phial
boils up, making the straw fixed in the cold, dry clot move about,
in Pozzuoli the blood on the marble block gets fresh and bright; and
whoso standing on the shore has the eyes of faith sees the saint's
livid, cut-off head floating in. The miracle is repeated twice every
year. When it is later than the usual hour, it is a bad sign; it
means a bad year: if he were not to do the miracle ... but the patron
saint could not forsake his faithful city. In eruptions, epidemics,
earthquakes, his hand is always raised to mitigate and overcome the
scourge. All the common people have their own legends about him,
besides the great legend of the miracles. The great saint was a
Naples man, poor, of the people; there has not been a king, a prince
or great lord who has visited San Gennaro's chapel without adding a
splendid gift to the patron's wealth. Naples' common folk, to cry up
their saint, go about saying proudly and tenderly, 'Even Vittorio!
Even Vittorio!' which means that the great King Victor Emmanuel also
brought his gift to the patron saint. In former days there were
knights of San Gennaro, and his treasury was guarded with hierarchal
pomp; the keys were under a solemn trust. There are no longer any
knights; indeed, the order is abolished, and the old patrician pomp
is rather diminished. But what of that? The saint is stronger than
ever, powerful, miracle-working, safe in the people's heart as in an
inviolable tabernacle.
That year the people's love for San Gennaro came out stronger than
ever, as if a new rush of faith had fortified their souls. At a
certain hour the traffic through Forcella and Tribunali was stopped;
all who were leaving Naples or arriving had to make a long round to
the station by Marina or Foria Road. The cabman told any annoyed fare
who asked the reason of the endless journey, 'It was San Gennaro';
and touched his hat with his whip in compliment to the saint. He
tried to hurry his horse, not for the sake of being obliging to his
fare, but that he himself, after putting up his cab or by taking his
stand with it at a street corner, might see San Gennaro's precious
blood pass. If all the little streets were crowded with people, all
the sumptuous balconies of the patricians' houses and the small,
mean balconies alongside were swarming, and in the wide street by
the cathedral the crowd was stupendous. That great road that goes
down rather too steeply from the hill to the sea from Foria Road
to Marina, which was the first surgical cut through old Naples
(an energetic cut, but not well carried out; rather ferocious and
ridiculous as regards architecture, but certainly sanitary--the Duomo
Road, which is the Toledo of old Naples), had then all the majesty of
its great days, when the popular flood alarms even those who count
over its numbers proudly. People stretched up to Gerolomini and
Pendino, above and below, in the two porticos to the right and left
of the cathedral; they stood on the broad flight of steps, climbed on
the gas-lamps, and even on the scaffolding that has been up so many
years for repairs to the west front; there were people there close
together, crushed in, choking in the open air, hanging on to iron
girders or a beam, and balancing themselves in an extraordinary way
on an insecure board. Sometimes a mother in the crowd held up her
child to let it get air, and it waved its legs and arms rejoicingly
for that throw into the gentle May air. The cathedral police vainly
tried to make way for the procession, which was already formed in the
church; but when they pushed back the crowd, it surged back again so
strongly it went up against the façade of the church.
Suddenly from under the black arch of the great wide-open door,
where some torches were burning in the background, solemn psalmody
was heard, and the head of the procession appeared amidst silence
and stillness in the crowd. Very, very slowly, with an almost
imperceptible motion, the Naples religious orders came forward in
advance. White and black monks, brown, shoeless, or in sandals, with
cape or shaven head, singing holy San Gennaro's lauds, with wandering
eyes, and holding bent torches, whose slender flame was hardly
visible, being swallowed up by the sunlight. A little boy followed to
pick up the great wax drops that fell from the torches. Dominicans,
Benedictines, Franciscans, Verginisti, missionaries, Jesuits, monks,
and priests in double file were flowing along, carried by the crowd,
not looking at it, gazing at a far-off point on the horizon or on
the ground. All mouths were open to sing the Latin psalms--severe,
stem mouths, like the psalms that came from them, which rose in waves
over the crowd's head; and involuntarily, as the religious orders
moved along imperceptibly down towards Foria, the devout who knew
the Divo Gennaro's Latin prayers joined in the solemn song, while
many of the crowd, excited by the air and light and others singing,
intoned a wordless psalmody, seized by a mystical fervour. From the
bottom of the Duomo Road the crowd, advancing with the procession,
went with open mouths; thousands of voices were solemnly singing,
the wide sky swallowing up the sound. But those that went on towards
Forcella did not leave the Duomo Road open: others took their place,
and pushed them on; then, a string of parish priests and the canons
of San Giovanni Maggiore having passed, there was a lively tumult
among the people, showing evident interest and pleasure. It was
caused by the slow filing-out of saints that go with Saint Gennaro,
to do him honour in his chapel--there are forty-six of them, either
whole statues or busts, in silver. These saints stand on litters,
carried on four men's shoulders. These porters disappear among the
crowd, so that the saint seems to go along miraculously by himself,
all sparkling, over the people's heads. Very, very slowly, as I said,
for the crowd was so dense, so congested, the statues sometimes
stood motionless, while the people gazed on them with suffused eyes
lingeringly, for Naples' devotion loves to feed at length on the
sight of their special protectors, who are shut up in the treasury
all the year, and only come out that day to bless the poor folk.
As every saint appeared under the dark vane of the great door and
went through the people on the way to Santa Chiara by Forcella, there
were shouts of joy. The first was Naples' other patron, one who comes
next to San Gennaro as a protector, Sant' Antonio. He carries a staff
with a tinkling bell on the top, and at his side is the head of the
animal he loved. The bell swayed as the saint moved, and rang out
cheerfully above the crowd, making them gay, so that they cried out:
'Sant' Antonio! Sant' Antonio!'
Excited, almost sobbing, Carmela, the cigar-girl, asked the
saint's protection. He, too, loved an ugly beast, as she loved
that ungrateful, hard-hearted Raffaele, called Farfariello. She
had been pushed right into the telegraph-office in Duomo Road, and
her strained face following his figure showed her hard life and
privations plainer than ever. She gazed on the saint's shining face,
he who had resisted so many temptations, imploring him to take that
love out of her heart, and free her from love's temptations, for it
made her gnawing poverty twice as hard.
'Sant' Antonio, Sant' Antonio!' the crowd shouted to the saint as he
went off.
'Sant' Antonio, deliver me!' Carmela sobbed out, not knowing she had
cried out, and that her neighbours were listening.
But one prays aloud in Naples, whether in the church or the street.
Now the Archangel Michael, the triumphant warrior, appeared, tall
and agile, in a splendid victorious pose, his dazzling corslet close
to his young figure, a helmet on the fair, triumphant head, lance in
hand to kill the dragon his foot presses down; Michael, mystic and
war-like, saint and hero. Seeing him appear so handsome and breathing
out triumph, with the devil wriggling vainly under his feet, the
devout had an artistic feeling in their enthusiasm: San Michele was
called on by thousands of voices.
Leaning against a column of the portico, to the right of the
cathedral, was the Marquis di Formosa. He took off his hat in humble
greeting of the brilliant Archangel, for whom he had great devotion;
that combination of cherubim and warrior pleased his violent
disposition and love of fighting so much. As the splendid, handsome
saint came forward, for ever victorious, trampling on the dragon,
the old Marquis prayed passionately and fervently that he might be
enabled to overcome the dragon of poverty, shame and death that came
against him every day; he implored great Michael, overthrower of the
devil, to lend him his holy lance to kill the monster that threatened
to devour him. San Michele went down the road to the sea also; he was
so handsome, flaming with glory in the noon-day light, that the three
syllables of his name were repeated over and over again, up and down,
as fire runs along a powder-train: 'Michele! Michele! Michele!'
But San Rocco made a diversion, the saviour of the plague-stricken,
the people's protector in all epidemics; he is dressed as a pilgrim,
with mantle, hood, and staff; he raises the tunic to show the bare
knee, with a sore carved on it, a sign of the plague. A faithful
little dog follows him--so faithful that people say: 'San Rocco
and his dog,' referring to inseparables. This strong friendship,
the saint's rather queer figure, in a short cloak, and the dog
following--this well-known story, excites affectionate hilarity among
the crowd. They look on San Rocco as a dear, indulgent friend they
can joke with, as he never gets in a rage.
'Is your knee cold, Santo Rocco?'
'Hi, hi, baldhead!'
'Lend me your great-coat, Santo Rocco!'
But the really devout were scandalized, and insisted on silence. The
lovely saint who was a sinner now appeared, the penitent Maddalena,
quivering over her bearers' heads, her fine hair falling down her
back, her eyes bedewed with petrified tears; behind her, curiously
enough, came another saintly sinner, Maria Egiziaca, consumed and
wasted by a not less ardent remorse than the Magdalene's. A sort of
dull shiver went through all those who saw the statues pass in their
midst--it was a quiet excitement that had no outburst. On the widest
low step of the flight, under the façade scaffolding, stood Filomena,
Carmela's unhappy sister, in blue skirt, gray silk bodice, a pink
ribbon round her neck, hair combed to the top of the head, cheeks
covered with rouge. She did not hear the insolent hints of those
around her. Pulling up her embroidered shawl, she prayed earnestly to
the two saints--sinners like herself, but still saints--in blessed
San Gennaro's name, to do her the grace of freeing her from her
disgraceful life, and she would offer up a solid silver heart.
Then there was a great flutter among the women in the balconies
and street. After San Giuseppe and Sant' Andrea Avellino, both
patrons of a _good death_, and therefore very dear to imaginative
Neapolitans, who have the greatest fear of death; after San Alfonso
di Liguori, who is called 'wry-neck,' with loving familiarity,
because his head leans to one shoulder; after San Vincenzio Ferrari,
who bears the flame of the Holy Ghost on his head, and an open book
of the law in his hands--when all these popular saints passed amid
shouts, smiles, and affectionate greetings, a fine shining saint,
as if newly out of the engraver's hands, with a round, good-natured
face and open lowered hands to rain down blessings, came out of the
cathedral. It was San Pasquale Baylon, the girls' patron saint--he
they make a _novena_ to to get a husband; he sends husbands, being an
accommodating, joyous saint: all the lassies know the figure, they
recognise him at once. From a balcony with a dressmaker's signboard,
'Madama Juliana,' Antonietta the blonde, with her friend Nannina, let
fall a rose, that whirled slowly down on to San Pasquale's arm. All
felt the devotion, the longing, in that act; quantities of roses were
thrown from the balconies and street at San Pasquale. 'Like you, just
the same, oh, blessed San Pasquale,' prayed the girls, referring to
the husband they wanted.
Now the procession hurried a little; the saints passed quicker, for
the impatience of the crowd in front of the cathedral and Duomo Road
got tremendous. Great shudders went through the people; all this
splendour of silver aureoles and faces, that singular walking over
people's heads, and going off towards Forcella, the continuous new
silvery apparitions in the great black vane of the cathedral door,
gave a nervous feeling even to quiet onlookers.
Cesare Fragalà and De Feo the medium were standing in a little
coffee-house doorway to see the procession, but the mild little
confectioner, who fled from his shop every day he could, to follow
the mysterious lanky medium, had lost the old youthful joyousness and
certainty about life--his face had a sickly, care-lined look now.
The medium, though he pumped out money every week from the whole
cabalistic group, and from others too, still wore his dirty torn
clothes, unstarched, frayed linen, and cravat curled up like a wick;
his complexion was still yellow with dull-red, scirrhus-like streaks,
as if he had barely recovered from a severe fever. The medium always
brought Cesare Fragalà along with him now; he insisted on keeping up
with De Feo's fantastic ideas, though his simple commercial mind did
not understand them; but he was furious, enraged at himself for his
want of comprehension. He accused his own disposition, as being too
lively, healthy, and stupid to be able to take in the spirituality
and refinements of him who had the luck to be visited by the spirits.
Now, Don Pasqualino had told all his devotees plainly enough that
a great fortune would come to them that May Saturday, sacred to
San Gennaro's precious blood. The gamblers listened greedily; for
many weeks, for ever so long, they had not won a half-penny. Except
Ninetto Costa, the stock-broker, who made a big profit off some
numbers he got from a wine merchant's lad who brought him an account
to settle, and Marzano, who got an _ambo_ of fifty francs from his
friend the cobbler's advice, no one else had got anything, in spite
of the inspired friar, or the medium, good spirits or bad, in spite
of all their prayers and magic.
Now, Don Pasqualino, who had sucked up hundreds of francs that winter
and spring, said that San Gennaro would certainly grant a favour
that first Saturday in May, and all the Cabalists believed him, and
were scattered here and there among the crowd in Duomo Road, having
agreed to meet at Vespers in Santa Chiara. But Cesare Fragalà clung
the harder to the medium, the deeper he plunged in the gambling
gulf; he had staked a lot that Saturday, and was determined to keep
an eye on him. Whenever a saint appeared, the medium turned up his
eyes, and prayed in a whisper in the midst of the crowd; Fragalà,
alongside of him, crossed himself distractedly. He stretched his
ears to hear all the medium said when each saint came out. Now Santa
Candida Brancaccio passed, one of the first Naples Christian martyrs,
a young woman looking up to heaven, and in her right hand she held a
long arrow, that of divine love. A voice called out from the crowd,
supposing the arrow to be a pen:
'Write a letter for me to the eternal Father, Santa Candida!'
'The saint is writing for you,' the medium at once chimed in, turning
to Fragalà.
'So we hope--that is my hope,' he humbly replied.
A great noise greeted San Biagio, another Bishop of Naples; he
is shown blessing the town. For two or three years diphtheria and
quinsy had kept the hearts of Naples' mothers in terror, especially
among the lower classes. San Biagio is just the saint for throat
complaints. When the silver saint came out, amidst clamour, fathers
and mothers held out their children to the holy Bishop to get his
blessing, that they might escape the dreadful scourge that killed so
many innocents.
'San Biase! San Biase!' screamed out the excited, sobbing mothers,
holding up their children.
Annarella too, Carmela's and unhappy Filomena's sister, held up
her two remaining sons, for the smallest was dead, after having
languished a long time. Ah! he would never again be waiting for her
on the cellar doorstep, patiently munching a bit of bread till she
came back from work. Poor little Peppinello--he was dead! He died of
wretchedness in a damp, smelly cellar, from bad, coarse food, with
only his little garments to cover him when asleep, always clinging to
his mother for warmth. Mother's little flower was dead, starved by
the _bonafficciata_, by that terrible lottery that ruined Gaetano,
that drove him to steal his children's bread. Annarella would never
be consoled for that death. The two left to her were well-behaved
and strong, but they were not her blonde, delicate flower. They had
dragged her there to see San Gennaro, and when the wretched woman saw
so many little ones held up she lifted hers too, weeping and sobbing,
thinking her dear flower had not been saved either by San Biase, San
Gennaro, or all the saints in Paradise. But as the day went on, the
people's emotion increased; everyone was given up to strong emotions
that grew stronger every moment from the influence of those around
them. In the excited eyes of girls, mothers, the poor, the unhappy,
the guilty, all who needed help, whether moral or material, that show
of saints got to be like a dream; they saw a shining vision pass,
with silvery, dazzling reflections; the names got lost, but the whole
procession of the blessed images was impressed on them.
The crowd, now confused and deafened, shaken by religious fervour,
did not recognise a group of saints of Naples' earliest ages--Sant'
Aspreno, San Severo, Sant' Eusebio, Sant' Agrippino, and Sant'
Attanasio, most antique saints, rather obscure and forgotten. A roar
like thunder greeted the five Franciscans who keep watch round San
Gennaro in the _succorpo_: San Francesco d'Assisi, Di Paolo, Di
Ceronimo, Caracciolo, and Borgia. Another shout when Sant' Anna,
the Virgin's mother, came out, to whom, say the people, no grace is
ever refused. No one troubled themselves much about San Domenico,
who invented the Rosary, as no one in the confusion of that noontide
hour recognised the proud Spanish monk, except the gloomy Finance
Secretary, Don Domenico Mayer. Being pushed by the crowd against a
wall, he kept his tall hat well over his eyes, and his arms were
crossed in a proud, gloomy way, his lips set in a sad, sceptical
smile. The saints went on and on, out of the cathedral's great dark
portal, towards Forcella, rather quicker now; the crowd swayed from
right to left, as if to free itself from the constraint of that close
attention.
The saints' procession was just about finishing, having lasted
nearly an hour, from the slowness of the going, and it ended with
San Gaetano Thiene, the angelic San Filippo Neri, with the holy
doctors Tommaso and Agostino, Santa Irene, Sant' Maria Maddalena di
Pazzi, the great Santa Teresa in ecstasy, all ardour and passion,
that magnificent saint of Avila, who died of divine love. When the
long file of saints finished, and the first of the cathedral canons
came out, there was a great movement among the waiting people. All
stretched their heads to see better, not to lose a tittle of the
religious show; but the noise was unrestrained in spite of this close
attention. At last the canons ended also, and finally, under the
great embroidered, gold-fringed canopy, appeared the chief pastor
of the Neapolitan Church, pallid, his face radiant with a deeply
compassionate expression, his lips moving in prayer. Eight gentlemen
held up the poles of the canopy, eight choir-boys swung censers of
smoking incense around him. The Archbishop, a Cardinal Prince of the
Church, walked slowly, alone, under the canopy, his eyes fixed on his
own clasped hands; and the whole crowd of women stretching out their
arms, men praying, children lisping San Gennaro's name, gazed not at
the canopy, gold vestments, or jewelled mitre, but affectionately,
enthusiastically at the Archbishop's waxen, clasped hands, weeping,
crying, asking favours and pity, gazing fixedly at what he pressed in
his hands, now trembling with sacred respect. To it were directed all
glances, all sighs, all prayers. The Cardinal Archbishop of Naples
held the phial of the precious blood.
* * * * *
In Santa Chiara's fine church, all white with stucco and loaded with
gilding like a very spacious royal hall, the crowd was waiting for
San Gennaro's miracle. It was not yet night, but thousands of wax
tapers, on the high altar and in the side chapels, especially on
those dedicated to the Virgin and Eternal Father, lighted up the
vast, lovely, graceful church. On the high altar, San Gennaro's head,
in a gemmed mitre, the face ornamented with gold, was placed on a
white napkin in a gold dish. The two phials of the precious blood
stood more in the middle, for the adoration of the faithful. All
around the high altar and behind the antique carved wood balustrade
that cuts off a large space with the altar from the rest of the
church, stood the forty-six silver statues that form a guard of
honour to San Gennaro's relics. The Cardinal Archbishop and the
canons were doing service at the high altar to Naples' holy patron,
that he might perform the miracle; behind the balustrade, to the side
of the high altar, stood a solitary, favoured, happy group of old men
and women, all in black, with white neckerchiefs and cravats, the
men uncovered, the women with a black veil over their hair, a group
watched, commented on, and envied by all the other devotees. They
were San Gennaro's relations; they alone had the right to go up to
the high altar to see the miracle at half a yard's distance.
Then came an immense crowd--in the great single nave of Santa
Chiara, in the side chapels, and even outside the two great doors,
on the steps and cloisters, where the latest arrivals stood on
tiptoe, dazzled by the thousands of tapers, trying to see something,
struggling vainly to push a step forward, for there was no more room
for anyone. All were agitated and disquieted, from the Cardinal
Archbishop kneeling in prayer before the altar to the humblest
little woman of the lower class; all were waiting till the heavenly
Gennaro carried out the miracle. Most fervently, with head bent over
the seat in front, with the trusting piety of a young heart, Bianca
Maria Cavalcanti was praying, as the miraculous moment drew near. She
prayed to San Gennaro, in the name of his precious blood, to give
peace to her father's heart, to give Amati faith; and sincerely, in
the great, wise, deep goodness of her heart, she asked nothing for
herself. It was enough for her that her father's sick, troubled,
tortured heart should have peace; that Antonio Amati's strong, hard
heart, besides its human love, should share the highest tenderness
of the Divine. Here in a short time one of the greatest miracles
of religion would be accomplished. Could not San Gennaro work a
miracle in their hearts, if she worshipped with her whole strength?
She prayed on, her cheeks flushed with an unwonted fire, a faint
blush over them, with a restrained force of mystic enthusiasm, a new
passion that had come into her frozen life and brightened it.
At the high altar, his face turned to heaven, breathing intense
faith, his voice trembling with overpowering emotion, the Cardinal
Archbishop was saying the Latin prayers in honour of Naples' high
protector. The whole crowd responded with a long thundering 'Amen!'
'Amen!' came from Santa Chiara's patrician nuns, hidden behind the
choir grating.
After the _Oremus_, a moment's silence followed; the fore-running
breath of great things seemed to pass over the praying people. San
Gennaro's relations at the high altar intoned the _Credo_ in Italian
impetuously, and the whole church took it up; that ended, there were
two minutes of uneasy waiting, to see if the miracle was beginning.
But a second, a third _Credo_ was soon taken up with vigour, as if
the whole people declared its belief, swore it on their conscience,
gave themselves over to faith in spirit and truth, impetuously. The
Cardinal Archbishop, kneeling, his hands covering his face, prayed
on in silence. The _Credo_ went on behind him, intoned at short
intervals by San Gennaro's relations, and carried on by the whole
people. A solemn note stood out here and there amid the general
rumble from a desolate heart, a sharp note struck off tortured
nerves.... 'I believe!' shouted the people, with a break in the voice
which seemed to denote a thousand prayers, vows, and hopes.
Ah! Luisella Fragalà, too, seated in a corner beside the melancholy
Signora Parascandolo, was a profound believer. Tears, caused by
her excited religious feelings, ran down her cheeks silently. She
had a dark presentiment of coming misfortune; she felt it, without
seeing or making out what it was, but sure that it was on its way
inexorably. She asked San Gennaro for strength, such as he had in
his frightful martyrdom, to bear the mysterious catastrophe that
was coming on her. Signora Parascandolo was saying the Creed too
with the people in a feeble voice; but in the almost frightened
pauses, while waiting for the imminent miracle, she, bereaved of
her children, begged San Gennaro to grant her a grace, to take her
from this land of exile, whence all her children were gone, leaving
her alone, groping in the cold and darkness. Rosy Agnesina's happy
mother, just like the unhappy mother who was wounded in the past, as
she was to be in the future, asked for strength to conquer or to die.
But at the fifteenth _Credo_ uneasiness began among the multitude;
the words of faith sounded shrilly, like a challenge flung to
unbelievers, but they had a quiver of secret dread; the pauses
between each _Credo_ got longer as the depression of waiting wore out
their nerves, then it was taken up again enthusiastically, as if the
renewed rush of feeling was terrible, as is the way with crowds.
The wildest in mystic enthusiasm were the old people at the high
altar; from behind them a flame ran from one heart to another,
carrying the devouring fire into soft indolent temperaments, even
to the hearts of sceptics, who trembled as if a rude revolution had
struck them and was clearing their eyes. At the twenty-first _Credo_
there was anguish in the expectation. All eyes went from the saint's
head on the gold dish to the clear crystal phial with its clot of
dark blood. The head, in its gemmed mitre and yellow gold mask,
sparkled with metallic, rather livid reflections; the blood was still
congealed, a stone that prayers could not break. At the twenty-second
_Credo_, intoned with a burst of rage, some shouts were heard,
calling out desperately:
'San Gennaro! San Gennaro! San Gennaro!'
The feverish prayers recited by the multitude in Santa Chiara, which
humbly, forcibly, tremblingly implored a miracle from Naples' holy
patron, were fervently said by two women kneeling in the crowd,
their elbows on straw seats, and faces hidden, absorbed soul and
body in the grace they implored. Donna Caterina, the clandestine
lottery keeper, and Donna Concetta, the money-lender, had taken a
vow together to San Gennaro for a bishop's heavy gold ring with a
large topaz, if he would do them the grace to end their sufferings:
either change their lovers, Ciccillo and Alfonso Jannacone's, hearts,
make them tolerant of the sisters' enterprises, or change their own
hearts, and free them from love of money. A ring, a magnificent
ring, to the miracle-working saint if he did that miracle for them;
so they both prayed in a whisper, saying their offer over again,
monotonously raising their imploring, tearful eyes to the high altar,
where the great mystery was imminent. But the people were in a panic
already from that delay; they felt a great terror that just that
year, after two centuries and a half, the saint, angry, perhaps,
with the sins of the people, should refuse to do the miracle that
is the proof of his benevolence. The Creed, taken up again after a
longer, deeper, and therefore more emotional pause of silence, had an
alarmed, almost angry, tone, and burst out with a despairing rush;
above all, the old women's voices at the high altar got angry and
frightened, trembling with sorrow and terror. In a silent pause,
suddenly one of them said, in a voice shaken by devout familiarity,
meek jocularity, and uncontrollable impatience:
'Old cross-patch, you want to keep us waiting, eh?'
'San Gennaro! San Gennaro! San Gennaro!' yelled the populace,
curiously excited.
Down there, at the bottom of the church, near the wall, where that
sweet, faded Madonna, said to be Giotti's, calms the eye with its
subdued colouring, Don Pasqualino stood in an attitude that was
all prayer; he was standing, but his head and shoulders were bent
forward obsequiously, and now and then, when he raised his head from
tiredness or inspiration to look at the gilded, painted sky in the
church, the whites of his eyes looked enormous, out of proportion,
and all colour had left his cheeks; his livid pallor went on
increasing. By a magnetic attraction, all those who believed in him
and his visions had gathered round him, all disturbed-looking, full
of repressed despair, that showed itself in some faces as if they
were deep down in sorrow's abyss, for that Saturday, too, had brought
them a great disappointment, two hours before, when the lottery
figures came out; all were bent by a gnawing remorse, for they
felt guilty towards others and themselves. The Marquis di Formosa
was bowed, his fine figure looked almost decrepit, for he felt the
shame of his disreputable life; he was losing everything, even his
daughter, in a slow agony of bad health and wretchedness. Cesare
Fragalà's commercial standing was always getting more compromised;
he felt his trading correspondents' coldness, his wife's evident low
spirits and secret dread, hoping always, but in vain, to set it all
right with a big haul. Ninetto Costa was pallid, but smiling, his
eyes hollow from sitting up at night and anxiety; he often thought of
the catastrophe, choosing in his mind between dishonourable flight
and the revolver shot that does not clear scores, but softens people.
Baron Lamarra was there, big, fat and flabby, cursing his ambitious
beggar-on-horseback dreams, shuddering at the idea of that promissory
note signed by himself and his wife. Marzano's gentle smile had
got rather idiotic, for he increased his frugality every week so
as to be able to gamble; he had given up snuff, smoking and wine,
had pawned his pension papers, and was now getting compromised in
queer affairs. Colaneri and Trifari were getting no more pupils; the
first especially felt himself suspected, discredited, fearing every
morning, as he entered the school, to be turned out by order of a
superior, or knocked down by the students. All, all, were attacked
by that Saturday-evening desolation, the black, terrible hour when
conscience alone speaks, loudly, sternly, inflexibly. Still, they
were in church, and the most indifferent and unbelieving murmured
some words of prayer; they still surrounded the medium, eagerly
looking at him as he prayed. One could see from that fascination that
he still had power over them, and judge from their eager glances that
once the momentary discouragement was past the passion would grow
again. Ah! but that hour in the midst of the crowd, breathing out
all its unhappiness in prayer, was as frightful for them, who were
guilty, as the fatal night of Gethsemane was for the great sinless
One.
Despairingly, all fixed their eyes on the high altar, where the
burning candles cast reflections on the saint's face.
'San Gennaro! San Gennaro!' the people shouted out as every _Credo_
ended.
A wind of terror that the miracle would not come blew over them and
burst out in their voices. San Gennaro's relatives were torn with
sorrow and rage; they had got to the thirty-fifth _Credo_, and the
time was going by with threatening slowness; they, feeling at once
offence at their holy ancestor's delay and despair at his anger,
called out to him things like this:
'San Gennaro, face of gold, don't keep us waiting any longer!'
'You are in a rage, eh? What have we done to you?'
'Old cross-patch, do the miracle for your people!'
The feeling of rage, tenderness, devotion, and agitation that
breathed in these reproaches and pious invocations cannot be
expressed. The legend says San Gennaro likes to be pressed, and does
not get offended at the remarks his relatives and the populace make
to him, and the people's emotion was such that at the thirty-eighth
_Credo_ each sentence of the prayer was said desperately, as if every
word was dragged out by overpowering agony; cries burst out far back:
'Green face!'
'Ugly yellow face!'
'Not much of a saint!'
'Do this miracle--do it!'
The thirty-eighth _Credo_ was clamorous; everyone said it from one
end of the church to the other: the Cardinal, the priests, men,
women, and children, everyone was seized by a mystical rage. All of
a sudden, in the great silent pause that followed the prayer, the
Archbishop turned to the people; his face, irradiated by an almost
divine light, seemed transfigured; his uplifted hands displayed the
phial. The precious blood in its thin crystal covering was bubbling
up. What a shout! The old church's foundations seemed shaken by it;
the echoes were so loud and long that passers-by in neighbouring
streets were alarmed; the sonorous bells in the tower seemed to
quiver of themselves; the weeping--the sob of a whole kneeling
people, cast down on the ground, kissing the cold marble, holding out
their arms, quivering with the vision of the blood--was endless.
At the high altar the old relatives lay as if they were dead; one
single powerful force bent the whole crowd; there was one lament,
sob, prayer; in that long moment everyone mentioned with warm tears
and shaking voice his own sorrow and need. At the high altar the
Archbishop and clergy now stood up, and sang the anthem in full tones
above the organ notes.
CHAPTER XI
AN IDYLL AND MADNESS
Dr. Antonio Amati was deeply in love with Bianca Maria Cavalcanti.
That rugged heart that had got like iron in its conflict with
science, men and things, that had had to drink up all its tears
again, and look on calmly at all kinds of wretchedness--that iron
heart which had a great deal of coldness in its simplicity, which,
as regards sentiment, was virginal, childishly pure, had opened
out slowly, almost timidly, to love. At first.... How had it been
at first? The habit of seeing the white, melancholy figure at the
balcony windows every day, noticing that gentle, slender apparition
among the shadows of the court in these melancholy surroundings. At
first it had been nothing but habit, which is often the beginning
of love; it creates, strengthens, and makes it invincible. Then
came pity, a lively source of tenderness--a source that often hides
underground, disappears, seems lost; but, later on, further on, it
burst forth gaily, flowing inexhaustibly.
While Bianca Maria's fainting-fit was going on, from the
Sacramentiste parlour to her bare room in the Rossi Palace, her
transparent face, shut eyelids with their violet shadows, lips as
pale as the tender pink of a rose, made him fear more than once
she was dead. He often saw that youthful figure again in his mind
in a death-like torpor; he saw her as if dead. Pity twined itself
round his heart on recalling the sorrowful expression that often
crossed the girl's face, as if a terrible secret, a physical and
moral torture, went through her soul and nerves; pity led him to
wish to save her from her suffering. The day the idea flashed into
the great doctor's mind to snatch the pure creature from death,
sickness, and unhappiness, whenever his life-saving instinct warned
him the struggle was beginning, when he felt the appeal to his
intuitive perception of life, to his energy and courage, when his
whole strength was summoned up to save Bianca Maria, he knew the
word was said that not only the scientist, the man, wished the girl
health and happiness, but that the lover was shaking at the idea of
losing her. The slight touch of the thin hand, now frozen as if it
had no life, then burning with fever, sent flames of passion to his
brain. The word was spoken with a lad's simple tenderness and a man's
strong resolution, swaying from the purest idyll to violent dramatic
possibilities. He was in love. Why not? For one day, one single
moment, he had tried to conquer himself, from the natural egotism of
a man who has fought and triumphed alone; but accustomed to accept
all his responsibilities in life to the utmost, he bowed to love.
Why not? He never had loved, for passing attractions towards women,
short caprices, leave no trace in the heart. Being children of the
imagination, born of a hard, impetuous life, they come back sometimes
like a dream, but as indefinite and undecided as dreams; the heart is
not concerned.
Dr. Amati, a lonely man, of strong brain and heart, had gained his
fortune and reputation at a bound, and up to thirty-eight he wished
to know no other joy but helping men, no ease but satisfied ambition.
Now he was so completely in love that everything seemed to lose its
colour and taste if Bianca Maria was not present, if he did not hear
her feeble, sensitive voice.
In love. Why not? In the humblest, meanest, most obscure lives,
that warm, bright hour comes--an hour of such vast capacity that
it includes all time and space. So, in lives outwardly successful,
when the pomp of earthly things opens out, the warm, deep hour
comes, inward and intense; all is gathered up in the heart, the soul
trembles with passionate strength. Being intensely in love, with
all the greater force and violence from any expression of feeling
having been rare in past years, a heart like Antonio Amati's gathers
up all the friendships missed or neglected: affection for relatives
and congenial people; poetic admiration for women that was kept
down, never shown, conquered sometimes at the very beginning, and
almost always quickly forgotten; all the thousand attachments, petty
and great, the human heart fritters itself away on. He was in love
knowingly, willingly, tasting all the sweetness of this late fruit
of his soul. He found in his retarded passion the thousand and one
characteristics and feelings of the love affairs and attachments he
had never had. He was done with the great renunciation; he was in
love knowingly.
Bianca Maria was in love without knowing it. She was simple and
right-minded; she had lived a solitary life, with no conflicts,
thinking and praying a great deal; her soul was refined by solitary
musing, not by the rough, sore pounding down of a struggling life.
From her mother, who had led a sad life, she got a keen, but silent,
sensitiveness; from her father she had taken a headstrong loyalty,
pride without haughtiness, and uncalculating generosity that delights
in giving without interested motives. Over it all was a deep, inbred
faith that seemed to be rooted in her, the food of her spiritual
life, just as the lamps lighted before the saints are fed on the
purest oil, and draw the prayers of the faithful from a distance by
their constant, feeble light. She loved unconsciously. Who could have
told her anything about it? Her mother had passed away seven or eight
years before from a lingering, fatal illness, suffering no pain or
sharp spasms; but her heart was pierced with agony for her almost
mad husband, who was hacking down the poor feeble stem of the House
of Cavalcanti and throwing its branches into an abyss--agony for the
poor daughter she left behind to her mad father's guidance, who was
going forward to wretchedness, perhaps dishonour.
Bianca Maria remembered; she recalled her mother's face when she
was dying, the colour of clay from agonizing thoughts, inconsolable
at having to die so soon. These ineffaceable recollections left
her grave, made her youth austere, and took away from her all the
longings, ambitions, and coquettishness of her age. What did she
know of love? Nothing. She lived in a dull way, with no enjoyments,
beside a father she respected; but alarmed by his fatal passion,
she felt threatened by something obscure, but imminent, and already
pinched by poverty, she took to heart the necessary doleful shifts
to keep up appearances. She felt an unknown danger in herself like
the seeds of death; and now, a wise, strong, good man--an ark of
safety in danger, formed to overcome obstacles, to give help; a giver
out of consolation, whose presence and voice brought security and
hope, strong to lean against; a name never associated with anything
foolish; a vanquisher of sickness, pure of any stain--this man held
out his hand to save her. Well, she took his hand; it was natural;
she could not think of doing anything else but take it and love him.
Unconsciously she loved him, because she must. From her age,
temperament, and surroundings, her whole existence, she felt that
innocent sort of love that weak natures, beaten down by tempests,
have for strong ones.
When Bianca Maria was alone in the dreary suite of rooms where the
sparse furniture had got to have a still older, more wretched look,
with these old servants always in low spirits, busied in hiding their
poverty, in giving it an air of respectable ease, she felt chilled to
the heart; she seemed to be old, poor, and neglected like the house
and furniture, doomed to languish on in want of everything. And when
her father came in, uneasy always, led by his violent passions, his
one idea, credulous over vain dreams, giving in to mystic alarms,
calling around him a terrifying world of phantoms, she lost her
tranquillity at once; her brain whirled, and she saw curious ghostly
things with fatal effects. She could not get rid of the nightmare;
she felt so weak, so unfit to defend herself from the assaults of
that cabalistic madness; she shook all over from the jar to her
nerves, from the fever going up to the brain and making it reel.
She always felt very wretched when she was alone or with her father;
helpless, without a guide, knocked about by a rushing wind, drawn
in by a whirlpool. But if Antonio Amati showed his manly face, his
genial strength; if she heard his firm, rather rough voice, that was
smooth for her; if his hand just touched hers, so that she felt a
magnetic influence, warmth, youthful vivacity, go through her nerves,
she knew she was guided, protected, started on the way of life and
happiness. The black clouds moved off with one breath; she saw the
blue sky; the fever grew milder, went off altogether, and the sombre
ghosts, the fears that blanched her lips, went off at the same time;
she quieted down as if a heavenly benediction enfolded her in its
sphere of help. She felt like a child again when he was there: Amati
was the firmest, safest, strongest.
So she loved him, innocently, unconsciously. This kind of love allows
of great humility, great tenderness; it was pure and fervent, it
refreshed her. With their different ground-work, the two sorts of
love understood each other, melted into and completed one another.
That spiritual harmony that is the soul's finest, but also rarest and
shortest, experience began the first day she from her dull balcony,
he from his stern study, that saw so much agony, beheld each other.
Wherever the two minds, feelings, personalities met, the harmony got
greater. When she raised her great thoughtful eyes to his, asking in
all simplicity for help and affection, he felt his heart bound with a
longing for sacrifice. They understood each other perfectly without
speaking.
He came from the land, from a small, out-of-the-way provincial town
that had little communication with Naples; he had made his name and
fortune by struggling with life and death, with men's indifference
and hatred, thus getting a formidable idea of his own powers, and
only believing in himself. He had plebeian blood and a powerful mind;
none of the refinement that comes from breeding and surroundings, the
triumph of ideals.
How different from her! She was the daughter of a noble house,
refined by instinct, breeding, and surroundings; used to live in
meditation and prayer, without a particle of self-reliance to stand
out against the ruin of her family, or withstand her father's ruling
passion, to save her name or herself. She lived amid privations and
discomforts; she had set out too early on the sorrowful stages of the
Via Crucis; an unhappy future was before her. How different and far
off these two were!
Still, they understood each other, as the secret, mysterious law
of love decrees. It mingles everything--feelings, tradition,
origin; puts force next to weakness, and binds two persons together
irrevocably by their very differences. She did not consider she
lowered herself by loving the obscure Southern peasant become a
great doctor; he did not consider he stooped to this decaying
family, impoverished in blood, means, and courage. The two souls
that had to love one another had set out far apart, had had to run
through infinite spiritual space to meet, know, join together. It is
Plato's grand love theory, that only fools and heartless folk dare
to laugh at; the grand theory of falling in love, once more, after
a million instances, was to be realized. Did it not seem arranged
purposely, that this unknown, common man should reach to fame and
riches by his own efforts, getting to know science and life so that
he could console the high-born girl's cold, faded, sorrowful youth,
languishing in solitude and secret poverty?
When the serving Sister in the Sacramentiste convent ran from the
chilly parlour, where Bianca Maria fell in a faint, to the hospital
for a doctor, and obstinately insisted Antonio Amati should come to
help the invalid, that was the hour of the decisive meeting. The icy,
bloodless hands were at last enfolded in the doctor's strong, healthy
ones; once more the wonderful attraction by which loving souls
overcome time, space, a thousand obstacles, this attraction--unlucky
he who has not felt its power--brought together those who were bound
to be united. How could it be these two were not to understand
each other, if only Antonio Amati could, by his knowledge, save
Bianca Maria from the disease sapping her vital forces, if only he
could give her health, riches, and happiness? How not come to an
understanding if that innocent gentleness, that mild poesy, that
source of every affection, if all that was wanting in Antonio Amati's
laborious, stern life, could only reach him through Bianca Maria's
slight, modest personality?
He was strength, with a serene, just conscience; she was goodness,
all unconscious tenderness and mercy. That strength and that goodness
called to each other to unite. They were obeying destiny's order
to join, so that love should create once more a fine miracle of
harmony. When she _had_ to will something, she lifted her eyes to her
lover's face and drank in will power. When he looked at her he felt
the stretched cords of his energy slacken and the great flower of
benignity blossom in his heart.
But it was destined that all Amati's experiences in life were to
be conflicts, that every reward men of talent and energy get in
this life should only be gained by him after a fierce struggle.
With love it was the same. A serious obstacle arose between him and
Bianca Maria Cavalcanti. It was her father, the Marquis. The first
time Amati saw the proud, deluded, violent man, he felt a painful
suspicion rise in his mind. He divined dull hostility in Formosa.
Perhaps birth, past and present conditions, divided them, the
opposite ideas they had of life and its responsibilities. Perhaps the
one that came from the earth, bringing forth good like her, scorned
this falling away in health, fortune, and respectability. Perhaps
he who lived by the arrogant rules of a life given up to luxury,
pleasure, and generosity, despised the obstinate, unpolished worker,
sparing in pleasures, unfavourable to them, too hard on himself and
on others. Perhaps the one guessed the other's scorn, and felt
miles apart, with such different ideas that they could never meet.
Perhaps the reason of the mutual antipathy, of Amati's coldness and
Formosa's hostility, was more inward, deeper, more mysterious. It may
be neither dared confess it to himself. In short, it was suspicion,
distrust, an unconscious hostility. Indeed, Amati saw in Carlo
Cavalcanti the unknown danger that might wreck Bianca Maria's reason
and life. It was vaguely, but obstinately, without well knowing why
or wherefore; but he felt the danger was there. And Carlo Cavalcanti
felt Antonio Amati was his judge--his enemy, I would almost say.
Twice, when the doctor was present at Bianca Maria's fainting-fit and
at the attack of fever, that made her delirious a day and a night,
he said harsh things to the Marquis di Formosa about his daughter's
health. The old man listened, quivering with rage, fretting inwardly.
He submitted to this deliverer from a dark hour, but he looked
haughtily at him, and shrugged his shoulders when he threatened that
the girl would die. By what blindness did he always refuse to take
Bianca Maria away from that cold, mean house, where all her youthful
strength was languishing? At any rate, he obstinately refused,
quivering with emotion every time the doctor touched on the subject.
It seemed to be from affection, pride, and nervousness, as if he knew
what the right remedy was, and could not, would not, make use of it.
Full of doubt, the doctor got always nearer to something shady, but
he checked himself, fearing to wound certain susceptibilities. The
Marquis was poor: how could he change houses? It was natural for him
to redden with fright and melancholy when he was told his daughter
was fading away to a fatal ending, to frown with offended pride when
offers of service were made. Still, his pride had had to give way
that Saturday morning he asked Amati for a loan, saying he would give
it back during the day. His pride had had to go altogether several
other times, always on Saturday, with an urgent note in a large,
shaky hand asking for money--more money out of Amati's purse, always
promising to give it back the same day, always failing to do so.
He blushed a little as he wrote, his old head bent to weep over his
lost dignity as an old man and a gentleman; but his passion was so
strong he would have made money out of anything. When the doctor
sent him the money in an envelope, and then another sheet of paper,
so that the servant should not notice what it was, the Marquis
felt mortified, and opened the envelope roughly with a sharp tear,
and the blood went to his head. Amati never wrote a reply, but he
never refused. In the evening, when father and daughter were in the
drawing-room, she working at her fine lace, he going up and down
the room to quiet his excited nerves, the doctor would come in. The
Marquis could hardly restrain his annoyance, but went forward to meet
his visitor with sham heartiness, his face pale. They greeted one
another in an embarrassed way, while Bianca Maria's face sparkled.
In spite of service rendered, no cordiality grew up between them.
They were cold, and took stock of each other, feeling they were
enemies. When the doctor, from his native audacity, and that which
love gave him, went to sit opposite Bianca Maria and asked her about
her health, when they gazed in each other's eyes, the Marquis was
troubled, an angry quiver came into his voice. He was the obstacle.
It was in vain every time his ruling passion obliged him to ask Amati
for money that Amati gave it without hesitation, more delicately each
time. It was lowering all the same. This queer intimacy could not
rid them of suspicion, want of confidence, antipathy. Perhaps these
loans, asked with a lying excuse, lying promises, only dug that gulf
of sorrow, shame, and humiliation that is between him who asks and
him who gives. Formosa's great dream now was to get money--a lot of
money, so as to lead a grand life, after throwing the doctor's sous
in his face and turning him out. He ended by hating him for these
benefits it was so hard to ask for, that his wretched passion drove
him to take.
Antonio Amati understood; he knew Formosa stood in the way.
Naturally, he knew what was the greedy mouth that swallowed up all
the old man's money, and some that was not his; he knew the fever
that destroyed his gentlemanly feeling, that the wretchedness was
the result of sin; he knew an irresistible force obliged him to ask
for these loans. His only wish was that Bianca Maria should not
suffer, that she should get out of these sad, poverty-stricken, mad
surroundings, ever since the time she had, in a low state of health,
bodily and mentally, induced by fever, told him she loved him and
begged him to take her away. He renewed the offer of his country
house, where his mother was, more than once. She shook her head,
smiled sadly, and said nothing. One evening when she was suffering
very much, choking with heat in that flat, airless in summer, icy
in winter, he made the offer to Formosa, bringing it out naturally,
trying to be cordial. Formosa thought it over a moment. His daughter
looked anxiously at him, awaiting his answer.
'It is impossible,' said the Marquis di Formosa concisely.
'Why so?' the doctor asked boldly.
'Just because I choose,' the old man retorted obstinately.
'And you, my lady; what do you say?'
The doctor looked earnestly at her, to give her the strength to
rebel. The poor girl's eyelids fluttered once or twice. She looked at
her father, then said:
'As my father says, it is impossible.'
He would have liked to remind her then of the sweet words she said
to him one day, to take her out of that pit, to carry her far off to
the sunny, green country; but he noticed a sudden coldness in her
cast down eyes and stern mouth; he felt her soul was escaping from
him. He understood he had come into conflict with filial obedience
of that deep, unshakable, almost hierarchical kind one meets with in
the upper classes, where paternal authority is blindly respected and
family reigns absolute. Rage rose in the doctor's heart. He fretted
against the obstacle, seeing the power of love crumble in a moment
before a simpler but older feeling or instinct, an affection which,
besides the ties of blood, had tradition and life in common for it
also. He did not say a word, nor cast a reproving glance, as he saw
it was a superior power rising against him that for twenty years had
held the girl's heart. Love seemed suddenly to have lost its power,
as at a word from her father she had been able to give up the idyll
she had dreamt over so long in her empty room.
After a little the doctor went away, cold, frozen, like the father
and daughter, who looked like ghosts in that great deserted house. He
went off with his first love disappointment, which is the bitterest,
quivering with rage and grief. When he was alone in his handsome,
solitary house, he vainly tried to amuse himself by reading a
scientific review. He was wounded in his love and in his self-love.
Like a love-lorn youth, to cheat that bitterness and give a vent
to his excitement, he sat down to write a long, incoherent letter
full of love and rage. But when he finished it he calmed down. It
seemed unjust to accuse Bianca Maria of indifference and cruelty.
On reading it over, he thought it ridiculous. He was a man, not a
boy; he had white hairs; he ought not to give himself over to boyish
outbursts.
'I will tear up the letter,' he said. But he afterwards felt
discouraged. The first, purest flower of his poetic love was cut off;
the idyll had vanished; the whole future could only be a tragedy.
Yes, the combat between Antonio Amati and Carlo Cavalcanti was secret
but obstinate, subtle but very acute. The old man had great power
over his daughter; one might say he bent her will to his with an
imperious, fascinating glance. He did not wish anyone else should
get power over her; he feared to lose his influence. From paternal
self-love, that exaggerated jealousy that hates from the beginning
those who love their children, or some other mysterious reason,
he set himself between his daughter and Antonio Amati when he saw
the latter's sway might increase. When they were alone they never
mentioned him--on her part out of obedience, for she always waited
for her father to speak first, and he never named the doctor. The
maiden was sensitive about this reserve, and got more and more
self-contained, already seeing the first sad symptoms of the struggle.
Amati had written her just one letter; she treasured it and read it
over and over, because it breathed of honesty, peace, strength, which
were altogether wanting in her wretched, disturbed life, with its
saddening past, hurrying on to a dark future. She bent her head, even
now feeling that love could not save her, for she seemed tied by a
sad fatality, by a charm cast over her life. When Antonio Amati came
back in the evening, determined not to yield to this extraordinary
tyranny of the father's, she looked up timidly at them; the false
cordiality and vivacity with which the men greeted each other
encouraged her. A pink colour came to her pale cheeks; but if her
father frowned or the doctor's voice got hard she became pale and
alarmed again. Her father had carefully hidden that he got pecuniary
help from the doctor; he was ashamed to confess this loss of dignity
his ruling passion had dragged him into. The good, pale maiden took
courage when she saw the healthy, hearty hand held out to her to pull
her out of her unhealthy surroundings; but when her father abruptly,
roughly put away that hand, she trembled; she did not ask why. Her
mother had pined away too resignedly for her to dare to rebel. Only
she just lived from day to day without going into the disagreements
between her father and Amati, letting herself go to the sweetness
of the new feeling, trying to escape from her bitter presentiments.
But he, a man of science and much given to observation, finding
her father's conduct incomprehensible, tried to curb himself so as
to tear the secret out of Formosa's heart. He knew the gambling
fever devoured him. Sometimes, when he was with Bianca Maria in the
drawing-room, two or three of the Cabalist group would come in to ask
for the Marquis. He got rather embarrassed. Once he shut himself up
in his study with them; voices reached them from there, deadened and
indistinct. Twice he went out with them, the doctor's presence making
him impatient and nervous.
'Who are those people?' the doctor asked.
'They are friends,' she said, turning away her head.
'Are they yours?'
'No; my father's.'
She let him see she did not wish to speak about them, so he held his
tongue. Another time, one Friday evening, Don Pasqualino De Feo came
in, with his sickly look and torn, dirty clothes. At once the doctor
remembered he had seen him. Yes, at the hospital, where he arrived
black and blue, knocked about as if he had got a severe licking; and
he remembered his fantastic talk. While the medium was whispering
with the Marquis in a window recess, the doctor asked Bianca quietly:
'Is he a friend, too?' But he noticed she got so pale, her eyes so
frightened, crushed by fear of something he knew nothing about,
that he said no more. He remembered that, on recovering from her
long faint, she had tried to send the medium out of the house. 'You
dislike him, don't you?'
'No, no,' said she. 'I am foolish.'
She was afraid Amati would interrupt her father's conversation; but
finding their talk prevented, they got up to go away. The medium went
past with his eyes down, but Amati called out to him:
'You have got over that licking, De Feo?'
He started, rubbed his forehead, and answered, without looking at the
doctor:
'I have had favour from him who sent me the misfortune.'
'From whom?' asked the doctor, with a mocking laugh.
The medium said nothing. Formosa got flushed. His eyes sparkled as he
answered, in a shaky voice:
'From the spirit.'
'What spirit?' said the doctor jokingly.
'Caracò, the spirit that helps Don Pasqualino,' the Marquis said
emphatically.
'Do you believe that, my lord?' Amati retorted, casting on him a
scrutinizing glance.
'It is as clear as light,' answered the noble, raising his eyes to
heaven ecstatically.
'And you, my lady, do you believe it?' the doctor asked Bianca,
examining her face.
She was just going to answer she did not believe, that she was afraid
to believe, when a wild look from her father froze the words on her
lips. One saw the effort she made to send back a sorrowful cry.
Vaguely she waved her hand, and said:
'I know nothing about it.'
The medium cast an oblique glance at the doctor. For the first time
an enraged look came over his face and mingled with his mysterious
humility. He twisted his neck, as if a hard bone was choking him.
He pulled the Marquis's sleeve in an underhand way to get him to
go away; but by Amati's words and grin had he found out his utter
incredulity, and, like all deluded folk, he felt his faith in the
aiding spirit increased doubly, together with a great desire to
convince Amati.
'You don't believe in the spirit, doctor?'
'No,' said the latter dryly.
'Neither in good nor bad spirits?'
'In neither.'
'Why?'
'Because there are no such things.'
'Who told you so?'
'Science and facts are enough, it seems to me,' the doctor said
plainly.
'Science is sacrilege,' shouted the Marquis, getting in a rage. 'It
has been proved spirits do exist; I can prove it to you.'
'It is no use; I would not believe you'--with a slight smile.
'There are spirits; the so-called incredulous deny their existence
in bad faith--yes, because they don't know the facts, and then say
they are false; because they see nothing, their eyes being blinded by
scepticism, they say there is nothing--insincerely altogether.'
The doctor smiled at his excitement, but, glancing at Bianca Maria,
he saw she was in torment; he guessed that behind this discussion was
the secret of the hostility. Being accustomed to sick and excited
people's outbursts, he examined the Marquis with a doctor's eye,
following the violent stages of his excitement.
'Quite insincere--quite!' the Marquis screamed out, going up and down
the room, speaking to himself. 'Hundreds of honest men, scientists,
gentlemen, ladies, have seen, touched, spoken with the spirits,
held important interviews with them; there are printed books, thick
volumes, about the very thing you deny totally. What do you think
this help from the spirits is?'
He stopped in front of Amati to ask him the question. Although the
doctor did not want to make him angrier by contradiction, the demand
was too direct not to answer it. He glanced at the Lady Bianca, and
saw in her face such secret anxiety to know the truth, and such
agitation, he brought it out straight:
'I believe it is an imposture.'
The medium cast up his eyes, swimming in tears. Bianca Maria's face
got serene, but Formosa's voice hissed with rage:
'Then, you think me a fool?'
'No; but your soul is too loyal and generous not to be easily
cheated.'
'Nonsense!' the Marquis called out, quivering--'nonsense! You can't
get out of it; Don Pasqualino is a cheat, and I am a donkey.'
'I deny the second part,' said the doctor dryly.
'But you agree to the first?'
'Yes, I do,' said the doctor boldly.
'How do you prove it?'
'There is no need to prove it; I answer because you question me.
Besides, now I remember, Don Pasqualino was beaten by two gamblers,
enraged because they did not get the right lottery numbers. He told
you it was the spirit Caracò.'
'It was all a pretence, the gamblers beating him, so as to keep the
spirit's secret.'
'But the two that assaulted him were arrested and confronted with
him at the hospital; they had to spend a month in prison.'
'Is that true, Don Pasqualino?' the Marquis asked severely.
The medium looked distressed, as if it were impossible for him to
defend himself against an unjust accusation. But the doctor was
offended at that request for confirmation.
'My lord,' he said solemnly, 'I am too serious a man and take too
little interest to care to go into the business with that fellow. If
you have any esteem for me, I beg you to spare me further discussion.'
'All right--very good,' the Marquis said at once, his proud spirit
being open to any appeal to good feeling. 'Let us have no more of it;
discussions between sceptics and believers can only be unpleasant.
Let us go away, Don Pasqualino; perhaps the doctor will do you
justice some day. Let us go; I see Bianca Maria is pained also.
You must convince the doctor, my dear,' the father added rather
maliciously.
'In what way is she to do that?' asked he, astonished.
'She will tell you,' Formosa replied, grinning; and on getting a
dismayed look from his daughter, he added: 'Tell him--tell him what
you know; I allow you, Bianca. Perhaps he will believe you. You
are harmless; you have no interest in cheating; you are not a sham
apostle. Tell him all about it; perhaps you will convince him.'
Resolutely he put on his hat and took the medium's arm, as if to
give him a proof of affectionate confidence after the way the doctor
had abused him. The old noble, Guido Cavalcanti's descendant, with
a lineage of six centuries, put his arm into that mean cheat's, who
had been shown up as a liar a few minutes before. But who noticed
that act that showed Formosa had again shipwrecked his dignity? The
two were out of the house already. Bianca Maria and the doctor stood
silently; the whole drama of their love seemed to ripen in that
silence. With unscrupulous cunning, telling his daughter to speak,
let the doctor know all, leaving them alone with that secret between
them, the Marquis took his revenge for Amati's scepticism and his
daughter's passiveness. He gaily and cruelly lighted the match of a
mine, and then went off just as it was catching fire, so that all
love's edifice should come down.
'Well, what have you to tell me?' said the doctor at last, keen to
know the truth.
'What is it?' she said faintly, coming out of her sad musing.
'Have you not something to tell me? Did your father not
advise--almost order you to do so?'
She started. Amati spoke sharply; she had never heard him speak so.
She was offended, and became reserved.
'I know nothing,' she said very low. 'I have nothing to tell you.'
He bit his lip angrily. What evil influence had induced him to come
between father and daughter in these queer, mad surroundings, all
sickness, wretchedness, and vice? What was he doing, with his rough
honesty, his vulgar integrity, in that half insane, poverty-struck
life? What bonds, what perplexities, was he not making for his own
heart, that up to then had kept pure and unmoved? The decisive hour
had come. He must break it off sharply if he wanted to escape the
fetters that smothered all his old instincts. He was going to make an
end of these romantic complications--that subtle, annoying tragedy;
his life was a plain one. He got up determinedly, saying:
'Good-bye!'
She rose too. She understood that her father first, then she, had
exhausted the lion's patience. Feebly she asked:
'You will come to-morrow?'
'No, I will not.'
'Some other day, then?'
'No.'
'Some other day when you are not busy?'
'No.'
The three 'No's' were said very decidedly. Bianca Maria gave a
shiver. He was going away; he would never come back. He was right.
He was a strong, serious man, devoted to his work--a work of love
and saving others. He was getting involved in a falling away from
reason and dignity in the society of people he was helping and being
friendly to, and as a return he had been slighted and insulted; and
now a charlatan, a cheat, was preferred to him. He was right to go
away, never to come back. But she felt lost, a prey to insanity, if
she let him go. Looking beseechingly at him, she implored him:
'Don't go away--stay.'
'What is there for me to do here? Ought I to wait for your father to
turn me out to-morrow? Because I stood that scene a little ago, must
I stand another?'
'I did not do anything to you,' said she, wringing her hands to keep
down her sorrow.
'Good-bye!' he said, and nothing else.
'Don't go away--don't go away!'
Two big tears she could not keep back rolled down her cheeks. He had
refused to give in to her voice, beseeching pallor, and excitement,
but he gave in to her tears. He was a hard man in his success, but a
child's, a woman's tears made him forget everything. When she saw him
come back and sit down, his good nature making him yield, she did not
restrain her choking tears. She sank into her chair again, her face
hid in her handkerchief, sobbing.
'Don't cry,' he muttered, feeling that it did her good, but that he
could not bear it.
A good deal of time was needed before she could calm herself. She
had kept in her feelings too much for the outburst to be otherwise
than long and noisy. The June evening was very warm; the scirocco's
breath depressed sickly nerves. The only sound was a skilfully played
wailing mandoline in the distance up Pontecorvo Hill.
'Listen,' the doctor began, not harshly, but coldly, when he saw
she had got quieter. 'I hope you will listen to me quietly. I am an
intruder in your family. Don't interrupt me; I know what you would
say. I cured you twice; but that is my work; you have no need to feel
obliged to me. Don't protest; I know the limits of human feeling. I
am an intruder, then. There is nothing in common between you and me;
we are different kinds. It does not matter. I, who am not dreamy,
seeing you are fading away, that you need the wide, healthy country
and solitude, tried to get you away from here. If my dream has not
come true, whose fault is it--yours or mine?'
'It is mine,' she said humbly.
'One day,' the doctor went on rather slowly, as if he was thinking
over what had happened--'one day you yourself told me to take you
away. Do you remember?...'
'I remember....'
'... I thought ... it is no use saying what I thought. I must have
been mistaken; but any man in my place would have been. Well, when
our dream might have come true, Bianca, tell me, who was it let it
fade away?'
'I myself. It was I.'
'You see, then, that I, a man of realities and action, dreamt too
much. To your father and you I am a sort of intruder, meddling in
your affairs without having any right to, and ineffectually. On the
other hand, Bianca, believe me, my whole life has been disturbed
through wishing to see you healthy and happy, and from the useless
struggle my efforts lead to, for you oppose me yourself. Would I not
do well, then, to go away and never come back?'
'You are right,' she said, with a despairing gesture.
'... Still,' Amati went on, striving to hide his agitation, 'I
believe--rather, I know--leaving you would cause me great pain. It
may be, you too would suffer?' questioning her face.
'I should die of it,' she brought out, sincerely moved.
'Don't say that. But if I am to stay near you, Bianca, to try,
against your will and your own weakness, to save your health and
fortune, I must be your friend--your greatest, only friend; do you
understand? I must have your whole confidence and faith; after God,
you must believe in me. I can see that here, in this house, there
is a sad secret which your father and you vainly try to hide; but
the Marquis di Formosa's feverishness lets it out darkly every
minute. Besides this fever, that is at the same time a disease, an
overmastering passion and vice, there is something that escapes me,
something crueller that tortures you, and you, out of filial piety,
respect to your father--fear, perhaps--hide it from me. Bianca, if I
am not to know everything, I must go away for ever, and let your life
and mine be ruined irretrievably.'
'I love you so,' she said, abandoning her soul to him.
'Darling!' he whispered, patting her brown hair as her head leant for
a moment on his strong, faithful heart.
'Promise me one thing ...' she asked in a babyish way.
'Say what it is....'
'Promise me you won't think ill of my father--promise! He is the
best of fathers; any girl would be proud to have him. Nothing could
shake my respect and love for him. I want you not to blame him
for anything--promise me! His fatal tendency is only part of his
kindness. He is so unhappy at heart!'
'I promise you, Bianca, to be as indulgent as you could be.'
'That is enough. He is an unhappy man. For years and years our house
has been going down. Since when or why I don't remember. I was very
little. I don't even know whose fault it is. I don't wish to. I only
remember that my mother was pale and sickly; her hands were always
cold....'
'Like yours, poor dear!'
'Like mine?' she answered with a pale smile.
'What did your mother die of?'
'Bloodlessness and languor. She faded away ... at the last, she was
not in her senses all the time.'
'Did she rave?'
'Yes, slightly,' she answered, blushing to her forehead.
'Don't think of that,' he said, guessing the reason of her blush.
'My father felt mother's sufferings so much! For years a dream had
taken hold of him: it was to build up the Cavalcanti fortune, to let
mother and me live in style, keep open house, and in one day pour out
in charity what now serves to keep us for a year,' she added, with a
lump in her throat.
'Keep calm, dear-don't get excited.'
'No, no, let me speak; if I don't I'll choke. A great dream, as large
as his heart, noble and generous as his soul, so much so that my
mother and I felt gratitude that will not end with life, but must
go on beyond the tomb, where one still hears, loves, and prays.
But, with his excited fancy, he longed for quick, ample methods of
realizing this fortune: methods suited to the case, for a Cavalcanti
neither works nor speculates ...'
'It was the lottery,' Amati finished up for her.
'Yes, the lottery; how do you know?'
'I do know.'
'Our misfortune is known to everyone who comes near us,' she went on,
quivering with grief. 'Such a misfortune, to crown the others! Mother
died of it, from physical and moral weakness. Our whole means are
sacrificed to it; it has taken my father's heart from me; when it has
destroyed all that is dearest, it will hand me over to wretchedness
and death.'
'Don't be afraid, don't fear; everything has a remedy,' he said
vaguely, trying to cut short that despairing outflow.
'It can't be cured,' she said earnestly. 'My dying mother, in a lucid
interval, said as she kissed me: "Don't judge your father--never
be hard on him; obey, be obedient. The passion that eats him up,
and is killing me, can only increase with years. This fever will
get higher: I have not cured it, neither will you. Leave him to
this dream--don't annoy him; if you are unhappy, ask God's help;
but respect his years. He only desires our happiness--he is killing
me for it; he will make you suffer frightfully, though he is noble
and generous. Be merciful to him. It is only so that I can die, as
I do, with a quiet conscience." Mother was right. With years he
has got unhappier, more eccentric; he is incurable now; he forgets
everything, everything--you know what I mean. Some day or other I
fear my noble old father, whose gray hairs I ought to honour--that I
want everyone to respect--may forget the laws of honour in some dark
gambling combination.'
'May God keep him from it!' said Amati, starting.
'May God hear you!' she cried out; 'but I pray so much, and the
evil gets worse. If you knew! We are in want of everything: it is
the first time I have told anyone. I am quivering with shame, but I
can't hide anything from you. He has sold everything: first works of
art, then furniture, down to a few jewels mother kept for me--and he
adored her!--even the Cavalcanti portraits--though he is proud of his
race!--even the silver lamps in the chapel--and he is religious! I
live with these two old servants, so faithful neither sin nor poverty
has taken them from us! They are not paid: they serve us of the
House of Cavalcanti without pay. Do you know, it is by their clever
contrivances that the house goes on, that we have enough to eat,
and that there is oil in the lamps! I am raising for you the veil
of sacred family decency--don't betray us!' He bent and kissed the
hand Bianca held out to him, to seal his promise. 'All that money,
and more that he gets somewhere--I know not where and have no wish
to know--goes in gambling. Friday and Saturday he is wild. Other
wretches, like that medium, come for him: his very name makes me
shiver with fright and shame; they have queer alarming consultations;
they get excited, shout, and quarrel; they use a queer jargon. These
are his friends; men of his own rank, his relations, have left him.
It may be he asked money from them, got it, and did not give it back,
perhaps; it may be the whisper, even, of wickedness makes them
avoid us. These Cabalists, men who _see_'--she shivered and looked
round--'take his money from him and incite him to play. The day is at
hand when he will have nothing left, and he won't be able to gamble.
God, God open his eyes, if we are not to perish altogether, the name
and the family!'
'Bianca, Bianca, I implore you to be calm,' he said, alarmed at her
excitement, following its phases with a doctor's mind and a man's
heart.
'I can't,' she cried. 'I have not told you all. Listen: I am a
poor, weak creature; the blood runs poor and slow in my veins, you
know--you told me so. I have lived either in this sad house or my
aunt's convent--that is to say, with my father, always full of his
fancies, or with my aunt, whose faith gives her almost prophetic
visions. Mother died here; as the gambling passion filled my father's
mind, the delusion began to filter into mine against my will.
Father speaks to me of ghosts, phantoms, spirits, at all hours,
especially in the evening and at night, and I believe in them; you
see how frightful that is. The sunlight, seeing people, chases fears
away; but evening comes, the house gets full of shadows, my blood
freezes; when father speaks of the spirit my heart stops or goes at
a gallop; I feel as if I was dying of fear. I get queer singings in
my ears. I hear light steps, smothered voices. I see in my mind's eye
white-robed figures--they look at me and weep; shadowy hands smooth
my hair. I seem to feel icy breaths on my cheek; my nights now are
one long watch, or light sleep broken by dreams.'
'There are no such spirits, Bianca,' said he, in a gentle, firm voice.
'I am so weak, so unfit to get rid of delusions. When I have got
calmer, father, from his own fancies or the medium's infamous
suggestions, comes to torment me. He wishes me to _see_ without
caring about my feebleness, my fears, not knowing how he tortures me.
He speaks of the spirit, wants me to call it up, for I am young and
innocent. I try to go against him; vainly I struggle and ask him to
spare me, not to make me drink this bitter cup. But it is no use: he
is obstinate and blinded; he wants me to see the spirit, and ask what
numbers to play. Father has such influence over me, he makes me share
his madness to a frightful extent. I shall end by being like him, a
poor deluded thing, worn out by night watches and daily delusions.'
She hid her face in her hands, quivering. The doctor looked at her
astounded, not daring to say anything.
'And you don't know all yet,' she went on excitedly. 'One day you
wrote me a kind, comforting letter, suggesting I should go off to
your mother's. What comfort it was! I would have got out of this
house at last, where every black doorway frightens me in the evening,
and the furniture looks ghostly. I would have gone where there was
light, sun, heat, and joy. Well, that night father took an extra mad
fit: he came to my room. Wakened from sleep at so late an hour, in
the flickering lamp-light, his words put me into a panic; he wouldn't
listen to my entreaties, he didn't know he was torturing me, and for
two hours he spoke about the spirit that was to appear, that I must
evoke; he would teach me the sacred word. He held on to my hands,
breathed in my face, filling me with his enthusiasm and faith, and so
he gained his end.'
'In what way?'
'I saw the spirit, dear.'
'How? You saw it?'
'As I see you.'
'It was fever; there is no such thing, Bianca,' he said harshly, to
bring back her wandering mind to peace.
'You say so; I believe you. But when you are gone, when I have
finished my prayers and reading, when I am alone in my room with
the shadows the lamps throw, I shall see again that night's vision:
my head will swim, my brain whirl, my teeth chatter. Father is in
despair now because that night's numbers did not come right; he says
I don't know how to interpret; he wants me to call up the spirit
again. He thinks now I am a medium, and he gives me no peace. I am
not his daughter now; he only looks on me as a mediator between him
and Fortune. He watches every word I say, looks enviously at me or
haughtily, and goes about thinking of some queer discipline, some
privations or other to enable me to see the spirit again, to make my
soul pure like my body, and my sight clear. He leaves me alone at
the beginning of the week, but on Thursday night he comes and begs
me--fancy, he implores me--to call the spirit; that aged man, whose
hand I kiss respectfully, kneels before me, as at the altar, to
soften me. On Friday he gets wild; he never notices how frightened
I get; he thinks it is the coming of the spirits that excites me.
The other night, to get away from the torture I find unbearable, I
locked my door: I was so bold as to deny father access to my room.
Well, he came, knocked, softly at first, then loudly; he spoke to
me entreatingly, he ordered me to see the spirit--in a rage first,
and then abjectly. I stopped my ears not to hear him, put my head
down in the pillows; I bit the sheet to choke my sobs. Twenty times
I wanted to open the door, but terror nailed me to my bed. Father
wept. Mother, mother, I disobeyed you! You could die for father, but
I could not do that for him.'
'Poor darling!' he murmured, trying to calm her down with gentle,
compassionate words, petting her hands, as if he wanted to set her to
sleep or magnetize her.
'Yes, yes, pity me, for I am so wretched, so unhappy, I envy any
beggar on the street. Pity me, because the one person who should
love me, take care of my health and happiness, dreams instead about
getting money for me, a great lot, and makes me suffer in body, in
mind, for it; pity me, for I am an unhappy woman, doomed to a dark
ending. In all the wide world, I only have you to care for me!'
They said no more. Bianca Maria's pallid cheeks had got some colour,
her eyes shone; her whole heart had been poured out as she spoke,
now she kept silence. She had said everything. The bitter secret
that implacably tortured her whole existence, on being evoked by
love, had come out and had given a shudder of alarmed astonishment
to the strong man listening. He said nothing, trying to keep down
his own amazement, to arrange his confused ideas. He was accustomed,
certainly, to hear lugubrious stories of all kinds of misery, both
of body and mind, from his patients; he had lifted the veil from all
kinds of shame and corruption; the sorrowful and contrite came to him
as to a confessor, and hearts that hid the most horrifying secrets
of humanity opened to him. But Bianca's sorrow was so profound, the
very source of life being attacked, that it frightened him to see
such unutterable wretchedness. Also this girl, wasted by an obscure,
unnatural malady, tortured by her own father, that lovely, dear
creature, was the woman he loved, that he could not live without,
whose happiness was dearer to him than his own. Disturbed, not
knowing yet how to set to work before that complicated problem of
sickness and delusion, that made the Marquis di Formosa the family
destroyer, he found nothing to say to comfort Bianca.
She was worn out now; she felt a vague remorse at having accused her
father. But was not Amati to deliver her? Did she not feel quite
safe, strong, when he was there? Rousing herself from her exhaustion,
she raised her eyes to his timidly, humbly, saying:
'You don't think me bad and ungrateful, do you?'
'No, dear, I do not.'
'Do not judge badly of him.'
'I will cure him,' he said thoughtfully.
CHAPTER XII
THE THREE SISTERS--CHIARASTELLA THE WITCH
The summer of that year was a bad one for the Neapolitans, morally
and materially. Above all, from the end of June the summer scirocco
had gone on dissolving into rain; storms covered the bay with black
clouds, lightning played behind Posillipo, thunder rumbled from
Capodimonte, sudden heavy summer showers raised a pungent smell of
dust, and went rushing down the city roads from the hill to the sea
like little waterspouts, making the passers-by start aside and run.
The poor cabmen, with no umbrellas, ragged, with shabby hats crushed
down on their heads, could do nothing but stick their hands in the
pockets of their worn-out jackets and keep their heads down. It was
a devilish summer, a real correction from God; that was why San
Gennaro had been so long in working the miracle that year. He makes
no mistakes.
The rushing scirocco lashed up the waves in the bay furiously; they
got livid with rage, and foamed under the chill curtain of clouds,
and all the bathing-places from Marinella to Posillipo had to take up
the boards of their wooden huts to let the raging sea pass through,
or they would have been broken to pieces. There lay the great
irrecoverable loss, for the long files of provincial people that come
from Calabria, Basilicata, Abruzzi, and Molise, to take sea-baths,
and fill up the inns and second-class eating-houses, who sit four
in a carriage that barely holds two--these country people, who are
Naples' summer source of revenue, being afraid of the bad weather,
always went on intending to start for Naples the next week, and ended
by never leaving their villages at all. Those who had arrived the
first week in July, intending to stay till the end of August, on
finding they could only have a bathe on one day out of five, and then
have to face a stormy sea, got frightened and discouraged, and ended
by going back to Campobasso, to Avellino, Benevento, and Potenza, to
the great sorrow of the girls and young fellows. It was a lost season.
At the _Fiori_ Inn, in Fiorentini Square, the _Campidoglio_, in
Municipio Square, and the _Centrale_, at Fontana Medina, there was a
void; as for the _Allegria_, in Carità Square, one of the greatest
resorts of country people, it was a desert.
Very warm days came at times between the stormy ones, which were very
exhausting. It was a real African climate, and the bathing-places--De
Crescenzio, Cannavacciuolo, Sciattone, Manetta and Pappalordo--had
five days' emptiness to one day of too large a crowd of people. The
owners shook their heads despondingly, whilst the bronzed, thin,
black-toothed, hoarse-voiced bathing-women, shoeless, in shift,
petticoat and straw hats, ran after sheets of doubtful whiteness on
the dirty brown sands, where the wind caught them and threatened to
cast them into the sea. What rain! what rain! The eating-houses in
the centre of Naples had poor business, but those who put tables out
in the open air on Santa Lucia causeway, the eating-houses that go
from Mergellina to Posillipo, the _Bersaglio_, the _Schiava_, the
_Figlio di Pietro_, all those whose slender existence depends on fine
weather, summer and winter, these suffered most; no one had anything
to do, from the cook yawning in the kitchen to the few waiters left,
who sat sleepily in the steamy atmosphere that even the storms
did not freshen up. Only crawling flies buzzed on the uselessly
prepared tables. There was a general idleness; a chorus of oaths
and lamentations arose at every new outburst of showers. Even the
evenings at the Villa, round the bandstand, where the municipal band
plays its old polkas and variations on 'Forza del Destino' of ancient
date, where a penny for a seat is all that is needed to be able to
enjoy the pleasant sight of a middle-class crowd, seated or wandering
round the band, just a penny to sit in the open air and hear the
modest concert--even these simple, economical, popular evenings were
spoilt. Among the tradesmen's daughters, for whom the Villa means
an occasion to show their humble white frocks, sewn and starched at
home, to see their lovers, even at a distance, under the flickering
gas-lamps, to go a step further on the road, often a long one, that
leads to marriage--among these girls there was secret weeping. The
chair-hirer wandered through the deserted, damp avenues, full of
snails, to see if no one would come to brave the bad weather, or,
driven desperate, he settled himself in a corner of Vacca Café to
talk over his woes with one of the waiters. What a season!
Don Domenico Mayer's son and daughter, who in other years went every
evening to the Villa, walking there and back, so as to spend only
fourpence, this year nearly expired with heat and boredom in their
Rossi Palazzo flat. Their father was so stern. Their mother was even
more sickly and doleful than usual. It was a bad season for the
three sisters scattered in different parts of Naples--Carmela, the
cigar-maker; Annarella, the servant; and Filomena, the young girl who
lived in sin. Above all, their mother was dead in the cellar where
she had lived with Carmela, and in spite of having got a pauper's
coffin for her from the Pendino district authorities, and her being
thrown into the common pit on the great heap of the wretched at
Poggio Reale, Carmela still had had to pay seventy or eighty francs
for burial expenses, without even having the consolation of knowing
that her mother had had a separate grave. For some time Carmela had
paid a small weekly sum to a pious _Congregazione_ so as to have at
her own death, or any of her family's, a separate carriage following
and a grave; but debts and wretchedness, gambling resorted to in
desperation, had prevented her from going on paying the fees, and she
had lost her claim. She was left alone, with no mother, in that damp,
dark cellar, in debt up to the eyes, not having twelve francs even to
get a black dress or any mourning; she wore a light-coloured cotton
with a black kerchief at her neck, and her neighbours criticised
her for her heartlessness. Her everlasting lover, Raffaele, had now
risen to the highest grades of the Camorrist hierarchy from having
taken part in two duels, or _dichiaramenti_, and from having a mark
against him with the police; he had got still more haughty to her,
especially after her mother's death; he fled from Carmela, and when
she went after him at inn doors and suburban taverns, he treated her
brutally, all the more that she had got into a wretched condition;
she could not give him five francs ever now, or even the two francs
he haughtily asked for and she humbly gave.
A subtle suspicion was growing in the girl's mind, and from her
mother's death, her excessive poverty, and Raffaele's suspected
false-dealing, she lost her head. She often failed to go to
the tobacco factory, and lost her day's work, or worked so
absent-mindedly, so badly, she was fined and got very little on
Saturday. Often during the week she broke her fast with a penny-worth
of dry bread dipped in macaroni-water, that a neighbour, not so
poor as herself, treated her to. It was too hard, too hard, for one
who only wished for others' happiness, to see her mother die of
privation, and then thrown into a common paupers' ditch, to mingle
her bones with theirs; to see her lover going down gradually the
whole ladder of vice, even to prison, perhaps to capital crime; and
also to see her sisters fading away for want of moral and physical
comfort. Now, with her mother gone to her eternal rest--how Carmela
envied her sometimes!--and with Raffaele always going farther off
from her, she, feeling her heart as cold as her stomach, went oftener
to see her sisters. She thought of going to live with Annarella, for
economy's sake, and not to live in such a lonely way; but Annarella
lived in a cellar in Rosariella di Porta Medina--she, her husband,
and two children, already getting of a good size--in a cellar with
a beaten earth floor and walls not white-washed for years. The
husband and wife slept on a bed made of two iron trestles, with
three squeaking boards laid over them lengthwise, and a big mattress
stuffed with maize leaves--the _paglione_, which has an opening in
the middle to put in the hand when the bed is made. The girl slept by
the mother in the big conjugal bed, and they made up a little bed for
the boy every evening upon two broken chairs.
Frightful, utter misery had gradually fallen on the glove-cutter's
family. He not only staked his whole week's pay on the lottery, but
on Friday evening and Saturday morning he beat his wife, enraged if
she had only one or two francs to give him. Now the children were
beginning to earn something. The girl worked at a dressmaker's, the
boy as a stable-hand; and when he could not get anything from his
wife, Gaetano went to the dressmaker's where his little girl worked
by the week, called her down, and, by dint of lies, wheedling, or
blows, one after the other, he managed always to draw some pence from
the child, who got the dressmaker to advance them on her week's pay.
With his son, now a boy of twelve, Gaetano behaved still worse. The
stable-boy often refused him money, taunting him with his vice and
the wretchedness he had reduced his mother to. The father rained
down blows on him. The boy, choking with tears, shouted, swore, and
struggled. People came up to hear a son call his father a scoundrel,
an assassin. Once, when his father gave him a blow on the nose,
making the blood flow, he got enraged and bit his hand. On Saturday
evening, when they came back to their home, the children carried
the marks of their father's blows. The mother, who had forgotten
the blows she got herself, found the marks, and wept over her poor
children, asking them:
'How much has he taken away from you?'
'Fourteen sous,' Teresina answered sadly.
'He took half a franc from me,' said Carmine, raging.
'Merciful God!' the mother cried out, weeping.
But what she could not get out of her mind was her
two-and-a-half-year-old baby, which died from bad milk, bad
nourishment, from languishing in that black cellar, which dripped
from damp summer and winter. If Peppino was named by chance, she grew
pale, and nothing could get it out of her head that her husband's
vice had killed her little son. She had religiously kept the big
swinging basket that poor Naples children are cradled in (the
_sportone_); but she first sold the pillow, then the little maize
mattress, and one day of great hunger, not knowing where to get a
half-penny, she sold the cradle. Parting from it was so agonizing
that the mother sat on the doorstep, not caring who passed, and wept
for an hour, with her head in her apron. 'You know, Peppino--you
know!' she whispered, as if she was asking pardon of the tiny dead
for having sold his cradle.
Now that summer had come in so unsettled and stormy, it had made
the family position worse than ever. Of the two half-days' service
she did, she had lost one, which meant ten francs. It was the
lodging-house keeper: as she had empty rooms, she dismissed her
servant. The girl Teresina had had her weekly pay reduced, as the
dressmaker had no work; but, not wishing to dismiss the girl straight
off, she let her do the house-work out of charity. The coachman that
Carmine was stable-boy to went off with his master's family to the
country for four months, and would have taken the boy with him; but
Gaetano, the lad's father, knowing he could always get some pence out
of the boy if he stayed in Naples, by threats, arguments, or blows,
prevented him from going to the country. He ordered him to look out
for another service in Naples. Carmine shrieked, wept, cursed,
threatening to go away secretly.
'I am going away, mother; I am going off secretly, and father won't
see a farthing of my money, you know. I will send it to you in a
letter; father is not to have any of it.'
'What can I say, darling? You are right to go,' his mother lamented.
And that going away of her son tore her heart also.
But the debts they had with Donna Concetta, the usurer, were
Carmela's greatest agony, also Annarella's and Gaetano's. Even she
had suffered from the bad season, as the debtors almost all failed
to pay, and had not even money to pay the interest with by the week.
She did not lend a farthing more to anyone; she was embittered
and fierce, for even she was feeling the pinch of other people's
wretchedness. She shut herself up in the house at night behind iron
bars, for she had pension papers and savings-bank books in the house;
and that put her in a state of constant fury. She wandered about all
day from one street to another, from cellar to attic, from shop to
factory, running after her own money, till she was out of breath;
for she always went on foot. Devoured with rage from the constant
refusals, she began by asking for her interest at least, coldly
insistent, and ended up by making a scene, yelling, demanding her
'blood,' as she passionately called her money. But those who most
enraged her were Gaetano, Annarella and Carmela. Between them they
had got about two hundred francs from her, and she could not get even
a centime of the weekly ten francs' interest. Oh, these three! these
three! She went to the Bossi factory at Foria, where Gaetano cut out
gloves, and had the workman called down sometimes; but, warned by a
companion, he got them to say he was not at the factory that day. But
she persisted, being suspicious and unbelieving; she walked about in
front of the door, and he ended by going down to her, a black cigar
ever in his mouth.
The scene began in a whisper, short, energetic, violent: sometimes
Gaetano, grinning--for the lottery made him lose all sense of
shame--repeated to her the motto of Naples' bad payers: 'If I had
it and could, I would pay; but not having it, I can't and won't
pay.' But she set to yelling, said she would go to Carlo Bossi to
complain, or to the judge; and Gaetano, in a rage, but controlling
himself, made answer. What would she gain by getting him turned out
of the factory? She would not get another farthing then. The judge?
What could he do? The prison for debtors no longer exists in Naples;
the Concordia prison has been abolished by gentlemen who could not
pay their big debts. Then she got in a rage like a witch; the whole
neighbourhood came out to the doors and balconies. He listened, very
pale, biting at his black cigar-stump. One day he threatened in a
whisper to cut her in pieces. Muttering vague, threatening words,
pulling her shawl round her angrily, Donna Concetta went off with
the swinging step of rich, lazy women of the lower class, her head a
little to one side, her face still discomposed after the scene.
Since she happened to be at Foria, and the cigar-makers' work ended
at four o'clock, she went to stand at the door of the factory in
Santi Apostoli Square, waiting till Carmela came out, to ask her for
her money. She was not the only one that was waiting; other women
were at the door who had lent money or clothes to the workers at
high interest; and they knew and recognised each other, feeling they
had a strong, mutual interest in the laws of usury; they made a long
lament together over the tardiness in paying and inexactness of their
clients. They all said they were ruined by the bad season and the
ill-will of their debtors; the words '_my blood, our blood_' came
up always like a wail, as they spoke of the money lost. It was not
allowable to send up for any workgirl, but the money-lenders waited,
like the cake and fruit sellers, till the workpeople came out. The
poor women who were coming from the factory, with sickly faces from
the bad tobacco fumes, their hands stained up to the wrist, stopped
to buy something to carry home to feed their families on, after their
day's work. The money-lenders mingled with pot-herb-sellers, and
vendors of parsnips in vinegar and pancakes, and waited patiently,
pulling their shawls up on their shoulders--that common trick. At
last the women, after being searched, one by one, by an overseer to
find out if they had stolen any tobacco, came out. Some slipped away,
others stopped to buy broccoli, radishes, potatoes, or some pancake;
but the palest certainly were those who were caught outside by their
creditors. The palest of all, and not from tobacco fumes, but shame,
was Carmela. She tried to lead off Donna Concetta towards Vertecoeli
Street or Santi Apostoli steps, so as not to let her friends hear
what was said; but Donna Concetta went slowly and raised her voice.
She wanted her money, her blood; it was a shame not to give it to
her; she would have the interest, at any rate. If Carmela had any
shame, she must at least give her the interest. The cigar-girl's
eyes filled with tears at that abuse, and, having a few pence in
her purse, it was impossible to hold out. She handed them to Donna
Concetta; but it was so little always that, although she sacrificed
her day's meal, it only got her the more abuse. She listened, with
her head bent, to Donna Concetta's taunts up Arcivescovato Street and
Gerolomini Road; after a time Donna Concetta recognised that the girl
had no more money, and that it was useless to worry her.
But Carmela, even when Donna Concetta had gone off, felt the shiver
of shame that bitter voice had sent through her, saying such
offensive words; and tired, crushed, without a farthing in her pocket
after working a whole day, she again felt envy of her dead mother.
Of course, she, too, had that vice of gambling, but it was for good
ends--to give money to everyone, to make all her friends happy, if
she won, to let Raffaele, or Farfariello, as he was called, draw
money from her; but to be so severely punished for this venial sin
cut her to the heart. Ah! on some days how willingly she would have
thrown herself into the well of the building where the factory was,
so as not to hear or feel anything more! But Donna Concetta's thirst
was not at all quenched by that drop of water, Carmela's pence, and
on her way home every evening, before going in at her door, she
hurried to the Rosariella Street cellar where Annarella lived. She
was generally seated near the bed, and often in the dark, for she had
nothing to buy oil with, saying the Rosary with her daughter. Donna
Concetta crossed herself and waited till the Rosary was ended, to
ask for her loan back, uselessly as it happened every day. Annarella
could do nothing now but answer with a sigh or lament, and when Donna
Concetta burst into eloquence she began to cry. Then Teresina broke
in, speaking to both women.
'Don't cry, mother, to please me.' And to the money-lender: 'Do you
not see, Donna Concetta, that mother has not got any money?'
'Dear girl, my darling!' sobbed her mother, choked by all the sorrows
of her life.
The money-lender would not be appeased; she was so accustomed to the
sham tears of those who wished to cheat her of her money that she no
longer believed in any sorrow; it was only when she had exhausted her
whole vocabulary of abuse that she decided to go away, slowly, with
that sleek walk of hers, muttering that she would do justice with her
own hands, against robbers of her blood. The mother and daughter were
left alone in the damp, dark cellar's unhealthy heat, and the poor
charwoman, responding to an inward thought, exclaimed:
'Soul of Peppinello, do me this grace!'
When Carmela and Annarella afterwards met in the street or the
Rosariella cellar, there was a long outpouring of sorrows and
interchange of news, when the physical and moral bitterness of their
sad existences burst out.
'That lottery! what bad luck, what infamous luck, it was, for it
never to give a farthing's winnings, and to take their all--even the
bit of bread that just kept them alive!' Sometimes, through speaking
about their wretchedness and solitariness, Filomena, the third
unfortunate sister, was referred to. 'What was she doing? How could
she bear that life of sin?'
Carmela had twice gone to seek her in the alley behind Santa Barbara
Steps: once she was out; the other time she found her so cold, so
changed, as if struck by remorse, that Carmela, filled with emotion,
ran away at once. Another time Annarella had met Filomena in the
street, in blue and yellow, with the usual red ribbon at her neck;
she asked her why she wore no mourning for her mother.
'I am not worthy,' Filomena had answered, casting down her eyes,
and going off with that sliding step on high-heeled, shiny shoes.
All through this Carmela felt, besides her open griefs, besides
the sequence of wretchedness and humiliation, something she could
not take hold of, as if a new misfortune was coming on her head, a
crowning fatality was hemming her in, with no way of escape. What
was it? She could not say what it was. Perhaps it was Raffaele's
increasing coldness, and the brutal way he treated her when they met;
it may have been her brother-in-law Gaetano's fierce expression, or
that queer look that Filomena gave her: she dared not go to ask for
her now.
For some time Annarella and she had been making up a plan to put an
end to their difficulties. Among all Naples common folk there are
women famed as witches--_fattucchiare_, as they call them--whose
witchcraft, philtres and charms cannot be resisted. Some, indeed,
have a large practice, much larger than a doctor's would be in the
same neighbourhood; almost every quarter boasts of its witch, who can
do the most extraordinary miracles, always, however, by God's help
and the Virgin's. Well, Chiarastella, the great sorceress, who lived
up there at Centograde Lane, near the Corso Vittorio Emanuele, had a
tremendous reputation: there was not a shop, cellar, road, square, or
street corner where Chiarastella's marvellous deeds were not known
and spoken of. It was said everywhere that, to get Chiarastella's
spells, you must ask for things that were not against God's will;
but no one who attended to this rule had come home disappointed from
her little place in Centograde Lane. No one among the mass of Naples
common folk dared to throw a doubt on Chiarastella's magic powers.
If in the provision stores and macaroni shops, where young and old
women love to gossip, or in front of herb-sellers' baskets and
barrows, where small folk haggle for three-quarters of an hour over
a bundle of borage, and at basement doors, where such long, animated
talk goes on; any ignorant woman, on hearing of the Centograde
witch's miracles, raised her eyebrows in surprise and unbelief,
twenty anxious, excited voices told her of all the deeds done by
Chiarastella. In one place a traitor husband had been brought back to
his young wife; then a young fellow dying of consumption was cured
when the doctors had given him up. Another case was a dressmaker who
had lost her customers, and had got them all back gradually by the
witch's influence; then there was a heartless girl who drove her
lover to an evil life and crime by her coldness, and Chiarastella
had set things right. Above all there was the tying of the tongue:
that--that was Chiarastella's grand feat. Everyone who had a lawsuit
coming off, or a trial in which they might be overcome by their
adversary or by justice, where money, honour, liberty or life would
be at stake, rushed in desperation for Chiarastella's magic. After
hearing about the case, if she considered it moral and in accordance
with God's will, she promised to tie the tongue of the adversary's
lawyer. The spell consisted of a magic cord with three knots in it
to represent the number of persons in the Trinity. Means must be
found to put it on the advocate's person, either in his pocket or
in the lining of his clothes, on the decisive morning of the trial,
and by the help of prayer the rival's advocate would not be able to
say over any of his arguments, even if he had them in his mind--his
tongue was tied, the suit was lost to him, the spell had secured
its object. Examples were quoted where the innocent and oppressed,
suffering from man's injustice, had been thus saved by Chiarastella.
Carmela and Annarella had thought of applying to Chiarastella for
some time, Carmela to try and awaken in Raffaele's heart renewed love
for her, she never having had his love, and now it was less hers than
ever. Annarella required a spell to get her husband Gaetano to give
up gambling at the lottery.
Carmela had been up already at Centograde Lane to make inquiries
about getting the magic; she found five francs were necessary; and,
besides, there were some small ingredients that had to be bought.
Afterwards, if it was successful, just as God willed it, the two
sisters would make the witch a good present. Chiarastella certainly
never promised anything; she spoke mysteriously, in a doubtful way,
and kept deep silence at certain questions. It seemed as if she did
not care about money; she contented herself with a small fee for her
support, counting on people's gratitude to get a better gift if it
was God's will that the thing turned out well later on. Meanwhile,
ten francs at least were needed; without them nothing whatever
could be done. Whatever privations the sisters might endure that
bad summer, they never would have been able to put aside ten francs
between them.
But days went by, and moral wretchedness was as urgent of care as
their bodily wants required looking to: it was the only remedy left,
so, though much against the grain, Carmela made up her mind to sell
her old marble-topped chest of drawers, the chief bit of furniture in
her room, that had been bought by her mother as a bride. She barely
got twelve francs for it--everyone was selling furniture that hateful
summer; there was not a dog left that would buy a farthing's worth of
things. She put her few pieces of linen in a covered basket under her
bed, and hung her poor clothes on a bit of string from two nails in
the wall, where they got damp, but she had her twelve francs.
It was one Sunday at the end of August, after hearing Mass in Sette
Dolori Church, that the sisters went towards Centograde Lane.
Carmela had shut up her home and carried the key in her pocket.
Annarella left her daughter Teresina at home mending a torn dress,
after working till mid-day at the dressmaker's. For eight days now
Carmela had not succeeded in finding Raffaele, though she wandered
through Naples in her free hours. Gaetano, Annarella's husband, had
not come home on Saturday night, nor that morning. In Sette Dolori
Church, kneeling at a dark wooden form that the poor must use, as
they cannot pay for seats, they prayed earnestly during Mass. Now
they were laboriously going up the steps of the steep incline that
leads from Sette Dolori Street to Vittorio Emanuele Corso, not
speaking, wrapt up in vague hopes and fears. Chiarastella, the witch,
lived appropriately in a dark alley. It was quiet, but well enough
lighted, and stood to the right of the steep steps that lead from
the principal street up the hill to the little outlets Pignasecca,
Carità, and Monte Santo. There was a great quietness in that blind
alley, but the damp summer scirocco had covered the flint pavement
with a thin coating of mud, so they had to walk carefully not to
fall, and they made no noise.
'Does she expect us?' Annarella asked, hardly moving her lips. She
was panting after going up the steps.
'Yes, she does,' said Carmela in a whisper, as she went in at the
door.
They went up to the first-floor, on to the narrow landing. There
were two doors facing each other; one was shut fast; indeed, it was
fastened by a chain and a heavy iron padlock. It looked as if the
dwellers there had gone off after a misfortune, shutting up their
dull abode for ever. The door on the left was half open; but the
sisters, on hearing a muffled sob, dared not go in without knocking.
It was startling for Carmela to pull a brown monkey's paw joined
to a big-ringed iron chain the bell inside was hung to. The black,
mummified paw gave one a shudder; it was hairy above and pink
underneath. It seemed like finding a bit of a swarthy murdered child.
The bell tinkled long and shrilly, as if it would never give over.
A very old, decrepit, bent servant, with a pointed nose that seemed
to wish to go into her toothless mouth, appeared. She signed to the
two women to come into the bare, narrow lobby, which was rather damp
underfoot. The choked sobbing went on behind another closed door.
Soon after the door opened, and a girl of the people, a seamstress
(Antonietta the blonde it was), crossed the lobby, her shawl off her
shoulders, weeping, her handkerchief at her eyes. Nannina, her short
friend, kept one arm round her waist, as if she wanted to hold her
up, and went on repeating, to console her:
'It does not matter; never mind about it.'
But on the sobbing getting louder the old woman opened the outer door
and sent the girls off, almost pushing them out; then she disappeared
without saying a word to Annarella or Carmela. They, already moved
by the feelings that induced them to invoke the witch's power, were
very sympathetic with the two girls, one so inconsolable, the other
so vainly trying to soothe. Leaning at the lobby window, they waited,
their eyes cast down and hands crossed over their aprons, tightly
holding the ends of their shawls, not saying a word to each other. A
great silence was around, in the damp summer sultriness of that long
summer noon. Annarella, being gentler, more saddened, and at the same
time less infatuated than Carmela, bent her shoulders to her fatal
destiny, feeling an increasing want of confidence in any means of
salvation, being almost sure that Gaetano would never be brought back
to reason by any prayer nor charm. She felt nothing but a growing
fear all through her low spirits. Carmela, instead, having an ardent,
loving soul that nothing could subdue, felt the flame of passion
light up within her. She was not afraid; no, she would have dared
any sight or danger to get Raffaele's heart again. But the decrepit
servant, bent into a bow, as if she wanted to reach the earth again,
appeared in the lobby and made a sign to Carmela to come in. Without
making a sound, the sisters disappeared into the other room, and the
door shut behind them.
'Here is my sister that I told you of,' whispered Carmela, standing
aside to present Annarella, who stood just behind her.
Chiarastella nodded as a salutation. The witch was of middle height,
or a little below it, very thin, with long lean hands, the skin of
them shiny from sticking to the bones; her body moved automatically,
as if she could stiffen every muscle at will. She had a small
head, and short face covered with deep red blotches, the jaw very
prominent; her complexion was of a warm vivid pallor, and the nose
a short one. But her eyes were the interesting thing in the witch's
neurotic face; they had a very mobile glance, and the colour varied
from gray to green, with always a luminous point, a sparkle, in
them; the glance was sometimes shy, then frightened-looking, then
seemingly carried away in a spiritual ecstasy; her whole vitality
was summed up in them. Chiarastella looked as if she were more
than forty, but her hair remained very black, and her forehead was
marked by a single deep wrinkle; but when her eyes lighted up, an
irradiation of youthfulness spread over her face and person. She wore
a black woollen dress, simply made, the usual cut among the common
people, only it was ornamented with white silk buttons, and a white
silk ribbon hung at her waist, in a knot with two long ends, at the
side. White and black are the colours worn by the votaries of Our
Lady of Sorrows. A thick crooked red coral horn hung from her neck
on a thin black silk cord; in making some careless gesture, the
witch often touched this horn. She was seated at a big walnut table
that had a closed iron box on it, of deep-cut, artistic workmanship,
an antique, evidently. A big black cat slept beside her, its paws
gathered up under it. Set round the small room were a little sofa of
faded chintz and five or six chairs; that was all that was in it. On
the wall was a black wooden crucifix; the figure of Christ, carved in
ivory, was a work of art also. She kept silence, with her eyes down.
The sisters felt that a great mystery was coming near, and would
envelop them.
'We have brought the ten francs,' Carmela said timidly, taking them
out of the corner of her handkerchief and putting them on a table by
Chiarastella's hand.
The witch did not move an eyelash; only the black cat raised its
head, showing fine yellow eyes like amber.
'Have you heard Mass this morning?' Chiarastella asked, without
turning her head.
'Yes, we have,' the sisters muttered shyly.
She had a low, hoarse voice--one of those women's voices that seem
always charged with intense feeling--and it caused deep emotion in
the heart and brain of the hearers.
'Say three _Aves_, three _Pater Nosters_, three _Glorias_, out loud,'
commanded the witch.
Standing in front of her, the sisters said the words of prayer; she
said them too, in her vibrating voice, her hands clasped in her lap
on her black apron. The cat rose on its long black legs, holding down
its head. Then, altogether, the three women, after bowing three times
at the _Gloria Patri_, said the _Salve Regina_. The prayers were
ended. The witch opened the wrought-iron casket, holding the lid so
as to hide what was in it, and groped with her fingers a long time.
Then, taking out some little things, still hiding them in her hands,
she got mortally pale, her eyes became wild, as if she saw a terrible
sight.
'Holy Virgin, help us!' Annarella uttered in a low tone, shaking with
fear.
Now Chiarastella, with a yellow lighted taper, burnt two queer
scented pastilles, which were pungent and heavy at the same time;
she gazed intently at the flying smoke-rings; her eyes dilated,
showing the whites streaked with blue, as if she was trying to read
a mysterious word. When the smoke had disappeared, only a heavy
smell was left; the sisters felt stupefied already, from that smell,
perhaps. Monotonously, not looking at them, Chiarastella asked:
'Have you made up your mind to work a spell on your husband?'
'Yes, provided that he does not suffer in health from it,' Annarella
replied feebly.
'You want to tie his hands, two or three times, so that he never at
any time can stake at the lottery, do you not?'
'Yes, that is it,' the other answered eagerly.
'Are you in God's grace?'
'I hope I am.'
'Ask the Virgin's help, but under your breath.'
Whilst Annarella raised her eyes as if to find heaven, the witch took
out of the iron casket a thin new cord, looked at it, muttered some
queer irregular verses in the Naples dialect, invoking the powers of
heaven, its saints, and some good spirits with queer names. The chant
went on; the witch, still holding the cord tight in her hand, looked
at it as if filling it with her spirit; she breathed on it and kissed
it devoutly three times. Whilst she was carrying out this deed of
magic, her thin brown hands shook, and the cat went up and down the
big table excitedly, spreading its whiskers.
Annarella now repented more than ever of having come, of trying
to cast a spell on her husband. It would have been better, much
better, to resign herself to her fate, rather than call out all
these spirits, and put all that mystery into her humble life. She
deeply repented; her breathing was oppressed, her face saddened. She
wanted to fly at once far off to her dark cellar; she preferred to
endure cold and wretchedness there. It was her sister who had led
her into such an extreme measure; she had done it more out of pity
for her, seeing her so melancholy, desolate, and worn out by sorrow
from Raffaele's desertion. It was not right--no, it could not be--to
try and find out God's will by witchcraft and magic in any case. No
witchcraft, however powerful, would conquer her husband's passion.
She had read one Saturday in his eyes, grown suddenly ferocious,
how unconquerable the passion was. She had seen him ill-treat his
children with that repressed rage that is capable of even greater
cruelty. That witchcraft, you see, with its alarming prelude and
continuation, seemed to her another big step on the way to a dark,
fatal end.
Now Chiarastella, with sharpened features, her skin more shiny and
eyes burning, made three fatal knots in the twine, stopping at each
to say something in a whisper. At the end she threw herself all at
once from the chair to kneel on the ground, her head down on her
breast. The black cat jumped down too, as if possessed, and went
round and round the witch in the convulsive style of cats when going
to die.
'Mother of God, do not forsake me!' Annarella called out, shaking
with fear; but the witch, after crossing herself wildly several
times, got up and said in solemn tones to the gambler's wife:
'Take--take this miraculous cord. It will tie your husband's hands
and mind when Beelzebub tells him to gamble. Believe in God; have
faith; hope in Him.'
Trembling, feeling hot all over from excessive emotion, Annarella
took the witch's cord. She was to put it on her husband without his
noticing it. She would have liked to go away now, to fly, for she
felt the sultriness of the room, and the perfume was turning her
brain; but Carmela, pale, disturbed from what she had seen and the
commotion in her own mind, turned an appealing look on her to get her
to wait.
Chiarastella had already begun the charm to make Raffaele love
Carmela again. She called Cleofa, her decrepit servant, and said
something in her ear. The woman went out, and came back carrying with
great care a deep white porcelain dish full of clear water, looking
at it as if hypnotized, not to spill a drop; then she disappeared.
Chiarastella, with her face close to the dish, muttered some of her
mysterious words over the water. She put in one finger, and let three
drops fall on Carmela's forehead, who at a sign had leant forward to
her. Then the witch lit a big wax candle Carmela had brought, and
went on muttering Latin and Italian words. The candle-wick spluttered
as if water had been thrown on the flame.
'Did you bring the lock of hair cut from your forehead on Friday
evening when the moon was rising?' Chiarastella's hoarse voice
demanded in the middle of the prayer.
'Yes, I have it,' said Carmela, with a deep sigh, handing a tress of
her black hair to the witch.
From the iron casket Chiarastella had taken a platinum dish with
some hieroglyphics on it, as shiny as a mirror. On this she put the
hair, and raised it up three times, as if making a sacrifice to
heaven. Then she held the black tress a little above the crackling
flame, which stretched up to devour it; a second after there was a
disagreeable smell of burnt hair, and nothing was seen on the dish
but a morsel of stinking ashes. The incantation went on, Chiarastella
singing under her voice her great love-charm, which was a queer
mixture of sacred and profane names--from Belphegor's to Ariel's,
from San Raffaele's, the girl's protector, to San Pasquale's, patron
saint of women--partly in Naples dialect, partly in bad Italian.
She afterwards took a small phial from the wrought-iron box, which
held all the ingredients for her charms, and put three drops from it
into the plate of water, which at once became a fine opal colour,
with bluish reflections. The witch looked again to try and decipher
that whitish cloud which whirled round in spirals and volutes, and
dropped the ashes of the hair in. Gradually under her gaze the water
got clear and limpid again in the dish; then she told Carmela to hand
her a new crystal bottle, bought on Saturday morning after making her
Communion, and she filled it slowly with water from the dish. The
love-philtre was ready.
'Take it,' the witch said in her solemn tones, ending the
incantation--'take and keep it jealously. Make Raffaele drink some
drops of it in wine or coffee. It will inflame his blood and burn in
his brain; it will make his heart melt for love of thee. Believe in
God, have faith, and hope in Him.'
'It is not poison, is it?' Carmela ventured to ask.
'It will do him good, and not harm. Have faith in God.'
'And what if he goes on despising me?'
'Then, that means that he is in love with someone else, and this
charm is not enough. You must find out who the woman is that he has
left you for, and bring me here a bit of her chemise, petticoat, or
dress, be it wool, linen, or cotton. I will make a charm against her.
We will drive in a bit of her chemise or dress with a nail and some
pins into a fresh lemon; then you must throw this bewitched lemon
into the well of the house where the woman lives. Every one of these
pins is a misfortune; the nail is a sorrow at the heart of which she
will never be cured. Do you see?'
'Very well, I will try and find out,' said Carmela, in despair at the
very idea of Raffaele being unfaithful.
'Let us go away,' said Annarella, who could bear no more.
'Thank you for your kindness, ma'am,' said Carmela.
'Thank you so much,' added Annarella.
'Thank God! thank Him!' the witch cried out piously.
She cast herself down again, kneeling, fervently praying, while the
big black cat gently mewed, rubbing its pink nose on the table. The
two women went out, thoughtful and preoccupied.
'That witchcraft is not good,' said Annarella, in a melancholy way to
her sister.
'Then, what should be done--what can be done?' the other asked,
wringing her hands, her eyes filled with tears.
'Nothing can be done,' said Annarella, in a solemn voice.
They went down slowly, tired, worn out by that long scene of
witchcraft, which was above their intellectual capacity, and
depressed by the tension on their nerves. A man went up the steps of
Centograde Lane quickly, turning towards the witch's house. It was
Don Pasqualino De Feo. The sisters did not see him; they went on,
feeling the weight of their unhappy life heavier, fearing to have
gone beyond the limits allowable to pious folk, and that they had
drawn God's mysterious vengeance on the heads of those they loved.
CHAPTER XIII
THE CONFECTIONER'S SHOP BANKRUPT
Cesare and Luisella Fragalà had shut the shop that rainy summer
evening at nine o'clock, half an hour earlier than usual, because
with that bad weather, that boisterous, warm scirocco wind, which
made the hot rain whirl round, few people were in the streets, and
no one would come out to buy coffee, a bottle of brandy, or a fancy
chocolate-box, at that hour in the storm. Only some purchaser of a
penny-worth of cough-lozenges came in occasionally, bringing in a
puff of wind into the hot shop, dirtying the marble floor with his
wet shoes. The evening had been unsuccessful, like the rest of the
summer.
Luisella, who was suffering from low spirits, had not had the courage
even to go to Santo Jorio for country quarters; it is one of the
villages round Naples favoured by the towns-folk. She saw too many
clouds coming down on her family peace, just as in the Naples skies,
to dare to go from home and leave the shop. The humble pride of a
rich tradesman's wife who stays at home with her children and does
not think about the shop was all over. She left Rossi Palazzo, that
had been the joy of her middle-class ambition, early, only to come
back at the dinner-hour, go out again at once, and just come back in
the evening to sleep. It was quite another affair from staying with
the children.
Little Agnesina, who was three years old now, was a florid, quiet,
well-behaved little creature, and often came to see her mother in the
shop. She did not ask for sweets or tarts, but, hidden behind the
tall counter, she cut out silently those slips of paper that are put
like cotton-wool between one sweet and another in the boxes sent to
country places. Agnesina made herself useful without making any noise
or giving trouble, so that she should not be sent away nor be left
at home with the cook and housemaid, who were always bickering. The
mother, when she weaned her, would have liked to indulge in a nurse,
a Tuscan by preference, so that she should not learn the Naples
dialect; but just as she was going to get one, on thinking it over,
she felt the subtle bitterness of a presentiment, and gave up the
idea. The little girl would have grown up with no training; so, not
to be separated so long nor see her unhappy, Luisella allowed her to
be brought to the shop now and then.
When Agnesina saw her mother go away in the morning, she ran after
her, not crying nor yelling, not saying anything, just looking up
in a questioning way. The compassionate mother understood, and to
console her, seeing her so quiet and obedient, she made her a promise
she might come to the shop later on. That made the tiny arms let go,
quite satisfied, as if she had made up her mind to wait. When she
opened the big glass door, coming in in her plain cotton frock and
big straw hat, she smiled at her mother as if she was a big child
already. She silently went to put down her hat in the back-shop
without any outburst of greed, very happy to stay beside her mother
behind the high counter. Only her mother, after the moment of the
little one's arrival was over, got sad. She had never thought of
this, of coming to the shop every day for twelve hours to sell
caramels and chocolate, to fill paper bags and wooden boxes, always
to have to be ready to serve the public, whilst her little one cut
paper strips, not saying a word, as neatly as a big girl. She had
never dreamt her baby would be a shop-girl, too.
Luisella certainly did not despise a tradesman's life; but she would
have liked to be a house, and not a shop, keeper, a housewife,
and not a sweetmeat-seller. She had not dreamt of this. She would
have liked to sew white work, make her baby's clothes, teach her
something--carols at Easter and Christmas, the way to knit stockings,
sewing, embroidery, all that is the humble but glorious inheritance
of happy wives. But instead she spent her life in public with a
stereotyped smile on her lips, not able to say a word privately to
her husband and daughter, nor collect her thoughts a single moment.
She had taken up that duty of selling in the shop from feeling
the financial embarrassments her husband was in. It seemed to her
that the shop-lads robbed him, or that they had bad ways with the
customers--that, in short, there was need of a woman. For this she
gradually sacrificed her whole day. Now no source of commercial
aggrandisement was beyond her; while she was a zealous counter-up of
pence, she kept house on a still more economical footing always. That
was not enough, evidently, because her husband's low spirits began to
be still more frequent. It must have to do with large transactions,
buying sugar, flour, coffee, liqueurs--matters she could not go into.
Cesare kept them out of her reach purposely. Still, she knew the
price of goods, and it made her wonder the more at the discomfort
they were in. When Cesare, not able to hide the straits he was in,
ended by owning that he could not pay a bill, that he had not the
weekly money to pay the workmen in the bakeries, she raised her
eyebrows in sad surprise, saying:
'I cannot make it out. I do not see why we are so short of money.'
Cesare tried to humbug her, talking some nonsense about Customs and
colonial tariffs. He spoke vaguely about losses by some speculations
he was not responsible for, saying the whole trade was going to the
bad. So she, getting thoughtful, ended by saying:
'Then it would be better to shut up shop.'
'No, for goodness' sake, don't say that!' he cried out.
Ah! she had found out what her misfortune was in the end. Three or
four times, without intending it, she had discovered that Cesare was
not so honest as he used to be, that he told lies. This made her
start with fright, dreading worse evils. When they made up accounts
together, he said he had paid so much, at such a price, and it was
not true, or he had paid a part of it only. He had got to be a
bad payer. The two landlords of the flat and the shop complained
several times; they had their burdens, too; they could not wait so
long for their money. She had discovered this with a sharp, secret
anguish. When she questioned her husband severely, he got pale and
red, stammered, letting out his hidden sin by his whole attitude.
For a moment Luisella thought she was deserted for another woman,
and the flames of jealousy scorched her blood; but Cesare was always
so tender and loving, so sincerely and thoroughly in love with
his wife, that she was reassured. No, it was not that. She could
hardly make out at first what subtle, dissolving element melted
away the money in the house. She discovered that the increasing
debts were always getting fatally larger, from her husband's growing
absent-mindedness, in spite of the sad lies he told her. She could
not make out by what tiny wound the blood of the Fragalà house was
going drop by drop. It was in vain that the shop was successful, that
she did wonders in economy: the money disappeared all the same. She
felt a hollowness under the seeming solidity of their commerce; she
felt the incurable languor of a body losing all its blood. But she
saw no reason for it. It was not a woman, in so far; then who and
what was it? Only by dint of searching minutely and lovingly into
her husband's daily life had she ended by understanding what it was.
First of all, Cesare Fragalà had fallen into the habits of all keen
Cabalists; instead of tearing up the lottery tickets he played each
week, he was so foolish as to keep them, to compare and study them.
One day, in a jacket-pocket, Luisa found a whole sheaf, a week's
collection of lottery tickets, four or five hundred francs thrown
thus to the greedy Government, given to an impersonal, hateful being,
to try for an elusive fortune. Perhaps, in spite of the fright she
got then, amid the blaze of light that blinded her, she thought it
was the aberration of one week only. But Cesare was too simple about
deceiving, for her to go on thinking so. Luisa's clever eyes now
saw that Friday was a day of the greatest excitement with him. She
saw his nervousness in the early hours of Saturday, and the evening
depression. Now, Luisa's heart was divided by two sharp sorrows that
opposed each other: first, seeing their prosperity always flying
away, then finding Cesare to be a victim to an incurable moral fever.
That fatal period began with her when one may suffer from seeing
a loved one given over to a tragic passion, and yet dare not even
oppose his self-indulgence, or show one is aware of it. She was still
patient, for she disliked the idea of having a grand explanation with
her husband, of confronting him with his vice; she still hoped it
would be a fleeting fancy.
But, to dash her hopes, day after day she saw Don Pasqualino De Feo,
the medium, in the distance, circling round her husband continually,
trying not to let her see him; but she guessed he was there, as a
woman guesses her rival's presence. She felt the ill-omened, mean
beggar was in the back-lane, at the street corner, or under the
gateway waiting for Cesare, so as to draw more money out of him,
and incite him to gamble again by saying silly fantastic things for
Cesare to draw lottery numbers from, figures that would never come
out of the urn. Now and then, in spite of Don Pasqualino's prudence
that also seemed to be fear, Luisella found him at the doorway, or at
the street corner, and looked so coldly and disdainfully at him that
he cast down his eyes and went off in his awkward way like a man who
does not know what to do with his body. Once Cesare Fragalà named
Don Pasqualino De Feo before his wife, watching to see if her face
changed; her sweet, affable look went off: she got to have a cold
expression, and frowned. He dared not name the medium again. Indeed,
he had had to warn him of his wife's ill-will, so Don Pasqualino got
still more cautious; if he wanted to call Fragalà when he was at
business, he sent a newsboy from the Bianchi corner. But Luisella
found out whence these mysterious calls came also; she shook her head
as she saw her husband go out of the shop with an affectation of
carelessness.
The more the medium circled around, always dressed like a pauper,
still torn and dirty, always a sucker-up of money, of everything, the
more she felt her husband's rage for the lottery was not a temporary
caprice, but incurable vice. Now, on Friday nights, he came in
very late; she, pretending to sleep, heard quite well that he was
awake, uneasy, turning in his bed, knocking his head on the pillows.
Besides, while Cesare's fever did not go down, the shop's prosperity
did visibly. The wholesale dealers, seeing that Fragalà was always
asking for renewals of bills, or that he barely paid a part of
them, got suspicious; they put off sending the goods, they even got
to sending them on consignment, which is a grave proof of want of
confidence commercially, a thing that ruins a trader; for he has to
keep the goods in the Custom-house, not having money to take them
out. He goes on paying storage, knowing all the time that the things
are deteriorating.
The warning that Fragalà was not quite solvent must have run from
Napoli Square to other parts, for he began to find all doors shut if
he did not come money in hand; his having signed money-lenders' bills
spoilt his credit altogether. Still, his reputation and means stood
it so much the more that it was the reputation of all the Fragalàs
together. But that could not last. One final blow, and his commercial
standing would go also.
Now the bad summer season had come, with a scarcity of country
visitors, which caused a languor of all Naples' forces, a crisis
that went on increasing among all classes; for everyone lives off
strangers in that town of no commerce. It was no use for Luisella
Fragalà to give up her change to the country that year for the first
time; nothing had come of it. Goods were short in the storehouses
from the suspiciousness of dealers, and customers were still scarcer
from the bad weather.
Luisella could not manage to keep down her depression now; the pretty
young face had got to have a grave expression, her head was often
down on her breast. She thought and thought, as if her soul was
absorbed in a most difficult problem; for one thing, she saw that her
husband's mental malady was always getting worse. He was so sorrowful
at some moments, it wrung one's heart to look at him. Besides, the
bad weather affected her, too; all suffered from it, rich, well to
do, and poor, for in this great country everything radiates, joy as
well as grief, good fortune as well as bad. Now she had decided to
speak, to question her husband's heart, for the situation was getting
gradually worse, it was desperate; in a short time he would be ruined.
Being quite decided now in her loving, strong, womanly heart, having
made up her mind to act, she kissed her dear little one, who was so
quiet and prettily behaved, saying to herself she would speak, she
would bring out everything. Her life was already grievous from her
responsibilities as wife and mother; the gay, idyllic time was past
for ever, the long sad hour was come when she needed all her courage
to influence and convince Cesare. It was really a battle she intended
to hold that evening in the steamy shop, whilst the summer rain
rattled sadly outside.
It was Friday; still, for a wonder, Cesare Fragalà had not left the
shop that evening, as he had got into the habit of doing every week
at dusk, not to return till three in the morning, the time the last
lottery-shop shut. He went backwards and forwards nervously; twice
the usual newspaper boy had come to call him for Don Pasqualino:
he answered that the person must wait, because he was busy. Pale
and trembling, feeling she had got to an important crisis, his wife
followed, with a side-glance, her husband's wanderings. Outside, the
rain beat sadly on the windows, the gas-flame looked sickly.
'Shall we shut up shop now?' Fragalà said impatiently.
'It would be best, no doubt,' she said, with a slight sigh,
'especially as no one will be coming in.'
The two shopmen, helped by the porter and message-boy, made haste to
put up the iron gates, put out the outside gas, and give a general
cleaning up before going away by the little back-shop door in Bianchi
Lane. Quickly they said good-night and set off, one by one. The white
shop, its shelves brilliant with colour from the chocolate-boxes, was
now lit by one gas-jet only. Luisella was seated behind the counter,
as usual, and little Agnesina had gone to sleep in her chair, her
knees covered with shreds of paper. Cesare often disappeared into the
back-shop, as if he could get no peace. Neither of them could make up
their mind to speak, feeling that it was a grave crisis that they had
come to. She, above all, felt herself choking. It was he who spoke
first.
'Look here, Luisella,' he said, in a low voice: 'you know what a bad
season we have had.'
'Yes, a wretched one,' she muttered.
'It is a real disaster, I assure you, my dear--enough to make one
give up keeping shop. You carry out economies, I work hard ... and it
goes from bad to worse.'
'I know that,' she muttered again, as if tired of those grumbles.
'You cannot know the full extent of it ... you would have to deal
directly with the wholesale houses to know what ruin----'
'Come to the point,' she said, rather bitterly.
'Are you angry with me?' Cesare asked humbly.
'No, it is not that,' she replied, in a curious tone.
'Well, I want you to do me a favour--a great favour, so great I am
ashamed to ask it, even.'
'Say what it is,' she just uttered, keeping down the pained feeling
her husband's words caused her.
'I have a payment to make to-morrow morning....'
'To-morrow, in the morning, do you say?'
'Yes; it is a bill that falls due. I had forgotten it. It is a big
bill.'
'Still, you had forgotten it?'
'You know I have got rather confused lately ... in short, I must pay,
and I am not ready. I asked in vain for a renewal or if I might pay
part only. Everyone wants his money just now. I cannot pay, and there
is no money to be had.'
'Then, what is it that you want of me?' she said, looking coldly at
him.
'You could help me; you could get me out of this momentary
embarrassment. I will give you back the money at once.'
'I have no money.'
'You have some valuables. Those diamond earrings I gave you: they are
worth a great deal. One could get a lot for them.'
'Would you like to sell them?' said she, shutting her eyes as if she
saw something horrible.
'I would pledge them--just take them to the pawn-shop, only for a few
days. They will be redeemed at once.'
'Do you intend to pawn the diamond earrings?'
'And the star--the star Don Gennaro Parascandolo gave you,' he said
hurriedly, in an anxious tone.
She said nothing, just kept her head down and looked at the baby
quietly sleeping. Then, in a whisper, with an irrepressible shudder,
she said to her husband:
'You want to pawn my jewels so as to stake on the lottery.'
'That is not true!' he cried out.
'Do not tell lies. Can you say before me and your daughter that you
won't use the money for the lottery?'
'Do not speak to me like that, Luisella!' he stammered out, with
tears in his eyes.
'You want them to stake on the lottery with. Have the courage of your
vices; don't load your conscience with lies,' his wife answered with
the cruelty of desperation.
'It is not a vice, Luisa; it is for good ends I gambled, for good
motives, for your sake and Agnesina's.'
'A father of a family does not gamble.'
'It was to open the new shop in San Ferdinando Square. Seventy
thousand francs were needed for it, and I had not got it. You know
all our money is in use.'
'A family man ought not to play.'
'It was for the happiness of us all, Luisella. I swear to you,
believe me, it was because of my love for Agnesina.'
'You don't love her. If you cared for her, you would not gamble.'
'Luisella, don't humiliate me--don't make me out mean. Be kind. You
know how much I loved you--how I do love you!'
'It is not true. If you loved me, you would not gamble.'
He threw himself on an iron seat, leant his arms and head on a marble
table, and hid his face, not able to bear his wife's anger and his
own remorse. He felt great grief and sorrow, only surmounted by that
sharp, piercing need of money. With that agony he raised his head
again, and said:
'Luisella, if my honour is dear to you, don't force me to make a
poor figure to-morrow. Give me your jewels; I will give them back on
Monday.'
'Take the jewels; they belong to you,' she said slowly, with her eyes
down; 'but do not say you will give them back on Monday, because it
is not true. All gamblers lie like that, but pledged goods never come
back to the house. Take all the jewellery. What can I say against
your taking it? I was a poor girl with no dowry, and you, a rich
merchant, condescended to marry me, and gave me a higher position.
Should I not thank you for that all my life? Take everything; be
master of the house, of me and my daughter. To-day you will take the
jewels and stake them; next time you will take the best furniture,
the kitchen coppers, the house linen; it always goes on like that.
The Marquis di Formosa, too, who lives above us--has he not done
that? His daughter has not a bit of bread to put in her mouth now:
and if Dr. Amati did not help them secretly, both would die of
hunger. Who will help us when, in a year or six months, we are like
them? Who knows? Perhaps I will go mad, too, as the poor young lady
up there threatens to do. Her father makes her see spirits. It is a
scandal amongst all those who know her. But what are we women to do?
Fathers, husbands, are the masters. Take the diamonds, pawn them,
sell them, throw them into the gulf where your money has fallen and
is lost; I do not care for them now. They were my pride as a happy
wife. When I put them in my ears and hair, when I opened the casket
to look at them, I blessed your name, because, among other pleasures,
you had given me this. It is ended; it is all over. We are done with
pleasures now; we are at the last gasp.'
'Luisella, have some charity!' he screamed out, feeling his flesh and
soul burn from these red-hot words.
'Charity! we will soon be asking for it. The diamonds go to-day,
the other valuables next; then all, everything we possess, will
disappear. It will all be a flying dream,' she replied, looking in
front of her as if she already saw the frightful vision of their ruin.
'Still, I need them; it is necessary for me to take them!' he cried
out with the doleful persistence of a desperate man who only feels
his evil tendencies pushing him on.
'Who is denying you anything? Even Agnesina has pearl earrings. Put
them in; it will make a larger sum. Her cradle has antique lace on
it; Signora Parascandolo presented it to her. It is valuable. Take
it; it will bring up the sum.'
'Look here, Luisa,' her husband began saying pantingly, emotion
choking his utterance, 'I swear to you the money is not intended for
gambling; I would not have dared to ask it from you, a good woman, if
it was. You have such good reasons to despise me already. But it is a
debt for former stakes I made--a terrible debt to a money-lender. He
threatens to protest it to-morrow--to seize my goods. This cannot be
allowed to happen; a merchant whose bills are protested ought to die.'
'That is true,' she said, hanging her head.
'It may be,' he added after a short hesitation. 'Perhaps I would
have taken some of it to gamble with--just a little, only to try and
recoup myself--only for that, Luisella.'
'In short, you cannot keep from gambling!' his wife cried out in a
rage.
He trembled like a guilty boy, and did not answer.
'Can you not keep from it?' she asked again, attacked by a most
terrible fear.
'Look here, this is how it is: it is a perfidious passion. You do not
know what it is; you must have felt it to know; you must have panted
and dreamt, or you cannot think what it is like. One starts gambling
for a joke, out of curiosity, as a little challenge to fortune.
One goes on, pricked to the quick by delusions, excited by vague
desires that grow. Woe to you if you win anything--an _ambo_, a small
_terno_! It is all up with you, for your chance of winning seems
certain. Do you see? You feel certain of winning a large sum, as you
have managed to get a small amount, and you put back not only all
you have gained, but you double, treble the stake in the weeks that
follow your success. It is the devil's money going back to hell. What
a passion it is, Luisella! It is bad for one to win, and bad not
to win. Then the dream, that for seven days keeps you alive, on the
eighth day gives you a bitter disappointment; it ends by setting your
blood on fire, and to increase your chances of winning at any cost,
your stakes increase frightfully; the desire of winning gets to be a
madness. The soul gets sick; it neither sees nor hears anything. No
family ties, position, nor fortune, can stand against this passion.'
'My God!' she said softly, just as if she were going to fall into a
chasm.
'You are right, Luisella, to ill-use me, to strike at me with your
scorn; you have a right to do it. I am a bad husband, a worse father;
I have beggared my family. You are quite right,' Cesare said again
convulsively. 'I was a cheerful, industrious young fellow; all wished
me well; my business was going splendidly; you were a joy, and
Agnesina a pleasure to me. What fascination has overcome me? That
cursed idea I had of winning seventy thousand francs at the lottery
to open a shop at San Ferdinando with--a cursed idea that has put
the fire of hell into my blood. I wanted to enrich you by gambling,
whereas grandfather and father taught me by example that only by
being content with a little, by putting sou upon sou, one gets rich.
What folly was it seized me? What was the infection? Where did I
catch it? What a horrible passion gambling is!'
The poor woman listened to that anguished confession, pale, her
lips shaking from the effort she made to restrain her sobs, leaning
against the elbows of the chair, feeling crushed by a nameless agony.
'How much have I staked?' Cesare went on. He seemed to be speaking to
himself now, without seeing his wife or hearing his sleeping child's
breathing. 'I do not know, I do not remember now. The lottery is a
great melter-down of money; it is like a crucible the metal runs out
of. At first I played moderately; I tried to be moderate and wise
about it, as if the lottery was not the most laughable trick that
fortune plays on man. At that time I wrote down the money I staked
in a pocket-book where I note my ordinary expenses; but afterwards
the fever seized me, and has grown so, I remember no more. I do not
remember how many thousands of francs I threw away so madly in an
ugly dream, a delirium that came back again every Friday. Luisella,
you do not know it, but we are ruined.'
'I do know it,' she said very softly, looking at the little one's
pink face sleeping in childish serenity.
'You do not know, you cannot know, everything. I have given bills for
the money put aside for yearly payments; I have staked the thousand
francs we put in the savings bank for Agnesina; I have robbed her
of the money I gave her--her own money; I have failed to carry out
my bargains commercially. Our correspondents have no confidence in
my soundness; they will have no more to do with me; they send me no
goods. You see the shop is getting empty; I have no ready money to
fill it again. I have not even paid the insurance money; if the shop
was burnt down to-morrow, I would not get a farthing. I am a bad
payer. You do not know--you can't. I have tried for money everywhere
in desperation; put myself in a money-lender's hands, mostly in Don
Gennaro Parascandolo's, and they have eaten me up to the bone.'
'Did you borrow money from Agnesina's godfather?' Luisella exclaimed
sadly, hiding her face in her hands.
'In money matters no relationship counts; money hardens all hearts.
These debts are my shame and torment. A tradesman who takes money
at eight per cent. a month is thought to be ruined, and they are
right. Money-lending is dishonest both in the borrower and lender.
What shall I do? The season is a very bad one for poor and rich;
but even if it was a splendid one, the gains would not be enough
even to pay the interest on my debts. Just think; it is a miracle
that Cesare Fragalà, the head of the Fragalà house, has not yet been
declared bankrupt, and a discreditable bankrupt; for a merchant
cannot take creditors' money to stake on the lottery. It is theft,
you understand, theft, and thieves go to the gallows. After reducing
my family to wretchedness, I will take their honour from them by this
hellish madness.'
Not able to bear his unhappiness any longer, he burst into sobs,
choking and crying like a child. She, shaking with emotion, feeling
in her heart a great pity for her husband and a great fear for the
future, raised her head resolutely.
'There is no remedy, then?' she said, in her firm voice, like a good,
loving woman.
'There is none,' he answered, opening his arms in a despairing way.
'We are on a precipice. I understand--I see it. But there must be
some way of mending matters,' she reiterated obstinately, not willing
to give in without a struggle.
'Pray to the Virgin for help--pray!' he whispered, like a child--more
lost than a child.
'Let us try and find some cure,' she still answered softly.
'You try; I can do no more. I have no will or strength left. You must
search for it. I am lost, and nothing will save me.'
The despairing words seemed to echo in the gay, white shop, shining
with satin and porcelain. There was a deep silence between the
couple. She, wrapped in thought, with the firm, introspective glance
of a strong woman, counted over the extent of her misfortune. She
did not feel angry now. All rage had fallen at the young fellow's
agonized voice. He had been so easy and merry, and now he stammered
out piteously his irreparable mistake. What she had heard, the
anguish bursting forth from her husband's inward heart, what she had
guessed at, and that grievous, impressive spectacle, had done a work
of cleansing. All personal resentment had gone from her generous
mind. She only felt a strong desire for self-sacrifice, for saving
her husband and his home. The littleness that sometimes limited
her womanly mind had gone. Her soul rose to unselfish heights of
sacrifice. He kept to earth, tied down by his engrossing passion.
He did not show even the Marquis di Formosa's greatness under it.
His grief, his lamentation, were as monotonous and rhythmical as
a child's. She, on the other hand, on meeting misfortune became
spiritualized, and let the noblest part of her character rule her.
After that wild confession she felt more like a helpful sister, a
compassionate mother, than a young wife; more like a high magnanimous
protector. She forgot all her natural pretences and affectations as a
woman and wife.
He was weeping, with his head down on his arm against the table, like
a wretched creature whose unhappiness is really infinite and not to
be cured, while she, deep in thought, pondered over means of setting
things right. But all at once, with a hush, she told him to say no
more. Agnesina had wakened, very gently, as usual, without weeping
or crying. Seated queerly on her tiny chair, she was looking at her
mother with wide-open, mildly-sparkling eyes. Luisella lifted her
out of the chair she was fastened into and bent over to kiss her
little one, as if she got strength from that kiss and her requited
love.
The tiny one looked at her father without speaking, seeing his head
down on the table; then she said, 'Is father asleep?'
'No, no, he is not sleeping,' said her mother under her breath, as
she went into the back-shop to take her mantle and hat. 'Go and give
him a kiss. Go and say this to him, "Father, it is nothing--it is
nothing."'
The obedient infant went to her father, leant her tiny head against
his knee, and, in her pretty, singing voice said:
'Father, give me a kiss; it is nothing, nothing.'
Then the poor young fellow's swollen heart burst. The most scalding
tears rained on his little one's head.
While tying her bonnet-strings, Luisella, as she heard these
desperate sobs, shivered to keep back her tears. But she did not
interfere. She let the desolate heart find a vent and take comfort in
kissing the little one. She, full of wonder, went on saying under the
tears and kisses, 'Father, father, it is nothing.'
'Let us go home,' said Luisella, coming into the shop again, biting
her lips, trying to harden her heart.
Still moved, Cesare Fragalà took his little girl in his arms, as he
did every evening when she went to sleep in the shop, and put on her
woollen hood, tying it under the chin. Luisella went on tidying up
the shop a little, taking the key out of the strong box, feeling if
all the drawers of the counter were properly shut, with that instinct
for working with their hands all healthy, good young women have.
They put out the gas, and Luisella lit a taper. Then they went away
through the back-shop and the small door that led into Bianchi Lane.
It was still raining. The warm scirocco wind beat the tepid summer
rain in their faces; but they were not far from home. Cesare put up
his umbrella, his wife took his arm to shelter from the rain, the
child was perched on his other arm and put her head on his shoulder.
All three went along, bowed under the summer storm, not speaking,
clinging one to the other as if only love could save them from
life's tempest that threatened to overwhelm them. At night, under
the rage of heaven, it seemed as if they were going on and on to a
sorrowful destiny. But the two innocent ones pressed close to the
unhappy, guilty man, seeming to pray for him. They would bring him
into safety. They said nothing till they got home, where the servant
was waiting for them at the open door. She held out her arms to take
Agnesina and carry her to her room to undress her and put her to bed.
But the little one, as if she had understood the importance of the
time, asked her father and mother to kiss her again, saying, in her
gentle, baby tongue, 'Bless me, mother; bless me, father.'
At last they were alone again in their bedroom, where the silver lamp
burned before the Mother of Jesus, the holy grieving Mother. Cesare
was depressed. But Luisella opened the glass door of the wardrobe at
once, where she kept her most valuable things, and stood for a little
searching in that half-light. Then she pulled two or three dark
leather jewel-cases out.
'Here they are,' she said, offering the jewels to her husband.
'Oh, Luisella! Luisella!' he cried out, agonized.
'I give them to you willingly, for the sake of your honour. I would
not dare to keep these stones when we are in danger of failing in
honesty. Take them. But by all that has been sweet in our past, by
all that may be frightful in our future, by the love you bore me,
that I bear you, for our dear child's sake, whose head you wept over
this evening, I implore you with my whole heart, as one prays to
Christ at the altar, give me a promise.'
'Luisella, you want to kill me!' he cried out, putting his hands
through his hair.
'Do you promise to leave all your trade affairs in my hands--debts
and dues, buying and selling?'
'I do promise.'
'Will you promise to give me all the money you have or may get, and
not try to get money without my knowledge?'
'I will give it to you--all, Luisa.'
'Promise to believe me, only to listen to my advice and what I say.'
'I promise that.'
'Promise that no one will have more influence than me; promise to
obey me as you did your mother when you were a child.'
'I will obey you as I did her.'
'Swear to all that.'
'I swear it to the Madonna, who is listening to us.'
'Let us pray now.'
Both piously knelt before the holy images. They said the Lord's
Prayer in a whisper, louder at the end. She raised her eyes, and
said, 'Lead us not into temptation,' and he rejoined, very humbly and
disconsolately, 'Lead us not into temptation.'
CHAPTER XIV
THE MEDIUM'S IMPRISONMENT
The summer rain beat sadly on the pavement; two broad yellow gutters
went down the sides of Nardones Road; the sickening sulphurous smell
of August storms was in the air. In San Ferdinando Square the cabs
had their hoods up, and were shiny all over with rain, dripping on
all sides. The long thin horses stood with their heads down, drenched
to the bones, and running down with water. The drivers sat huddled
up, their shapeless hats over their eyes, keeping their heads down
and hands spasmodically fixed in the pockets of their torn capes,
as they patiently bore the deluge from the sky. All around was
dreary-looking--the royal palace, the porch of San Francesco di Paolo
Church, the Prefecture, barracks, and large coffee-houses--all were
dreary, in spite of the grandeur of the buildings and the numbers
of lights behind the plate-glass windows. There was the majestic
edifice of San Carlo Theatre also; but the whole night landscape
was wrapped up in the noisy tempest that never rested, and seemed
to draw new force from its weariness to beat on houses, streets,
and men. There were few passers-by, and these looked like unhappy
folks' ghosts walking under dripping umbrellas, or, having no
umbrella, they scraped along the wall with coat-collar raised and
soft hat soaked with rain. Some few wanderers turned the corner from
Toledo Street into Nardones Road, which is a broad enough street in
the best quarter of the town; but it has an equivocal appearance,
all the same, as if it was uninhabited and unsafe. It had no
shady corners, but shutter-closed windows, ill-lit balconies, and
half-open doors, where the gaze was checked by a dark passage, had
a suspicious appearance. Some great door now and then broke through
this doubtful impression, from the brightness of the gas and width
of its courtyard, but a shop with far from clean windows, obscured
by reddish stuff curtains carefully drawn, a feeble light coming
through and small or large shadows showing behind, gave a new feeling
of suspicion and uneasiness to the minds of people going home that
way who might be bending under the weight of cares and long fatigue.
At one point a woman with a black shawl barely covering her yellow
dress and white bodice turned the corner from Toledo Street and went
up Nardones Road slowly, holding the corners of the handkerchief on
her head tightly between her teeth, sheltering from the rain under a
very small umbrella. She went along very cautiously, lifting her feet
so as to wet her bright leather shoes as little as possible, lifting
her skirt to let red cotton stockings be seen. When she passed under
a lamp-post's reddish light she raised her head and showed the face,
now sad and tired, for all its commonplace beauty, of Filomena,
Annarella and Carmela's unfortunate sister. She got as far as the
suspicious-looking shop with the red curtains, and stopped before
the plate-glass door as if she was trying to see someone or find out
what was going on, and did not dare to open the door. She could make
out nothing but some dark shadows with hats on moving about. After
hesitating a little, she decided to put her hand on the knob of a
small window and open it. She put in her head timidly, and called:
'Raffaele! Raffaele!'
I am coming immediately,' the young Camorrist's voice answered from
inside in rather an impatient tone.
She quickly shut the window again and set herself to wait in the
rain. A man passed, and cast a queer look at her, his curiosity
aroused by meeting anyone in that strange stormy weather at so late
an hour. But she cast down her eyes as if she was ashamed, and
watched the end of Nardones Road to see who came round the corner,
evidently being much afraid of being recognised. Suddenly she gave
a start. Two working men were coming along, going up Nardones Road,
not speaking to each other, getting all the rain on their shoulders.
The one man, old, hump-backed, dragging his leg, turned out to be
Michele, the shoeblack, not carrying his block for once; the other,
tall and thin, with burning eyes in hollow sockets, was Gaetano, the
glover. On recognising her sister Annarella's husband, Filomena gave
a frightened shiver and got closer to the wall, as if she wanted to
get to the other side of it. She lowered her umbrella, and prayed
silently, with lips that could hardly stammer out the words, that
Gaetano should not recognise her. She shivered and trembled, fearing
the shop door would open and that Gaetano would see the man who was
coming out. But Gaetano, as he was getting the full force of the rain
on his head, took no notice of the people on the road, luckily for
Filomena, nor did the shop door open as he passed. Instead of that,
the working men disappeared, one after the other, into a gateway,
forty paces off, where some other men had gone in before them. But
Filomena felt her cheeks icy under the rouge, from the fright she had
got, and she opened the door again to beg and beseech in a whisper:
'Raffaele, do come!'
'I am coming--I am coming,' the young fellow answered in a bored
tone, not even noticing that the poor woman was waiting all this time
in the rain, at night, in a wind-swept road.
She sighed deeply. Her eyes had no need now of bistre, for a deep
line of fatigue went under them, and they were filled with tears. The
rain now had soaked through her green cotton umbrella and come down
on her head. It soaked her shiny black hair and ran down her face and
neck, a warm water, like tears. But she did not even feel the rain
trickling, for she felt nothing. She did not see three or four other
men come out of Toledo Street, go on to the top of Nardones Road, and
disappear into the gateway where Michele and Gaetano had rushed in.
Inside the shop the shadows moved about, and a noise of voices in
discussion arose. She got up closer and strained her ears anxiously
as she heard Raffaele cursing and threatening. She could not stand
the noise of angry voices. Again she opened the door, crying out
beseechingly:
'Raffaele, Raffaele, do come!'
Still angrier words burst out on all sides from those drinking and
gambling in that wretched coffee-house; then Raffaele came out of the
shop, putting on his hat with a bang, as if he was being pushed from
inside. On finding himself confronted by Filomena's humble figure,
soaking, the rouge running down her cheeks, her face distorted by
fear, he cursed impiously, and gave her an ugly shove.
'Come on home--do come!' said she, taking no notice of the push and
the curses.
The Camorrist furiously told her to go and kill herself. But it was
raining, and he had no umbrella; his short jacket did not shelter him
well, so he got under her umbrella, still cursing.
'Be patient with me, be kind,' she said, lengthening her steps on the
pavement to keep alongside of him, and lowering the umbrella to his
side, so that he should not get soaked.
'But you know you should not come to the billiard-saloon,' said the
young fellow, with suppressed rage. 'It bores me to look like a
schoolboy being fetched home--it bores me.'
'Be patient with me. I could not help it,' she whispered, drinking in
the tears that ran down her cheeks, not being able to wipe them.
'I will leave you--as true as death, I'll leave you! You have
your sister's fault. She was so ragged she disgusted me. She came
everywhere to look for me, and made my friends laugh at me. I left
her for that. Do you understand?'
'Poor sister!' she moaned out.
'You are not ragged, but you get me laughed at just the same. Do you
hear?'
'Yes, I know.'
'If you don't give over, I will leave you, as I did Carmela. I am a
young fellow of honour, you know.'
'Yes, I know that.'
'Don't come here again.'
'Very well, I never will.'
They still went on with this talk, for he felt enraged at losing
his game and at being laughed at by his friends, also at not having
any money. She was penitent, feeling that ill-treatment was her
just punishment for playing her sister false; so, while he bit at
his spent cigar in a corner of his mouth and went on abusing her,
taunting her with her unhappy life, calling her every bad name, she
went alongside, silent and pale, for all the rouge had run down
with the rain. Her wet chemise stuck to her shoulders, and her hair
was glued to her forehead with damp. She went on, keeping down the
umbrella to his side, bearing his insults; for she was carried away
by sorrow and repentance, and said mechanically over and over again:
'It is little to what I deserve.'
Up there all those who went in at the gateway on the right side of
Nardones Road had gone up a stair of one flight, opposite the chief
staircase, which was a little broader. They went into an apartment
of two rooms that was let for an office--so called by the owner
because it had no kitchen. But the two rooms were so low in the
ceiling, so badly lighted by two small windows, the red brick floors
were so cold, the wall-paper so dirty, and the paint of the doors
and windows so greasy, that no small notary, poor advocate, doctor
without practice, or dealer in doubtful business, stayed there more
than a month. The cobbler who served as a porter and the inmates
who went down the big stair were accustomed, therefore, to see new
faces for ever going up and down the small stair--young and old men,
ushers and commission agents, a string of white-faced people, often
very queer-looking. Who troubled themselves about the people living
there? No one--not even the porter. He got no pay from the occupiers
of the flat, and did not care therefore if the tenants were changed.
On the big stair busy people lived: house-agents, writing-masters, a
third-rate dentist, a midwife, and others of queer professions. They
went up and down, taken up about their own interests and business,
their decent poverty or unsuccessful ill-doing. They were people who
took little notice of their neighbours, so that one might call the
office, that always was having new tenants or being left vacant,
rather isolated. The ticket 'To Let' stood there on the door the
whole year round; every month it was the same. When the apartment was
let, then the tenant carried off the key at dusk; when it was vacant,
the cobbler kept it on his counter, or, if he was away, he handed it
over to the charcoal-dealer opposite. The stair of the apartment was
broken in places, slippery and dangerous for those who had not good
legs and sharp eyes.
Now, that August the little place had been occupied for a couple of
months by a neatly-dressed young gentleman, affecting the style of
a provincial trying to be fashionable. He was fat and thick, with
a bull-like neck, and his red hair, joined to a florid complexion,
gave him an apoplectic look. So the office was opened several times a
week for a few hours, and two or three men, or sometimes more, came
in. They disappeared up the staircase, and nothing more was heard,
nothing showed behind the dirty window-panes; only after an hour or
so these men appeared again, one by one, some red in the face, as if
they had shouted for a long time, others pallid, as if gulping down
repressed rage. They vanished each one by his own road, without even
the porter seeing them sometimes.
But one evening of the week, always the same one, seven or eight men
met in the office, and then a dirty petroleum lamp, covered by a
shade that might cost threepence, lighted up the dirty room. Its only
furniture was a rough table and eight or ten chairs, of odd patterns.
On that evening the confabulation lasted till past midnight; often
some gesticulating shadow showed queerly against the panes; sometimes
the men leant out of the window, and looked stolidly into the dull
black court, as if they saw the ghosts of their own excited minds.
The cobbler, tired with his hard day's work, casting an indifferent
glance at the windows of the office, saw it was still lighted up,
and, shrugging his shoulders, went off to sleep in his den, a hole
under the staircase. The courtyard was not lighted up; the street
door was left half open; some people still went out and came in
cautiously from the so-called great staircase. Some mysterious
night-patient of the dentist, some hurried client to call the
midwife, who opened the door mysteriously to go out.
It was after midnight when Dr. Trifari's guests went away from the
meeting, all together, silently, hurrying down one after the other to
get away as quickly as possible. The last one pulled the office door
behind him, and it gave the creaking noise of old rotten wood. The
two small rooms that formed the office returned to their solitude,
and, with hearts beating high in the excitement of their dream, the
party melted away through the town. But this dreary evening the poor
cobbler had gone to bed at dusk, wrapping himself up in his ragged
bed-covering and torn cape he had worn all day, feeling the chill of
the tertian fever and the damp of the stormy weather in his bones.
So, in the confusion of the fever that had come on like a block of
ice on his chest, he heard the clatter of those going up and down
the big stair. Two or three times he seemed to hear voices raised
in the office, where there was a window open, and the scirocco wind
carried the rain rushing in, and made the oil-lamp flicker. The
rain went on falling in the badly-paved court, covering any other
noise; then the window was shut, and no more could be heard. Later
on the shutters were fastened too, and everything sank again into
deep shadow. Still, there was a meeting going on there. Trifari, the
master of the house, had been the first to arrive; he lighted the
lamp, and went through to the second room to arrange some things,
going and coming from it, with his hat a little on the back of his
head. In spite of the scirocco wind, it was the first time the colour
had gone out of his red face, and some drops of sweat came out on his
forehead. Sometimes he stood still, as if he repented of what he was
going to do or thought of doing; but he quickly recovered from that
momentary depression. When the shrill bell rang the first time, Dr.
Trifari gave a start and stood still uncertainly, as if he dared not
open it. Still, he went, but he only half opened the folding-door,
with great caution, to let Colaneri pass through. The ex-priest's
face was rather gloomy, and his shoulders were dripping wet; for
his small umbrella, a very shabby one, only protected his head.
They said good-evening to each other in a whisper; Colaneri, with
cautious glances from behind his spectacles, dried his wet hands with
a doubtfully white handkerchief--the fat, flabby, whitish hands that
are peculiar to priests. They said nothing to each other. The same
complicated anguish bore down on them, so that their Southerners'
loquacity was subdued; all the past excitement, beaten down by
disappointments following each other, had ended by sapping their
strength.
Suddenly, raising his head, Colaneri asked: 'Is he to come?'
'Yes, he is coming,' Trifari breathed between his lips.
'Has he no suspicion of what we are going to do?'
'None at all.'
A gust of wind came into the room and nearly put out the light. It
was then Trifari went to shut the window.
'We are only doing what is an absolute necessity,' Professor Colaneri
replied, repeating aloud the excuse with which he had been soothing
his conscience for some days.
'It is impossible to go on any longer like this,' the doctor remarked
in a dull voice; then he lighted a cigar to try and look at his ease,
but he did not manage it: he let the match go out.
'The report made against me to the governors is frightful,' said
Colaneri in a whisper, with his eyes down. 'I have a lot of
enemies--lads I ploughed in the examinations, you know. They reported
me to the President of the University as having sold the exercises
to some students. They put down the names, too....'
'How could they know all that?' the doctor asked slowly.
'Who can tell? I have so many enemies. The President made a dreadful
report; I am threatened....'
'With being turned out?'
'Not only that; there is to be a lawsuit....'
'You don't say so?'
'I have so many enemies, Trifari. It is a serious threat. How will I
be able to prove my innocence?'
'You have sold these exercises, then?' the doctor muttered cynically,
throwing away his cigar.
'The pay is so wretched, Trifari, and the examinations are all a
fraud, too.'
'If they take you to law it will be bad for you.'
'I am ruined if they do. I must have money in hand at any cost this
time, do you understand; if not, I am ruined. There is nothing left
but to shoot myself, if they take me to law. We must win, Trifari.'
'We will win,' the other affirmed sternly. 'I have a lot of trouble,
here and at my home. My father has sold everything; my brother,
instead of coming home after his service as a soldier, out of poverty
has enlisted in the military police; my sister is not to be married,
she has not a farthing of dowry now; she is reduced to making dresses
for rich peasants. We had very little, and I have eaten all there
was, and there are a number of debts, of calls.... The father of
the student whom we forced to sign a promissory note at Don Gennaro
Parascandolo's wants to denounce me as a cheat.... We must win,
Colaneri; we cannot live another week without winning.... I am more
ruined than you are.'
Here the bell rang very gently.
'Perhaps it is him, do you think?' Colaneri asked with a little shake
in his voice.
'No, no,' Trifari answered; 'he is to come later, when we are all
here....'
'Who took the message to him?'
'Formosa took it.'
'He has no suspicion, then?'
'No, none.'
'Then, the spirit has not told him anything?'
'It looks as if the spirit could not go against Fate, for it tells
him nothing about this.'
'It is Fate, I suppose?'
Another ring came. Trifari went to open the door. It was Marzano,
the lawyer, the sprightly, good-natured, smiling old man. But
sudden decrepitude seemed to have come over him; his pallor had got
yellowish, his pepper-and-salt moustache was quite white, and had got
thin over his mouth. His smile had gone for ever; evidently, as death
drew near, his good opinion of life had gone. He came in sighing. He
was soaking, his overcoat shone with drops of water all over, and
his lean hands trembled. He sat down saying nothing, and kept his
hat well down over his ears, only his mouth kept up the old habit
of moving, always chewing ciphers. Now he leant his pointed chin,
where a neglected beard was growing, on his stick, being so wrapt in
thought he did not even hear what Trifari and Colaneri were saying
to each other. Suddenly he, too, having the same engrossing thought,
asked: 'Will he come, do you think?'
'Of course he will,' the other two answered together.
'Has he not guessed?'
'He knows nothing about it.'
'These mediums either see a lot or they see nothing.'
'Better so,' the other two muttered.
Dr. Trifari, on hearing knocking at the door, went first into the
second room to fetch three or four other chairs, and arranged them
round the shabby table. Ninetto Costa and Don Crescenzio, the
lottery banker at Nunzio Lane, came in. The stock-broker had lost
all his smartness. He was dressed anyhow--in a morning coat; his
too light overcoat had big splashes of wet on it; not even a pebble
breast-pin shone on his black silk necktie. His fine lucky man's
bright smile that showed his teeth had gone too with the smartness.
The stock-broker was going on with difficulty from one settling-day
to another, taking no more risks, not daring to gamble; he had lost
all his audacity; he only managed to keep his creditors at bay: they
still had faith in him; because his name was known on the Exchange,
because his father had been a model of honesty and he himself had
been so lucky, all still believed in his fortune. But the unhappy man
knew that the hour of the crisis had come, that he would not even
be able to pay the interest on his debts soon, that Ninetto Costa's
name would be on the bankrupt list. He had put down everything--his
handsome house, carriages, luxurious appliances, journeys, dinners,
and English clothes from Poole. But this sacrifice was not enough,
for the cancer that gnawed his breast, that ate into everything, was
not rooted out. He still desperately played at the lottery, being
taken by it now soul and body, shutting his eyes to the storm so
as not to see the waves coming that would drown him. Alongside of
him Don Crescenzio, with his handsome, serene face and well-combed
chestnut beard, had the traces also of beginning to fall off in
prosperity. By dint of being in contact with feverish people, just
as if he had been touching too hot hands, something of the gambling
fever had been affecting him, and through the desperate insistence of
the gamblers he had got to giving them credit. How could he resist
the imploring demands of Ninetto Costa, Trifari and Colaneri's
pretexts, that had a vague threat under them, the Marquis di
Formosa's grand promises?--all used different forms of supplication.
To begin with, he let them have credit from Friday till Tuesday, the
day he got ready the State profits; they, doing a renewed miracle
every week, managed to give him what they owed, so that he might be
ready on Wednesday; but at last, their resources being exhausted,
some of them began to pay a part only, or not to pay anything, and he
began to put his own money into it, so that his caution money should
not be seized by the State. The gamblers dared not show again till
they had got money; then they paid off part of the debt and staked
what they had over. One client had disappeared altogether--Baron
Lamarra, son of the mason who had got to be a contractor and a rich
man. He owed Don Crescenzio more than two thousand francs, and when
Don Crescenzio had waited for him two or three weeks, he went to look
for him at his house. He found the wife in a furious state. Baron
Lamarra had forged her signature on a number of bills, and she had
to pay unless she wanted to be a forger's wife; but she was already
trying for a separation. Baron Lamarra had fled to Isernia, and from
there gave not a sign of life. Don Crescenzio was rudely turned away
from the door--that was two thousand francs and more lost! He swore
not to give more credit to anyone; but, in spite of the debtors
paying him a little now and then, seven or eight thousand francs were
still risked, with little hope of getting them back. Eight thousand
francs was the exact sum of his savings for several years. Besides,
he could not press his debtors much--they had nothing now but a few
desperate resources that only came to light from a wicked, burning
love of gambling. He now took a lively interest in their gambling,
and was anxious for them to win, so as to get his savings back, to
recover the money left so imprudently in the hands of these vicious
fellows. He watched the gamblers so that they should not go to play
elsewhere, now uneasy and sick himself from coming in contact with
so many infected people. It was for this reason that the evening's
mysterious design was made known to him; they all owed him money, and
could hide nothing from him. And in spite of a secret friendship, we
would almost say complicity, between Don Pasqualino, the medium, and
him, he told him nothing about the mysterious plan; by his silence he
seemed to approve of it.
There were five of them already in the small room, seated round the
table in different thoughtful or rather absent-minded attitudes. They
were not speaking: some held their heads down, and scribbled with
their nails on the dusty table; others looked at the smoky ceiling,
where the petroleum lamp threw a small ring of light.
'Seven hundred thousand francs have been paid out in Rome,' said Don
Crescenzio to break that weighty silence.
'Lucky they! lucky they!' two or three cried out, with a stirring of
envy against the lucky Roman winners.
'If what we are doing is successful,' Colaneri muttered darkly, and
his spectacles gave a sad twinkle, 'the Government will pay Naples
three or four millions of francs.'
'We must succeed,' Ninetto Costa retorted.
'The urn will be under command this time,' said Marzano mysteriously.
Now came renewed knocking, very gently, as if timidity had enfeebled
the hand at the door. Trifari disappeared to open it, after asking
through the door who it was; he had suddenly grown suspicious. The
answer was 'Friends!' and he recognised the voice. The two common
folk, Gaetano the glover and Michele the shoeblack, came in; they
took off their caps, saying 'Good-evening!' and stood at the entrance
of the room, not daring to sit down in such good company.
Outside the wind and rain grew furious, a gutter full of water
emptied into the court with a loud swish. Now, under the
window-frames, a stream of water came in at the cracks, wetting
the window-sills and trickling to the ground, the closed but
broken-ribbed umbrellas leaning against the walls in the corners
of the room dripped moisture on the dusty floor, and the wet shoes
made mud-pies. The men sitting down never moved: they kept up a
solemn stiffness and lugubrious silence, as if they were watching
a dead person and were overwhelmed with fatigue and the oppression
of their funereal thoughts. The two working men standing, one lean,
colourless, with a cutter-out's round shoulders, the hair thinned
already on the forehead and temples, the other man crooked and
hunchbacked, twisted like a corkscrew and old, though his rugged,
sharp face was lively still, kept silence too, waiting. Only
Ninetto Costa, to give himself a careless look, had taken out an
old pocket-book, the remnant of his old smartness, and was writing
ciphers in it with a small pencil, wetting the point in his mouth.
But they were fancy figures, and his hand trembled a little. His
friends said it was from his fast life that it shook. Thus they spent
about fifteen long slow minutes that lay heavily on the souls of all
those waiting there to carry out their mysterious plan.
'What bad weather we are having,' said Ninetto Costa, passing his
hand over his forehead.
'The sky has opened,' Don Crescenzio remarked, yawning nervously.
'What o'clock is it, doctor,' asked old Marzano in a trembling,
decrepit little voice.
'It is five minutes to ten,' said the doctor, taking out an ugly
nickel watch, the sort that cannot be pawned, attached to a sordid
black cord.
'What hour is the appointment for?' asked Colaneri, trying to look as
if he was indifferent.
'It was to have been ten o'clock, but who knows whether he will
come?' the doctor replied, lowering his voice, putting all his
uncertainty and doubt into what he said.
'Who can tell?' said Ninetto Costa profoundly. A long sigh relieved
his breast, as if he could not bear the weight that bore him down.
'Are you feeling ill?' Colaneri asked him.
'I wish I was dead,' muttered the stock-broker desolately. Someone
shook his head, sighing; another one had the same feeling, evidently,
from the expression of his face, and the sad words spread through
the damp dirty room under the smoky lamp. Then for a little the
summer storm calmed down, fewer drops rattled on the window, and
again there came a great silence. Through the wall, no one knew from
where, like a slow warning voice, a solemn clock gave ten melancholy
strokes. There was a pause between each stroke, and it cast a breath
of fear among the men gathered there to plot some cruel device or
other.
'That will be the Spirit,' said Don Crescenzio, trying to joke.
'Don't let us jest,' Trifari said, in a severely reproving tone; 'we
are occupied about serious matters here.'
'No one wants to make jokes!' Ninetto Costa said chidingly. 'We all
know what we are doing.'
'There is no Judas here, is there?' said the doctor, looking round at
everyone.
There was a protesting murmur, but it was feeble. No, none of them
was Judas, nor was there a Christ among them; but all felt vaguely
at the bottom of their hearts that they were going to carry out a
betrayal.
'No one is Judas--no one,' cried out the doctor impetuously. 'Swear
before God that if there is he must make a bad end.'
'Don't swear, don't swear,' said old Marzano, quite frightened.
Again the bell rang; they all caught each other's eye suddenly, pale
and shivering; their fault rose before them. No one moved to open the
door, just as if there was a serious peril behind it.
'It will be him,' Colaneri dared to say, not raising his eyes.
'Perhaps it is,' Costa muttered, twisting his pocket-book absently in
his hand.
At once all of them regretted that the medium was outside the door.
The same shadow of furious disappointment disfigured their faces,
hardening them, from the cruelty of a wicked man who sees his prey
escaping. The furious instinct that sleeps at the bottom of all
human hearts, urged by long unsatisfied passion, burst forth in
that delirious form that vice produces in young and old, gentleman
and working man. The faces were reserved and hard, strong in their
ferocity. Dr. Trifari went forward in an energetic way to open the
door. To let the company know for certain that the medium was there,
he greeted him and the Marquis di Formosa at once, aloud.
'Good-evening, good evening, Don Pasqualino; we are all expecting
you.'
He stood aside to let them go in; the men in the room took a long
breath with fierce joy; there was no danger now that the medium would
escape them. And he that spoke every night with spirits, who had
especial communication by favour with wandering souls, he that ought
to have known all the truth, went quietly into the little room where
the meeting was, without suspecting anything. He cast, as usual, an
oblique glance all round, but the Cabalists' faces said nothing new
to him. They had the pallor, contortions, and feverish excitement
usual on Friday evening, but he saw nothing else. Only the Marquis
di Formosa, who was coming in with him, shivered two or three times;
it almost looked as if he wanted to turn back. But the Marquis had
been very excitable for some time past. He stammered in speaking, his
noble countenance was now degraded by traces of his ignoble passion,
he was badly dressed and untidy, had dirty shoes and a frayed collar,
and his ill-shaved beard was disgusting and pitiable. He had got so
excitable since he no longer had any money, since his daughter's
engagement to Dr. Amati. The medium could get no more money out of
him, so avoided him, and only saw him at the Friday evening meetings
in Nardones Road. But that evening the intimacy had begun again, the
Marquis had looked everywhere for the medium, and during the day had
given him fifty francs, making an appointment for the evening at ten
o'clock; indeed, he had anxiously insisted on this appointment, and
the medium had put it down to a disappointed gambler's eagerness to
get lottery numbers.
The Marquis's manner on the way to the office had been peculiar,
still, Don Pasqualino was accustomed to gamblers' eccentricities, and
took no notice of it. He went to sit at his usual place every week
near the table, putting one hand over his eyes to shelter them from
the glare of the lamp. Around the deep silence still held, broken
by a sigh now and then, and on looking at all their pallid, dumb,
excited faces the medium felt his first suspicion. He tried to do his
usual fantastic humbugging work.
'It rains, but the sun will come out at midnight.'
'That is idle chatter,' shouted Trifari, bursting into an ironical
laugh.
The others around muttered sneeringly. Now there was no longer any
belief in Don Pasqualino's mysterious words. This want of faith stood
out so plainly that the medium drew back as if he wanted to parry an
attack. But he tried again, thinking he could profit as usual from
the feverish imaginations of the Cabalists by striking a sympathetic
chord.
'It rains, the sun will come out at midnight, but he who wears the
Virgin's scapulary does not get wet.'
'Don Pasqualino, you are joking,' the glove-cutter said ironically.
The medium darted a look of rage at him. 'You need not look at me
as if you wanted to eat me, Don Pasqualino. Asking the gentlemen's
pardon, you are trying to make fools of us, and we are not the people
to allow it.'
'My lord, make that ass hold his tongue,' muttered the medium, making
a scornful gesture.
'He is not such an ass after all, Don Pasqualino,' said Formosa,
keeping down his excitement with difficulty.
'What do you mean, my lord?' asked Don Pasqualino sharply, getting
up to go away; but Trifari, who had never left the medium's
neighbourhood, put a hand on his shoulder without speaking, and
obliged him to sit down again. The medium sank his head on his breast
a minute to think it over, and gazed sideways at the door.
'Sit still, Don Pasqualino,' said Formosa slowly, 'we have a lot to
talk about here.'
A slightly agonized expression went over the caller-up of spirits'
face. Once more looking round the company, he only saw hard, anxious
faces, determined on success. He understood now confusedly.
'Gaetano the glover is not an ass for saying you are making fools of
us. What you have been doing for three years past looks like a trick.
For three years, you see, you have gone on saying the most disjointed
things with the excuse that the spirits said these things to you. For
three years you have made us stake the very bones of our necks upon
this nonsense of yours; every one of us has not only gained nothing,
but thrown his whole means away, from following your rubbish, and we
are full of woes, some of them incurable. What sort of a conscience
have you? We are ruined!'
'Yes, we are ruined--ruined!' shouted a chorus of agonized voices.
The speaker with spirits had often heard these lamentations,
especially lately; but faith had come again into the souls of his
followers. Now, he understood they no longer believed in him. Still,
hiding his fear, he tried to brazen it out.
'It is not my fault, it is your want of faith.'
'Rubbish!' the old lord shouted in a rage, whilst the others stormed
against the medium for repeating to them his invariable reason to
account for disappointment. 'Rubbish! how can we have failed in
faith when we have believed in you as in Jesus Christ? How can you
say faith is wanting when, to reward your overflow of chatter, we
have paid through the nose? You have pocketed thousands of francs in
these three years. Don't deny it. Have we no faith? We, who have had
Masses, prayers, and rosaries said; we, who have knelt and beat our
breasts, asking the Lord's favour--have we no faith? Why, we must
have had it! How can you account otherwise for the squandering of
money, for the way we wasted our own means and our families', thus
causing such unhappiness that it would have been nothing but a crime
if we had not believed in you? You say we have no faith; you have
been our God for three years, you have deceived us, and we never said
anything, but went on believing in you after you had taken every
penny from us.'
'Everything--you have taken everything!' shouted the company.
'You insult me, that is enough,' said the medium, getting up
resolutely. 'I am going away. Good-evening.'
'You do not leave this till we get satisfaction!' the Marquis di
Formosa cried out. 'Is it not the case that he will not get out of
this till he does?' he asked the assembled Cabalists.
'No, no, no!' the company of these cruel madmen shouted ferociously.
The medium understood, a deadly hue spread over his pallid cheeks,
his frightened glance wandered round in a desperate attempt to fly;
but the fierce gamblers had got up and made a circle round him. Some
of them were very pale, as if they were keeping down strong emotion,
the others were red with rage. In all their eyes the medium read the
same implacable cruelty.
'I wish to go away,' he said in a whisper, with that hoarse tone
that gave such a mysterious attraction to his voice.
'None of us would wish to detain you,' said the Marquis di Formosa
with ironical deference, 'if we had not need of you. If you do not
give us lottery numbers, you don't leave this!' he ended up by
shouting in a fit of fury.
'Lottery numbers, lottery numbers!' hissed Colaneri's thin voice.
'If not, you don't get out of this!' shrieked Ninetto Costa.
'Either give numbers, or you stay here!' thundered Dr. Trifari.
'An end to your fooling; give us the real tip for the lottery,' said
Gaetano, grinding his teeth.
'Don Pasqualino, make up your mind that those gentlemen won't let you
go away till you have given them lottery numbers--make up your mind
to it,' Don Crescenzio remarked wisely. He wished to pretend he was
not interested in the question.
'Next week. I promise them to you then; now I have not got them, I
swear it upon the Virgin!' stammered the medium, turning his eyes to
heaven despairingly.
'What good is next week?' all yelled out. 'It must be to-night, for
to-morrow--quick!'
'I have not got them, I have not got them,' he stammered again,
shaking his head.
'You must give them. We will make you give them,' the Marquis roared.
'We can do no more. Either we win this week, or we are ruined. Don
Pasqualino, we have waited long enough; we have believed too much;
you have treated us unfairly. The spirit tells you the real figures,
you know them, you always have known them; but you went on mocking
at us, telling us silly things. We can't wait till next week; before
that we may die, or see someone else die, or go to the galleys. This
evening or to-morrow we must have the true numbers. You understand?'
'The true--the true ones!' hissed Colaneri.
'Do not go on talking nonsense; it is past the time for that now,'
shouted Ninetto Costa, with the greatest indignation.
Still, in spite of feeling conquered and taken hostage to the
unreasonable fury that he had set on fire himself, the medium tried
to fight on.
'The spirit does not give numbers by force,' he slowly announced.
'You have offended him. He will not speak to me again.'
'Lies--you are telling lies! A hundred--a thousand times you have
told us that the spirit obeys you, that you do what you like with
him,' retorted the Marquis. 'A hundred thousand times you have told
us that the urn is under orders. Tell the truth; it will be best for
you, I assure you. You are at a bad pass, Don Pasqualino; the spirit
ought to help you. Our patience is exhausted, so is our money, and
other people's, too. The spirit must give you the right numbers.'
Then the medium stood silent for a little, as if he was collecting
himself, his eyes turned up showing the whites. Everyone looked at
him, but coldly, being accustomed to these antics of his.
'In a little the camellias will flower,' he said suddenly, trembling
all over.
But not one of the company troubled himself about this mystic giving
out of lottery numbers. Dr. Trifari, who always carried a book of
dreams in his pocket, did not even take out the torn book to see what
figures corresponded to the camellias.
'In a little the camellias will flower by the sea, on the mountain,'
repeated the medium, still trembling.
No one stirred.
'In a little the camellias will flower by the sea, on the mountain,'
he repeated the third time, trembling with anxiety, looking his
persecutors in the face.
An incredulous snigger answered him.
'But what do you want from me?' he cried out, with a gasp of fear.
'The _real_ numbers,' said Formosa coldly. 'We don't believe these
that you are telling us can be the right ones; that is to say, just
on the chance we will play the numbers corresponding to the mountain,
the sea-coast, and flowering camellias. But the _real_ figures must
be different. While waiting for them, we will play these three, but
we will keep you shut up here in the meanwhile.'
'Until when?' he asked hurriedly.
'Until your numbers come out,' retorted the Marquis harshly.
'Oh, God!' said the medium softly under his breath.
'You understand, Don Pasqualino, these gentlemen wish to have a
guarantee, and they intend to keep you as a pawn,' the lottery-banker
explained, trying to make out that shutting him up was lawful. 'What
does it signify to you? What trouble is it to tell the truth? If you
have kept them in error up till now, it is time to speak seriously,
Don Pasqualino. These gentlemen have a right to be enraged, and I
know it. Speak, Don Pasqualino, send us off satisfied. You will stay
here till to-morrow at five. When the lottery drawing is over, we
will come and take you in a carriage for an airing. Come, come; do
what you ought to do.'
'I can't do it,' said the medium, opening out his arms.
'Don't tell lies. You can, but you won't. The spirits obey you,' said
Colaneri, letting himself go in a passion of rage.
'Tell them this evening; it will be better for you,' Gaetano the
glover muttered in an ill-natured tone.
'Get rid of this obstinacy,' Ninetto Costa advised in a brotherly way.
'Give us the truth--the truth,' stammered the old lawyer, Marzano.
'I can't tell you,' the medium still said, looking at the doors and
windows.
Then the Cabalists, on a sign from the Marquis di Formosa, gathered
in the window recess. Only Trifari stayed beside the medium. With a
threatening, cruel face he put his fat, hairy hand on his shoulder.
They spoke to each other a long time, and disputed in a ring, all
heads close together; then, having decided, they turned round.
'These gentlemen say they are firmly resolved--as they have a right
to be--to get the real lottery numbers, after having made so many
sacrifices,' the Marquis di Formosa said coldly, 'and that therefore
Don Pasqualino will remain shut up here until he makes up his mind
to satisfy our just demands. He cannot go away from here; besides,
Dr. Trifari, who is afraid of nothing, will stay with Don Pasqualino.
To make a noise would be useless, as the neighbours would not hear;
and if by chance Don Pasqualino wished to right himself by going to
law, we have an action ready for him as a cheat, with witnesses and
documents enough to send twenty mediums to prison. It is better,
therefore, to bow your head this time, and try to get off by giving
the right numbers. We are quite decided. Until Don Pasqualino allows
us to win, he will not get out; Dr. Trifari will sacrifice himself to
keep him company. In that other room there is sleeping accommodation
for two and food for several days. Between to-night and to-morrow one
of us by turns will come every four hours to see if he has made up
his mind. We hope he will do so soon.'
'You are trying to kill me,' said the medium with angelic resignation.
'You can free yourself when you choose. We wish you good-night,' the
Marquis ended up with, implacably.
And the seven wicked Cabalists passed in front of the medium, wishing
him good-night ironically. The medium stood there near the table, his
hand lightly placed on the wooden surface, with a tired, suffering
expression on his face. He looked now at one, then at another of the
Cabalists, as if he were questioning their faces to see if any of
them were more civil, and would say a word of release to him. But sad
delusions had hardened these men's hearts; the excitement prevented
them from understanding they were committing a crime. They went in
front of the medium, greeting him, saying a cold phrase or word of
condolence without heeding his suffering expression, his entreating
eyes.
'Good-night, Don Pasqualino. God enlighten you!' said old Marzano,
shaking his head.
'We ask too much of God,' the medium answered in a very melancholy
voice.
'Good-night; quiet sleep,' the glover ironically wished him. His
words, countenance, and voice had all become cutting.
'So I wish you,' the medium answered darkly, lowering his eyelids to
deaden the cruel flash of revenge that shone in his eyes.
'Good-night, good-night, Don Pasqualino,' Ninetto Costa muttered
rather regretfully; his frivolous nature was so opposed to tragedy.
'We will soon meet each other again.'
'Of course,' the man of the spirits muttered with a slight grin.
'Good-night,' Michele the shoeblack ventured to remark. He was a keen
accomplice in that gentlemanly plot, and thought it made a gentleman
of him to be mixed up in it. 'Good-night; keep in good health.'
The medium did not answer him even. He scorned to cast a glance at
the deformity, who belonged to the common folk he came from himself,
out of whom he could never get any money.
'Pasqualino, do you intend to give these _true_ numbers?' asked
Colaneri, passing in front of him, still wild with rage.
'I cannot give them like this, being bullied into it.'
'You are joking. We are all your friends here,' squeaked the
Professor. 'Do as you like. Good-night.'
'Good-night; the Madonna go with you,' the medium muttered piously,
intensifying the mysticism of his voice.
'Dear Don Pasqualino, come, be good-natured before we go,' said the
Marquis di Formosa with sudden affability. 'Give us real numbers, and
your prison will last only till to-morrow evening at five o'clock.'
'I know nothing,' said the medium, darting a look of hatred at the
Marquis, since it was the noble lord who had brought him to this bad
pass.
They joined each other at the door to go out, leaving him alone with
Dr. Trifari, who went backwards and forwards quietly and coldly from
the room alongside, with that icy determination born villains have in
carrying out a misdeed. Up till then the medium, except for a shadow
crossing his face, leaving its traces of boredom and sorrow, but for
a humble, beseeching glance, had given tokens of sufficient courage;
but when he saw the others were going away, when he felt he was to be
left alone with Dr. Trifari for long hours, days, and weeks, perhaps,
all his courage fell, the cowardice of an imprisoned man rose up,
and, stretching out his arms, he called out:
'Don't go away! don't go away!'
At that agonized cry the accomplices in that imprisonment stood
still; their faces, set like stern judges till then, got suddenly
pale. That was the only moment of the whole gloomy evening they
realized they were condemning a human creature, a fellow-Christian,
a man like themselves, to a frightful punishment. It was the only
moment they saw the whole extent of what they were doing in its
legal and moral bearings. But the demon of gain had taken possession
of them, soul and body, completely. Every one of them, turning
back, surrounded the medium, still asking him for lottery numbers,
certain real numbers, that he knew, and up till then would not give
them. Then, choking with emotion, understanding they were turning
the weapons against him that he had wounded them with, the man who
had gradually brought the waves of a slow shipwreck over them, who
had taken their money and their souls, when confronted with that
persistent, malignant cruelty that nothing could soften, that demon
his own voice had called up, that real evil spirit he had truly got
in communication with, the cowardly medium felt a tremendous fear,
and began to sob like a child. The others, alarmed and disturbed,
gazed at him; but the demon was stronger than all their wills
together. The supreme hour of their life had come for old and young,
gentlemen and working men--the tragic hour when nothing can prevent a
tragedy, when everything pushes men forward to a tragedy.
Hearing the medium weep like a child, drying his tears with a
flaming, torn pocket-handkerchief, none of them felt pity. All felt
the warmer, keener desire for lottery numbers to save them from the
ruin that threatened them. They left him, to weep meanly, like a
frightened fool; one by one, making no noise, they went slowly from
that house that had become a prison. He, still going on sobbing,
stretched his ears, and heard the door shut dolefully, with that sort
of noise that gives echoes in the soul. Trifari, standing behind the
door, went putting up chains and bolts, shutting himself up with
the new prisoner, with no fear either of the man or of the spirits
he might evoke. The hairy red face, when it showed in the shining
circle of the lamp, had something animal in it; it showed cruelty
and obstinacy in cruelty. On coming in again, the doctor breathed
in a relieved way. He looked around, as if the departure of the
Cabalists, his friends who had deputed him to be gaoler, pleased him.
Now he still went and came from the next room, carrying backwards and
forwards all sorts of things. Then he came back from the bedroom,
having changed his clothes; he had put on an old jacket instead
of his frock-coat. The medium followed all his gaoler's movements
closely, for, like all prisoners, he studied his only companion with
profound observation. At one point they exchanged a cold, hard glare
as from prisoner to turnkey.
'Do you want to smoke?' the doctor asked from a corner of the room.
'I don't smoke,' the medium answered sulkily.
'Won't you sit down?' Trifari asked the medium in a whisper.
'Thank you, I will,' he replied, letting himself down on a chair.
'Do you wish to sleep?'
'No, thank you.'
The doctor sat down, too, then, beside the table, putting one hand
over his eyes as if to shield them from the light. There was deep,
nocturnal silence. Outside the rain had ended; inside the long,
gloomy vigil began.
CHAPTER XV
SACRILEGE--LOVE'S DREAM FLED
Bianca Maria Cavalcanti and Antonio Amati's love for each other
had got stronger and sadder. Indeed, the secret sorrow gave some
attractive flavour of tears to their passion; what had been an
idyll between the innocent pious girl of twenty and the man of
forty had acquired dramatic force and depth. Innocently, with the
trustingness of hearts that love for the first time, they had
dreamt of living, spending their life together, holding each other
by the hand as they went on the long road; but Formosa's hostile
face rose continually between them. In that troubled summer which
had unhinged the Marquis di Formosa's mind more, the position of
the lovers had gone on getting worse, together with the old lord's
increasing moroseness. People cannot live with impunity alongside
of physical or moral infirmities, even if they are heroic or
indifferent; and neither Bianca Maria nor Antonio Amati was selfish
or indifferent. They did not manage to shut themselves from moral
contact with Carlo Cavalcanti, nor to give themselves up entirely
to their deep love. Moral as well as physical fevers fill the air
with miasma; there is an infectious warmth that sets the atmospheric
elements out of balance and poisons the air subtly and heavily, so
that the healthiest have to bend their heads, feeling oppressed and
suffocated. They were good, honest, and pitiful, their souls were
purely filled with love, so that no acid, however powerful, could
corrode the noble metal; but the air around was poisoned by Carlo
Cavalcanti's moral disease, and they could hardly exist now in that
atmosphere.
It was an unhealthy summer. Whatever means of persuasion Dr. Amati
used, he could not get Carlo Cavalcanti to send his sickly daughter
to the country. Stronger than any argument or anger was the obstinacy
of the hardened gambler; he looked on his daughter as a spiritual
source of lottery numbers, and put her to torture, so that she might
fall into visions again, and he with his disturbed brain, like an old
fool, tried to force her to _see_. When the doctor, in despair and
anger, insisted she must go to the country, the Marquis, who felt
no shame now in asking money from him, promising always to give it
back, took up a tone of offended pride, and the doctor, intimidated
at bottom by the old lord's grand airs, gave up insisting, and put
off the attack till another time. Once he very nearly got Carlo
Cavalcanti to go away too, with his daughter, by describing to him
the healthy freshness of this out-of-the-way country place, and
the old noble almost got ready to start. But he must have made
inquiries, and found out that in that small village there was no
lottery shop; it was necessary to write or telegraph to Campobasso.
Even the telegraph-office was in another village; there were endless
difficulties in playing a ticket, and he must have felt at that time
more than ever chained to Naples, to the company of gamblers, and
to Don Crescenzio's lottery shop. He bluntly refused to go, without
giving any reason. The girl bent her head before his decision; she
had always obeyed him, and she could not rebel. Amati trembled with
rage, angry with her as well; but at once a great pity subdued him.
The poor, innocent, suffering girl was wasting away; she could not
bear that her lover should refuse to submit. She gazed at him so
earnestly with astonished sad eyes that he forgave her for her filial
submission.
It was an unhealthy summer. Each year the doctor had kept up the
attentive habit of spending a month with his mother, the good
old peasant woman in the country, doing the simplest kinds of
work--resting, not reading, neither calling nor seeing visitors,
keeping always with his mother, speaking the peasant's dialect again,
building up his physical and moral health by rustic habits. Well,
that year, tied by love's chain, he put off his start from day to day
to Molise, feeling all the loss of putting it off, growing pale every
time a letter came from his mother, dictated by her to the estate
agent--letters that were full of melancholy summonses to come to her.
The doctor stayed on in Naples, displeased with himself and others,
worshipping Bianca Maria, hating the Marquis. The poor thing's dreams
were always disturbed by her father's delusions; she fell off daily
in health, and the doctor could do nothing to cure her. All he could
manage was that, by offering his carriage, Bianca Maria should take
long drives by the sea on the gentle slopes that lovingly enclose
Naples. Old Margherita went with her, and sometimes the doctor also
dared to go out with the young girl. When he heard of such a thing,
the Marquis di Formosa frowned, the old family blood boiled; he
felt inclined to punish the bold plebeian, who behaved as if he was
affianced to the high-born maiden. But he held his tongue; he had
had so many money transactions with Amati, and went on having them
every day, keeping up still more pride, decorum, and honour with it.
Besides, everyone said, with a compassionate smile, that Dr. Amati
would soon marry the Marchesina Cavalcanti, as if the doctor would be
doing a kindly act to marry her.
Up there, in green Capodimonte woods, with its hundred-year-old
trees, its fields carpeted with flowers, down there along the
charming Posillipo Road, that goes down to the vapoury Flegrei
fields, the lovers' idyll began again before Nature, ever lovely in
Naples, with its gentle lines and colouring. The maiden's delicate,
bloodless cheeks, with the sun and the open air going round her head,
got coloured by a thin pink flush, as if her impoverished blood was
moving quicker. She smiled sometimes, and threw back her head to
drink in the pure air; she managed to laugh, showing white teeth and
pinky gums that anæmia had made colourless. Then the doctor, become
a boy again, chattered and laughed with her, looking into her eyes,
taking her by the hand, sometimes loading her with field flowers.
They forgot old Margherita, who forgot them, as she sat on the grass
stupefied by the free summer air, as old people are apt to be; but
they were so loving and modest with it, that the forgetfulness was no
sin. The maiden went back to the house intoxicated with light, sun,
and love, her hands full of flowers, her pink nostrils dilated fully
to breathe in the pure air still; but as the carriage got into the
city streets her youthful smile died away, and when they went under
the Rossi Palace entrance she bent her diminished head.
'What is the matter with you?' the doctor asked her anxiously.
'It is nothing,' she replied, the great answer of timid, distracted
women who hide their fears.
She went up to her bare, sad room very slowly, but still had a smile
for Antonio Amati on the threshold. She went into the house with a
resolute look, as if she were keeping down alarm or distaste. Often
Carlo Cavalcanti came to meet her, coldly angry, his face distorted
by his bad hours of passion. She shivered, while his very look made
the blood fly from her face, and chased away the whole idyll of love,
took away all the sweetness from the sun and from love. When she
got into the drawing-room, she put her big bundle of flowers down
on a corner of the table. The old lord questioned her anxiously and
greedily about what road she had gone and what she had seen. Bianca
answered feebly in short phrases, turning her head away; but he
persisted--he wanted to know all she had seen. Nowadays, everything
his daughter saw filled him with uncertainties, curiosity, and
sorrow; he tried continually to find out in whatever she saw a mystic
source of the cipher of lottery numbers. He now considered she was
a medium, a much better one than Don Pasqualino, because she was a
woman, an innocent maiden, and unconscious of her powers. She did
not know it, but she was a medium. Had she not seen the spirit that
fatal night weeping and hailing her? He went on wildly with his close
questioning, obliging his daughter to follow him in his freaks.
'What have you seen? what have you seen?' the gambler, who forgot he
was a father, asked in anguish.
How love's young dream flew away, with its light and happiness! how
all the oppressive ghosts of the bare old house gathered round her
from that old man raving alarmingly, and obliging her to go through
the same terror. Also, every time she mentioned the name of Antonio
Amati, her preserver, friend, and lover, the Marquis di Formosa
reddened with rage. She saw that her father had ended by hating
Amati thoroughly for the very services he had done him, for the
very gratitude he owed him. Formosa's face grew so hard and fierce
that Bianca Maria was frightened. Her heart was torn between her
unwavering daughterly respect and her love for Antonio Amati. Once
Margherita hinted before Formosa at rumours of a marriage between
her ladyship and the doctor. The Marquis got into a fury and said
'No!' with such a yell that Margherita put her hands to her ears in a
fright.
'Still, her ladyship must marry some day,' she remarked timidly and
maternally, 'and the doctor might be better than another.'
'I said no,' the Marquis retorted darkly.
From that time forward he spoke in a still more wild and eccentric
way. Sometimes in the middle of the many mysterious ghostly
incoherencies his mind wandered amongst he came back in speaking to
his daughter to a ruling thought--to love looked on as a stain, a
sin, an ingrained want of purity in soul and body. The girl often
blushed in her simplicity on hearing the abuse heaped on love, and
then he praised the chastity that keeps the heart in a state of
grace--that allows human eyes to see supernatural visions, and go
through life in a sweet, dreamy state. He would get excited, and
curse love as the source of all defilement, all evils and sorrow.
Bianca Maria hid her face in her hands, as if all her father's
strictures fell on her head.
'My mother was a saintly woman, and she loved you,' she remarked one
day, repenting at once of her audacity.
'She died from that love,' he answered darkly, as if he was speaking
to himself.
'I would like to die like her,' the maiden whispered.
'You will die accursed--cursed by me, remember that!' he shouted,
like a demon. 'Woe to the daughter of Casa Cavalcanti who stifles
her heart in the shame of an earthly love! Woe to the maiden who
prefers the vulgar horrors of earthly passion to the purest heights
of spiritual life!'
She bent her head without answering, feeling that iron hand ever
weighing more on her life to bend and break it. She dare not tell
her lover of such scenes; only sometimes, breaking momentarily the
bonds of respect her father held her in, she repeated to Amati her
despairing cry:
'Take me away--take me away!'
He, too, now had lost all his calm. He himself was taken by this
plan of carrying her off, of taking the maiden away as his comrade,
his adored companion--of freeing her from the dark nightmare of a
life that was a daily agony to her. Yes, he would carry off the poor
victim from the unconscious executioner; he would tear her from
that atmosphere of vice, mystery, and sadness; bring her into his
house, his heart; defend her against all this folly, these tempests.
The Marquis di Formosa would be left to struggle with his passion
alone. He would no longer drag to the abyss of desolation he was
plunging into this poor meek, innocent girl. Every day this longing
to save her grew in his heart, until it became all-powerful. He
longed to speak so that his grand dream should become a reality.
Gravely and solemnly he had promised Bianca Maria that sad evening
she had confided her sad family secret to him that he would save
her, and an honest man must keep his promise, even if it induce
in him the wildest ecstasies or bring on a sorrowful depression
at certain times. He longed to do it. In the meanwhile the days
ran on. Some uncertainty still withheld him, even when he was most
strongly resolved to ask Formosa for his daughter's hand. He vaguely
felt that the answer would be decisive--that after it was said his
life would be settled for him. But an important incident all of a
sudden made him come to a decision. The Marquis di Formosa, amidst
the fluctuations of his mind, kept up his mystical piety, and every
Friday he spent hours in prayer in the chapel before Our Lady of
Sorrows and the life-sized pierced Ecce Homo crowned with thorns.
With that faith of Southerners which has bursts of enthusiasm, but is
also bound in by a close net of the commonplace keeping it down to
the earth, he constantly mingled heavenly things with all the worldly
complications of his ruling passion, and sometimes in his despair he
made the responsibility of his ruin rest on his Creator.
'You allowed this to happen; it is all Your fault, Jesus Christ!'
the Marquis called out in his prayer. But on terrible days his faith
became still more accusing and sacrilegious, unjust. 'It is all Your
fault; You allowed it to happen!' he cursed on, tears burning his
eyes, his voice choked. Indeed, one evening when Bianca Maria thought
her father had gone out, on passing the chapel door she heard angry,
sorrowful words coming from it. She put in her head, and saw her
father kneeling with his arms thrown round the Ecce Homo. First he
deplored his misfortunes; then he set to calling out blasphemies,
cursing all the names of the Godhead impiously; then he repented
quickly, asking pardon for his untrue and sacrilegious words, until
a new outburst of rage came on, and he unclasped the holy image with
scorn and threatening words. In his raving he threatened Jesus Christ
his Saviour, bound to the column, to punish Him--yes, punish Him--if
by next week He did not allow him to win a large sum at the lottery.
Bianca Maria, horrified, seeing no end now to his sacrilegious
madness, fled, hiding her face in her hand; and, shut up in her own
room, she prayed the Lord all night that her father's ignorant
heresy should not be punished. Now she always shut herself up at
night, to shield her slumbers from her father's influence, because
he always wanted her to call up the spirit, and spoke to her of
those ghosts as of living persons--in short, keeping her constantly
under that frightful nightmare. But she slept very little, in spite
of the solitude and silence of her room; for her strained nerves
shook at the slightest noise, because she was always afraid that
her father would knock at her door, and try to open it with another
key, to get her to ask the ministering spirit for lottery numbers.
While she was slumbering in a light sleep from which the slightest
noise wakened her, she started as if excited voices were calling
her, and gazed into the shadow with wide-open eyes, as if she saw a
spectre rising up by her bed. How often she got up, half dressed,
and ran bare-footed over the floor, because she thought a light
hand scratched on the pillow, touched her forehead, or patted her
hair! One night, a Saturday, she heard her father going up and down,
as she lay awake, all through the house, passing before her door
several times, in the wild cogitations of his storm-tossed soul. In a
whisper she called down on him Heaven's peace--the peace that seemed
to have deserted his mind altogether. But just as she was going to
sleep again, a queer, dull noise wakened her, quivering; it was as
if a very heavy body was being pulled along, making the doors and
windows shake with that dull rumble. Sometimes the mysterious noise
quieted down and was silent; after about a minute's pause it began
again, stronger, and at the same time more deadened. She remained
raised on her pillows, fastened there by an unknown iron hand: what
was happening there? She would have liked to cry out, ring the bell,
get hold of people, but that rumble deprived her of voice; she kept
silence in a cold sweat, the whole nerves of her body strained to
hear only. The noise, like an earthquake, was getting nearer and
nearer to her door; she clasped her hands in the dark, and shut her
eyes hard not to see, praying she might not see. Together with that
dragging of a heavy, unsteady object, she heard laboured breathing,
as if someone was attempting a task above his strength; then a hard
knock, as if her door had been hit by a catapult. She thought her
door had violently burst open, and fell back on her pillows, not
hearing or seeing anything else, losing her feeble senses. Later on,
a good time after, she recovered consciousness, frozen, motionless;
she stretched her ears, but she heard nothing else for a long time.
In the confusion there now was between her dreams and realities, she
believed that all she had heard was only a doleful nightmare that had
oppressed her with its terrors. Had she dreamt it, therefore--that
queer earthquake, that laboured breathing, that strong blow on her
door?
In the morning, having rested a little, she got up easier, and, after
saying her prayers, went to her father's room, as she had to do
every day, to wish him good-morning. But she did not find him; the
bed was unused. Several times lately the Marquis di Formosa had not
come home at night. The first time it had caused Bianca Maria and
the servants great alarm, but when his lordship came in, he scolded
them for having sent to look for him, saying he would not stand being
spied upon, he would do what he liked. Still, every time Bianca Maria
knew that he had spent the night out of the house she got uneasy;
he was so old and eccentric; his madness led him into dangerous
company, and made him weak and credulous. She always feared some
danger would befall him one of these nights on the road, or in some
secret Cabalist meeting. She trembled that morning, too, and went on
into the other rooms, thinking over what had happened at night, again
asking herself if all that did not point to a dreadful mystery. She
found Giovanni sweeping carefully.
'Did his lordship not come home last night?' she asked with pretended
carelessness.
'He did come in, but he went out very soon again,' answered the
servant.
'He did not go to bed, I think,' she said in a low voice, casting
down her eyes.
'No, my lady, he did not,' said old Giovanni.
Margherita came up just then; she said something hurriedly to her
husband, who agreed to it, and vanished into the kitchen.
'I asked Giovanni to draw the bucket of water from the well this
morning,' the old waiting-woman said. 'I am not strong enough to-day.'
'Poor thing! it tires you too much,' Bianca Maria remarked
compassionately, her eyes full of tears.
'I am rather old, but I could do anything for you,' said the faithful
one in a motherly voice. 'But I don't know what has come to the
bucket this morning; it is so heavy I can't pull it up. I begged
Giovanni, who is stronger than I am, to take my place.'
Both went away from there, because Margherita held to the honour of
combing out Bianca Maria's thick black tresses. But Giovanni came and
interrupted the combing. He called his wife out, not daring to come
in, and they chattered together some time, while Bianca Maria waited,
her black hair loose over her white wrapper. Margherita came back in
disorder; the comb shook in her hand.
'What is the matter?' asked Bianca Maria.
'Nothing, nothing,' the woman uttered hastily.
'Tell me what it is,' the other persisted, looking at the old woman.
'It is that Giovanni, even, cannot pull up the bucket.'
'Well, but why are you alarmed?'
'Giovanni says there is something in the way.'
'Something in the way? What do you mean?'
'He has called Francesco, the porter. They will pull together.
Perhaps they will get over the difficulty.'
'What can it be?' the girl stammered, growing deadly pale.
'I don't know, my lady--I don't know,' said the old woman, trying to
begin her combing again.
'No,' said the other firmly, waving off the hand with the comb, and
gathering up her hair with a pin--'no; we had better go and see.'
'My lady, my lady, what can we do? Giovanni and Francesco are there.
We had best stay here.'
'I am going there,' the girl insisted, going towards the kitchen.
Old Giovanni and Francesco in their shirt-sleeves were pulling at the
rope with all their strength, and it hardly moved, creaking as if it
was going to break. Both Giovanni's and Francesco's faces showed,
besides the great fatigue they were enduring, that they were in a
great fright.
Occasionally, with heaving sides and cramped arms, they gave up
pulling, and cast a frightened look at each other. From the kitchen
doorway, in a white wrapper, with her hair down, Bianca Maria looked
on, while Margherita, standing behind her, begged her in a whisper to
go away for the love of the Virgin! to go away, in God's name!
'But, in any case, what can it be?' asked Bianca Maria steadily,
turning to the two men, whose growing fears deprived them of strength.
'Who can tell, my lady?' Giovanni stammered. 'This weight is not a
good thing.'
But while all kept their eyes fixed on the well, waiting on in
anguish, all feeling a shudder from the delay and fear of the
unknown, the _thing_ the two men were pulling up hit twice against
the sides of the well, noisily from right to left. The dull, heavy
noise echoed in Bianca Maria's heart, for it was the same she had
heard at night. A little frightened cry came from her mouth; she
pressed her nails right into her flesh, wringing her hands to keep
down her alarm before the servants. But once more, with a stronger,
nearer sound, the _thing_ beat against the side of the well.
'It is coming,' said the message-boy affrightedly.
'It is coming,' Giovanni repeated in consternation.
Margherita, standing behind Bianca Maria, could not command her
strained nerves; she prayed in a trembling whisper, 'Madonna, help
us! Madonna, deliver us!' But what came up to the well-brink,
bounding, quivering, with the bucket-rope wound three times round its
neck, the chain hanging on the breast, made her yell with fright. It
was a man's trunk, water and blood dripping from the forehead over
the sorrowful cheeks and bared breasts, water and blood flowing from
the wounded side; blood and tears were in his eyes, and over the face
and breast, which all had death's livid hue.
Yelling from fright, Francesco and Giovanni ran off, calling
for 'Help! help!' The women, mistress and maid, rushed to the
drawing-room and fell in each other's arms, the one hiding her
face on the other's breast, not daring to raise it, haunted by the
frightful sight of the murdered body. It was quite livid, bloody
in the face, breast, and enfolded arms, with a despairing look in
the eyes and half-open mouth, which seemed to be sobbing. It stood
against the parapet dripping blood and water, bound by the cord and
chain. The message-boy and the butler had flung downstairs, calling
out there was a dead man, a murdered man. At once, on the stairs, the
gateway, the whole neighbourhood, the news spread that a murdered
man's body had been found in the Rossi Palace well.
Everyone opened doors and rushed to windows; but Francesco and
Giovanni's confused, breathless story caused such fright no one
dared go in at the Marquis di Formosa's open door, or to the kitchen
where the corpse lay. The women were still clinging to each other in
the drawing-room; though Margherita tried to command herself for her
mistress' sake, she felt the girl's body grow flabby from want of
vital force--sometimes it stiffened as in a nervous convulsion. But
the great whispering in the palace had got even into the doctor's
flat, and his heart was always quivering, expecting a catastrophe.
He put his head out of the window and saw people everywhere; the
sound of voices came up even to him, saying that a murdered man had
been found in the Rossi Palace well, and that the body was in the
Cavalcantis' kitchen. Just then Giovanni, on thinking it over that
the two women had been left alone, felt sorry that he had made such
a fuss, for he knew the scandal would be reflected on the Cavalcanti
family, and he was going upstairs again.
'Is there really a dead man?' Amati asked him, not managing to
conceal how disturbed he was, in spite of his strength of mind.
'Yes, sir, there really is,' said the butler, with desperation in his
eyes and voice.
'Who saw it?'
'Everyone saw it.'
'What! everyone? Did your mistress see it, too?'
'Yes, sir, she did.'
The doctor cast a furious look at him and went into the fatal house,
where a tragic breath had always blown from the first moment he put
his foot in it, where any queer, doleful tragedy was possible to
happen. He wandered about the rooms like a madman in search of Bianca
Maria, and found her sitting on a large drawing-room chair, so pale,
so terrified, so silent, that Margherita was kneeling before her in
alarm, holding her hands, begging her to say a word--only a word.
Bianca Maria glanced at Amati, but seemed not to know him; she kept
cold and inert and stiff in her frightened attitude.
'Bianca,' said the doctor gently. She still kept silence. 'Bianca,'
he said louder, and he took her hand. At the light touch she
quivered, gave a cry, and came back to consciousness. 'My love, my
love! speak to me--weep,' he suggested, looking at her magnetically,
trying to put his strong will and courage into her. All of a sudden,
as if that will and strength had unsealed her lips, she began to cry
out:
'The dead man! take him away--take away the dead man!'
'Now, now, don't be frightened; we are taking him away; keep calm,'
the doctor said to her.
'The dead man--the dead man!' she cried out, covering her face with
her hands wildly. 'For goodness' sake take the dead man away, or
he will carry me off. Do not let him take me away, I entreat you,
darling, if you love me.'
The doctor gave Margherita a look bidding her take care of Bianca,
and went into the kitchen, followed by Giovanni. In the lobby were
some people who were already speaking of calling the magistrate;
there were the porter, his wife, the Fragalà and the Parascandolos'
servants, and Francesco the errand boy, but not one of them dared
enter the kitchen, even after the doctor went in. They let him go
alone, waiting on silently in the pantry, still wild with fear. The
doctor, though accustomed to see dead bodies, being shaken by that
catastrophe that affected him so particularly, broken-spirited with
the thought of the consequences, went into the kitchen a victim to
the deepest melancholy, and the sight of the bleeding forehead,
weeping eyes, the tied, wounded hands, the livid trunk, wounded,
bleeding, and bound, increased the feeling. But the coolness of a man
of science, accustomed to see death, took the upper hand; going right
up to it, he saw the head had a crown of thorns, and with perfect
stupefaction he understood it all.
It was the Ecce Homo. The wooden, life-sized half-figure of the
Redeemer tied to the column, powerfully carved and painted, had all
the disagreeable appearance of a bleeding corpse; the well water it
had fallen into had discoloured the flesh and the vermilion blood,
making it run, with the double magical effect of murder and drowning.
Still, Dr. Amati felt his heart tighten on finding out this doleful
farce--that mixture of cruelty and grotesqueness. Amazement was his
predominant feeling; the strong man only thought of Bianca Maria's
great suffering, of her sickness and sorrow, now mortally wounded,
perhaps, by this gloomy, mystical, childish madness that the Marquis
di Formosa was proud of. All that was urgent now was to save her.
'It is the Ecce Homo,' he said shortly, as he went out to the people
assembled in the pantry.
'What do you say, sir?' Giovanni cried out, feeling the same
astonishment, increased by horror, of the sacrilege.
'It is the Ecce Homo,' he repeated, looking coldly at them all with
that imperious look of his that permitted of no reply. 'Go into the
kitchen, dry it, and take it back to the chapel.'
They looked at each other, asking opinions; having got over the
horror of a dead man, the outrage on the Divinity shocked them.
'You may send for the priest afterwards,' he said, 'to give a
blessing;' for he knew the heart of the Naples folk.
The girl was still lying on the armchair, her eyes covered with her
hands, always muttering to herself:
'The dead man--the dead man, dear love! Take him away. Get the dead
man carried away.'
'There is no dead man, dear,' he said, with the gentleness that came
from his great pity.
'Yes, yes there was,' she whispered, shaking her head in a melancholy
way, as if nothing would convince her to the contrary.
'There was no dead man,' he answered gravely, feeling it was
necessary to bring her back to reason.
He tried to take her hands from her eyes, but they stiffened, and an
agonized expression came over the girl's face.
'Look at me for a moment,' he whispered in an insinuating tone.
'I can't--I can't!' she said in a sad, mysterious voice.
'Why not?'
'Because I would see the dead man, love--my love!' she said, still
with that deep sadness that brought tears to the doctor's eyes.
'Dear, I swear to you that there is no dead man,' he replied again
gently, as persistent as with a sick child.
In the meanwhile he tried to feel her pulse, and the temperature of
her skin. Strange to say, while she seemed almost delirious, her hand
was icy and the pulse was slow and feeble. It gave him a pang at the
heart, for that want of life and strength showed him a continuous
incurable wasting away. He would have liked to find out about that
curious disease which made the blood so feeble and the nerves so
irritable, but his heart loved Bianca Maria too well for his science
to keep its clear-sightedness. He could not find out the secret of
the impoverished blood or the disordered nerves; he only understood
thus, darkly, that her constitution was wasting away from weakness
and sensitiveness. He did not think of medicine or rare remedies;
he just thought, in a confused way, he must save her--that was all.
Ah, yes, he must snatch her at once from that madman's claws--this
poor innocent girl that was subjected daily to being startled by this
hopeless folly; he must take her away from that growing wretchedness
of soul and body, from that fatal going downhill to sin and
death--his poor darling who only knew how to suffer without rebellion
or complaint. He must act at once; he was a man and a Christian. He
must save this unhappy girl, as he so often had saved people from
hydrophobia, or as, on one occasion, he had saved a wretched man who
had got tetanus. At once--at once--he must save her, or he would not
be in time. Where was the Marquis, then? Where was the cruel madman
that staked his name, his honour, his daughter?
'Sir, it is done,' said Giovanni, putting in his head at the door.
The old servant was very pale. After being relieved from the
terrifying impression of what he thought was a murdered corpse, the
serious insult his master had done to the Godhead came to disturb
his humble religious conscience. That figure of the Redeemer, with
the cord round His neck, hung down in the well, as if it was the
mangled remains of a murdered man--to see that representation of the
meek Jesus so scorned made him think that his master's reason had
given way; such sacrilege must bring a curse on the house. He called
out Margherita, to tell her what had happened, while the neighbours
round about--on the stair, at the entrance, and in the shops--were
going about saying that the Ecce Homo of Cavalcanti House had done
a miracle, resuscitating a man that had been murdered, by putting
Himself in his place. Everywhere, in different ways, they got lottery
numbers out of the extraordinary event.
'The dead man, poor fellow!' the girl went on, half unconscious, the
voice like a faint breath from her lips.
'Do not say that again, Bianca Maria. Believe what I say,' the doctor
replied with gentle firmness. 'There was no dead man; it was the Ecce
Homo statue.'
'Who was it?' she cried out, getting up and looking wildly at him.
He gave a start. He thought it was the crisis, her mind having
wandered so long, so he repeated, trying to influence her by his
steady gaze:
'It was the Ecce Homo figure. Your father flung it in the well, with
a rope round its neck.'
'My God!' she shrieked in a loud voice, raising her arms to heaven.
'God forgive us!'
She fell on her knees and bent forward, touching the ground with her
lips. Weeping, praying, sobbing, she went on imploring the Lord to
forgive her and her father. Nothing served to quiet her, to get her
up from the ground, where she often burst out in long crying-fits.
The doctor vainly tried gentleness, kindness, force, violence; he did
not succeed in quieting her. Bianca Maria's excitement increased,
though there were some stupefied intervals, after which it burst
out louder again. Sometimes, while she seemed to be keeping calm, a
quick thought crossed her brain, and she threw herself on the ground,
crying out: 'Ecce Homo! Ecce Homo, forgive us!'
The doctor looked on, shuddering, his head down on his breast,
feeling his will powerless, his science useless. What was to be
done? He called in Giovanni and wrote two lines on a card--an order
for morphia, which he sent for to the druggist's. But he was afraid
to use it: Bianca Maria was not strong enough to bear it. She
despairingly, with strong, queer vitality, beat her breast, muttering
the Latin words of the _Miserere_, weeping always, as if she had an
inexhaustible fountain of tears.
This had gone on for an hour, when quietly the Marquis came into the
room. He looked older, wearied, and broken with the weight of life.
'What is the matter with Bianca Maria?' he asked timidly. 'What have
you done to her?'
'It is you that are killing her,' the doctor said freezingly.
'You are right--quite right. Darling, I am an assassin!' shrieked the
old man.
That man of sixty cast himself at his daughter's feet, trembling with
shame and humiliation, shaken by dry sobs. Under the doctor's eyes
the scene went on, with filial and paternal positions reversed. That
bald, gray-haired father, with his tall, failing form, full of dread
and sorrow, shedding old folks' rare burning tears, feeling the whole
horror of his fault, bent before his young daughter, begging her to
forgive him, with a childish stammer in his voice, just like a boy
relieving his childish repentance by crying. The daughter was still
trembling from the great wound his inconsiderate cruelty had given
her soul; it was quivering with the gall his cruelty still poured
into it, while her father's humiliation made her groan still more
dolefully. To the strong man, whose life had always been an honest,
noble struggle, directed always towards the highest ideals, both of
them seemed so weak, so wretched, so utterly unhappy--the one as
torturer, the other as victim--that he once more regretted the time
when the tragic Cavalcanti family had not got hold of his heart, to
grind it to powder. But it was too late; that misery, unhappiness,
and weakness struck him so directly now that Amati, strong man as he
was, suffered in all these spasms, and could not control his instinct
to give help, the feeling that was the secret of his noble soul.
'Forgive me, dear--forgive your old father; trample on me, I deserve
it--but forgive me,' the Marquis di Formosa went on saying, seized
with a wild, grovelling humility.
'Do not say that--do not say it. I am a wretched sinner; ask
forgiveness of Ecce Homo, whom you have insulted, or our house is
accursed, and we will all die and be damned. For the sake of our
eternal salvation ask Ecce Homo to forgive you.'
'Whatever you wish, whatever you order me, I will do,' he answered,
still grovelling, holding out his hands beseechingly; 'but Ecce Homo
deserted me, Bianca Maria--he betrayed me again, you see,' he ended
by saying, again seized with the rage that had led him to do the
sacrilegious, wicked, grotesque act.
'You frighten me,' she cried out, stepping back and putting out her
arms to prevent him touching her: 'you--a man--wanted to punish the
Divine Jesus. Ask for forgiveness if you do not want us all to die
damned.'
'You are right,' he muttered, frightened, humbled again. 'Do what you
like with me. I will do penance. I will obey you as if you were my
mother. I am a murderer, a scoundrel.'
The Marquis threw himself into a chair, broken down, his breast
upheaving, his head bent, and keeping a glassy stare on the ground.
His daughter was standing in a white dressing-gown that modestly
covered her from head to foot, her black hair loose on her shoulders,
and she had the dreamy, sorrowful look of one walking in her sleep,
wakened from wandering, pleasant dreams. The doctor broke in:
'Bianca Maria,' he said.
'What is it you want?' she replied, feebly looking at her father, who
was still plunged in deep dejection.
'Your father is much distressed; you are in pain--you must both
forget this sad scene. Will you listen to kindly good advice from me?'
'You are goodness and kindness itself,' she whispered, raising her
eyes to heaven. 'Speak--I will obey you.'
'This has been a very sad time, Bianca Maria, but it may bring good
fruit. Your father and you have wept together--tears cleanse. By your
common sufferings, by the love you bear him, you ought to ask your
father not to humiliate himself so far as to ask your pardon, but to
promise you, in the name of all you have suffered, to do what you
will request him later on, when you are calmer; tell him so, Bianca
Maria.'
The girl's mobile face, which had been drawn and quivering, at the
doctor's commanding, quiet, amiable words, at that voice that had
the magic power of giving her ease and faith in life, was getting
tranquillized. Her soul, broken and tired, was resting.
'So be it,' she whispered, as if she was finishing an inward prayer
aloud. Going up to the big chair, where her father lay looking quite
broken down, she bent towards him, and in a very gentle voice said:
'Father, you love me, do you not?'
'Yes, dear,' said he.
'Will you do me a favour?'
'I will do everything--all, Bianca Maria.'
'I only want one favour for my good, for my future health and
happiness; promise to do it.'
'Whatever you like, dear; I am your servant.'
'It is a great favour. I will tell you later on, when we are in God's
grace again, when we are both quieter, what it is. I have your word,
father, your word--you have never failed.'
'You have my word,' he said, panting as if he were not fit to go on
talking.
She understood; she bent with her usual filial submission and
touched his hand with her lips; he lightly touched her forehead as
a blessing. She went to Amati, held out her hand, and looked at
him with such loving intensity that he grew pale, and, to hide his
emotion, bowed down to kiss her hand. Slowly dragging her slender
person, from failing strength, she went out of the room, leaving
the two alone. The old man seemed wrapped in deep and rather sad
reflections, for he raised his face to heaven and cast it down in an
anguished way, shaking his head as if discouraged. The doctor saw
that the right moment had come.
'Can you listen to me?' he asked very coldly.
'I would prefer ... I would like to wait for some other day, rather,'
the Marquis answered in a feeble voice.
'It will be better to have the talk out to-day,' Amati said, with the
same commanding coldness.
'I am much disturbed ... very.'
'It may be that from what I tell you you will find something to
soothe you. You know that I am devoted to you.'
'Yes, yes,' the other said vaguely.
'I cannot say much to prove my devotion; I try when I can to act in
that spirit. I am sincerely attached to both of you.'
'We know it; our debt of gratitude is great.'
'Do not speak of that. For some time past I have wished to tell
you of a hope of mine, and I dared not. You know me better than to
suppose that any material interest would influence me. You see, my
lord, I do not want to recall the past to your memory, it is so
sorrowful, but it is necessary to do it. You and your daughter have
been in poor circumstances for some years, and it is certainly not
your daughter's fault. Your intentions are loving and holy; they
have a high motive all honest men must approve of--the setting up of
your house and fortune, to get happiness for your daughter; it is a
good intention, I do not deny it. I myself admire this noble wish of
yours.'
The Marquis held up his head now and then, glanced at the doctor with
a flutter of his eyelids, showing approval of what he was saying,
with such care and delicacy not to offend, not to cast an old man
down more, for he suffered so much from his humiliation.
'But the means,' the doctor went on to say--'the means were risky,
hazardous, very dangerous. Your passionate desire for fortune made
you go beyond bounds, made you forget all the sufferings you were
unconsciously spreading around you. Do you not see, my lord? You have
sickness, wretchedness, around you, and in you. Passion has carried
you away, and the loveliest, dearest of women, your daughter, must
fall into the abyss with you.'
'Poor darling! poor darling!' the Marquis muttered pityingly.
'You love your daughter, do you not?' Dr. Amati asked, wishing to
touch all the chords of feeling.
'I love no one but her; I love her above everything,' Formosa said
quickly, with tears in his eyes again.
'Well, there is a way of protecting that innocent young life from
all the physical and moral anguish that daily eats it up; there is a
means of taking her out of these unhealthy surroundings of decent but
stern poverty that she suffers from in every nerve; there is a means
of securing her a healthy, comfortable future, with the peace and
quietness her pure soul deserves; there is a way for her to recover,
and it is in your hands.'
'I tried it, you know,' the Marquis di Formosa said despairingly;
'but I did not succeed.'
'You do not take my meaning,' the doctor went on, barely keeping in
his impatience, as he saw that the Marquis was still blinded. 'I am
not speaking of the lottery, which has been so disastrous to your
family, a torment to your daughter, the despair of all who love
you and wish you well. How can you suppose I was referring to the
lottery?'
'Still, it is the only way to make money--a lot of money. Only with
that can I save Bianca Maria.'
'You are making a mistake,' the doctor answered still more coldly.
'I am speaking of something else; ease and fortune can be found
elsewhere.'
'It is not possible. There is no limit to what one can win at the
lottery....'
'My lord, I am speaking seriously. This madness of your Cabalist
friends does not influence me; indeed, it infuriates me when I think
of the sorrow it causes. I can recognise the good intentions, but
they stand for an unpardonable frenzy. Never refer to it with me
again--never!'
Formosa looked up; his face, which till then was undecided and
disturbed, got icy and hard. That 'never,' said so firmly by Antonio
Amati, made him frown rather.
'What methods are you referring to, then?' he asked in a queer voice,
in which Amati noted hostility again.
'Perhaps to-day we are too excited; let us put off talking about it
till another occasion,' muttered Amati, who saw he was about to lose
an important advantage. 'To-morrow will do.'
'There is no use in delaying,' the Marquis di Formosa insisted coldly
and politely. 'As it has to do with Bianca Maria's welfare, I am
ready.'
'Give me your daughter for my wife,' said Dr. Amati quickly and
energetically.
The Marquis di Formosa shut his eyes for a moment as if a bright
light dazzled them, as if he wanted to hide his flashing glance, and
did not answer.
'I think I am offering your daughter a position worthy of the name
she bears,' the doctor went on again at once, determined to go to the
bottom of it, 'for my work has brought me money and credit; it is no
use being modest. I will work still harder, so that she may be rich,
very rich, happy, and in an assured position, protected by my love
and strength.'
'You love Bianca Maria, do you?' Formosa said, without looking Amati
in the face.
'I worship her,' he said simply.
'Does she love you?'
'Yes, she loves me.'
'You are a liar, sir!' the Marquis di Formosa answered, in a deep
voice.
'Why insult me?' asked the doctor, determined to stand everything.
'An insult is no answer.'
'I tell you that you are lying, and that you have no ground for
saying you are loved.'
'Your daughter told me that she loves me.'
'That is all lies.'
'She wrote it to me.'
'Lies. Where are the letters?'
'I will bring them.'
'They are not genuine. All lies.'
'Ask her.'
'I will not ask her. My daughter cannot love without having told her
father.'
'Ask her about it.'
'No, she confides in me. You lie.'
'Question her on the subject.'
'She would have spoken to me before; my daughter is obedient; she
tells me everything.'
'It does not look as if she did.'
'I am her father, by Gad!'
'You have often forgotten that you are; she may have forgotten it
this time.'
'Dr. Amati, don't go on speaking on this subject,' the Marquis said,
with cold, ironical politeness.
'I insist on it, it is my right; I have not lied. Besides, I spoke
distinctly; I offer myself to your daughter, who is sick, poor
and sad, as husband, friend, protector, to care for her, body and
soul, to love and serve her as she deserves. Will you give me your
daughter? You ought to answer this.'
'I will not give her to you.'
'Why will you not?'
'There is no need for me to give my reasons.'
'As the refusal is insulting, I have a right to ask them. Perhaps it
is because it is I am not of noble birth?'
'It is not for that.'
'Do you not think me young enough?'
'It is not that, either.'
'Have you a particular dislike to me?'
'No, I have not.'
'Why is it, then?'
'I repeat that I do not choose to tell you the reason; I can only
answer "No."'
'You will not agree even if I wait?'
'No.'
'You give me no hope for the future?'
'None.'
'Not in any circumstances?'
'Never,' the Marquis said decisively.
They said no more. Both were vexed in a different way.
'Do you want your daughter to die?' said the doctor, after thinking a
minute.
'Never fear, she won't die; there is something keeps her up.'
'To-morrow she, a Cavalcanti, will be a beggar.'
'I will make her a millionaire, sir; I alone have the right to enrich
her.'
'I told you that I love her.'
'Nothing can equal my affection.'
'But woman's destiny is love in marriage, and to have children.'
'Of common, vulgar women, but not of Bianca Maria Cavalcanti. She has
a very high mission, if she will carry it out.'
'My lord, you will ruin her.'
'I am saving her. I assure her immortal fame and immortal life.'
'My lord, I beg, you see how I implore, I who have never prayed to
anyone. Don't say "No" so obstinately without even consulting Bianca
Maria. You are preparing a new, heavy sorrow for her. You give me no
chance of living for her, and insult me, an honest man, like this for
no reason. I beg you think over it; don't make up your mind at once.'
'To-morrow or any other time would be the same. It is "No"--always
"No"; nothing else but "No." You will not get Donna Bianca Maria
Cavalcanti,' he said, grinning devilishly.
'Think it over, my lord. If you still say "No" to me, I must go away
for ever. Do not sever our ties so roughly.'
'You are free to go as far as you like. We will not see each other
again. Perhaps it would have been better had we never met.'
'That is true. I am going.'
'Go, certainly. Good-bye, sir.'
'Before going away, however, I want to question your daughter here,
before you. We are not in the Middle Ages; a girl's will goes for
something, too.'
'It does not.'
'You are mistaken. I will ask her. I will go away when she tells me
to go. Call her, if you are loyal and a gentleman.'
The old lord, challenged in the name of honour, got up, rang the
bell, telling Giovanni to send in his daughter. The two enemies stood
in silence until she came in. She had got back all her calm with the
facility of all very nervous temperaments, but a glance at the two
she loved disturbed her mind at once.
'I leave the word to you,' said the doctor politely, bowing to the
Marquis.
'Bianca Maria,' the other began, in a solemn voice, 'Dr. Amati says
he loves you. Did you know that?'
'Yes, father.'
'Did he tell you?'
'Yes, he did.'
'Did you allow him to tell you?'
'Yes; I listened to him.'
'You have committed a great fault, Bianca Maria.'
'We are all apt to do that,' she said in a low tone, looking at Amati
to gain courage.
'But there is something much worse. He says that you love him. I told
him that he lied--that you could not love him.'
'Why did you call him a liar?'
'Can you possibly ask me, Bianca Maria? Is it possible that you are
so lost to all sense of shame and modesty as to love him and tell him
so?'
'My mother loved you also, and told you so: she was a modest woman.'
'Keep to the point--do not call witnesses. Answer me, your father. Do
you love this doctor?'
'Yes, I love him,' she said, opening out her arms.
'I will never forgive you for saying so, Bianca Maria!'
'May God be more merciful than you, father!'
'God punishes disobedient children. Dr. Antonio Amati asked me for
your hand. I said "No": "No" now, to-morrow--for ever "No"!'
'You do not wish me to marry Dr. Amati, then?'
'No, I do not. In reality you do not wish it, either.'
She did not answer; two big tears rolled down her cheeks.
'Answer, my lady,' said Amati, in so anguished a tone that the poor
girl shivered with grief.
'I have nothing to say.'
'But did you not say that you loved me?'
'Yes, I said so; I repeat it--I will always love you.'
'Still, you refuse me?'
'I do not refuse you. It is my father who rejects you.'
'But you are free; you are not a slave. Girls have a right to choose.
I am an honest man.'
'You are the best, truest man I have ever known,' said she, clasping
her fragile hands, as if in prayer. 'But my father will not allow me:
I must obey.'
'You know you are causing me the greatest sorrow of my life?'
'I know, but I must obey.'
'Do you know you are breaking my life?'
'I know, but ... I cannot do otherwise. Mother would curse me from
heaven, father would curse me on earth. I know it all: I must obey.'
'Will you give up health, happiness, and love?'
'I give it up out of obedience.'
'So be it,' he cried out, with a quick gesture, as if he were
throwing off all his weakness. 'We will only say one word more.
Good-bye.'
'Will you never come back? Are you going away?' said she, shaking
like a tree under a tempest.
'I must go. Good-bye!'
'Are you going?'
'Yes; good-bye.'
'Will you never return?'
'Never.'
She looked at her father. He made no sign. But she felt so desperate
for herself and for Antonio Amati that she made another trial.
'A little while ago, father, you promised me, in a time of terror
and repentance, to do whatever I wanted. I ask you to do this one
thing. It is this: let me marry Antonio Amati. A gentleman's word, a
Cavalcanti's, is sacred. Will you break it?'
'I have my reasons--God sees them,' the Marquis said mysteriously.
'Do you refuse?'
'For ever.'
'Would nothing influence you--neither our prayers, nor your love for
me, nor my mother's name--would nothing induce you to consent?'
'Nothing.'
'He says "No," love,' she whispered, turning, looking around her with
a wandering eye. But Antonio Amati was too mortally wounded to feel
compassion for another's suffering. Now one single wish possessed
him, that of all strong minds, to lock up the great catastrophe of
his life, scorning barren sympathy, and fly to solitude. He needed
darkness, silence, a place to hide, to weep in, to cry out in his
sorrow. The girl before him was the image of desolation, but he saw
nothing, felt nothing: compassion had gone out of his heart; he felt
all the unforgiving selfishness of great suffering. 'My love, love!'
she still repeated, trying to give expression to the anguish of her
passion.
Do not say that, Bianca Maria,' he said, with the bitter grin of the
disappointed man; 'it is no use--I do not ask you for it. We have
spoken too much. I must go.'
'Stay another minute,' she said, as if it meant putting off death for
a little while.
'No, no--at once. Good-bye, Bianca Maria.' He bowed low to the
Marquis.
The cruel, impassible old man, whom nothing would move, for his eyes
saw nothing but his mad vision, returned his bow. When the doctor
passed in front of the girl to leave the room she held out her hand
humbly, but he did not take it. She made a resigned gesture, and
looked at him with as much passion as an exile for ever banished
from his country can express. It was no time for words or greeting;
divided by violence, they were leaving each other for ever; words
and greetings were of no use now. He went away, followed by Bianca
Maria's magnetic gaze, without turning back, going away alone to
his bitter destiny. She listened longingly for the last sound of
the beloved foot-step, that she would never hear again. She heard
the entrance door shut quietly, like a secret prison door. All was
ended, then! Her father sat down in a big chair, thoughtful but easy,
leaning his forehead on his hand. Quietly she came to kneel by him,
and, bending her head, said:
'Bless me.'
'God bless you--bless you, Bianca Maria!' said the Marquis de Formosa
piously.
'Your daughter is dead,' she whispered; and, stretching out her arms,
she fell back, livid, cold, motionless.
CHAPTER XVI
PASQUALINO DE FEO'S WILL
Don Gennaro Parascandolo, the money-lender, had for some time past
been coming very often to the big gateway in Nardones Road. He went
up the big stairs to the second floor, where he enjoyed real love
with a poor good girl, a flower of delicacy and innocence he had
found on a doorstep one evening. The wretched girl was just going
to ruin. He, with his usual money-lender's prudence, had made her
believe he was a poor clerk, a widower with no children, who would
certainly marry her if she proved good and faithful.
The unlucky Felicetta, whose name was a mockery, lived like a
recluse, served by a rough girl, her only companion. She spent her
time longing for her lord and master's presence, though she did not
even know his real name; and, in spite of a physical distaste, she
was full of gratitude to this good Don Gennaro, who had freed her
from the danger of a dreadful fall by promising to marry her when,
later on, she had ended her probation of virtue and faithfulness.
She was a tiny, neat little woman, with rather fine features, and a
quantity of fair hair, too great a weight for her small head. Cast
out on the world by a curious fate, she would certainly have fallen
into an abyss if she had not met at a decisive moment Don Gennaro,
who spoke to her kindly, gave her something to eat, took her to an
inn, and finally hired a little flat for her in Nardones Road, where
she spent her time crocheting and getting her humble marriage outfit
ready, expecting Don Gennaro's visits daily, and smiling to him with
lips and eyes, like the good girl she was! Besides, the money-lender,
who took off his diamond rings and gold studs when he went to see
her, was quite paternal with her. Every little gift--for he kept her
in decent comfort only--was made so pleasantly that it brought tears
to Felicetta's eyes. Though he was her lover, Don Gennaro treated
her so respectfully that she went pondering in her innocent, grateful
heart how she could show her gratitude and affection.
Don Gennaro, the hard money-lender, who had seen so much weeping
and despair without troubling himself, was very tender with her. He
often spoke sadly to her of his two handsome sons who had gone to the
dark world of spirits. He got sentimental, and brought flowers like
a timid young lover, asking her to pray for him; also for his dead
little ones, he added, wishing to join these two loves that were so
curiously different.
'For them it is no use,' replied Felicetta humbly; 'they are angels.'
Little by little Don Gennaro had gone deeper into this love-affair,
more than he would have desired, still using all precautions, so
that Felicetta should find out nothing about him, and no one should
know about his love-affair with the poor girl. He could not restrain
himself. His man's heart of ripe years, familiar with life, flamed
with youthful passion. He came every day now to Nardones Road,
changing the time, but spending long hours in Felicetta's simple,
loving company. At the end of that stormy summer he had given up his
usual autumn trip, and was forgetting his precautions, bringing gifts
to the girl, who took them rather astonished; but he explained he had
just succeeded to a little money.
'Then, we will get married,' the young woman said timidly, for she
felt her bad position.
'I am getting my papers sent from my village,' Don Gennaro answered,
sighing, regretting to the bottom of his heart he had a wife.
But one holiday, after taking a few turns in Toledo Street, when he
had gone down by Sant' Anna di Palazzo to Nardones Road, carrying a
bag of sweets in his hand for his lady-love, as he was going up the
stairs, he heard a sort of call or whistle behind him, evidently
to make him turn his head. He did turn, though he could not quite
make out if it was a whistle or a loud signal that had called his
attention. It had been a mysterious call, that was all, one of those
voices that come from the soul. However much he looked round, above
and beneath, going close to the railing, he saw nothing, could find
out nothing. Annoyed at being detained on that stair, where he was
always afraid of being discovered, he hurried into Felicetta's rooms.
Still, all the time of the visit he was put out; he thought, secrecy
being the foundation of his happiness, it had crumbled away with that
voice calling to him. Indeed, next day, right under the entrance, he
met the Marquis di Formosa coming down the small stair, looking as
if he were in a dream. Really, they were not on speaking terms now,
though they knew each other; but that day, both feeling put out, they
stopped in front of each other, watching one another.
'Busy as usual,' the Marquis di Formosa muttered, in a hoarse voice
that gave an idea of emotion, for it looked as if rage had made him
lose his voice.
'Yes, like yourself,' Don Gennaro replied darkly.
'I have no business to do,' Formosa replied, in a still more
undecided and shy manner. 'Is Signora Parascandolo well?'
'She is quite well,' Parascandolo said, at once suspecting something
under the question. 'How is Lady Bianca Maria?'
'She is rather in poor health,' the old man said, hanging his head.
'Good-morning, my lord,' Parascandolo answered at once, taking the
opportunity to go off.
'Good-morning, sir,' Formosa said, touching his hat, and looking
after the usurer mechanically.
He went slowly up the big stair, frightfully bored by that meeting,
thinking at once he must change houses and carry Felicetta off to
a far-away part; and he slackened his steps to see if the Marquis
were asking the porter where Don Gennaro Parascandolo was going to.
But Formosa had gone off. When the usurer got to the second landing,
again he heard a whiff; a flash passed before his eyes, as if the
mystical warning was being repeated persistently because he had
taken no notice the first time. Again holding on to the railings, he
thought over where that call could come from, and told himself he
must be dreaming, as there was nothing about. That love, carefully
hidden, made him as superstitious as a woman.
'There must be spirits in this house,' he said to Felicetta during
his call, as he could not get over his absent-mindedness. 'Twice in
coming upstairs I felt as if someone was calling me, and I could not
make out where the voice came from, or if it really was a voice.'
'Do you believe in spirits, then?'
'Well, who can tell?'
'This house has certainly a queer lot of lodgers,' said the girl.
'Day and night a number of suspicious-looking people come and go. The
other evening, as I was watering my flowers on my balcony, I thought
I heard cries and complaints coming from the first-floor. Then all
was silent; I heard no more.'
'They must have been spirits,' said Don Gennaro, laughing
unwillingly. 'Would you like to go to another house?'
'Yes, very much--a small house, with more sun.'
'On the Vittorio Emanuele Corso would you like?'
'It would be too grand for me.'
Don Gennaro was still thoughtful when he went away. As he was on the
first-floor landing, he thought he saw two people he knew go down the
small stair--the advocate Marzano and Ninetto Costa. They, heated
in argument, did not see or pretended not to see him, because they
owed him a lot of money, and he held a heap of stamped paper against
them. But the money-lender was put out; he felt a mystery growing
around him, while a burning curiosity took hold of him to know the
truth. So that the next day, after wandering about all morning to
find a new house for Felicetta, having found her a nook in that open
quarter between Vittorio Emanuele Corso and Piedi Grotta, as he
was coming back to tell her so, he stood on the stair on purpose,
waiting. And the call, the fluttering, the secret voice, was heard
like a suppressed summons. He peered about; this time he saw. He saw
two windows of the flat that looked on to the great door, one with
closed shutters, the other of obscured glass half open. There, just
for a second, through the glass, an emaciated, despairing face showed
that cast an imploring look at him, then disappeared, and a thin hand
and white handkerchief waved to call him. Then the hand went out of
sight. The darkened window was slammed violently, and the shutters
were closed as on the other window. Don Gennaro turned round to go
down at once to the isolated flat, but then he stood still, confused.
What did it matter to him what was going on there? Who was it who
showed himself imprisoned inside there? He remembered his features
vaguely, though he barely had seen them. He did not know him. It had
to do with a stranger; but whether he was a stranger or not, Don
Gennaro's mature prudence took the alarm. Perhaps it would be best
to go and give the alarm at the police court. He thought better of
that, too; for many reasons it was best to have nothing to do with
the police. But the idea that someone was shut up, calling for help,
for days past, who would perish perhaps without his help, put him
in a great state. A mysterious crime was going on; his Southerner's
curiosity burned within him, and his coolness as a man who had seen
many ugly scenes encouraged him to help the unlucky man. At last he
went downstairs, and, crossing the small yard, he went up the damp,
broken stairs. After thinking a minute, he knocked and rang. The
little bell tinkled mournfully, but no sound came from inside. He
knocked again; not a sound. Then time about with ringing the bell,
he knocked with his ebony stick. The silence was like that of an
empty house. Twice he stooped to the keyhole, and said: 'Open, by
Gad! or I will go and call the police.' The second time, when he had
shouted louder, he thought he heard a whisper, and he waited again.
No one came to open at the loud ring he gave. Then he began to go
downstairs, determined to call the police authorities. It was on the
last step that he again met the Marquis di Formosa. The latter raised
his head and grew pale as he recognised Don Gennaro. Still, he had
the courage to ask:
'How come you here?'
'There is something wrong going on up there, my lord,' said the
money-lender coldly, lighting a cigarette. 'I am going to a
magistrate.'
'Why should you call in a magistrate?' the old man stammered, in a
nervous way.
'I tell you that up there a disgraceful thing has happened, or will
happen, and, as I am an honest man, I cannot allow it. Will you come
with me to the magistrate?' and he looked him straight in the eyes.
'Don Gennaro, don't let us exaggerate. Perhaps it is a joke among
friends, or a just punishment,' said Formosa, getting excited.
'I do not wish to know anything about it. I only know that a man
asked my help. I know I knocked, and they would not open.'
'What exaggerated talk are you going on with?'
'Something bad is going on.'
'We will go upstairs. I will induce them to open,' said the Marquis,
making up his mind to have as little of a catastrophe as possible, as
it had to be.
Silently they went up together. Formosa gave two long rings, the
known signal.
'Who is it?' asked a muffled voice, speaking through the keyhole.
'It is I, doctor; open, please.'
'But you are not alone.'
'It doesn't matter--open.'
'If you are not alone I will not open, as you know,' Trifari said
angrily from inside.
'Open the door; it will be better for everyone, doctor,' the Marquis
di Formosa negotiated. 'If you do not open the ruin will be greater.
Don Gennaro Parascandolo here knows all; he wants to go to a
magistrate.'
'At any rate, I am not going away,' Parascandolo said from outside.
'I will only go for the purpose of calling the police.'
'Oh dear! oh dear!' Formosa muttered with a senile quiver.
A step was heard going and coming, then a slow rattle of chain-links,
and Trifari's face, with long, red hair growing unevenly on it,
showed in a slit of the door.
'Open, open!' said the money-lender, grinning, going on, without
seeing the bloodthirsty glance Trifari cast on him.
On going in, a smell of smoky oil caught the nostrils, of cooking
done in an airless place, of not very clean people, who have lived
shut up for a long time. The front-room and the so-called dining-room
were dirtier than ever, with dust, lampblack, bread-crumbs, and
fruit-skins. The house was like an animals' lair, when they have been
shut up in their dens for days and weeks from fear of the huntsman.
On a chair, pale, with hollow cheeks, pinched nostrils, bloodless
ears, his blue lips half open, as if he could hardly breathe, the
medium lay stretched out, his limbs flaccid, his beard long and
dirty, his hair hanging in curls on his neck.
Trifari, to make him stand up, gave him two blows, one on the arm,
the other on the shoulder. It brought quite a new sort of doleful
expression on the unlucky impostor's face.
'What are you doing? Are you not ashamed?' shouted Don Gennaro, quite
scandalized.
'He treats me so at all hours of the day,' the medium muttered in a
thread of a voice.
'Keep up your courage; you will come away with me,' said the
money-lender, handing him a flask of brandy that he always carried.
'I shall not have the strength, sir,' said the other feebly. 'They
have killed me, shut up here, with no air nor light, with this stink
that makes me sick. I have generally fasted or got poor food, and
been worried all the time to give lottery numbers. I was often beaten
by this hyena of a doctor, that the Lord has brought into existence,
for my sins. It is agonizing, sir; I am in agony.'
'How could you do that to a man--a fellow-Christian?' Parascandolo
asked severely, looking at the other two.
'See who is preaching!' shouted Trifari. His impudence was
indomitable.
'You, my lord, a gentleman!' said Parascandolo, making out he would
not speak to Trifari.
'What would you have? Passion carried me away,' said the old man,
quite humiliated, shivering from other remembrances also.
Just then came in at the door, which had been left open, Colaneri,
the viperish professor, and Don Crescenzio the lottery-banker. On
seeing a stranger, recognising Don Gennaro, they understood all, and
looked at each other dismayed, especially Don Crescenzio, who was a
Government official, as he said.
The money-lender went on smoking coolly, whilst the medium, getting
weaker, let his head fall back on the chair. The house, which had
been a prison for a month now, had an ugly, sordid look, and the
artificial light of the lamp in full day wrung the heart like the wax
tapers round a bier. Really, Don Pasqualino looked like a corpse.
'Have so many of you set on one man?' the money-lender asked, without
directly addressing anyone.
'Why did he not give the lottery numbers at once?' yelled Colaneri,
pulling at his collar with a priestly gesture. 'No one would have
done anything to him then.'
'You could be sent to the galleys for this, you know,' said the
usurer rather icily.
'Don't you speak of the galleys; you ought to have been there long
ago!' hissed the ex-priest.
The other shrugged his shoulders, then said:
'Don Pasqualino, have you the strength to get up? I want to take you
away.'
The four looked at each other, grown pale suddenly. It was natural
that, the thing being discovered, the medium should go away; but the
idea that he would be taken away to the open air, free to come and
go, and to tell what had happened--this escape from persecution made
them very frightened.
'I have no strength to move, sir,' said Don Pasqualino complainingly.
'If they wanted to kill me, they could not have found a better way.
God will punish them;' and he sighed deeply.
There were two knocks at the door, and two other couples came
in--Ninetto Costa and Marzano, Gaetano the glover and Michele the
shoeblack. Not content with coming every day, every two hours, in
turn, to ask for lottery numbers, with the monotonous perseverance
of the Trappist monk who says to his fellow, 'We must all die,' on
Friday there was always a full meeting. Then it was a case of torture
in the mass; it was the reckless conduct of those fallen to the
bottom of the abyss, who still hope to get up out of it--of those
hardened by passion, who see light no longer. Indeed, their cruel
obstinacy had increased, because of the evil action they were doing
and the persecution they had carried out against Don Pasqualino.
Instead of feeling remorse, they were in a frightful rage, because
even their violence had had no effect, since not one of the lottery
numbers, whether given by symbol or straight out by the medium during
his imprisonment, had come from the urn. The first cold douche on
their wrongheadedness came when Don Gennaro Parascandolo arrived. It
was only then they noticed the wretchedness and dirt of the prison
where they had kept the man shut up, the cruelty of Trifari the
gaoler's face, and the suffering look on the prisoner's--then only
they understood that they might be prosecuted for such a crime,
and that they were at Don Pasqualino's and Don Gennaro's mercy.
Dumb, frozen, amazed, they did not even ask how the prison had been
discovered. They now felt the heavy weight on the heart that is the
first moral personal punishment of sin. The Marquis di Formosa was
the most humiliated of all; he remembered he had brought the medium
there, and he already saw his name dragged from the police-court to
prison, then to the assizes. Now the Cabalists turned imploring
looks on the two arbiters of their fate. Don Gennaro Parascandolo
methodically went on smoking.
'Above all, doctor,' he said, throwing the smoke in the air, 'put out
the light and open the window.'
'I won't take orders from you!' Trifari shouted. He was the only one
unsubdued; he was wild at his prey escaping.
'Do you really want to go to San Francesco,' Parascandolo asked
quietly, meaning the largest prison in Naples.
'They ought to put you there!' yelled the liverish Cabalist, who had
got half mad from having to watch Don Pasqualino.
'I will wait till you pay me the lot of money you owe me,' remarked
Parascandolo.
'Don't you wish you may get it!' said Trifari impudently.
'Someone will pay--father or mother--to avoid a trial for cheatery,'
the money-lender added without putting himself about at all.
All the men looked at each other, shivering. Each of them owed money
to the usurer, even Don Crescenzio. The only two who did not--Gaetano
and Michele--were worried as much by Donna Concetta. Even Trifari
held his tongue; the idea of being shamed in his village before those
old peasants, whose secret plague he was, made him groan already like
a wounded beast. Stolidly he went to open the windows and put out
the smoking lamp that gave out a horrid smell of blackened wick. The
bystanders' eyelids fluttered at that strong light of day; all faces
were white, and the medium's was like a dying man's. The usurer gave
him another sip of brandy, which he drank drop by drop, being hardly
able to get it down.
'Now we will call up a cab,' said Don Gennaro.
'What! are you going to take him away?' asked Ninetto Costa in
despair.
'Do you want me to leave him here for you to carry off a corpse?'
'What an exaggeration!' muttered the other vaguely. 'Don Pasqualino
is accustomed to living shut up.... You are ruining us, Don Gennaro.'
'Think of your other woes,' said the money-lender gravely.
The other, struck by his words, said no more. All of them trembled,
seeing the medium was trying to rise; slowly, leaning on the table,
and only by a great effort, taking breath every minute, opening his
livid mouth with its blackened teeth, did he succeed. The enchantment
was broken altogether; now the medium was escaping for good. He would
go to the police-court, and accuse them of keeping him in custody--of
cruelty and ill-treatment. But at heart they thought this of less
consequence than the medium's getting away, for, to revenge himself,
he would never give them lottery numbers again. Would they were sent
to gaol, if only they got right lottery numbers, for they would be
able to corrupt justice and escape. The dream had fled; the source of
riches was going, flying off. Nothing, nothing now would induce the
medium to give them lottery numbers--certain, infallible ones. Every
step he tried to take on his thin, shaky legs gave them a pang.
'If you don't take heart, Don Pasqualino, we shall stay here till
evening,' Don Gennaro remarked.
He was in a hurry to be off. Indeed, his position among them was not
very safe. All owed him money. If they had been bold enough to carry
out one imprisonment, they might well carry out another more useful
and profitable. Don Gennaro, indeed, took the command by his coolness
and strength, but were not these men desperate? Yet they were feeling
that break-up of moral and bodily strength, that weakness, that comes
to the most finished scoundrels when they have carried out some
wicked deed, having put all their real and fictitious strength into
the enterprise and obtained no result. At any rate, it was better to
go out.
'Gentlemen, I wish you good-morning,' he said, taking his hat and
cane, seeing the medium was scratching at his coat with skinny hands
to clean it.
'I would like to say a word to each of these gentlemen,' the medium
requested.
There was a whispering. All crowded round him who spoke with the
spirits, while Parascandolo was already in the lobby and held the
door open as a precaution.
'One at a time,' said the medium. 'It is a kind of will I am making.
I want to leave a remembrance to every one.'
He took them aside one by one in the window recess. He looked them in
the face and touched their hands with his feeble, cold fingers. The
first was Ninetto Costa.
'Look here, Ninetto: don't give up hope; remember, there is always a
revolver for a finish up.'
'That is true,' he said, trying to find a number in the words.
The second was Colaneri, the ex-priest.
'There is the gospel for you; it opens its arms,' whispered the
medium.
'Thank you for reminding me,' said the other, half cheerfully, half
sadly, taking the double meaning of the advice.
The third was Gaetano, the glover.
'Why are you a married man? I would have advised you to marry Donna
Concetta, who has so much money.'
'Has she a lot?'
'Yes, a great deal.'
'You are right, it is hard luck.'
The fourth was Michele, the shoeblack, the hunchbacked dwarf.
'If you were not so crooked and old, I would advise you to marry
Donna Caterina, she that has the small lottery.'
'But I am crooked,' said the shoeblack sadly.
'Well, work hard.'
The fifth was Marzano, the lawyer, his head shaking, but still
burning with the frenzy.
'You know, thousands of sheets of stamped paper are sold in Naples:
why do you not try for a license?'
He whispered rather than said it, and the old man looked wonderingly,
suspiciously at him, and went off hanging his head.
The sixth that came up was Dr. Trifari. He hesitated, for he had
ill-treated the medium too much in the prison days. Still, he was
treated with great civility.
'To get rid of your worries, why do you not sell all in your village
and bring your parents here?'
'I never thought of it. I will consider it.'
The seventh was Don Crescenzio, the lottery-banker at Nunzio Lane,
whom Don Pasqualino had had a long intimacy with. They spoke in a
whisper. No one could hear what was said.
'How foolish Government is!' said the medium.
'What is that you are saying?' cried out the other, alarmed.
'I say, how stupid Government is.'
'I don't know what you mean.'
'You do perfectly.'
The eighth to come up was the Marquis di Formosa. He was rather
timid, too, feeling that he had done most wrong to Don Pasqualino.
'The spirit spoke to me again, my lord.'
'What did he say?'
'He told me that Donna Bianca Maria Cavalcanti was a perfectly lucid
soul, but that, as I said, man's touch would defile her; it would
make her obtuse and unlucky, unable to have further visions.'
'Donna Bianca shall die a virgin. Tell the spirit so,' the old man
said proudly.
'Well, Don Pasqualino, are we to stay here till evening?' said the
money-lender, coming in. 'Have you finished with these gentlemen?'
'Yes, I have done,' said the other in a strange voice, as if he had
got back his strength in some queer way.
While the medium looked in his pockets to see if he had a torn
handkerchief and a dirty pack of cards he always carried with him,
and then put on his shabby hat, the Cabalists had gathered in a
group, but they were not speaking. What he had said in its true and
symbolical sense as a hint, a suggestion, had deeply moved them.
'Gentlemen, may God forgive you!' the medium cried out in a queer
way, with a slight smile, as he went off.
They hardly greeted him, but glanced at him remorsefully. None of
them dared make an excuse for the ill they had done him; each of them
felt the nail riveted that the medium had driven in. The two went
down the small stair very slowly, for the medium often threatened
to fall. The usurer did not go so far as to offer him his arm; the
medium was much too dirty. When he came to the doorway and looked
around, drinking in the free air, tears came to his eyes.
'I thought I would never get out alive,' he said as he got to the
carriage.
'Where do you wish to go?' asked Parascandolo.
'To the police-court,' said the other in a feeble voice again.
He was spread out in the carriage like a serious invalid. Don Gennaro
frowned rather, and, not to make people stare, he had the carriage
hood put up. They went on to Concezione Street.
'Do you intend to denounce them?' Parascandolo asked.
'You do not know how they have tortured me,' muttered the other,
knocking his head against the carriage hood whenever there was a
jostle, as if he could not keep his head straight on his shoulders.
'So you will take them up, will you?'
'For thirty days I, an unhappy man, in bad health, was shut up with
no air nor light and a stinking oil-lamp, whilst they who behaved so
badly to me took their exercise.'
'Why did you not give them the lottery numbers?'
'Just because----' said the medium mysteriously.
'Don Pasqualino, you don't know the lottery numbers,' said Don
Gennaro, laughing.
'What does it matter to you?'
'Nothing at all; but you must be frank with me.'
'Yes, sir, yes, sir,' said the medium humbly; 'but why did they
endanger my life? What harm had I done them?'
'Don Pasqualino, you ate up several thousand francs belonging to
these gentlemen, to my knowledge,' Parascandolo went on in the same
laughing tone.
'It was all charity, sir--charity.'
'Really, was it all charity?' Don Gennaro sneered wickedly.
'There was some little thing for myself, sir,' Don Pasqualino sighed
out, with a flash of malicious amusement in his eyes.
'Then, there is no use in going to the police-court?'
'We had better go there, all the same; you will be satisfied with me.'
They got down at the big gateway in Concezione Street, where the
guardians of the public safety were going and coming. It was a
tremendous effort to the medium to go up the stairs; he lost his
breath at every step.
'Rather an effort, eh?' the usurer said more than once.
'Don't leave me, don't desert me!' the medium sighed out.
At last they got to the first-floor, where Don Gennaro, respectfully
saluted by the ushers, asked if there was a magistrate present. There
was not. The head-clerk was there; he had them shown in at once, and
was most ceremonious.
'Here is Signor Pasqualino De Feo; he wants to make a statement,'
said the money-lender, setting to smoking a cigarette, after
offering the head-clerk one, looking the medium straight in the eyes.
'I wished to know,' said he feebly, 'if anyone has come to say I had
disappeared.'
The inspector took a thick ledger, and turned it over as he smoked.
'Yes, sir,' he said. 'Chiarastella De Feo, living in Centograde Lane,
wife of Pasqualino De Feo, stated that her husband was unaccountably
absent. She feared imprisonment or misfortune.'
'What misfortune, what imprisonment, could there be?' the medium
called out, smiling ironically. 'Women always talk nonsense.'
'She said it had happened to you before, though she could not state
under what circumstances.'
'Why should they have shut me up?'
'To drag lottery numbers from you.'
'Did my wife say that I knew lottery numbers?' said the medium with a
little laugh.
'Do not believe it, inspector; it is nonsense,' Parascandolo added
laughingly.
'I wish to state, to avoid mistakes, that, being at Palma Campania,
at Don Gennaro Parascandolo's villa there, I was so ill I had to stay
there a month without being able to write to my wife. Then I thought
every day I would soon be able to return.'
'You witness that this is true, do you, sir?' said the inspector
carelessly, not giving it any importance.
'Yes, I do, sir.'
'Then it is all right. He would have given you lottery numbers during
this month's illness of his, I suppose?' asked the police official,
still grinning.
'Of course he did,' said Parascandolo, in high good-humour.
'But what use are they to you? With a poor employé like me it would
be different.'
'Don Pasqualino, if you are strong enough, give the inspector lottery
numbers.'
'You are making a fool of me,' muttered the medium.
They said good-bye, and the inspector advised De Feo to go to his
wife's house at once, as she would be anxious.
'Did you not see that I did as you wished, sir? I forgave those who
had offended me,' said Don Pasqualino as they went downstairs.
'You are too good,' the other answered, rather ironically.
'I do not intend to make a merit of it, for there is none. I would
never have accused these gentlemen.'
'Ah!' said the other, standing still for a moment. 'Why is that?'
'It would not suit me to do it.'
'I see. But why did we come here, then?'
'It was necessary to make a statement, for the police were looking
for me.'
'Is your wife such a simpleton?'
'What! my wife? She is very fond of me; she is nervous for me, and
says we must retire from the profession.'
'What profession is it?'
'Don't you know? She is the famous witch of Centograde, Chiarastella.'
'Ah, I remember. Her witchcraft is like your knowing lottery numbers,
is it?'
'Her magic is true,' said Don Pasqualino thoughtfully and sincerely.
'And does she believe in your being a medium?'
'Yes, she does,' said the other, hanging his head. 'My wife is in
love with me.'
'In love with you?'
'Yes, with me.'
'You are a queer lot,' said the money-lender philosophically. 'And,
meanwhile, you have saved the eight scoundrels.'
'How have I saved them? Did you understand the advice I gave them
all?'
'No, I did not,' Don Gennaro answered, surprised at the malicious
tone of his voice.
'I left them each a remembrance,' the medium replied, in a shrill
voice.
'Will they obey you, do you think?'
'As sure as death,' said the medium dolefully.
He bowed to Don Gennaro, and, with renewed strength, went off quickly
towards Municipio Square. Parascandolo looked at him as he went off,
and felt for the first time a shudder at cold malignity.
CHAPTER XVII
BARBASSONE'S INN--THE DUEL
In the little Barbassone inn, on the road that goes down from
Moiariella di Capodimonte to Ponte Rossi, there were no customers
that clear winter morning. It was really an outhouse on pillars,
roughly built, and on the ground-floor there was a big, smoky kitchen
with a wide, grimy fireplace and a large hall, where rustic tables
were set out for eating and drinking. On the upper floor, which was
reached by a queer outside staircase, the host and his wife slept in
the room over the kitchen. The other bare room, used as a storeroom,
was full of black sausages and stinking cheese, strings of garlic
hung on the walls, and bunches of onions and winter marrows strung on
osier withes. Below, in front of the inn, were two or three arbours,
that must have been covered thick with leaves in spring and summer,
but now they were bare, showing the wooden framework. Under the
arbours were dusty, broken tables covered with dry, rustling leaves;
and at the side of the inn was a bowling-green, surrounded by a low
myrtle hedge. The host had had a wooden stair made inside, leading
from the ground-floor to the upper rooms; and a door at the back
opened on to the fields. From the first-floor windows could be seen
the suburbs of Naples, Reclusorio Road, the railway-station, the
swamps outside the town, and the Campo Santo Hill. Two roads went up
to the inn; one came from Moiariella, the other from Ponte Rossi.
There was the way from the fields also, but it did not count.
However, if the neighbourhood of the country inn was deserted, some
company were certainly expected, for the servant in the kitchen that
fine quiet morning was giving hard blows to some pork chops on a
big table. On the stove a kettle was boiling for a macaroni. Before
the inn door the host, a sagacious-looking peasant, was washing
fennel and salad in a bowl on the ground, throwing away the bad
leaves to the thin fowls that were clucking about. The hostess of
the Barbassone was away; her husband often sent her out when it
suited him, to buy fresh fish, tripe, or whatever could not be got
at Capodimonte market. He stayed at home with the old servant, who
was busy in the kitchen helping him; and there was a son of his,
about twelve years old, who waited on the customers. This boy was
now employed in the kitchen grating down some white nipping Cotrone
cheese, that looks like chalk and burns the throat, but Naples
throats do not object to it.
It was a soft, quiet time near noon. The host often looked to
see if anyone was coming from the low road of Ponte Rossi, or if
anyone was coming down Moiariella road, but Barbassone's keen
face was as serene as the December morning. He bent down again to
soak the lettuce-leaves in the already earthy water of the basin,
when, without his having seen her, a black figure of a woman rose
before him. She was a girl a little over twenty, but so worn with
fatigue, want and sorrow she looked years older, and her great black
eyes burned in her lean face. She was Carmela, the cigar-girl,
Annarella and Filomena's unhappy sister, Raffaele or Farfariello's
despised love. She had come on foot, so naturally made no noise. A
thinly-veiled excitement was mingled in her face with the weariness
after her long walk. She was dressed like a vagrant in a cotton frock
quite washed out, with a rag of a red shawl round her neck and a
rumpled cotton apron at her waist.
'Good-day, gossip,' she said, greeting the host with Naples common
folk's favourite title.
'Good-morning, lass,' he answered, looking at her suspiciously.
'Can I have a glass of wine?' she asked, keeping down a tremble in
her voice.
'Are you alone?'
'What about it? Am I not able to pay for a glass?'
'You may drink the whole cellar,' the host said in a tone of affected
carelessness, and he stood aside to let her into the room, following
her to a table.
She sat down on a rough chair, after glancing round quickly. There
were no customers.
'Is it Gragnano wine you want?'
'Yes, sir.'
'Half a pint of Gragnano wine!' shouted the host towards the kitchen,
cleaning the table with his apron.
'Do you wish anything to eat?' he then added, still staring at the
girl.
'I am not hungry; I am thirsty,' said Carmela, casting down her eyes.
'Give me a penny-worth of dry chestnuts.'
The host slowly went to get those white, shrivelled, hard chestnuts
that provoke thirst. In the meanwhile the boy brought a caraffe of
greenish glass full of dark wine, stoppered by the usual vine-leaf.
Carmela began to munch the chestnuts slowly, drinking a mouthful of
wine at times.
'Will you do me the pleasure?' she said to the host, who was hovering
about rather uneasily.
'Thank you, I will,' he said.
He never refused, and, as there was only one glass, he took a long
pull at the bottle, making the wine gurgle, then drying his lips.
'How quiet you are out here!' said the girl, trying to start a
conversation. 'Have you customers always?'
'Not always. It is according to the weather.'
'People from Naples come, do they not?'
'Yes, I have them sometimes.'
'Here are two francs. Buy a cap for your boy,' she said, seeing the
host was suspicious.
He took the money unhesitatingly and pocketed it, then stood to be
questioned.
'A set of young fellows are to come here at mid-day, are they not?'
'Yes, I expect some.'
'One Farfariello is to be with them, I believe?'
'Yes, I heard that.'
She gave a deep sigh.
'Is he your brother?' the inn-keeper asked.
'He is my lover.'
'There are no women with them,' the host remarked carelessly.
'I know that,' she said, shaking her head. 'But not only they are
coming. Don't you expect others?'
'Another set of men may be coming.'
'What to do?' she cried out, feeling her fears justified.
'To get dinner, of course.'
'Is there nothing else?'
'Nothing. At Barbassone's it is the only thing to do.'
'On your honour, is that all?'
'I give you my word. While they are in my house nothing can happen.'
'Yes, but what about afterwards?'
'I have nothing to do with that. When they have gone three yards
away, I have no more to do with them, do you see.'
She said no more, and got quite thoughtful. A wine-stain was on the
table, and she lengthened it with her finger, making a pattern with
the wine.
'Gossip, will you do me a kindness?'
'Don't speak like that.'
'A real charity, gossip, that God will give you back on that
handsome son of yours. Let me be present at this dinner in some room
aloft--any hole where I can see without being seen.'
'My dear, Barbassone never meddles with doubtful affairs.'
'If you love your son, do not say no to me. It is not a plot, I swear
it by the Virgin! It is an idea, a fancy of mine. I want to see what
my lover is doing.'
'Yes, to make a scene--a quarrel.'
'I will not move, sir; I swear it by my eyes! I just want to look on
at this dinner--nothing more.'
'Do you promise not to come out of the room?'
'I swear I will not.'
'Nor try to speak to anyone?'
'No, no, I won't.'
'If you are found out, do not say that I put you there.'
'Of course not.'
'Come with me,' he said sharply.
She started after the host, who left the hall and went up the outside
stair to the second-floor. Carmela gave a glance from the parapet
up the two roads that lead from Naples to Barbassone's inn, but
they were quiet and deserted. Not the slightest noise of a carriage
or footsteps came up in that noontide silence. The inn-keeper took
Carmela across the room where he and his wife slept, and opened the
door of the smaller one alongside where the inn provisions were kept.
A whiff of rancid lard and ripe cheese caught Carmela by the throat
and made her cough.
'You will be all right here, my dear,' Barbassone said to her,
leading her to a window that looked to the front of the inn. 'If
these honest fellows come, they will dine down there in the arbour.
You will see their every movement. Only you must promise you will
stay behind the window-glass.'
'Yes, sir, I will,' Carmela promised.
'You are not to go down, whatever happens. Do you understand? I don't
want to get into a scrape with my customers.'
'Yes, sir; I will not go down, never fear,' she said in a low tone,
half shutting her eyes, as if she saw a frightful sight before her.
'If not, I will shut you in.'
'There is no need of that. As I love the blessed Virgin, I won't
move.'
'Good-bye in the meanwhile,' said he, going away.
'God will reward you,' the girl called out after him.
The long waiting began, and to the love-lorn maiden these minutes
had the weight of lead. Still, she stood motionless behind the dull,
dirty window, and her warm breath dulled the panes more. There were a
couple of bottomless chairs and a wooden stool in the room, but she
did not think of sitting down. She was too anxious to mount guard at
the window, looking at the two sunny roads that mild winter's day,
examining the peaceful landscape, where city noises were silent. Only
twice she went backwards and forwards in that room full of black
sausages and brown cheese, choked by their bad smell, and she saw
there was another window that looked to the back of the inn, over the
fields going up to Capodimonte. It was perfectly silent on that side
too.
As time passed, a sharp anguish caught her heart. Perhaps the man who
had told her of Farfariello's and his friend's trip to Barbassone's
inn had cheated her, or she might have misunderstood what he meant.
Farfariello, his friends, and the others, perhaps at that time were
already in some other place, and all might be happening far off,
without her being able to stop it. Perhaps it had happened already.
She often turned her eyes to heaven, praying that it should not be
so. At one time, not managing to keep down her uneasiness, she pulled
her rosary from her pocket and began to say _Ave Marias_ and _Pater
Nosters_ mechanically, thinking of something else. Seeing a dreadful
vision, that made her despairing heart go out to the Virgin, for her
to save Raffaele from misfortune '_and in the hour of our death_,'
she caught herself saying aloud once. It was just then a noise of
wheels and a cracking of whips came from Capodimonte Road, and
Raffaele and three other youths, almost the same age, appeared in a
cab.
'Oh, Our Lady of Sorrows!' sobbed out Carmela from behind the window.
Raffaele paid for the cab, and, contrary to the usual habit in
these country trips, that the driver always shares the pleasures of
the day, this time the horse turned round and went back the way it
came. The young fellows, with trousers tight at the knee and caps
hanging by one hair, were now making a great uproar in the lower
room, perhaps because dinner was not ready. The boy quickly spread
the cloth on one of the tables which ought to have been shaded
by the leaves of the arbour, but it was bare. In the meanwhile,
quite calmly, these youths set to playing bowls, waiting till the
macaroni was ready. Raffaele especially went about quietly, with that
low-class ease that charmed Carmela's heart.
'May you be blessed!' she whispered, rather reassured by that
calmness.
Now, seated at four sides of the table, pulling macaroni into their
plates from a big dish in the middle, Raffaele and his friends ate
straight on with youthful appetites, improved by the wintry country
air. They drank a lot, and often lifted their glasses of bluish dark
wine, and, looking fixedly at each other, said something and drank it
off at a gulp, without winking. Carmela, though she heard no voices,
understood that they were drinking healths, or to the success of
something.
Up till then, everything had gone on like a commonplace joyous
winter trip, on a fine sunny day in a quiet country place: the inn,
the host in the doorway, the boy serving the table, and the four
fellow-guests, looked perfectly easy, in sympathy with the quietness
around. But again there was a noise of wheels from Ponte Rossi Road,
and an ostentatious whip-cracking. Raffaele and his friends looked
up, as if out of mere curiosity, while Carmela, cut to the heart
by that sound, felt her legs giving way, and she prayed the Lord
silently to give her the strength not to die just then.
It was a party like the first one--of four young fellows with light
trousers, tight at the knees, and neat black jackets, wearing
their caps over one ear. Carmela recognised the one that led the
party--Ferdinando, called the l'Ammartenato Teaser. He said something
to the driver on paying him; the man listened, bending down, then
went off slowly the road he had come, without turning his head. The
two parties looked straight at each other solemnly, and bowed very
punctiliously. Raffaele and his friends went on eating quietly; the
other four took off their hats and hung them on the bare boughs.
Macaroni was much quicker served for them, perhaps because the host
had got ready enough for the two parties, so that at one time, as
Raffaele's friends were eating slower and Ferdinando's were hurrying
their mouthfuls, they got to the same stage, then went on together
to the next course, swallowing, in two gulps, pork chops and lettuce
salad, and drinking glasses of wine one after another as if they
were water. While they were drinking, the two tables glanced at each
other now and then quite indifferently. In spite of the quantity
of wine swallowed they seemed to keep very cool; some of them lay
back in their chairs occasionally in a calm way. Still, all that
calm and free-and-easiness was the same at each table, curiously
alike, as if the two sets had made a tacit agreement; but it fell
short of the gaiety natural to Neapolitans on an outing, when
laughter, shouts, and songs rise to heaven. Sometimes the youths
round Raffaele, nicknamed Farfariello, bent towards him, and he
smiled proudly; it was the only sign of cheerfulness in the company.
Ferdinando--Ammartenato as his nickname was--did not smile even; his
set tossed glasses of wine down their throats always, not moving a
muscle. Carmela looked on from above; her lover's smiles, the wine
drunk off by the two sets, and their peaceful free-and-easiness,
did not reassure her. Amongst other things, she saw the movement
of the lips, but did not hear the words. It seemed to her that a
deep silence was between these people, who understood each other
by signs; it was a doleful silence, in the midst of country peace.
A slow, ever-increasing anguish oppressed her breathing, as if her
heart had contracted and only beat at intervals; her whole will was
in abeyance. She stood, leaning with her forehead against the dusty
window, rigid, her sad eyes fixed on Raffaele's face, as if she
wanted to read what was passing through his mind. Now the inn-keeper
and his boy brought the fruit--that is to say, dried chestnuts and a
bundle of celery with white stalks and long, thin green leaves--and
with it more wine. Then, all of a sudden, after his father had
whispered something in his ear, the little boy took off his apron,
put on his cap, and started off running up the Ponte Rossi Road.
As it was getting near the end of the meal, Carmela felt her brain
giving way; she had one single desire growing in her mind to go down,
take Raffaele by the arm, and carry him off with her, afar, where
neither _cammorristi_ nor _guappi_ could reach. She dared not. For a
month before that Raffaele had been cold and hard to her, avoiding
her persistently, so that she got to places he had been at always ten
minutes after he had left. He had let her know, too, that it was no
use; in any case, he would have nothing to do with her.
'He might at least tell me why, and I would go away satisfied,' she
cried out, weeping, to those who had repeated Raffaele's words.
But she had not seen him for a month; in fact, if she knew that two
sets of Hooligans were going that day to a mysterious appointment at
the Barbassone inn at Ponte Rossi, it was from an indiscretion of a
chum of Raffaele's. He had said it, looking her straight in the eyes,
with a secret meaning she could not help guessing, so that she left
him at once, and on foot, from her low-lying quarter, she had dragged
herself up there, panting, sorrowful, biting her lips, not to cry out
nor weep.
She dared not go down; she felt Raffaele would abuse her and chase
her away rudely, as he had always done lately. She shook at his
angry voice and contemptuous words. Now the dinner was coming to
an end very quietly; the two sets were smoking cigars, gazing into
vacancy with the solemn satisfaction of people who have dined well
and are getting ready to digest. For a time the peace that rose from
the surroundings was such, and the youths were all so quiet, that
for a moment Carmela felt her anguish soothed, and she hoped it
was a tragic dream. Only for a moment, to fall deeper again into a
sorrowful abyss, where the moments passed with dramatic slowness.
Ferdinando's party rose. The four young fellows, with the usual cheap
swell gestures, pulled up their trousers, tightening the straps,
dragged down their jackets, and set their caps haughtily across their
heads. They went away, passing beside Raffaele's table solemnly;
then they all touched their hats, and the others answered, saying
the same word. Carmela could not bear what; it was 'Greeting.' They
went away; she gave a sigh of relief. But instead of returning by
Ponte Rossi, whence they came, and where perhaps the carriage was
waiting for them, Carmela saw them go round the house, and one by
one. She had run to the window that looked on to the inn-keeper's
garden and the fields, and saw them disappear behind a green screen
of trees. Panting, she ran again to the other window, that looked on
to the inn-yard, where Raffaele's party were getting ready to go off
also. All was safe if they took the Capodimonte Road, whence they had
come. It would only mean that there had been two dinners, with no
after-thought nor consequences. The preparations had been somewhat
slow, but at a signal from Raffaele all hurried, while he, with a
spent cigar in a corner of his mouth, paid the reckoning quietly.
He got up, stretching his arm for his cap, which was hanging from a
bough; in doing it his waistcoat pulled up, and Carmela saw something
shining at his trousers belt. It was a revolver. Yet for a last
moment she still hoped. Perhaps they were going away peacefully by
the quiet country roads to the noisy town; and, at any rate, Raffaele
always carried a revolver, a small-sized one. But in a moment the
horrid fact she dreaded looked to her like a certainty. Very quietly
Raffaele and the other three youths turned, not by Capodimonte Road,
but behind the inn, through the garden, following the same road as
the other set, and making up to them--that is to say, walking quietly
with their springy step one after the other. She could bear it no
longer; she felt something give way within. She ran to the storeroom
door; the man had locked her in, evidently, for it would not open.
She, wild, blind with grief and rage, began to shake the door, which
was old and worm-eaten, so that it offered little resistance. The
bolt the host had drawn broke with the rattling, and she very nearly
fell on the landing from the shock. She went down the outside stair
at a bound, but on the last steps she found the host, his shrivelled
peasant's face very pale, for he had heard all the noise. He stood in
her way.
'Where are you going?'
'Let me pass--let go!'
'Where are you going? Are you mad?'
'Let me go, I say!'
He caught hold of her wrists and looked her in the eyes.
'Are you the woman they are going to kill each other for?'
'Holy Virgin, help me! Let me go!'
'Do you want to get killed?'
'Yes, yes! Let go of my wrists!'
'Do you want them to kill you?'
'It doesn't matter if they do,' she cried, slipping from his grasp
with a powerful wrench.
Running, panting, sobbing, her hair loose, clapping on the nape of
her neck, her dress beating against her legs and throwing her down,
then getting up again, crying, filling that serene country silence
with her despair, she ran after the two sets of men by the same road,
turning behind the same hill with green trees. She found herself in
a narrow country road, and instinctively followed it, feeling it was
the right one. She went on and on very swiftly, bursting with sobs,
her ears alert, questioning the silence. But on the right a harsh,
sharp sound made her jump; just after it came another shot, then
another. She rushed into the field where the two files of low-class
duellists were going on firing at each other at a short range.
Throwing herself on Raffaele, she shrieked wildly.
'Go away!' he said, trying to free himself.
'No, I will not!' she shrieked.
'Go away!'
'I will not.'
'It is not for you; go away!'
'That doesn't matter.'
All this took place in a minute; the shots went on echoing dolefully
in the country air. In an interval she slipped down on the ground,
her arms spread out, with a bullet in her temple. Carmela's fall
was the signal for flight, especially as, the virginal stillness
of the country air having been broken by the many revolver-shots,
people from Capodimonte village were heard arriving by Ponte Rossi
Road. Hurriedly the two sets went off across the fields by a marked
path, and quickly disappeared. On the duelling-ground only Carmela
was left lying on the grass, blood flowing from her temple. Beside
her, Raffaele, looking pale, tried to stanch the wound with a wet
handkerchief. But the blood went on spouting like a fountain, making
a red pool round the girl's head. She opened her eyes feebly.
'Tell me who it was for.'
'Don't think about that. Think of your own health,' he said in an
agitated way, looking around.
'People are coming now; make your escape,' she said, thinking only of
his safety.
'Can I leave you like this?'
'It does not matter; someone will help me. Fly, or you will be
arrested.'
'Adieu,' he said, feeling relieved. 'We will see each other again at
Pellegrini Hospital; I will come and ask for you.'
'Yes, yes,' she whispered, shutting her eyes and opening them again.
'Fly! Adieu.'
He rushed off, too, very quickly, without looking back; she followed
him with her glance, half sitting up, holding the handkerchief to her
forehead, while the blood flowed down her neck and shoulders into
her lap. She was alone. She was holding her head down in her great
weakness, when some peasants, a magistrate from Capodimonte with some
police, and a gardener from the Royal Palace grounds came up at the
same moment. They had to put her into a chair that the Barbassone
inn-keeper had brought out, and carry her. They went slowly, the same
road as she had come. She lay with her legs swinging against the
chair, her arms limp, her head going hither and thither, and at every
shake of the chair spilling big drops of blood on the ground. Before
the inn, where the two tables with wine-stained cloths still stood,
the chair was put down.
'Would you like anything?' asked the magistrate, a swarthy man.
'Only a little water to drink,' she said, opening her eyes slowly, as
if her eyelids were too heavy.
Meanwhile they put a cold-water bandage on the wound till a cab could
be got to take her to Pellegrini Hospital.
'How do you feel?' asked the magistrate. He wanted to go on with the
inquiry, as he saw that her strength was failing.
'I feel better; it is nothing.'
'Who was it did this to you?'
'Nobody,' she said quietly.
'Who did this to you? Tell me! I will find out, at any rate,' the
magistrate insisted.
'No one touched me' Carmela muttered.
'It was a duel, was it not? How many were there?' the magistrate
asked loudly, his heart hardened by now.
'I don't know.'
'How many were there?'
'I know nothing about it.'
'Take care, or afterwards I will have you put in prison.'
'It doesn't matter,' she said, shutting her eyes.
'It was for you, was it, that these shots were fired? Was it for your
sake?'
'No, no, it was not,' she said, her face suddenly growing sorrowful.
'Who was it for, then?'
'I don't know; I know nothing,' she added decisively, as if she was
not going to answer any more.
The magistrate shrugged his shoulders in a rage. But another inquirer
was coming along Ponte Rossi Road--a woman dressed in green cloth,
embroidered in pink, and a pomegranate bodice, her shiny black
hair dressed high, and cheeks covered with rouge. It was Filomena,
Carmela's unfortunate sister.
She came up panting, her face discomposed, her hair not kept up by
the silver comb, the patent-leather shoes quite dusty, holding a
handkerchief at her mouth to keep back her sobs. When she saw the
crowd evidently round a wounded person, she rushed into the group;
crying out wildly, and pushing people aside, she fell on her knees by
her sister, showing the self-forgetfulness of a frightful sorrow, and
groaned out:
'Carmela dear, how did this happen?'
The other opened her eyes--her face showed a sorrowful amazement; she
tried to caress Filomena's black hair with her weak hands, but her
livid fingers trembled.
'How did it happen?' Filomena exclaimed, sobbing noisily, while warm
tears ran down her cheeks and washed off the rouge.
'It happened just like that,' said Carmela, and nothing more.
'Carmela, who had the audacity to do this to you? Who was the
assassin? Bring him to me,' cried Filomena.
'Try and find out the truth,' the magistrate whispered in the woman's
ear. He made a sign to the others to stand aside for a little and
leave the sisters alone. Now they had bound the girl's head up
roughly, and under the bandages her face seemed tinier, more worn, as
if rubbed down smaller by the hand.
'My sweet sister, my sweet sister!' Filomena went on saying, still
kneeling before Carmela.
'Don't cry--why do you cry?' said the wounded girl, in a curious,
solemn, deep voice.
'Tell me who did it!' Filomena said her. 'It was for Raffaele, was it
not? Was there a fight? I knew it--I knew it; but I did not get here
in time. Holy Virgin, why did you not let me get here in time? I have
to see my sister like this because of not getting here in time.'
A livid look had come over the wounded girl's face on hearing this;
her eyes had got wide open. With a violent effort she raised her head
a little, and said to Filomena, staring at her:
'Tell me the truth.'
'What do you wish, sweetheart?'
'I want you to tell me--but think of the state I am in, think of that
first.... I want you to tell me all.'
Then the other, fallen into deeper affliction, shook all over and
held her tongue.
'They have had a duel,' Carmela brought out with difficulty, keeping
her eyes on her sister. 'There were eight of them; Raffaele was
there, and Ferdinando the Ammartenato--they were fighting for a
woman.'
'Holy Virgin!' Filomena said, going on weeping with her face in her
hands.
'Who was the woman?' asked the wounded girl, putting her hand on her
sister's head, and almost obliging her to raise it. Filomena only
looked at her, her eyes filled with tears.
'It was you--it was you,' the wounded girl said in a cavernous voice.
The bad woman threw herself back, raised her arms heavenward, and
cried:
'I am a murderer--I am the cause of your death!'
Carmela's face got clay colour; in a whisper, stammering, as if she
could not use her tongue, she too said:
'Murderer! murderer!'
'You are right--you are right, Carmela: I am a wretch!' Filomena
cried, stretching out her arms. A moment after, the blood soaked the
bandage round the wounded girl's head, and blood began to drop from
her nose. The magistrate, who had run up, frowned, and signed to the
cabman, who had come forward to take the girl to Pellegrini Hospital,
to stop.
'Forgive me, dear,' Filomena wept out, cast down at the foot of the
chair. But Carmela no longer heard her. Blood flowed from her mouth
and trickled down from her nose, falling on her breast; the earthy
pallor of the face spread to the neck; her half-open eyes showed the
whites only; her hands, lying on her knees, pulled at her wretched,
dull dress, as if searching, with that motion that gives a frightful
impression of terror and sorrow. All of a sudden she opened her
mouth--her breath was failing her.
'Carmela darling!' Filomena cried out, understanding, getting up on
her knees, panting. But from her mouth, black already, a loud, long
cry came out, as profound as if it came from her tortured vitals,
sorrowful as if all the complaints of a life-long agony were in it--a
cry so loud and doleful it seemed to shake everything around--men
and things--and make the neighbourhood lose colour. Carmela's light
hand was still vaguely searching for something, and ended by finding
Filomena's head, where it rested, grew cold and stiffened. The dead
woman's face was quite cold, but it was tranquil now. Silently bent
forward under the forgiving hand, the survivor sat there, and the
country around was silent also.
CHAPTER XVIII
TO LET
The fourth of January, 188--, very early in the morning, the porter's
wife at Rossi Palazzo, formerly called Cavalcanti, put a step-ladder
against the architrave of the entrance door, to the right, and stuck
three bits of paper on the pipernina stone, with 'To Let' printed on
each piece. The three notices said that three large suites of rooms,
so many in each suite, were available, and could be seen at such an
hour. Coming down the ladder, the woman sighed dolefully. For years
none of the Rossi Palazzo suites had been to let; everyone was very
comfortable and stayed on. She had got to know them all well. In
the four months houses are looked for in Naples, from the fourth of
January to the fourth of May, she had peacocked about at her ease
always. She had not to go up and down stairs with house-hunters, as
the Rosa Mansion woman next door or the Latilla woman had to do; she
did not risk changing tenants that liked her for new ones that might
be unpleasant. Instead of which, this very year three large flats
were empty at the same time: one on the first floor--the Fragalàs';
two suites on the second floor--Dr. Amati's and the Marquis di
Formosa's. It was a real catastrophe for the porter's wife, who never
would get any rest for four months, and get no pay for her trouble.
Altogether, three large suites to be empty was really a misfortune.
'Just like my luck,' said the porter's wife to those who condoled
with her and asked the reason of these changes. She told the reason
the tenants were going at once, so that people should not believe
Rossi Palazzo was damp, that it threatened to fall, or that the
owner had got an idea of raising the rents. Nothing of the sort. It
was misfortunes. All are liable to them. It was natural Don Cesare
Fragalà and that good soul Donna Luisa should leave the house where
they had been married. It was splendid, really--a gorgeous apartment,
but they could not pay the high rent any longer. The husband had
gambled everything away at the lottery; he was loaded with debts
and ruined. Also, his confectioner's shop in Santo Spirito Square
had gone out of his possession, for his wife, fearing bankruptcy
was at hand, had decided to sell everything: jewels, plate, and
furniture were all to be sold, everything luxurious got rid of, and
a composition be made with their creditors. They were to go into a
small house, and look out for a clerk's place for her husband, to
keep the family agoing. The porter's wife and her gossiping friend
remembered the two gorgeous parties for Cesare's marriage with
Luisella and at little Agnesina's birth--all the great style of these
receptions, the sweets, wine, and ices. It was an overthrow.
'Good gracious!' muttered the inquirer, man or woman. 'Did he lose
all that at the lottery?'
'He lost all. They are left without a farthing, if they pay their
debts; and Donna Luisa insists on paying. She may die from it, but
she will pay.'
'What a scoundrel of a husband she has got!'
'We are not masters of ourselves,' the porter's wife prosed solemnly;
'we are all flesh.'
She was sorry, very, that the Fragalàs were going off to who knew
where. She would never see them again. Most of all, she was sorry for
little Agnesina; she was so good, placid, and obedient. She already
went to the infants' school, tiny little body! Her mother went with
her and brought her back carefully every day. They were a good sort,
and it had to be seen who would come in their place.
The Cavalcantis' going away was a thing that had been foreseen for
some time. The Marquis had paid no rent for several months, and
Signor Rossi had stood it. He had allowed something to be paid on
account now and then, partly because the Marquis di Formosa had been
the old owner of the house and sold it to him, and he did not want to
turn him out forcibly. How patient he had been! Now he could stand
it no longer. In the Cavalcanti household they were often short of
five francs for food. The Marquis had carried off the most necessary
furniture piece by piece, selling it to a dealer in Baracchi Square.
Donna Bianca Maria, poor soul! often dined off a hot dish that her
aunt, Sister Maria degli Angioli, sent her from the Sacramentiste
convent. The two old servants, Giovanni and Margherita, tried for
outside work. The woman darned stockings and silk-knitted goods;
the man copied papers for a magistrate's clerk. They were in such
wretchedness that but for feeling shame the door-keeper would often
carry up a dish of her macaroni or hot vegetable soup; but she dared
not. They were gentlefolk, and bore their wretchedness silently.
Besides, for want of a dower, Donna Bianca Maria Cavalcanti had been
rejected as a sister of charity. By the new laws it was not allowable
to go into other monasteries or orders; the new Government would not
even let one be a nun.
'Then are they going away in May?' asked the inquirer rather
pityingly. 'Where are they going?'
'Who can say? But I can tell you that her ladyship will not see that
day. She is so ill; she wastes away like a taper; she says nothing,
but when she has the strength to show at the window, she looks like
a shadow. She does not go out now; indeed, she has no clothes to go
out with, and if she had them she would not have the strength to go a
step. Poor lady! to think her father could have got her married if he
had chosen.'
'To whom? Why would he not allow it?'
Here began the woman's third sorrowful recital, the departure of the
third tenant, Dr. Amati, that she earned such a lot of money by, from
his sudden summonses to sick people. Alas! he was going away; indeed,
he had gone, putting her on the street, poor woman, for she would
never earn another farthing. Just fancy that Dr. Amati, who was so
rich now, and earned as much as he liked, just out of charity, he was
such a good man, had wanted to marry the Marchesina, she was so sweet
and lovely; and she had been in love with the doctor, too, from her
soul, because he had helped her in her illness--because she had known
no other man--in short, because he only could get her out of that
beggary. Well, it was not to be believed, but the Marquis di Formosa
had said 'No,' and had persisted in saying 'No,' always making his
daughter lose that bit of good luck she would never have again.
'What do you say?' her questioner cried out. 'It seems impossible.'
'Indeed, yes, it looks like a lie, but the Marquis di Formosa said
"No." He felt quite honoured and pleased that Dr. Amati had asked
for his daughter's hand, but some forbears of his long ago had left
a written paper, in which it was said the last woman child of the
family was not to marry--she must die a maid; and if this command was
not carried out, a great punishment from God would come on her. No
one knew what tears the Marchesina had shed, but her father had been
firm. So that Dr. Amati--one evening they had had a great dispute--to
avoid further occasions for anger, and to get the idea out of his
head, had taken a month's leave from the hospital, left all his
patients, and gone off to his native village to see his mother.
Then he came back to Naples, but he would not even put his foot in
Rossi Palazzo; he had gone to live in a furnished house in Chiaia
Road. At Rossi Palazzo his flat was closed with all his furniture
and books which the doctor no longer read; sometimes the housekeeper
came to dust, and went away again. In a short time now the furniture
and books would be carried away, too, and in May the flat would be
empty. Poor Donna Bianca Maria, how often she had seen her come to
the window of the inner court and gaze on Dr. Amati's closely-shut
balcony! She made one's heart sore, that poor child of the Virgin,
wasting away with sickness, melancholy, and wretchedness. Really
it looked as if there was no more oil in the lamp. Margherita, her
maid, when she spoke about her, cast down her eyes not to show she
was weeping. But the Marquis was not wrong to obey his grandsire's
wishes; there is no trifling with God's vengeance.'
'Ah! it was written,' remarked the gossip approvingly, quite
thoughtful. 'It was written, my dear. When it is God's will, what is
to be done?'
House-hunters began to flock in to inspect the flats to let in Rossi
Palazzo, and the door-keeper's hard times began--it was never-ending,
from ten in the morning to four in the afternoon, up and down the
stairs. Every time a family arrived in front of the office and made
the usual inquiries, she shook her head and got up, sighing, to go
with them to the first or second floor. She went in front, going up
very slowly, turning round to chat with the usual familiarity of
small people in Naples, making her keys rattle, as they hung from her
waist; asking if they wanted to see the doctor's rooms, for he had
given her charge of them. Monotonously wandering through the huge
rooms, rather severely furnished, where the stern moral impression of
a great science--a great will--was still present, and all the human
misery that had come there to ask help, she praised up the house
and Dr. Amati, the famous doctor that all Naples admired, or, as she
said, the whole world.
'Ah,' said the visitors, much impressed; 'and why did he leave this
house, then?'
Very hastily she replied that the doctor was going to marry and
needed a larger house, or that his business had gone in another
direction, or that he was going to a smaller apartment, having taken
a consulting-room at the hospital; in short, any lie that came
into her head--such hurried, unlikely lies that the house-hunters,
endowed with natural suspiciousness, would not take it in at all,
and interrupted her with: 'All right; we will come back.' But they
did not come back at all; indeed, the solemn, solitary look of the
flat, with too many books, too many surgical appliances, and even
the chair-bed of black leather that the sick lay on to be examined,
that looked like the first step towards the tomb, left rather a sad
impression, so they went away hurriedly, speaking low, still more
alarmed by the doctor being away, the feared and respected god of
medicine. They fled, never to return, a cloud over their spirits,
not at all anxious to come back to be dispirited by these solemn,
thought-inspiring surroundings.
The door-keeper, standing in the doorway, saw them go off quickly
towards Toledo Street, where there was movement, light, and gaiety,
and in spite of their vague promises, hesitatingly made, she knew
they would never come back. 'Nothing is arranged, dear,' she often
said, with a wearied air, to the neighbouring door-keeper at the Rosa
Mansion. Nothing was settled, even for the flats that the Fragalà and
Cavalcanti families were leaving. It looked as if the house-hunters
noticed the bad luck that came from these two flats, where so many
tears had been shed, where so many were still being shed. In the
Fragalàs' house, brave, melancholy Luisella had got rid of a great
part of the furniture; the fine red drawing-room was now bare of
its old brocade couches, and the child slept in its parents' room.
Their way of living was of a sudden meaner, smaller, being restricted
to the bedroom and dining-room. Sometimes the visitors found the
family at dinner at two o'clock. Cesare Fragalà kept his eyes on
his plate, eating stolidly. Luisella said nothing, but kept rolling
bread-pellets in her fingers. Little Agnesina, well-behaved and good
as usual, looked at her father and mother alternately, taking care
to make no noise with her spoon and fork, not to disturb them. When
the visitors came in, the father of the family got paler and the
mother cast down her eyes. Both of them at each visit felt having to
leave the house: their wounds smarted and bled afresh. The little one
looked at them, and said over in a whisper:
'Mamma, mamma!'
The visitors, led in by the door-keeper, felt they were in the
way, and excused themselves, going on into other rooms while the
woman spoke volubly to take off their attention. When they saw the
drawing-room, parlour, and lobby empty, they gave queer glances at
each other, so that the door-keeper shivered with impatience, cursing
in her heart all who go away from houses and those who go looking for
them, also those who go round to show them--that is to say, herself,
who had this hard fate. The visitors asked the stock questions rather
suspiciously:
'Why are they going away?'
Then she made up her mind and whispered:
'They have failed in business.'
'Ah, is that it?' exclaimed the visitors, much interested.
On the stair she gave particulars--told the reason of the failure,
spoke of their former riches and the want of any comforts now;
told about Signora Luisella's courage and her husband's rage for
gambling on the lottery, and poor little Agnesina's good behaviour.
She seemed to understand having come into the world and grown up
at a bad season. The house-hunters listened full of interest, with
that skin-deep emotion peculiar to Southerners; but from what they
had seen, as well as from what they had heard from the door-keeper,
they got a singular impression of evil fate--a doom weighing down an
innocent, good family; a hard destiny, destroying all the sources of
happiness and energy.
The house-hunters turned their backs on the Fragalà household
and Rossi Palazzo slowly; but they still felt sad, and spoke to
each other about there being implacable, unforeseen, overpowering
disasters, sometimes coming on humanity. Some attributed it to
perfidious fate, some to the evil eye; others were philosophical over
the passions of humanity, especially for gambling, still repeating
the phrase that includes all the indulgence and forgiveness of
Naples' folk: 'We are not our own masters.'
It was difficult to get into the Marquis di Formosa's flat. Often
Margherita objected to anyone seeing the house, in spite of its being
the right hours for visits. The door-keeper talked her over, feeling
rather annoyed. She raised her voice and asked, 'How ever would
a house be let, if no one could get in to see it?' Sometimes she
managed to get in by slipping through the half-open door. All stopped
speaking at once, for from the freezing bare lobby to the bare frozen
drawing-room there was such cold, such a smell of old dust displaced,
that it gave one a shudder. Big dull stains on the walls marked
the outline of large pieces of furniture that had once been there,
which the Marquis had sold to use what they fetched for staking on
the lottery. One saw the big hooks and nails that the pictures had
been hung from, and a heap of old yellow paper lay on the ground in
a corner of one empty room. Where curtains had been fastened to the
doors and balcony windows, there were holes in the plaster, for they
seemed to have been violently torn away.
The chapel, too, had not a saint left. Our Lady of Sorrows and the
Ecce Homo had been sold, also the vases and ornaments--even the fine
napkins with old lace, so that the despoiled altar had a doleful,
desecrated look. Sometimes the visitors, on going through the house,
met a slight girlish figure in black, her shoulders wrapped in a
shabby shawl, the lady's heavy black tresses seeming to make her face
still more bloodless. She gazed at the visitors with her sorrowful
eyes as if she did not know what was going on; a shade of grief
reanimated them for a moment when she remembered it meant they had
to leave that roof, their only refuge. The woman said in a whisper,
'It is the Marchesina!' nothing else, and that apparition was like
the outline of an irreparable disaster. Sometimes the house-hunters,
followed by Margherita and the door-keeper, came to a closed
door. The waiting-woman rather hesitated, but on a hint from the
door-keeper she made up her mind to knock.
'My lady, may we come in?'
'Yes, yes; come in,' a feeble voice answered.
Then all saw a wretched maidenly room, freezing with cold, where a
pale creature in black, wrapped in a worn shawl, was seated by the
bedside, or getting up quickly from her kneeling-desk. Then, abashed,
they just gave a quick look round, muttered vaguely some excuse, and
went off, the maiden following them with her thoughtful, sorrowing
eyes. On the stair they dared to speak. They asked the woman, as if
speaking of dead people or things:
'_What was their name?_'
'The Cavalcantis; he is a Marquis,' said the door-keeper.
Then the visitors would go off, taking with them a deep impression of
people and things that are extinct.
CHAPTER XIX
DON CRESCENZIO'S TRIALS
Coming out of the Finance Department, from the Secretary's room,
having got to the lobby, Don Crescenzio staggered and had a singing
in his ears.
'Do you feel ill?' asked the usher anxiously, for he knew him.
'No, it is nothing; it is from this first heat of spring,' he
stammered. And he brought his hands across his forehead, which was
covered with cold drops of sweat. Still, to try to look at ease, he
pulled out a cigar and lit it.
'Is business good?' the usher asked the lottery banker, while he was
carefully putting out the match.
'Well, just so-so,' said the other, giving a sketchy sort of smile.
'It would be grand to get the right figures,' the usher muttered;
'one would like to spit in this infamous Government's face,' he added
in a whisper.
'But no one knows the right figures--no one does,' the other cried
out as he went away. But when he was under the portico and got out
to the open air, he felt dizzy again; he had a singing in his ears
and nearly fell. He had to stand a good minute, leaning on the stone
posts of San Giacomo Palazzo door, which opens on to Toledo Street,
seeing the usual crowd in that thoroughfare swim before his eyes.
It was larger than usual, from its being the first fine spring day,
which brought out more people than usual. He only saw a confused
crowd without distinct outlines. He heard a great noise without
distinguishing either words or voices. Only, while he went on smiling
instinctively, he saw sharply marked in his mind the corner of the
writing-room where the Finance Secretary had turned his cold, severe
glance on him. He heard the exact sound of the Secretary's words
ringing out as clear as if they had just struck the drum of his ear.
The Secretary had been very stern with him. He could no longer be
lenient to the lottery banker, for he had been too lenient already;
he did not want to seem an accomplice of his fraud. 'Fraud,' he
said and repeated, in spite of the deadly pallor that came over Don
Crescenzio's face on hearing the cruel word.
One cannot play tricks with the State; it gives no credit. Every
week lately, when Don Crescenzio came to hand over the profits, he
was short of money, and had had to ask the Minister of Finance at
Rome to make allowances for him and give him time. This had happened
every week. But the State is not a bank which can grant delays. It
makes others wait, but it will not. Every time he mentioned the State
the word filled the Secretary's mouth severely and sonorously, and
he frowned a little. Don Crescenzio listened, with his head down,
starting when he heard named that mysterious being who gets all and
gives nothing; who has no heart or bowels, and holds out open hands
to take and carry off everything. Ah! the Secretary had been decisive
in his cruelty. By Wednesday he must pay up all in full--stakes and
the debt in arrears; if not, the downfall was unavoidable: the State
would seize the caution money and prosecute Don Crescenzio for his
indebtedness. He had just given one sob at the Secretary's last words.
'You lose the caution money, and you go to prison if you don't pay
up,' the worthy official wound up his remarks with.
Don Crescenzio had set to imploring then. He had a wife and children;
if he had been so foolish as to give the gamblers credit, was he to
be ruined for that? If they would give him time, he would force the
men to pay; he would give back the State the uttermost farthing. He
was an honest man; in short, he was cheated, slain.
'You gamble too, and on credit,' the Secretary said haughtily.
'I only did it to try and recoup myself.'
'An honest lottery keeper never plays himself. It is immoral in a
citizen to play.'
'Then the State is immoral also.'
'The State cannot be immoral, remember that. Think of how you are to
pay; I can do no more for you.'
Still, he had begged, sobbing, that they would not cast him into
prison; indeed, they could not require a man's death, being men and
Christians. But he had made that scene before twice, and had managed
to get a month's, a fortnight's grace. This time the Secretary
looked so freezingly at him that Don Crescenzio had understood. This
was the end, really. He must either pay or go to prison. He took
leave, always feeling that word _Wednesday_, _Wednesday_, cut into
his brain. It was true he had a young wife and two babies; a small
family, that with Neapolitan good-heartedness and good-nature he had
accustomed to living freely, going from a fine holiday dinner at home
to a grander country excursion, and to celebrate all the feast-days
with good eating. They gave each other presents of heavy gold
jewellery, and, though contenting themselves with hired carriages,
had always a secret wish to keep a carriage of their own; and he
bought earrings, rings, and brooches for his wife, and presented her
with shiny jet mantles such as our towns-folk love. And all this
came while living off the income from the lottery bank; indeed, he
speculated a little with Government money, but did not gamble on the
lottery ever. This was past, the time of purity and innocence. When
had he staked the first time--he, who ought to have kept himself from
that contagion, and only lived off the lottery, without letting it
fasten on him, live off it as one may drink poison without dying of
it, though the same poison laid on an open wound will kill? When had
he first staked? He did not remember now; he saw confusedly a great
_Wednesday_ stand out with such vivid heat that it seemed like a live
coal, as if it must burn him. It was all a confusion, in which the
mental disorder of the Cabalists who crowded into his shop, touching
him with their feverish hands and infecting him, and their money--got
God knows how or where--passing from their hands to his, all gave him
the impression of a tragedy. That mental malady that burned in their
blood, young and old, rich and poor, powerful and insignificant, had
passed on to him; from being with them, breathing their atmosphere,
it had soaked through everything, and come into his very life. First
of all, greed of gain had made him give credit to the Cabalists,
keeping back always so much per cent. off their stakes when they
played on credit, while he asked for delay from the Government;
then, as the deviations became continually larger, as the hole got
deeper till there was a precipice down to it, he began to gamble too,
unlucky wretch, tempting Fate, having the delusion he was in her
favour, and playing on credit, with the huge delusion that he might
win a large, an immense sum.
Ah! the unlucky wretch, he knew quite well that hardly anyone ever
wins. He was well acquainted with the frightful law of averages, that
shows that winning is so rare it is difficult to find cases of it.
It is an infinitesimal chance, like one planet meeting another every
two or three hundred years by inflexible sidereal laws. He knew well
that Government always wins, always; that it takes sixteen million
francs from Naples alone every year--from all Italy, sixty million of
francs. But what did that signify? He went on giving credit to the
Cabalists; he showed at their meetings; he lent a hand to imprison
Don Pasqualino, being blinded himself. The vulgar luxury of his house
increased; his wife got fat, she was red and shiny from eating too
much, and now she was going to have another child. She wore a cream
silk dress covered with lace; her fat hands, laden with rings, lay on
her already rounded figure with that quietly satisfied air of women
easy in their feelings. What a disaster if on Wednesday he did not
bring the money to the Secretary! He, his wife and children, and the
one to be born, would be in wretchedness, and he himself in prison.
Now, every time the word 'Wednesday' came to the mind of the handsome
lottery banker, with his well-kept chestnut beard and white hands, a
little warm blood flowed into his pale cheeks, and he felt them burn
like two flames of fire. He had dragged himself away from the San
Giacomo doorposts, and was going among the crowd, letting himself be
carried along, feeling a slight dizziness that came from his being
wrapt up always in the same maddening idea. He must do something,
gain money, try and get it from those who owed it to him and had it,
so that on Wednesday he and his family would not be ruined. Where
was he to go? He must look for money at any cost; he would drag it
from his debtors' vitals. He was not going to die for them; he would
not go to San Francesco for these four scoundrels, who had drawn him
into dishonest courses. Money, money was what he wanted; he thirsted,
hungered for it; it was his soul--his body asked for that only.
Money, or he would die; that was all.
Now, having made up his mind, he set out on the search for some of
those indebted to him. They had gradually all deserted his shop,
not being able to stand his constant demands for money. They took to
some other lottery bank the few pence they managed to get hold of by
some dark miracle, God knows how or where. Out of fear for his just
anger, they had even taken away his profits, ungrateful now, as well
as dishonest. However, he knew where they all lived; he wished to
set on them; he would not let them go till they felt his despair as
if it was their own. He would wait at their homes, at their doors,
in the streets they went through; he would speak to them, shout at
them, and weep. He would give them such a fright that the State money
would be got out of them, dragged out by his rush of despair. It was
a question of life and death; his wife and children were not to be
sent to beggary because he had been too easy, too weak, too much of
a boy. He must get the money--he must. The crowd had now carried him
to the upper part of Toledo Street, while he was making up a good
plan in his head how to carry out best this burning desire to save
himself in a way likely to effect his purpose. Let us see: where
would he go first that springtide noon? Where would he say his first
word? He must make no mistake; he must try and strike a sure blow, or
otherwise.... He could not think of non-success; it was a notion he
could not bear. Now he had stopped in Carità Square, fixing his eyes,
which had a thick cloud before them, on Carlo Poerio's statue. The
people passing hustled him on all sides; the shouts of street-sellers
and voices of passers-by struck him as a vague, indistinct noise. He
thought a minute of going to the Marquis di Formosa's, the person
most largely indebted to him; but amongst them all the Marquis was
the one he was sorriest for, from his own misfortunes; also he was
the one least likely to have money. Now, Don Crescenzio did not want
to begin by being unkind to an unhappy man, nor did he want to make
a bad start; he was too much afraid of not succeeding--he was too
discouraged. He would go last to the Marquis di Formosa--afterwards,
as a last resource. The safest of those he had given credit to was
Ninetto Costa, the stock-broker--the safest because, in spite of
his falling behind with his payments, he always could get money to
borrow; some still believed in his star. Ninetto Costa had got into
debt several times with him, but had always paid until the last time,
when it was for rather a large sum; but for three weeks past he had
got so out of pocket he could not give a farthing to Don Crescenzio.
What did it matter? Costa was a moneyed man.
The lottery banker went forward towards the Exchange, knowing this
was an hour that Ninetto Costa would be there for certain. But among
the band of bankers, stockbrokers, merchants, and outside brokers,
who were chattering, talking things over, and vociferating, he
looked vainly for him for a quarter of an hour. Then he asked two
or three men for him, and got a bad reception. Some shrugged their
shoulders, others gave an ironical smile, and all set at once to
speak of their own business, leaving Don Crescenzio alone. He, who
with the extraordinary trustingness of people in desperation had
gone in there quite quieted down, already sure of a good result,
felt a burning from his mouth to the pit of his stomach. But where
was Ninetto Costa, then? He remembered having gone to call on him
once at Carolina Road, where the smart stock-broker had a set of
rooms furnished with striking youthful luxury; but he had changed
his house some time before--it was at the beginning of his downfall.
Now Don Crescenzio remembered having gone with him one evening, on
leaving the meeting in Nardones Road, up Taverna Penta Road to a very
ordinary house there, which Costa was reduced to, just opposite San
Giacomo Road. He must find him, at any rate, whether alive or dead.
Ninetto Costa would give him the eleven hundred francs he owed him,
and at least a part of the debt to Government would be paid; a small
part, it is true, but something, at least. He went up again towards
Taverna Penta Road, and the sulky door-keeper looked at him, and said:
'Fourth-floor.'
'But is he at home?'
'I don't know,' she grumbled.
Patiently, determined not to be discouraged by anything, he went up
the narrow, steep stair, and from the landings and doors came out the
sound of children's whining and women's quarrelling voices and noisy
sewing-machines. On Ninetto Costa's door was a torn visiting-card
fastened up by four pins. He knocked twice. No one came; there was no
sound from inside. He knocked louder, the third time--nothing yet.
The fourth time he gave the bell a hard pull, and a very light step
could be heard; then no sound nor movement, as if the person who had
come to the door was listening intently.
'Don Ninetto, it is I. Open--especially as I know that you are in the
house, and I won't go away,' the lottery banker said in a loud voice.
There was a few minutes' pause again. Then the door opened softly,
and the stock-broker's face appeared, sadly altered. Now all his
youthfulness, prolonged by high living and cosmetics, had fled.
His hair was sparse on the temples and on the top of his head. Two
flabby, yellowish bags underlined his eyes, and thousands of small
wrinkles came down in all directions, marking the face indelibly. The
jacket that hardly covered him had the collar turned up, as if he
were cold or wished to hide his linen.
'Is it you?' he asked, with a sickly smile.
He brought Don Crescenzio into the parlour, a shabby lodging-house
sitting-room with red chair-covers and curtains dulled by smoke, and
sat down opposite to him, looking at him with dull eyes which had
lost all expression.
'It is I. I went to look for you at the Exchange. Have you not been
there to-day?' Don Crescenzio asked, feeling a burning at his stomach
again.
'No, I did not go to-day.'
'Why not?'
'No matter.'
'Have you not been there for some time?'
'Not for--yes ... for three or four days.'
'What have you been doing?' Don Crescenzio asked anxiously.
'Nothing,' said the other, with a gesture that was too clear.
'Have you gone bankrupt?'
Ninetto Costa shut his eyes, shivering, as if he did not want to see
something; then he said:
'Yes, I have.'
'This is ruin, ruin!' shouted Don Crescenzio, throwing up his arms
heavenwards.
The other bit his moustache convulsively.
'At least, you have kept something. That eleven hundred francs you
owe me--you must have kept it, have you not?'
Ninetta Costa looked at him dreamily.
'If I do not get this eleven hundred francs by Tuesday evening, I
must go prison!' the lottery banker shrieked out.
Ninetto Costa hung his head.
'I must go to prison, and my family will have no bread. You must give
me the eleven hundred francs, you know!' shrieked Don Crescenzio in a
great rage.
'I have not got it.'
'Look for it.'
'I shall not find it. No one will give it to me.'
'You must find it; I cannot go to prison for you. Find it.'
'It is impossible, Don Crescenzio,' said the stock-broker, with tears
in his eyes.
'Nothing is impossible when it has to do with a debt like this, when
it is a question of saving an honest man from ruin. For pity's sake,
Don Ninetto; you know how dear honour is.'
'Yes, I do,' said the other, turning his face away.
'For pity's sake don't forsake me. I have done you a favour; don't be
so ungrateful.'
'I have not got a farthing, and I cannot find one.'
'But have you no friends or relations left?'
'None--not one. I have gone bankrupt; that is enough.'
'What will you do?'
'I am going--going to Rome,' the stock-broker brought out, after a
slight hesitation.
'What to do?'
'Who knows? Perhaps I shall make my fortune there.'
'But you ought not to forsake me; you, a man, must give me the eleven
hundred francs before you leave.'
'I have not got it. I can't get it. Don't torment me, Don Crescenzio;
I have not a farthing.'
'Give me your signature to a bill; some banker that you are
acquainted with will cash it.'
'All my bills are presented.'
'Pawn your jewellery.'
'I have sold it all.'
'Then give me your watch.'
'It is sold.'
'Then ask your mother or your uncle.'
'My uncle will perhaps do me the kindness to support my mother. The
mother of a bankrupt, you understand, is never very well received.'
'For how much have you failed?'
'For two hundred thousand francs.'
'All through the lottery, was it?'
'I lost all there,' Ninetto Costa said, with a decided gesture.
'But how can you leave me to such ruin?' Don Crescenzio rejoined,
nearly crying; 'how have you the heart?'
'How have I the heart?' the other said, in a shaky voice. 'I am
leaving my mother with nothing to support her, you know. I am going
to Rome. If I make any money I will send you some.'
'When do you go?'
'To-morrow.... Yes, to-morrow.'
'Can you send me money by Tuesday?'
'I don't think so, Don Crescenzio--I don't think so,' Ninetto Costa
said, with desperate calmness.
'It must be by Wednesday, you know; if not, I am ruined.'
'I was ruined three days ago.'
'Holy Virgin! who has blinded me?' the lottery-keeper said, crying.
'You want to kill me before the time,' Ninetto Costa muttered.
'What are you saying?'
'Nothing. But keep calm. Everything may come right gradually.'
'Wednesday is the last day I have got--Wednesday.'
'Perhaps Government will give you time. Find out some way; write to
the Minister, write to the King. I must start off.'
He pointed to a small bag, not half full, with a feeble smile.
'But, really, can you not give me anything?'
'I would do it, Don Crescenzio, but I swear to you that I have not
got a farthing. I am off to Rome; then I will see....'
Disappointed and excited, Don Crescenzio got up to go away, half
angry and half sorry for Costa. He wanted to rush off in search of
his other clients; he wanted to find money, to leave that sad house,
the sad company of a man more desperate than himself. He wanted to
go away. Ninetto Costa looked at him in a dull way, keeping up that
pallid smile on his white lips, the absent-minded smile of a man
quite indifferent to earthly affairs. Still, the other once more
insisted in a vague way, as if in justice to himself, thinking he had
not done enough to get his money. But the stock-broker gave him such
a suffering look he said no more.
'Good-bye, Don Crescenzio; for--give me.'
'Good-bye, Don Ninetto; don't forget me at Rome.'
'Have no doubt of it,' said the other, in a weak, queer voice.
They took each other's hands without pressing them--cold, feeble
hands, both. As in a dream, Ninetto Costa went to the door with the
lottery banker; silently they looked at each other, but did not
speak. Then the door shut again with such a queer _decisive_ sound
that the lottery banker, going slowly downstairs, gave a start. He
felt almost inclined to turn back; it came to his mind that Costa had
told him he had not a farthing, and, then, that flabby travelling bag
with nothing in it. But the thought of his own sorrows distracted
him from his pity and from any suspicion of greater misfortune. Now,
still on foot, to spare the money for a cab even, he began to run up
Toledo Street, as if prodded by a goad, to go to San Sebastiano Road,
where Marzano, the old lawyer, lived, another indebted to him. He,
too, because of his professional position, even if he had no money
to pay up at once, would be able to get a loan; at any rate, he owed
eight hundred francs to Don Crescenzio, and he would give them to
him; indeed, Don Crescenzio would sit there till he got them, even if
he had to wait till night. He knew his house very well, a poor house
indeed: for Marzano staked everything--all he earned--and he even
supported a cobbler at sixty francs a month, a Cabalist, who wrote
lottery numbers with charcoal on dirty pieces of paper.
Don Crescenzio went up the steps four at a time, running, because
a voice in his heart told him he would find the money at Signor
Marzano's; he felt a good presentiment. Still, when he put his hand
to the iron ring that hung from a greasy cord, a sudden alarm took
him, the fear of not succeeding, a horrible fear that paralyzed his
strength, the nervousness of the unfortunate when life and death are
at stake. A dragging step was heard, and a shrill voice asked:
'Who is it?'
'Friends--a friend,' the lottery banker stammered hastily.
The door opened suspiciously, and the cobbler's mean face showed,
all marked with pimples. His blear, red, stupid eyes stared at Don
Crescenzio.
'Do you want to see the lawyer?' he asked, drying his hands on a
dirty apron.
'Yes, sir.'
'He cannot attend to you.'
'Is he busy?'
'He is ill.'
'Ill, is he? Not much the matter, I hope?'
'He has had a stroke. Wishing you better health----'
'Good God!' shouted Don Crescenzio, throwing his hat down on the
ground in despair.
'It was the lottery did it.... Indeed, he always starved himself; he
did not live well. He ate very little and drank water, you see.'
'Oh, God! God!' Don Crescenzio whispered in lamentation.
'It is God's will,' the cobbler said softly, pulling out a little bit
of dirty paper and taking a pinch of yellowish snuff. 'When it is
God's will, what can one do?... Don't despair. Till the last there is
hope.'
'I know that; it is why I am so despairing!' shrieked Don Crescenzio.
'I have a right to complain,' the silly fellow rejoined. 'I would
have got him a fortune. I expected peace in my old days from him, and
in the meanwhile, by his own folly, he is at death's door, and leaves
me to wretchedness. Do you see?'
'But how was it? how did it happen?'
'Wait a minute. I am just coming.' And he went out of the room.
Don Crescenzio looked round him, stupefied with sorrow. The wretched
room had no other furniture but some old lawyer's bookcases,
choke-full of dusty papers, a small table, and two soiled straw
chairs. There was a glass on the table, with two fingers of bluish
wine in it--the thick, heavy Sicilian wine. The floor had not been
swept for a long time, the wall was full of spiders' webs, the
window-panes were covered with dust, and a smell of dirty staleness
and mustiness caught the throat. And this was the lawyer's house--of
him that had been one of the best advocates of his day, and had
earned thousands of pounds in his profession! Don Crescenzio felt his
heart bleed; his hands were like ice. Had he come here, to this abode
of poverty, shame, and death, to look for his eight hundred francs to
save himself? What madness, what madness his had been! Would it not
be better to run away, as he was finding everywhere the same traces
of dishonour and wretchedness--everywhere? But the cobbler came back.
'What is he doing?' Don Crescenzio asked in a whisper.
'He is in a stupor.'
'Is he asleep?'
'No; it is from the disease.'
'What has been done for him?'
'He has been bled; then, he has an ice blister on his head, and
another on his chest.'
'Does he speak at all?'
'He does not understand what is said.'
'Has he become powerless?'
'Only on his right side.'
'What does the doctor say?'
'What can he say? It is a case of death.'
'Is the doctor coming back?'
'Who can say? There is nothing to pay him with. I found seven francs
and a nickel watch that won't pawn. I have spent three francs already
on ice. When the seven francs are done, we are at an end of our
resources.'
'But how did it happen? how did it happen?' Don Crescenzio asked
again desperately.
'Humph! there has been such a lot of things. He has had some
unpleasantnesses, you see. A man is always a man.... He needed
money ... he tried to get it in all sorts of ways.'
'What did he do?' asked the other, alarmed.
'Evil-minded people say he forged stamped paper--washing, you know,
what was written on it already, and putting it to use again. But it
can't be true. He leaves me to beggary; he has been ungrateful to
me; but it can't be true. I will never believe it. It seems that
the ill-natured people got at the President of the Consiglio dell'
Ordine, who called him rather ugly things. It seems, in short, there
were unpleasantnesses.'
'Poor man! poor man!' Don Crescenzio called out in a low voice.
'This summons to the President was a fatal thing for him. You may
think for an honest man to feel himself insulted is unbearable.
Signor Marzano wished to go away to some village where there is
better breeding.'
'To go away at his age with seven francs in his pocket!'
'I would have gone with him,' the silly cobbler muttered modestly.
'I was getting ready to go with him, out of love to him; and as to
the money--that is the real reason of the stroke.'
'How could it be?'
'You know, sir, that my mathematical labours, with God's help, have
always brought in some money to the advocate.'
'Yes, some small sum every three or four months,' Don Crescenzio
remarked sceptically.
'You are mistaken; one may say that I benefited him, and these
wretched sixty francs he gave me every month, for me not to clap on
soles any longer, but work at necromancy, were not even the hundredth
part of what he won each month. Now he is leaving me, ungrateful
fellow! like this ... enough: I may tell you I had given certain
numbers to him symbolically, numbers that must necessarily come out;
and they did come, you know.'
'Then, he won?'
'No, nothing; he did not understand--he staked on others'
figures--his mind is not trustworthy now. When he knew it he got the
stroke.... To your health, sir.'
'But had you really told him what were good numbers?'
'I swear it before God; but he did not understand.'
'Why did you not play them?'
'You know quite well that _we_ cannot play.'
'Ah, yes, that is true.'
They stopped speaking; the cobbler put the glass to his lips and took
a sip of wine.
'I would like to see him,' Don Crescenzio said suddenly.
They went into the small bedroom; it was poor and dirty like the
study. Marzano, the advocate, lay on a wretched iron bed, raised on
pillows, whose covers were of doubtful whiteness; a lump of ice was
on his bald head, another on the bare, skeleton-like breast, and his
thin, small body was covered by a brown horse-blanket. On the night
table was a tumbler of water with a bit of ice in it; the dying man's
right hand was wrapped in the blood-letting bandages. All his right
side, from the face to the foot, was struck rigid, numb already,
while his left hand went on trembling, trembling, and all the left
side of his face often twitched convulsively. A confused stammering
came from his lips; all his gentle, good-natured expression was gone,
leaving on that old face, half belonging to death already, the marks
of a passion that had got to be shameful.
'Signor Marzano! Signor Marzano!' Don Crescenzio called out, leaning
over his bed.
The sick man set his eyes, veiled by a curious cloud, on the
lottery-keeper's face, but the expression did not change nor the
stammering stop.
'He doesn't recognise you,' said the cobbler, taking snuff.
Don Crescenzio left the room at once, feeling the nightmare of it
weighing on his mind.
'You are his friend: will you leave him something?' the cobbler
asked. 'I have only four francs; he will die like a dog.'
Then all Don Crescenzio's suppressed sorrow burst out.
'He owes me eight hundred francs, and I am ruined if I do not get it
by Wednesday. He is dying; but I am left, and I am tortured. He will
die; but my children will sleep on church steps in a month. He at
least is dying, but we shall all come to desperate straits, you see.'
'Excuse me, I did not know,' the cobbler said, alarmed.
'I have been assassinated,' sobbed out the other.
'Be quiet, he may hear you; what can you expect from him?' And he
took the last sip of the bluish wine left in the bottom of the
tumbler.
Don Crescenzio fled. Now at intervals he felt his head going, and
he needed to say the word '_Wednesday_' to gather himself together.
Still, instinctively, with that automatic style of moving of unhappy
people who go to meet their destiny, he went up by Porto Alba again
towards Bagnara Lane, where Professor Colaneri lived. He, too, owed
him money, and promised to give it week by week, but had always
sent him away with empty hands or put him off with small sums. The
ex-priest lived on the fourth-floor of a house in Bagnara Lane, with
an unlucky clear-starcher who had given heed to his blandishments and
passed for his wife. They had four unhealthy children with big heads
and crooked legs, and all lived in two rooms--quarrelling, crying,
beating each other, and weeping all day. He had hidden from the
clear-starcher that he had been a priest; the unlucky woman, thinking
to become a lady, gave in to him, and for six years had lived in a
state of servitude, between holding children and doing servant's work
of the roughest kind amid indecent wretchedness, among that brood
of ugly, howling, for ever hungry children, whom she avenged herself
on by slaps for the blows her husband was liberal with towards her.
It was a hellish house, where the father was always sulkily thinking
over mean, sometimes guilty, methods of getting money for gambling.
Twice Don Crescenzio had gone there, but he had been present at such
disgusting scenes that he had rushed away, hunted out almost by the
laundress's bad words and the four demons' howls. But now what did
that matter? Colaneri owed him seven hundred francs and more; of a
debt of nine hundred francs he had only paid two hundred in three or
four months, or rather less. Colaneri, by Gad! was not ruined like
Ninetto Costa, or apoplectic like Marzano--Colaneri must pay.
'Is Professor Colaneri at home?'
'Yes, sir,' an old woman who acted as door-keeper said.
Then he went up quickly; the laundress came to the door to open,
unkempt, a greasy kitchen apron over a shabby dress. Her cheeks were
fallen in, her breasts emaciated, and a tooth was wanting in front,
through which she whistled a little.
'I would like to see Professor Colaneri.'
'He is not here,' she said quickly, leaving the other still outside.
'He is in--I know he is,' said Don Crescenzio in a rage. 'At any
rate, it is no use denying it. I will wait for him on the stairs: he
must come out some time.'
'Then come in,' she said unwillingly. As the lottery-keeper was
coming in, a dirty boy with water on the head got a slap. Whilst he
waited in the room that served as a parlour, study and dining-room,
from beyond--that is to say, the kitchen, in the bedroom, and even
the landing-place--cries burst out from the quarrelsome family. But
in a silent interval the Professor came in, putting on an old jacket
all spotted with grease, and setting his spectacles on his nose with
an ecclesiastical gesture.
'I have come for my money,' Don Crescenzio said brutally.
'I have got none,' the debtor answered sulkily.
'That does not matter to me. You must give it to me.'
'I have no money.'
'Find some. I must have my seven hundred francs, you know.'
'I have not got it.'
'Give a lien on your salary: get a loan that way.'
'I have not got a salary now.'
'What! are you not a professor now?'
'No; I have been dismissed from my post.'
'What! are you dismissed?'
'Yes--turned out by force. I was accused of selling the examination
papers to the students.'
'It was not true, of course?'
'Of course not. But the plot to ruin me was well arranged. The Senate
advised me to resign.'
'So you are on the pavement?'
'Yes; I am destitute.'
Then only Don Crescenzio noticed that Professor Colaneri's face was
pallid and distorted. But this third disappointment enraged him.
'I don't know what to do to you; you must give me the seven hundred
francs, at any rate.'
'Have you got five francs to lend me?'
'Don't talk nonsense! I want my money--for to-morrow at latest, mind.'
'Crescenzio, you are putting a man already on the rack to torture.'
'That is fine chatter. I can't go to San Francesco on your account.
You are so many murderers. I go to Costa for money, and find that he
has failed--that he is going off to Rome, to do he knows not what.
If it is true, he is going to Rome ... and I get no money. I go to
Marzano, and find him half dead. Here you tell me you are on the
pavement and have no money.'
'We are all ruined--all of us,' muttered the ex-priest.
'Well, you all want to kill me, do you? But when you needed credit
I gave it to you ... and now you want to kill me and my family! But
you have got sons also; you must think about feeding them--to-morrow
and every other day; you ought to do something. You will think of
me--think of my babies--think that we are Christians, too!'
'Do you know what I must do to-morrow to give my little ones bread?'
'What do I care? I know you will give it to them. I know that my
children are not to go fasting while yours get their food.'
'Well, listen: I am not a priest now; I have been excommunicated,
I am outside the pale of the Church; therefore I will get no help
there. I had a professor's post, a good safe thing, but I have lost
it; I needed money too much. Don't ask me for sad confessions. I will
not get my post again, nor any other; I am a marked man.'
'But what is the use of telling me about these sorrows? I know about
them. I know they will do my affairs no good.'
'Look here, then: I have no outlook; now, as I have put unlucky
beings into the world, I feel that it is my duty to give them
bread--at least that. I have gambled away on the lottery what they
had as a certainty, an unfailing resource; but it is folly to think
of that. Therefore I have taken the great decision, once for all.'
'What are you referring to?' asked Don Crescenzio, much astonished.
'To-morrow I am going to accept the offer the Evangelical Society has
made me. I will become a Protestant pastor.'
'Oh, God!' said the lottery-keeper, astonished above measure.
'As you say,' said the other, gulping as if he could hardly swallow.
'And you will give up our religion?'
'I am leaving it through hunger.'
'And that other ... do you believe in it?'
'No, I do not.'
'And how will you set about preaching?'
'I will do it; I will get accustomed to it.'
'You will have to abjure, will you?'
'Yes, I have to do that.'
'Will it be a grand ceremony?'
'A very grand one.'
They spoke in a whisper, and Colaneri's cynical face was distorted,
as if he could not stand the idea of abjuring. Don Crescenzio, too,
in his astonishment, had forgotten his sorrow.
'You have got to apostatize?'
'Yes, I must apostatize.'
'Well, your priest's orders have been taken from you.'
'Still, to deny the faith is a different thing,' said Colaneri darkly.
'Then, it distresses you very much to do it?'
'I hate to do it.'
'How much will you gain by it?'
'Two hundred francs a month in some village they will send me to.'
'It is hardly enough for bread.'
'To each of my boys that turn Protestant they will give a small sum.
I will be able to marry their mother.'
'But to have to leave Christ's religion!' exclaimed Don Crescenzio,
with that horror of Protestantism that is in all humble Neapolitan
consciences.
'What would you have? It is hunger drives me to it,' Colaneri
muttered desperately.
He seemed now altogether changed, even in his character; it was
clear to him now how fatal his rage for gambling had been; he saw
what he had done against himself and his own gifts, and he felt
an unconquerable distaste for that apostasy. He had done wicked
things; he had descended to crime, even, of a coarse kind, having
got corrupted in that unhealthy atmosphere; but now he found the
punishment in front of him, he trembled and lost all his bravery; he
trembled at having to deny his faith, his God, for a loaf of bread.
Don Crescenzio looked at him and said nothing, amazed. He had always
thought Colaneri a scoundrel, and, if he had given him credit, it
was only because he thought he could seize his salary. But now, on
this decisive day, he saw him cast down, moved to his inmost soul by
an awful fear of the Divinity he had already betrayed and insulted,
whom he was again outraging by his apostasy. Don Crescenzio, although
small-minded, felt the agony of that conscience that was now fighting
in its last outpost, having got to the stage where human endurance
ends, the hardest, most wearing hours in life. So he dared not say
anything more to him about the money. He stammered:
'Your wife--what does she say?'
'She would like to prevent me doing it, except for the children's
sake.'
'The poor children, must they lose their souls also?'
'They are innocent. The Lord sees; He will be just. Besides, why has
He set me with my back to the wall? For each child that enters the
Protestant Church they give me a small sum.'
'When will this come off?' Don Crescenzio asked, after hesitating.
'In a month. A month of instruction is needed for the poor
innocents.'
'It will be too late for me,' the other said in a low tone, still
thinking of his money.
'I will give you a receipt if you like, then.'
'It is too late. I am ruined.'
'What a punishment--what a punishment!' the apostate said, hiding his
face in his hands.
'I am going away,' Don Crescenzio said, prostrate now, in a state of
utter depression.
'Be patient.'
'What is the use of patience? it is a punishment! You spoke the truth
just now: it is a chastisement! I am going away; good-bye.'
They did not look at each other nor say another word; both of them
felt seized and cowed by the frightfulness of the punishment, not
feeling any more rage or rancour in that breaking-down of all pride
and vanity that the Divine chastisement brings. When he was on the
stairs, Don Crescenzio was seized with such faintness that he had
to sit down on a step, and stay there confused, neither seeing nor
hearing in that moral numbness that comes on after great excitement.
How long did he stay there? In the end, it was the step of someone
going up and brushing past him that roused him, and with that start
all his frightful pain came back unbearably. He rushed downstairs
helter-skelter, and ran through the streets like one in a dream,
urged on as if someone with a straight, unbending weapon were pushing
him with the point. He got to Guantai Street, to the little inn,
Villa Borghese, a resort of country people, where for four months
past Trifari had lived with his father and mother, who had left
their village at his bidding. The two humble peasants had managed,
from youth to old age, to put some pence together and buy some bits
of land by working eighteen hours a day and eating stale black
bread, being content with beet soup cooked in water, with no salt,
and sleeping all in one large room, with only a bed and a chest in
it, upon a straw pallet; and this they bore for the sake of making
their son a doctor, handing on to him all their peasant's vanity,
making him have an unbounded longing to be a gentleman, a great man,
superior to everyone in the country-side, so giving him, unknowingly,
that rage for gambling that, according to him, was to make him grow
rich suddenly, very rich, so as to crush everyone with his power and
luxury.
But in a few years his whole professional career was ended, for he
scorned it and gave it up; he had begun to lead a life of shameless
indebtedness, expedients, and dodges. He had begun by deceiving his
parents, and had ended by weaving for himself nets of intrigues and
embarrassments. His father and mother gloomily, in the silence of
their peasant souls that know of no outlet, had sold off everything
gradually, going on sacrificing themselves for this son that was
their idol, whom they adored because he was made of better clay than
themselves. They were at last so reduced, so chastened in their
pride, they waited in their old house for their son to send them
ten of twenty francs now and then for food. And he did it; bound
to his old folk by a fierce love made up of filial instinct and
gratitude, he shivered with shame and grief every time they told
him, resignedly, that in spite of being well on in years they would
have to go back to work in the fields to earn their daily bread, so
as not to be a burden upon him. But these helps had got to be less
frequent; the rage for gambling blinded him so he could not even
take ten francs off his stakes to send to the unlucky peasants. The
finishing stroke was when he wrote imperiously, ordering them to sell
the last house they had left, the old home with its sparse furniture
and kitchen utensils, to bring the money and come and live in Naples
with him; they would spend less there, and be more comfortable.
It was a dreadful blow, for these unhappy folk held so to the habit,
now become a passion, of living in their own house and village, and
the very word Naples frightened them. Still, saying not a word of
their sufferings, they kept up their pride, told the villagers they
were going to live as gentlefolk with their gentleman son at Naples,
and had obeyed. They had haggled for a long time over the price of
the old house and those few bits of old furniture they got at the
time of their marriage; but at last, hoarding up the few hundred
francs they had got for them carefully in a linen bag, and travelling
third class, they got to Naples, frightened, not sad, but buried in
that dumbness that is the only sign of a peasant's ill-humour.
They had lived four months at that inn, in two dark rooms; for they
were on the first-floor with their son, who always came in at a
very late hour, sometimes when they were getting up. They had no
occupation, and never spoke to each other; staying up in their
own room, they looked with melancholy, surprised eyes on all the
extraordinary Naples people that moved about in that narrow, populous
road, Guantai Nuova. They stayed hours and hours, wrapt up in gazing
on a sight that stupefied them; but they were incapable, however,
of making any complaint, though they were suspicious of everything,
of the spring bed, of the bad, greenish glass of the mirror, of the
miserable dinners served in their own rooms. As it was a thing they
were not accustomed to, they thought they were living in unheard-of
luxury. They disliked the servants, who scoffed at the two peasants,
and the washerwoman, who brought back their coarse shifts all in
holes, and loaded them with abuse in the true Naples style if they
made any remarks.
Sometimes, getting over their instinctive shyness about speaking,
they told their son to take them away from the inn and hire a small
house, where his mother would cook and do the house-work; but he
pointed out to them that would require too much money, and they would
do it later, when he had got the fine fortune he was expecting from
day to day.
In the meanwhile, their fortune grew smaller, and every time they
loosened the linen purse at the end of the week, their hearts gave a
twinge. Often, when they pulled out the money, they saw their son's
eyes brighten up, as if an irresistible love-longing filled them; but
he never asked them for it--one could see he put a check on himself
not to ask. But each day he became gloomier, wilder; he no longer ate
with his parents, and spent his nights outside, not coming back to
the inn, so that even into these peasants' dull minds had come the
idea of some danger threatening.
The mother told her beads for hours, that the Lord would have
pity on their old age; whilst the father, being sharper, and more
experienced, thought that perhaps some bad woman was making his son
unhappy. But they said nothing to him; even the luxury they lived in,
as they thought, although they paid for it themselves, seemed to them
a condescension on their son's part, a favour he did his parents.
Like him, without understanding or knowing why, they began to hope
for this fortune that was to turn up, some day or another, to make
them gentlefolk. The old peasant-woman's purple lips were constantly
moving, saying prayers, in the small, mean, dark room of the Guantai
Street hotel, whilst the old man went out every day, going always
the same road, that is to say, into Municipio Square, and from there
to the Molo, to gaze at the blackish sea, the ships in the mercantile
port, and the men-of-war in the military one; he was fascinated and
struck only with that in all the great town, going nowhere else,
knowing nothing of the rest of Naples, being afraid of the noise
of carriages, and dreading thieves perhaps. He retraced his steps
slowly, looking round him suspiciously.
They never went out with their son--never, as they were just peasants
and so dressed. They always refused when he feebly invited them to
go out with him, guessing, in spite of their dulness, that it would
not please him to show himself with them. He was so handsome, such a
gentleman, in his great-coat and tall hat. But one evening he came
in more excited than usual. Quickly, in rather a hard voice, such
as he had never used to them, Dr. Trifari told his parents that
his business, his big affair, his plan for getting rich, in short,
required money to be laid out, so they should hand him over these
last few hundred francs they were keeping in reserve; do him this
last great sacrifice, and he would give it all back a hundredfold. He
spoke quickly, with his eyes down, as if he did not wish to intercept
the dreadful, chilled, despairing look the two peasants exchanged,
feeling struck to the heart, frozen. The father and mother held
their tongues, looking on the ground; then he, speaking quicker,
in an anxious tone, trying to soften his harsh voice, implored and
implored, begging them, if they loved him, to give him the money if
they did not want to see his death. They, without making any remark,
glanced assent at each other, and with senile, quivering hands the
father undid the linen bag and took out the money, counting it slowly
and carefully, starting again at each hundred francs, following the
money with a troubled eye and a convulsive movement of the lower lip.
There were four hundred and twenty francs, the whole fortune of the
three. Pale at first, the doctor got very red, his eyes filled with
tears, and before either of them could stop him, he bent down and
kissed his father's and mother's old brown, rugged, horny hands that
had worked so hard. Not another word had been said between them, and
he was gone. He did not come back to the hotel in the evening; but
now they did not take any notice of his being absent. Still, the
next day he did not come back to dinner; it was the first time it had
happened. They waited till evening, but he did not come. The peasant
woman told her beads, always beginning again; they ended by dining
off a bit of bread and two oranges they had in their room.
Dr. Trifari did not come back the second night either, and it was
about noon of the second day that a letter, with a half-penny stamp,
by the local post, came, addressed to Signor Giovanni Trifari, Villa
Borghese. Ah! they were peasants, with dull intellects and simple
hearts; they never imagined things, or even thought much; they were
curt, silent people. But when that letter was brought to them, and
they recognised their son's well-known and loved writing, they both
began to tremble, as if a sudden, overpowering palsy had come on.
Twice or thrice, his rough spectacles shaking on his nose, with the
slowness of a man not knowing how to read well, and having to keep
back his tears, the old peasant read over his son's letter, in which,
just before starting for America, he said good-bye to them filially
and tenderly; and, feeling the gentle, terrible letter getting well
printed on her mind, the old woman kissed her beads and gave a low
groan. Twice an inn servant came in, with the sceptical look of one
accustomed to all the chances and changes of life. He asked them if
they wanted anything to eat; but they, blind, deaf, and forgetful,
did not even answer. When, towards six o'clock, Don Crescenzio came
in, after knocking fruitlessly, he found them, almost in the dark,
seated near the balcony in perfect silence.
'Is the doctor here?'
Neither of the two answered, as if death's stupor had overcome them.
'I wished to know if Dr. Trifari was here.'
'No, sir, he is not,' the old father said.
'Has he gone out?'
'Yes, he is out.'
'How long has he been absent?'
'He has been away a long time,' the old peasant muttered, and a groan
from his wife echoed him.
'When is he coming back?' shouted Don Crescenzio, very agitated,
taking an angry fit.
'I can't tell you; we don't know,' the old man said, shaking his head.
'You are his father; you must know.'
'He did not tell me.'
'But where is he gone? Where is that scoundrel gone?'
'To America--to Buenos Ayres.'
'Good Lord!' Don Crescenzio just managed to bring out, falling full
weight on a chair.
They said no more. The mother devoutly clutched her rosary. But both
Trifari's parents seemed so tired that Don Crescenzio felt desperate,
finding everywhere different forms of misfortunes, and greater ones
than his own. Still, he clutched at a straw; above everything, he
wished to know all about it, with that bitter enjoyment a man feels
in tasting the full agony of his misfortune. He, too, had fled, then;
he, too, had escaped him; that money, too, was lost--lost for ever.
'But who gave him the money to get away?' he cried out in an
exasperated tone.
'Are you really friendly to him?'
'Yes, yes, I am.'
'Truly are you?'
'Yes, I tell you.'
'Here is his letter. Take it; you will find out from it.'
Then by the faint light of fading day he read the unhappy man's long
letter. Eaten up by debts and his ruling passion, not knowing where
to lay his head, he wrote to his parents, taking leave of them on
going to make his fortune in America. Of the four hundred francs it
had taken about three hundred and fifty to pay for a third-class
ticket on a steamer, counting in a few francs for his keep the first
two or three days in Buenos Ayres. He owned up to everything. He was
the cause of his own ruin and of his family's. He cursed gambling,
fate, and himself, swearing at bad luck and his own bad conscience.
He sent back a few francs to the two poor old folks, begging them
to go back to their village, to get on as well as they could, until
he was able to send them something from Buenos Ayres. He told them
to go home, and he would not forget them, and the money would just
serve for two third-class fares to their village; nothing would be
left over to buy food even. He begged them on his knees to forgive
him, not to curse him. He had not had the courage to kill himself,
for their sakes; still, he begged them to forgive him. Though he was
leaving them like this, he implored them not to give him a curse as a
parting provision on this wretched journey of his. He was starting
with no luggage or money, and would be cast into the ship's common
sleeping-place. The letter was full of tenderness and rage: abuse of
the rich, of gentlemen and Government, came alternately with prayers
for forgiveness and humble excuses.
Don Crescenzio read twice over that agonized letter written by a man
enraged at himself and mankind, feeling himself wounded in the only
tender feeling of his life. He folded it absent-mindedly, and looked
at the two old people. It seemed to him that they were centenarians,
falling to pieces from decrepitude and hard work, bent by age and
sorrow.
'What are you going to do now?' he asked in a whisper, after a short
time.
'We are going to our village,' the old man muttered. 'To-morrow we
will go by the first train.'
'Yes, yes, we are going back,' the poor old woman groaned, without
looking up.
'What are you to do there?' he rejoined, wishing to find out the full
extent of all that misfortune.
'We are to work by the day in the fields,' said the old man simply.
He examined the two, so old, tired, and bent, now making ready to
begin life again so as to get bread, to dig the ground with shaking
arms, bending their brown faces and sparse white hair, under the
summer sun. Struck to the heart by this last blow, feeling the chorus
of misfortune growing around him, he did not open his mouth about the
money he was to have got from Trifari; indeed, feverishly, he felt
such pity for the two old folk that he said to them:
'Can I do anything for you?'
'No, no, thank you,' the two said, with the despairing gestures of
those who expect no more help.
'Keep up your courage, then.'
'Yes, yes, thank you,' they muttered again.
He left them without saying more. It was night now when he went down
into the street. For a moment, feeling confused and dismayed, he
thought, Where was he to go? Anew, set along by quite a mechanical
goad, he took courage, and, crossing Toledo Street, went up to the
high part by San Michele Church, where the Rossi Palace stood out
dark and lofty. In that mansion lived the last of those largely
indebted to him, the most desperate of all. So as not to have a bad
omen at the beginning of the day, he had kept them to the last. But
he had found money nowhere; and now, with the natural rebound of the
unhappy who fight against their misfortunes by that strength of hope
which never dies, now he began again to believe that Cesare Fragalà
and the Marquis di Formosa would give him the money in some way--that
it might rain down from heaven.
When he went into Cesare Fragalà's flat, led across an empty dark
room by little Agnesina, who came to open the door, carrying a
half-burnt candle, he had at once regretted he had come. Husband,
wife and daughter were seated at a small table, with a cloth too
small for it, taking their supper silently, looking at every little
bit of fried liver they put in their mouths for fear of leaving
too little for the others. The child especially, having a healthy
youthful appetite, measured her mouthfuls of bread so as not to eat
too much of it. Cesare Fragalà sat very solemnly, all traces of a
smile having gone from his face, and looked at the tablecloth with
his brows knit. His wife, the good Luisella, with her big black eyes,
on whose brow the happy mother's diamond star had shone, had now a
humble, subdued look in a plain stuff gown. Quietly with her calm
eyes the child looked serenely, with a martyr's patience, at the
visitor, as if she understood and expected the request he was about
to make. Before that gentle, thoughtful child's eye Don Crescenzio
felt his tongue tied, so it was with an effort he stammered out:
'Cesare, I am come about that business.'
A flame of fire burned in Cesare's cheeks. The wife gave up eating,
and the child cast down her eyelids as if the blow were coming on her
own head.
'It is difficult for me to do anything for you, Crescenzio; you don't
know all our embarrassments,' Cesare said faintly.
'I do know--I know,' said the other, hardly able to keep down his
feelings; 'but I am in a worse state than you are.'
'I don't believe you can be,' muttered the merchant, who had gone
through the bankruptcy court a few days before, in a dreary tone; 'I
don't think you can be.'
'Your honour is safe, Cesare, but I am not to save mine. What can I
say? I add nothing more.'
And, not able to bear it any longer, feeling Agnesina's sympathetic
eyes on him, he began to weep. A little evening breeze coming from
a half-shut balcony made the lamp quiver. It was a fantastically
wretched group, the husband, wife, and daughter clinging to each
other, all most unhappy, looking at that wretched man sobbing.
'Could we not give him something, Luisella?' Cesare timidly whispered
in his wife's ear, while the other mourned vaguely.
'How much do you owe him?' said Luisa thoughtfully.
'Five hundred francs ... it was more. I paid part of it.'
'Was it a gambling debt?' she asked coldly.
'Yes, it was.'
'What was he saying about honour?'
'He gave us credit. If he is not paid, Government will have him put
in prison.'
'Has he children?'
'Yes, he has.'
She went out of the room. The two men looked sadly at each other, and
the girl gazed at them both with her kindly, encouraging eyes. After
a little Luisa came back looking rather pale.
'This is our last hundred-franc note,' she said, in her pleasant
voice. 'There is only a little small change left for ourselves; but
the Lord will provide.'
'God will provide,' the child repeated, taking the hundred-franc note
from her mother's hands and giving it to Don Crescenzio.
Ah! at that moment, before these poor people, who counted their
mouthfuls of bread, who stinted themselves of the last remnant of
their money to help him; at that moment, in the midst of sad, gentle
expressions on the faces of ruined folk, who still kept faith and
compassion, he felt his heart break; he shook as if he was going to
faint. For a minute he thought of not taking the money; but it seemed
to him charmed, made sacred by passing through that good woman's
hands and the brave little girl's. He only said quiveringly:
'Forgive me, forgive me for taking it.'
'It is nothing,' Cesare Fragalà said at once, with his easy
good-nature.
'You are so kind, so kind,' Crescenzio muttered, as he took leave,
looking humbly at the two--the woman and the child--who bore
misfortune so bravely.
Cesare went out of the room with him.
'I am sorry it is so little,' he said; 'it won't do you any good.'
'It is worth a hundred thousand, as far as the heart is concerned!'
the lottery-keeper exclaimed sadly. 'But I have to give four thousand
six hundred francs to Government, and this is all I have got.'
'Have the others given you nothing?'
'Nothing. I found nothing but misfortunes and bad luck everywhere. I
am going up to the Marquis di Formosa's now.'
'Don't go there,' said Fragalà, shaking his head; 'it is no use.'
'I will try.'
'Don't try for it. They are worse off than we are. They dread every
day they will lose Lady Bianca Maria. Her father has lost his senses.'
'Who knows? I might get it.'
'Listen to me: don't go. You might come in for some ugly scene.'
'Some ugly scene! What do you mean?'
'Yes, the Marchesina gets convulsions; she cries out frightfully
in them. Every time we hear her we leave the house. She cries out
always, "Mother! Mother!" It is agonizing.'
'Is she mad?'
'No, she is not. She calls for help in her fits. They say that she
sees.... Don't go there; it is no use. Do what is right.'
'Very well. Thank you,' said the other.
They embraced, as sad and excited as if they were never to see each
other again.
Now, when Don Crescenzio got to the Rossi Palazzo entrance, after
hurriedly going downstairs almost as if he feared to hear the Lady
Bianca Maria Cavalcanti's dying cries behind him--when he got out
on the street alone, amid the people going and coming from Toledo
Street that soft spring evening, he suddenly thought it was all
over. The hundred francs his weeping had dragged from the Fragalàs'
wretchedness was shut up in his otherwise empty purse in his
great-coat pocket. Just there he felt something like an increasing
heat, for that money was really destiny's last word. He would get
no more; all was said. His desperate resolutions, his growing
emotion, his day's struggle, running, panting, speaking, telling
his wrongs, weeping, and the great dread of ruin tarrying with him,
had done nothing but drag the last mouthful of bread from his most
innocent debtor. A hundred francs--a mockery to the sum he had to
pay on Wednesday, without fail. A hundred francs, no more; a drop
of water in the desert. He felt it, for he had used up a lot of
strength and excitement, and had only managed to drag these few
francs from the Fragalà family's honesty; so he felt flabby, weak,
and exhausted. That was the last word. Then there was no more money
for him; he must look on himself as ruined--ruined, with no hope of
salvation. A cloud--perhaps it was tears--swam before his eyes. The
flow of the crowd took him to the bottom of Toledo Street; he let
himself be carried along. He felt that he was the prey of destiny,
with no strength to resist; he was like a dry leaf turned over by
the whirlwind. He could do nothing more--nothing; all was ended.
Some other people still owed him money. Baron Lamarra, Calandra the
magistrate, and two or three others owed him small sums. But he did
not want to go to them even; it was all useless, all, since, wherever
he had gone, wherever he had taken his despair, he had found the
marks of a scourge like his own--the gambling scourge--that had sent
them all to wretchedness, shame, and death like himself.
He dared not go back to his home now, though it was getting late. He
had gone down by Santa Brigida and Molo Road to Marina Street, where
he lived in one of those tall, narrow houses one reaches by gloomy
alleys from Porto, which look on to rather a dull sea between the
Custom-house and the Granili, and from Marina Road, where fishermen's
luggers and boats are anchored and tied up. Among the thousands of
windows he gazed at the lighted-up one where his wife was putting
the babies to bed. But he dared not go in--no. Was it not all ended?
His wife would read the sentence, the condemnation, in his face, and
he could not bear that. An increasing feebleness took hold of him;
he felt as if his arms and legs were broken, and in the darkness and
silence--where only the cabs taking travellers to the evening trains,
only the trams going to the Vesuvian districts, gave a touch of life
to the dark, broad Marina Road--not able to stand, he sat down on one
of the seats in the long, narrow Villa del Popolo, the poor folk's
garden that goes along the seashore. From there he still saw, though
further off in the distance, like a star, the lighted window in his
little home. How could he go in to bring tears and despair into that
peaceful, happy little atmosphere! That innocent infant and the other
about to come into the world, the mother so proud of her husband,
of her little boy: must he--_he_--make them quiver with grief and
shame that evening? This would be unbearable for him. How tremendous
a punishment it was, falling on everyone's head, as if all were
accursed, and destroying health, honour, fortune, everything!
In a dream, going on from one thing to another, he knit together
all the threads of that chastisement that started from himself and
returned to him, going on from his despair to that of others, while
he still gazed at the slight beacon where his family were waiting
for him. He saw again Ninetto Costa's pale, worn face, setting out
for a much longer journey certainly than to Rome, leaving his mother
a bankrupt suicide's name; he saw Marzano the advocate struck with
apoplexy, his lips bloated, amid the frightful wretchedness that left
no money to buy more ice, whilst a dishonouring accusation had been
made against him, shaming his gray hairs; then Professor Colaneri,
chased away from the school, accused of having sold his conscience
as a teacher, and, after having cast off the clerical robe, now
obliged to give up the religion he was born in, of which he had been
a priest; he saw Dr. Trifari sailing in an emigrant ship, without a
farthing, short of everything, while his old parents had to go back
to dig the hard earth so as to earn their living; and Cesare Fragalàs
resigned surrender, which ended the name of the old firm, and left
him to confront a future of wretchedness. Finally, above everything,
the illness Lady Bianca Maria Cavalcanti was dying of, while her
father had not a bit of bread to put in his mouth. All, all were
being punished, great and small, nobles and common folk, innocent
and guilty, and he with them--he and his family, struck in all he
held dearest--his means, home, happiness, and honour--a band of
unfortunates, where the innocent were the ones that had to weep most,
where little infants, girls, and women paid for grown men's mistakes,
and old people, too--a band of wretched ones--to whom, in his mind,
he added others that he knew and remembered. Baron Lamarra, with the
accusation of forgery held over him by his wife, had gone back to
work as a contractor, in the sun on the streets, among buildings in
course of construction; and Don Domenico Mayer, the hypochondriacal
official, who one day in despair, not being able to move for debt,
had thrown himself from a fourth-floor window, dying at once; and
Calandra the magistrate, who had twelve children, was so badly
reported on that every six months he ran the chance of being put on
the shelf; and Gaetano the glover, who had killed his wife Annarella
with a kick on the stomach when she was two months gone with child:
but no one knew anything about it except his children, who hated
their father, as every Friday he promised to kill them also, if they
did not give him money. All--all of them were at death's door, yet
living on, amidst the pinching of need and the canker of shame. And
he, finally, who had his family there in the little house waiting,
while he had not the courage to go back, feeling that the first
announcement of their misfortune would burn his lips. It was all one
chastisement, one frightful punishment--that is to say, the hand of
the Lord bearing heavily on the wicked, the guilty, and striking
them to the seventh generation; or, rather, the same sin, the same
guilt, that infamous, cursed gambling, had got to be an instrument
of chastisement against those who had made an idol of it; for the
gambling passion, like all others that are outside of life and real
things, had the germ, the seed of bitter repentance, in the vice
itself. They were struck where they had sinned, or, rather, by the
sin itself. It was just one long burst of weeping from all eyes, even
the purest ones, a burst of sobs from the cleanest lips; a crowd
of poor, honest, innocent creatures struggling amidst hunger and
death, paying for others' mistakes, giving the guilty the remorseful
thought that they had cast the people they loved best into this great
abyss. Not one safe, not one, of those who had given up their life
to gambling, to infamous, wicked gambling, that eater-up of blood
and money. Not even he or his family were safe; he, too, was broken;
his children were to be reduced to holding out their hands. The
punishment was too great; it was unbearable. What had he done to have
to go to prison like an evil-doer, that his wife should be ashamed
of belonging to him, and his children would never mention his name?
What had he done to have to stay there in the street like a beggar,
who dare not go back to his den, having got no alms from hard-hearted
men? Ah! it was too much, too much! What fault had he committed?
A couple of policemen went through Marina Street, and cast searching
glances into the darkness of the footpaths in Villa del Popolo; but
the shadows were deep, and the men did not notice Don Crescenzio
lying at full length on a seat. But he, by a quick change of scene,
saw before him his lottery shop in Nunzio Lane, on glowing Friday
evenings and anxious Saturday mornings, when the gamblers crowded to
the three wickets in his shop, their eyes lighted up by hope, their
hands quivering with emotion. He saw again the placards in blue and
red letters that incited gamblers to bring more money to the lottery.
He saw again the number of advertisements of Cabalists' newspapers
and the mottoes: 'So you will see me'; 'It will be your fortune';
'The people's treasure'; 'The infallible'; 'The secret unveiled';
'The wheel of fortune.' He remembered the medium's frequent visits
and his fatal intimacy with all the other Cabalists, spiritual
brothers, and mathematicians, who excited the gamblers with their
strange jargon and impostures. He saw it again at Christmas and
Easter weeks, when the gambling became wild, fierce; for people have
such a longing to get into the long-dreamt-of Land of Cockayne. And
he always saw himself pleased with their illusions that ended in a
sad disappointment; pleased that that mirage should blind the weak,
the foolish, the sick, the poor, the sanguine--all those who live for
the Land of Cockayne; pleased that everyone should get the infection,
that no one was safe; quite delighted when, at great festivals,
the rage increased and the stakes augmented his percentage. He saw
it all clearly: his own figure bending to write the cursed ciphers
and the lying promises in the ledger, the gamblers' crimson or pale
faces distorted by passion. He bowed his head, crushed, feeling
he had deserved the punishment, he himself, his family, on to the
seventh generation. The lottery was a disgrace that led to illness,
wretchedness, prison--every sort of dishonour and death. And he had
kept a shop for the infamous thing!
CHAPTER XX
BIANCA MARIA CAVALCANTI
For three days in the Marquis di Formosa's house a deep silence
had reigned. The doors, oiled in their hinges and locks, shut and
opened with no noise. The two old servants, Giovanni and Margherita,
walked on tiptoe, not saying a word, like shadows gliding over the
floor--or, rather, they made no movement. Giovanni, seated on the
single straw chair that furnished the lobby, Margherita seated at the
sick girl's bedside, gazing at the pale face sunk in heavy stupor
in the sickly slumber of high fever, both kept quite still. The
doctor, some sort of a medical man, called in from Berriolas', the
neighbouring druggists, said that above everything any noise would
have a bad effect on the patient's brain, and at once in the house
every sound, even sighs, were hushed. Not a word was said above the
breath, for those old servants were accustomed to being silent and
motionless. It looked already as if they had been overtaken by the
long last rest. Then the doctor asked for the family practitioner.
When they mentioned Dr. Amati's name, he at once proposed to send
for him. He needed him. The Marquis di Formosa's anxious face got
icy, and the two servants looked just as sorrowful. Then he suspected
something, shook his head, and set to treating the patient himself,
covering her burning head with ice, giving her quinine every two
hours to try and bring down the high fever, the raging typhoid,
giving her strong nourishment, but without making any improvement,
never managing to overcome the state of coma she was in, except by
raising a queer delirium, mingled with spasmodic nervous convulsions;
for the blood-poisoning by typhoid was complicated by serious nervous
disorders.
'What do you say about it, doctor--what is your verdict?' asked the
Marquis di Formosa on the stair landing.
'If it was only typhoid there might be some hope; but the whole
nervous system is overthrown. We run the risk of meningitis. I tell
you again, you must call Dr. Amati in; he knows the patient.'
'It is impossible to do so,' the Marquis answered sharply.
'Then I do not answer for the consequences,' said the other, going
off.
Going back into his daughter's room, the Marquis di Formosa stiffened
his pride against the doctor's request, which tortured his fatherly
heart. That man, who had taken his daughter's heart from him, would
never enter his house again and bring his evil influence on her.
Bianca Maria was young and strong; she would get over the illness.
Thus he persisted in his haughtiness, and went back to sit at his
sick daughter's bedside. He leant over that face that always got more
bloodless, and called to his daughter just above his breath.
She was lying sunk in that torpor of typhoid, with a lump of ice on
her motionless head, her hands joined as if in prayer, the usual
attitude of typhoid patients. Still, she heard that breath of a
voice. She did not answer, she did not open her eyes, but, with a
slight contraction of her muscles, she drew her eyebrows together
frowningly, as if annoyed; and her hand made a constant motion,
always the same, obstinate, discouraging, to keep her father at a
distance. He leant down again, hurt and offended, saying in a whisper
that it was her father--her own father, who loved her so fondly, who
wanted to make her well; he was the only person who really loved her.
But the bored expression got stronger on the poor invalid's face--the
patient, as the doctor called her--and the slender, obstinate, uneasy
hand went on driving away the Marquis di Formosa. The old man had
difficulty in keeping down a rush of anger that rose to his brain,
and he went to sit a little distance off, folding his arms across
his breast, his head down, submitting, humbling himself. Margherita
alone got an answer when she asked Bianca Maria anything--if she
would drink any of that strong beverage, marsala, beaten up egg and
soup, that is given to typhoid patients, or if she wanted the ice-bag
changed. The girl, without opening her eyes, answered either way by a
wave of her slight hand. And the Marquis di Formosa was obliged, if
he wished to know anything, to watch the old waiting-woman's face.
At certain times, in despair at that obstinate ostracism, he went
out of Bianca Maria's room and began to walk up and down in the
drawing-room; but often his excited footsteps made too much noise,
and Margherita's worn face came to the doorway. He stood still. She
made him a sign to be quiet; the noise did harm to Bianca Maria.
'Here, too, do I annoy her?' he asked, quivering.
And as Margherita agreed, 'Yes, it was true,' even in the distance
he made her suffer, to keep down a feeling of rage, he took his
hat and went out of the house. Then the flat fell back again into
its great stillness; Giovanni slumbered sadly in the hall, whilst
Margherita leant over the invalid's pallid, burning face to breathe
out some gentle word to her. Making an effort, the poor girl smiled
for a single minute, and the old servant, satisfied, went back to her
chair, muttering words of prayer to herself, without taking her eyes
off Bianca Maria.
Very, very late, after having wandered through the streets, tiring
himself by walking, ill-dressed, unbrushed, having lost all care for
his appearance, quite unrecognisable, the Marquis di Formosa came
home to find the door open, as if they had heard his footsteps from
a distance. Margherita came up to him in the dark with her ghost-like
step.
'How is she?' he asked.
'Just the same,' she sighed out.
'What does the doctor say?'
'He orders ice and quinine. He again asked for Dr. Amati to be sent
for.'
'I told you never to mention that scoundrel's name!'
'Hush!' she hissed out respectfully, and she went away.
The Marquis was seized by so profound an anguish that, the old faith
rising again in his heart, he sought for a place to kneel down and
pray the Lord that He would save his daughter, and free him from
that agony. Alas! the small room used as a chapel at first, where
Bianca Maria and he had prayed together so often, was empty: he,
after having abused the saints and the Virgin, after having done
the sacrilege of punishing Ecce Homo, had sold the saints, Virgin,
and Ecce Homo to stake the money at the lottery. There were no more
guardian saints in Cavalcanti House; the Virgin and her Divine Son
had withdrawn their saddened eyes from insult. There was nothing left
in that house, nothing. During these last days, throughout the poor
girl's illness, they had lived on alms; that is to say, off some
allowance inexhaustible pity of Gennaro Parascandolo the usurer's
wife had granted to Margherita and Giovanni's tears and entreaties.
The Cavalcantis were holding out their hands for alms now! For many
weeks he had had no money to stake, and he avoided Don Crescenzio's
lottery bank, as he had not the many francs he owed him to give back;
but when Friday came, though he knew they were reduced to private
begging, knowing that what he did was a domestic crime, he came
to Margherita to implore her to give him two francs, or only one,
to gamble with. Only on that Friday, confronted by Bianca Maria's
illness, he had not dared; he was struck incurably. That girlish
body, stretched on what perhaps might be her death-bed; that head
crushed down under the heavy bag of ice; that profile, pinched as
if it was rubbed down by an inward hand; that eyebrow, that frowned
on hearing his voice only; and that hand, that hand above all, that
chased him away constantly, obstinately, a victim to a dumb, lively
horror--all that had broken down the last energies of his old age.
Illnesses of old people make the old thoughtful and melancholy, but
young people's illnesses frighten them as a thing against the order
of Nature. Ah! in these moments of anguish, he felt so weak, so old,
so worn-out, an organism with no vitality, a lamp with no oil. And
shaking, trembling, not even looking towards his daughter's bed, he
went to sit in his usual place, letting himself go, as if he had to
sit there and wait for death.
Only one thing could give him back a flash of energy--that is to say,
a flash of hatred--and it was the name of the loathed doctor, which
was repeated from time to time by the new doctor or mentioned by his
own servants, who referred to him in spite of his express orders
against it. She, Bianca Maria, had never mentioned it. In the doleful
convulsions that had come on before that typhoid she had raved at
great length, cried out over and over again, calling for her mother,
'Mama, mama!' like a child in danger, like a lost child; nothing
else. Vainly in these low ravings, in that confused muttering,
that long, disconnected chatter, he had stretched his ears to hear
his own name or the scoundrel's who had taken his daughter's heart
from him. She had always called for her mother, no one else. And he
trembled, shivered, in case of hearing that name coming from her
lips, still keeping up in his old age and tiredness, in his growing
weakness, that dull rage, that implacable hatred. Sometimes, when the
delirium got higher and higher and haunted him, he ran away from the
room, stopping his ears, always fearing she would call on that name.
Outside he stood thus, waiting, undecided, and very agitated.
'What is she speaking about?' he asked Margherita when she, stupefied
and frightened, came out of the room.
'She wants her mother,' the other muttered, crying silently, for it
seemed to her a forerunner of death.
And the typhoid went on, finishing its first week, not yielding to
the ice or the quinine, keeping always between a hundred and four and
a hundred and five degrees, as if the mercury in the thermometer had
stuck at that doleful figure, a funereal cylinder that nothing was of
any use now to bring down.
'How much is it?' the old father made inquiry with anxious eyes from
Margherita, who was looking at the thermometer held against the sick
girl's burning skin.
'A hundred and four degrees,' she muttered under her breath with
infinite despair.
Implacable figure! To bring down the fire that burned away Bianca
Maria's blood and nerves, seeing that quinine taken by the mouth
in large doses had no proper effect, quinine was now injected with
a tiny, pretty silver syringe into the patient's arm. Not having
the strength to open her eyes, she raised herself with difficulty,
propped up on pillows, and held up in Margherita's arms, and her head
shook, the black hair stuck to her temples, and dripped moisture
from the chill of the ice-bag. They had to hold up her head, too,
for it went from side to side. Then, baring the poor arms all
dotted by the silver needle, a new burning, painful puncture was
added to the others. She started, but only slightly, as if no pain
was worse than that sleep. Sometimes she opened her eyes, and set
them on Margherita's face, and they were so sad in their expression
of weariness, so muddy in colour, dry, and indifferent now to all
earthly sights, that a glance from them wrung the heart. It looked as
if they had emptied out the fountain of tears. When her father and
Margherita saw these doleful eyes in front of them, they gave a start.
'My child! my child!' the old man said to her, holding her hands.
Then she, disturbed and tired, lowered her eyelids at once, and
sank anew into that stupefied state in which the only two signs of
vitality were her laboured breathing and the high temperature. Very
seldom did the quinine injections succeed in bringing down the high
fever; there was a slight discouraging variation, nothing more.
Only on the morning of the tenth day she seemed, all of a sudden, in
a better state. It was sleep instead of torpor, and in the comforting
sleep a cold sweat ran over her forehead, which Margherita wiped off
carefully. The poor old woman followed tremblingly every minute of
that sleep, as if she guessed intuitively Bianca Maria's life was to
depend on it; and while she said her prayers over mentally, her whole
attention was fixed on the loved face sharpened by illness, that
seemed to be getting back renewed brightness. Whilst the sound sleep
lasted, Margherita's vigilant ear heard a noise in the flat. She got
up on tiptoe and went out. It was the Marquis di Formosa coming in
again, and he questioned her with his eyes anxiously.
'She is resting; she is better--she is much better,' muttered the
poor old woman, putting a finger to her lips to enjoin silence.
The father's dry eyes filled with tears; it was the first good news
in ten days' anguish and fears. He, too, went into his daughter's
room, sitting down in his usual place, watching the thin face, where
the great nervous tension seemed to have given way to a favourable
crisis.
Margherita, so as not to disturb Bianca Maria's sleep, dared not make
use of the thermometer to find out her temperature, but her heart
told her the fever had certainly gone down. Then, both silent, she
praying inwardly and the Marquis di Formosa fishing up some shreds
of prayer from the depths of his clouded conscience, they spent two
hours watching over the invalid's quiet sleep. It was dusk when she
opened her eyes--the large eyes that had been shut for ten days by
fever's burning, leaden hand, and at once Margherita leant over her,
questioning her:
'How do you feel?'
To her astonishment, the girl, instead of answering with a wave of
the hand or a nod, said in a very feeble voice:
'I am better.'
Also the Marquis di Formosa had come up beside the bed, and,
quivering with joy, he said over and over again:
'My child! my child!'
'Do you want anything?' the waiting-woman asked, for the sake of
hearing the feeble voice which had gone to her heart.
'No, nothing; I feel better,' the invalid whispered, with a sigh of
relief from her unburdened breast.
Her father had taken hold of her hand, gazing affectionately at his
daughter. And she, who for ten days had driven him away from her bed
by her look and the waving of her hand, smiled on him this time. It
was a flash of light. He could do nothing but stammer out:
'My child! my child!'
And Margherita went out of the room cheerfully, as if her young
mistress were safe--safe for ever from the frightful danger she had
gone through for ten days. The Marquis di Formosa had sat down at the
head of the sick girl's bed, and, holding her slight hand in his, he
felt his darling's fleshless fingers pressing now and then a little
harder on his own, as a loving caress. Twice or thrice he leant over
and asked, 'Would you like anything?' She had not replied, but that
rapid flash of a smile had come back. It was night already, and faces
could not be made out any longer, when, on a new question from her
father, Bianca Maria replied: 'Yes, I do.'
'What do you want? Tell me at once!'
'I want the doctor at once,' she said.
'Do you feel ill?' the old man asked, misunderstanding her.
'No; I want Dr. Amati.'
Her father put his hand over the girl's on the coverlet, but he said
nothing.
'Do you hear? I wish for Dr. Amati,' she repeated in a louder voice,
that already had a quiver of annoyance in it.
'No, my dear, it cannot be,' he replied, trying to restrain himself,
thinking of her illness, and remembering her danger.
'I want Dr. Amati,' she said in a loud voice, raising her head from
the pillow with a peculiar motion. It seemed, indeed, to the old man
that she had ground her teeth after having announced for the fourth
time her strange demand.
'It is not possible, my dear,' he muttered, trying to hold in his own
burning rage.
'Go and call Dr. Amati! Go at once!' she shouted, as if giving him an
order.
'You are mad!' he cried out, rising from his seat. 'I will never go.'
'Yes, yes, you will!' she yelled, rising on the pillow, clutching at
the sheet with her clenched hands; 'you will go at once, and bring
him here directly. I want Amati beside me--always with me. Go at
once!'
'No, no, I will not!' he shouted in his turn, not knowing what he was
doing. 'He will never put a foot in here while I am alive.'
Margherita had run in, quite upset, in despair a second time, but
still more despairing from the new turn the illness had taken. Hardly
had Bianca Maria seen her, when she called out to her:
'Margherita, if you love me, go and call Dr. Amati.'
'I forbid you to; do you hear?' the old Marquis shrieked to the
woman. He was so exasperated that his hands shook, his eyes gave out
sparks.
'For goodness' sake, miss, do not get in such a state; remember you
are talking to your father. Please, my lord, remember my lady is ill;
she is not in her right mind.'
'I am not mad; I want Dr. Amati,' the girl still cried out, clenching
her fists, grinding her teeth, rolling her eyes so convulsively that
only the white of the eyeball could be seen.
'Holy Virgin! Holy Virgin!' Margherita went on sobbing out.
'For the love of God, if you are fond of me, go and call Dr. Amati!'
the sick girl sobbed out, her head swaying about, sometimes rising
from the pillow and falling back upon it.
'She is mad! she is mad!' shouted the old man, raving.
'My lord, go away outside; I beg of you, go away,' Margherita
implored, seeing that his daughter fixed her eyes, now full of
intense rage, then with keen sorrow, on her father, and that the
sight of him made her still more frantic.
'I am going away--I am going away; but she will not see Dr. Amati!'
he shouted, going outside, feeling he could bear it no longer.
But from the drawing-room, whither he had borne his anger, he heard
a loud shriek, loud and agonizing, as if the patient were driving
her nails into her flesh; and after that shriek another, lower,
but equally agonizing, such a cry of unbearable sorrow quivered in
it, and words spoken now loudly, now in low tones, that came to him
confusedly. The girl had fallen into convulsions. Suddenly the sounds
quieted down, and then, still trembling from a mixed feeling of rage,
pity and fear, he went near the room; but he did not go in, merely
calling Margherita to the door.
'How is she?'
'She is worse, much worse,' she said, weeping silently.
'But what is she saying?'
'She wants Dr. Amati.'
'That she will never get.'
These short discussions, however, though the invalid sank at
intervals into a state of coma, were heard by her, and twice on
coming out of that torpor the loud shrieks had burst out anew, with
a quivering of all her muscles, especially with a frightful knotting
together of the muscles in the nape of the neck. Throughout the cries
that name, the name the poor thing had worshipped so long in secret,
that name that had been for her the sign of salvation--that name
came up again always obstinately in her delirium, proclaimed by the
soul that knew no fetters now; imperiously, gently, despairingly,
with such an outflow of love that Margherita and Giovanni, who
ran in to keep down the hysterical girl's arms, felt their hearts
breaking. From the other room, as the sick girl raised her voice,
sometimes shrill, then deep, calling upon Dr. Amati, the Marquis di
Formosa started and shuddered, with that obstinate, blind hatred of
old people who cannot forgive. Vainly, vainly he tried to think of
something else--not to hear, not to feel the despairing sorrow of
that appeal. It was no use keeping down his head and stopping his
ears, trusting to the farthest-off room in the house; that clamorous
complaint still reached him persistently--nothing could be done to
check it. It was a nightmare now, and in spite of the distance, in
spite of closed doors, he heard clearly and distinctly the words of
love and sorrow in which Bianca Maria called on Dr. Amati; the words
got printed on his mind, and hammered on his brain like a persecution.
That went on for an hour and a half, and she did not quiet down nor
stop speaking, finding new strength, nervous strength, to call, and
call as if her voice, as if her calls, were to go through the wall,
across the streets, were to get to the man she longed for to save
her. Oh, that nightmare, that nightmare! to hear his daughter's
ravings! She who had thrust him away from her bed, now was making
desperate appeals to another man. Now and then, as if to put an end
to that talking, imploring madness, he went close to the room door,
and heard Margherita's level voice, as she held her mistress clasped
in her arms, trying to calm her, whilst she went on as if she had
no ear for other voices, as if she had to call for Dr. Amati until
she saw him come into her room. And her old father went off wild
and desperate, shaking with rage and anguish, not knowing what to
do; now grovelling, now ferocious, still unsubdued; keeping up his
hatred, not able to calm down, his blood boiling in his veins, and a
shortness of breath oppressing him. But at a certain stage he heard
the bell ring, and someone go into the flat, and then into Bianca
Maria's room. Formosa stood still, motionless, astounded. Who had
come in then?
When Margherita came into the room where he had taken refuge, and
called him with a wave of her hand, he followed her meekly. Beside
the sick girl's bed, holding her twitching arms and looking into her
eyes, was the doctor in charge, Morelli, whom poor Margherita had
called in. But Bianca Maria, even under the doctor's strong hands,
even under his scrutinizing glance, went on trembling; her head rose
convulsively from the pillow, her neck stretched forward, getting
rigid, and then her head fell back again, worn out, still with a
continued slight movement backwards and forwards, whilst unweariedly
she went on saying, sometimes low, then shrilly, 'Amati ... Amati ...
Amati ... I want Amati....'
'But what is the matter with her?' asked Formosa, clasping his hands,
with tears in his eyes.
'She must have had some strong excitement two or three hours ago: had
she not?'
'Yes, I fear so.'
'Was it from some alarm, some noise?'
'I ... I don't ... quite know.'
'Well, she got excited? Did she cry out?'
'Yes ... she did.'
'Why did you let her get excited? Why did you not let her have what
she wanted? Do you know the danger your daughter is running?'
'I do not know ... I know nothing. What do you expect me to know?'
the old man shouted, holding out his hands, beseeching like a child.
'The danger is of meningitis,' said the doctor through his clenched
teeth.
Now the invalid had half opened her eyes. The doctor examined her
pupils. Her eye seemed glassy, rigid, as her whole person had got.
'Doctor, what is it? is she dead?' yelled the old man, as if he were
mad.
'It is temporary paralysis, from meningitis.'
'What is to be done?'
'Well, we will see. Meanwhile I beg you to have Dr. Amati called in.'
The old man looked at him, disordered.
'What do you say?'
'Send and call Amati. Do you not see she wants him?'
'... She is raving.'
'Yes, sir; but when she asked for him, she must have been conscious;
and even in delirium you must obey her, my lord.'
'Am I to obey?'
'Your daughter is in a serious state; it is better to satisfy her.'
'Is she in danger?'
'You may lose her from one hour to another. She has no strength to
bear up against meningitis.'
'Doctor, doctor, do not say that!'
'My dear sir, do you want me to tell you the truth, especially as
the poor patient cannot hear us? First of all, you would not allow
Amati to be called; then you let the young lady get into this state
of exasperation.... You will not go on with this refusal? The girl is
dying....'
'O holy God!' blasphemed the Marquis.
'I will go to Amati's house,' Morelli said.
'... He will not come.'
'Why should he not? Was he not the doctor in charge? He is an honest
man; he is a great doctor.'
'... He will not come,' Formosa repeated.
'Then go yourself, my lord.'
Now, whilst Formosa made a despairing gesture, the sick girl had
started up, and again rapidly through her clenched teeth she had
begun to say: 'Amati! ... Amati! ... I want Amati!...'
'Do you hear?' said Morelli.
'But I cannot!' shouted Formosa, 'for I turned that man out of my
house. I would not let my daughter marry him. I cannot humble myself
to him.'
'Very well, but my lady is dying,' said the doctor, holding down the
girl's hands, which were clapping together.
'Go and call Amati! For mercy's sake, for the love of God, do not
give me up! Call Amati!' groaned the invalid.
'My God! what a punishment! what a punishment!' the old man cried
out, tearing his hair. 'But, doctor, give her something; do not let
her die!'
'... Amati! ... Amati! ... I want Amati!' she said, raving, rolling
her eyes fearfully. Then, falling back again, worn out, on the bed
with a fresh stroke of paralysis, the only living thing in her was
her voice, asking for Amati; still the only idea of her wandering
reason was Amati, Amati, Amati.
'I will write to him,' the old man said desolately, going to another
room whilst the doctor was trying to put new ice on Bianca Maria's
burning head.
The Marquis di Formosa was writing, but it was unbearable, the shame
of having to give in, and the words would not come from his pen. He
tore two sheets. At last a short letter came out, in which he asked
Dr. Amati to come to his house, as his daughter was ill--nothing
more. When he had to write the address he nearly smashed the pen.
Then, not looking Giovanni in the face, he told him to run to
Dr.--yes, to Dr. Amati's. The poor old thing ran, whilst Morelli
gave calomel pills to his delirious patient, who was crying out,
for the pain in her head had got unbearable, frightful. Her father,
having carried out his first sacrifice, felt he was going mad with
these howls, fearing lest he should begin to howl and howl like her,
as if he had caught meningitis from her. Now that he had written
the letter, carried out an unbearable sacrifice, the Marquis di
Formosa began to wish that Dr. Amati would come soon, at least. It
was impossible for him to bear these cries, laments, and groans any
longer, where one name came up continuously. Now he was counting the
minutes for Giovanni to come back, straining his ears if he heard
the noise of a door opening. Time was passing, and the sick girl, in
spite of ice, in spite of calomel, was raving, with glaring eyes, a
prey to the inflammation that seemed to be burning up her brain.
Here was a door opening; someone was coming towards the room where
the Marquis di Formosa had taken refuge in his desperation. It was
Giovanni alone, and he looked so tired, so old, so sad, that the
Marquis shivered as he asked him:
'Well?'
'Dr. Amati is not coming.'
'Was he not at home?'
'He was not. I waited for him under the portico; then he came
back....'
'Well, then, what happened?'
'He read the letter ... and he said he was too busy; that the young
lady was sure to have a good doctor.'
'Did you not ... beg ... him to come.'
'I did, my lord. He got severe then, and went away muttering
something that I did not understand.'
'You ought to have gone upstairs and insisted.'
'I had not the courage.'
'But do you not know my lady is dying for want of him? Do you not
know that?'
'I do know it, my lord; but the doctor used me ill. I am a poor
servant.'
'He is right,' said the old man slowly; 'I insulted him deeply.'
'My lord, my lord, go yourself; he will not refuse you.'
'You are mad.'
'For the young lady's sake.'
'He will refuse. He will insult me.'
'For her sake.'
'No, no; it is too much to expect....'
'But, my lord, you said it yourself: my lady is dying.'
'Go away!' shouted the Marquis brutally, driving his servant away.
He was left alone. His pride rebelled against the idea of humbling
himself before the man he had abused. He suffered frightfully; his
daughter's voice, now muttering in a low tone, now yelling shrilly,
calling out 'Amati,' gave him a feeling of physical pain, of a
red-hot iron scorching his flesh. Within him, however, as time
passed, as the girl's danger increased, a work of clearing away was
going on, in which all the old and the new rebellions of his haughty
feelings went on tumbling down, and in place of the pride came a
tremendous pity, a great affection, an immense sorrow. The hours
flew by whilst he walked up and down, gnawing at the curb of the
last chains in which his heart was bending, till at last it sank to
the earth; and that eternal delirious voice which could say nothing
but the name of Antonio Amati never ceased. He no longer shook with
anger; hatred was silent, and when Dr. Morelli, having gone away and
come back, asked for Amati, he replied:
'He has not come. I am going myself.'
'Will you bring him?'
'Yes, I will.'
It was very late, however, when he set out on foot to go to Santa
Lucia Road, where Dr. Amati was now living. It was nearly midnight,
and people had turned out in Toledo in the mildness of the April
evening. In spite of being old, the Marquis ran through the streets,
urged by a nervous force, and when he got to the big gateway of the
palazzo Amati lived in, he went up the stairs rapidly, not giving any
answer to the porter, who asked where he was going.
'Tell Dr. Amati that the Marquis di Formosa is here,' he told the
housekeeper, who came to open the door to him.
'Really ... he is studying.'
'Tell him, I beg of you. It is very urgent ...' the old man
implored; his pride was completely gone. She went off, and came back
again at once, making the Marquis a sign to come in. He crossed
two sitting-rooms, and came to a study all in shadow, where the
lamp-light was concentrated on a large table scattered with papers
and books. But Dr. Amati was standing in the middle of the room,
waiting. These two men, who had hated each other so much, looked at
one another, with the same sorrow they had in common, and pity for
the unhappy dying girl cut short all rancour. They looked at each
other.
'What is it?' Amati asked in a weak voice.
'She is dying,' said Formosa with a despairing gesture.
'Of what?'
'Of meningitis.'
An earthy pallor spread over the doctor's face, and two lines formed
themselves about his lips. And he dared not make the Marquis any
reproaches. Had he not himself forsaken the poor girl, though he had
promised and sworn to save her? Had he not through pride left the
delicate, sickly flower a prey to all moral and physical evils? Both
of them were guilty, both.
'Let us start, then,' he said. They went out together, called for a
cab, and had the hood put up, as if they wanted to hide their sorrow.
They did not speak during the drive. Only whilst he bit at his spent
cigar Dr. Amati from time to time asked some medical questions.
'How long has she had meningitis? is this the first day of it?'
'Yes; but she has had typhoid fever for nine days.'
'Had she high fever?'
'It went up to a hundred and four and a hundred and five.'
'Had she bad headaches?'
'Frightful headaches.'
'Did she have convulsions?'
'Yes, at intervals.'
'Does she roll her eyes about?'
'Yes, she rolls her eyes.'
'Do the muscles at the nape of her neck contract?'
'Yes, they do.'
'Was there some reason for it?'
'Yes,' said the father humbly, almost sobbing out his monosyllable.
'Did she get calomel?'
'Yes; Morelli gave that.'
'Did it not soothe her?'
'No, not a bit. Often she is paralyzed, but for a short time.'
'It is just meningitis,' the doctor muttered thoughtfully.
The carriage went on and on, as well as it could with an ordinary
night horse. They were not getting there yet, and they had already
urged the driver to hurry.
'Is she delirious?' the doctor asked again.
'I do not know--I am not sure if it is delirium; but she is always
speaking convulsively.'
'What does she say?'
'She calls out for you.'
'For me?'
'Yes--always for you.'
Ah! the doctor's heart broke on hearing that. The old father heard
him say, like a frightened prayer, 'My God!' They said nothing
more. They found the door open. Poor old Giovanni had waited for
them on the landing, leaning over the railing, looking into the
entrance-hall, anxious to see them arrive, but certain that the
doctor would come.
'How is she?' asked her father at once; he had a constant need of
being reassured.
'Just as she is bound to be,' sighed the old butler, going on in
front. 'She is much the same.'
'Is she still delirious?'
'Yes, still delirious.'
They went in very softly to the small room. Dr. Morelli had gone away
a little while before, leaving a short note for Dr. Amati. But he
went straight to the sick girl's bed. Her voice, tired now, but still
impassioned, went on always repeating Amati's name, but her head was
sunk in the pillows, and her eyes half shut. He saw everything at
once, and the disorder of his mind must have been tremendous, for he
could not manage to control his face--he, the strong, invincible man.
And he hesitated a minute before replying to the unhappy, raving girl
who went on calling to him, fearing to cause too strong an impression
on her nerves; but he could not resist the feeble voice that went
straight to his heart and made it bleed with tenderness; he said:
'Bianca Maria.'
What a cry the answer was! She got up, her face suddenly flaming; her
eyes grew enormous. She threw her arms round his neck, and leant her
head on his breast, crying out:
'Oh, my love! my love! how long you have been in coming! Do not leave
me again--never forsake me; it is so long since I have been calling
for you--do not leave me.'
'Do not fear; I will not leave you ...' he muttered, trying to
overcome his emotion, petting her fine, ruffled, tumbled hair.
'Never go away from me again--never!...' she cried out passionately,
clinging with her arms round his neck. 'If you forsake me I shall
die.'
'Keep quiet, Bianca Maria, be quiet--do not say such things.'
'I will say so!'--she raised her voice, irritated at being
contradicted--'if I have not you it is death for me. But you will not
let me die? Ah, do not leave me to die!'
'My darling, be quiet--be quiet,' he said, not able to control
himself, trying to loosen the chain of her arms round his neck.
'Do not lift me from here! do not make me let go!' she shrieked,
making desperate motions with her head. 'If you make me let go, I
feel that death will take hold of me....'
'Oh, Bianca, Bianca, be quiet, for my sake! do not kill me!' said the
strong man, now become the weakest and wretchedest among men.
'Death will catch hold of me! it is here behind me! I feel it! You
alone can save me! Do not let me die--I do not wish to die: you know
I do not wish to die!'
'You will not die. Hush, my dear, or you will get worse. I am here: I
will not go away ever again--I will not leave you!'
'... I do not wish to die!' she ended up, again getting a little
quieter. They remained like that for some time. The father was
standing at the foot of the bed, leaning against the bed-rail, with
his eyes down, feeling in his broken pride, in his wounded soul, the
full weight of the chastisement the Lord was heaping on him, as a
punishment for his lengthened sin.
Very softly, seeing that the girl had stopped speaking, that her eyes
were closing, Dr. Amati tried to put her head back on the pillow;
but she felt the movement, and while he bent down she drew him to
her at the same time, and he had to stoop, since her arms would not
let go. They remained like that, she dozing, he leaning over in an
uncomfortable position, in such anguish at her state and his own
powerlessness that the sensation of physical discomfort did not
affect him. Grief took such a violent hold of him that he seemed
about to suffocate, not being able to weep, cry out, or speak now
the unhappy girl was dozing; but sometimes she gave a start, and an
expression of painful annoyance came over her fleshless face. An idea
seemed to come into her mind: either she heard a voice the others did
not, or saw some fanciful sight, for her eyelids fluttered and her
lips drew back from her whitish gums. Then she opened her eyes, as
if she had found out where that noise, that sight, that disagreeable
impression, came from, and with a thread of voice, which only the
doctor heard, she called:
'Love!'
'What is it you want?'
'Send him away.'
'Who do you mean?'
'My father.'
The doctor turned pale, and did not answer. He gave a side-glance at
the old man, who was still standing at the foot of the bed with his
eyes cast down in sorrowful thought.
'I beg of you, send him away,' she began again, speaking into his ear.
'But why do you wish it?'
'Just because--I don't wish to see him. Send him away. He must go
away.'
'Bianca Maria, remember he is your father.'
'Look here--listen,' she said, pulling him nearer to her, so that she
could speak lower. 'He is my father,' she whispered; then, with a
smothered fear and an immense bitterness, 'but he has killed me!'
'Do not speak like that,' he replied, turning his head the other way
that she might not see his feelings.
'I tell you I am dying through him. I am not raving, you know; I am
in my senses,' she replied, opening her eyes wide with that babyish
trick of dying children that drives mothers mad with grief.
He shook his head, as if he could not tell what to do nor what to say.
'Send him away!' she insisted, in a rage, with the fatal outbursting
fury of meningitis.
'I cannot do it, Bianca Maria....'
'If you do not send him away yourself, I will get up and shriek out
to him to go away, never to come before me again--never, for the
future: do you hear?'
'Wait a moment,' he said, as he made up his mind, resigned.
And he left her, loosening himself from her, putting back her thin
arms on the coverlet. She followed him with her glance, never taking
her eyes off him, as if through them she could know what Dr. Amati
was saying to her father in a low tone.
Dr. Amati, with great delicacy and a shudder of grief that made his
voice shake uncontrollably, was explaining to him that meningitis
is a frightful malady which burns the brain, breaks the nerves, and
makes the unlucky patients attacked by it rave for days and days: it
incites them to constant anger, and fury, even. Poor Bianca Maria was
a victim to this fancy, that she could not bear to have anyone in
her room; and that if he loved his daughter, if he did not wish to
hear her burst out into wild talk, would he be so kind as to go into
another room?...
'Did my daughter tell you that?' the old man asked, deadly pale, with
his eyebrows knitted.
'Yes, it was she who said it.'
'Does she wish to have no one in her room?'
'No, no one.'
'Except yourself, is that it?'
'Yes, I may stay.'
'Does my daughter turn me out?' shrieked the old man.
'For goodness' sake, my lord, do not get irritated! Have pity on your
daughter, yourself, and me.'
'I will not go away unless she tells me herself, do you hear? Bianca
Maria!' the Marquis called out, going up close to the bed.
She looked at her father with the greatest intensity, as if she was
answering him.
'Bianca Maria,' shouted the exasperated old man, 'is it true that you
do not want to have me in your room? Say yourself if it is true. I do
not believe this man. You must say it yourself.'
'It is true,' she said in a very clear voice, looking at her father.
He cast down his eyes, where the last tears of old age were showing,
and his head sank on his breast, overcome by the inflexible
punishment that came to him from the raving girl--from his dying
victim. He went out without turning round. And stooping, as if he
were a hundred years old, alone, speechless, he went away to what
had been his study, where only an old table and a chair were left.
There, lying forward with his face in his hands, with no conception
either of time or things, the old sinner sank into the immeasurable
bitterness of his punishment. Sometimes Bianca Maria's voice came to
him, feeble or loud, ever telling Amati:
'I do not want to die--I will not die! Save me! save me! I am only
twenty! I will not die!'
The voice, the despairing words, said in delirium, but which still
seemed to be a lament and a curse, had a cruel effect on him. He had
not strength left to get up and go out, to leave the house alone, to
die like a dog on some church steps, unwept for and unregretted. He
did not get up to go beside the dying girl, for his daughter had
turned him out, keeping by her the only person she had loved.
'I will not die, love! I will not die!' the delirious girl was saying.
'She is right--she is right,' her father thought, giving a start.
Whilst the hours went by he heard, from where he was, the doctor
going backwards and forwards, in his effort to save the girl's life,
the hurried orders, Giovanni going out and the assistant doctor
coming in. He had no right now to come forward and know what was
going on, and, in fact, he was forgotten there, as if he had been
dead for years and years, as if no Marquis di Formosa had ever
existed. Would it not be better for him if he were dead, since
everyone had forsaken him? 'It is what I deserve,' he thought to
himself.
He strained his ears sometimes, as if the noises that came to him
were to tell him that his daughter was getting better, that the
doctor was giving her strong, effective remedies; but, except for the
servants, the assistant, and the doctor going about their work, he
heard nothing else but the constant agonizing cry: 'I will not die! I
will not die! Love, save me!'
He sank into a slumber, with his old head resting on his arms,
towards dawn, still hearing in this slight unconsciousness that same
cry of anguish. It was Giovanni who wakened him, at full daylight,
by bringing him a cup of coffee. The father, turned out of his
daughter's room, questioned the servant with his eyes.
'She is still in the same state--just the same.'
'Then, not even Amati can save her--not even him?'
'He is trying to, but he is in despair.'
The Marquis di Formosa spent three days and nights in that room
alone, not seeing a bed and hardly touching the little food that was
brought in for the three days and nights that Bianca Maria's dying
agony lasted. The old man's face, always of a reddish tinge, in
spite of his age, was now streaked with purple, his white hair, when
Giovanni and Margherita came to him, was tragically disordered. Only,
from seeing their crushed state, he asked them no more questions.
Did he not hear her still raving, crying out that at her age she did
not want to die, she would not die, adding the most heartrending
supplications and cries?
The two servants told him nothing; his hearing had got more acute,
and not a word of the raving went past unheard. Still, that very
vitality of nervous strength, that strong voice, deluded him as
being a sort of health, and in the short intervals of silence he
almost wished the raving would begin again. But the third day, in
the morning, a new painful sensation drew him out of that stupor.
The delirious girl, in a choked voice, was calling for her mother,
begging _her_ not to let her die. Sometimes she stopped speaking; he
looked round him, alarmed at these sudden silences, which got longer,
starting when again Bianca Maria began to cry out:
'Mother, I will not die! I will not--I will not, mother dear!'
About two hours after midnight, on the third day, still seated by his
small table, slumber came upon him, with the raving still echoing in
his ears. How long did he sleep? When he wakened, the silence was so
profound that it frightened him. He waited to hear the voice crying
out not to die yet. There was nothing. He counted the time from the
wasting of the candle; two hours must have gone by.
A horrible fear took hold of him; he dared not move. He looked under
the doorway arch, and saw Margherita's white face looking at him. He
understood. Still, mechanically he asked:
'How is Donna Bianca?'
'She is well,' the old woman said feebly.
'When did it happen?'
'An hour ago.'
'Did she not ... did she not ask for me?'
'No, my lord.'
He tried to get up; he could not. He thought that death would lay
hold of him there, on that seat, at once, since young people of
twenty die before old men of sixty. Now Dr. Amati had come into the
room. He was unrecognisable; a deadly weight had broken down all his
moral and physical energies. Great silent, child's tears rolled down
his cheeks. They said nothing for a time.
'Did she suffer a great deal?' the father asked.
'Yes, frightfully....'
'Were you not able to do anything to ...'
'No, I was able to do nothing,' the doctor said, beaten, holding out
his arms as he owned to the most horrible of his failures.
The old man, his face now rigid in tragic expression, was not crying.
Like a child who is not to be comforted, Dr. Amati took him by the
hand, lifted him from his chair, and said gently:
'Come and see her.'
They went. The Marchesina di Formosa Bianca Maria Cavalcanti was
lying on her small white bed, her head rather sloping on one
shoulder, the waxen hands, with discoloured fingers, clasped over
a rosary. A soft white robe had been put over her wasted body. The
violet-shaded mouth was half open, the clayey eyelids lowered. She
seemed very much smaller, like a girl in her teens. On her face there
was only the haughty seal of death, that soothes all and forgives
all. It was not serenity, but peace.
From the doorway the two men gazed on the small figure, with long,
black hair flowing over it. They did not go in; motionless, both kept
their eyes on the mortal remains, and Amati repeated gently, as if to
himself, like a child whom nothing could comfort:
'There should be flowers--flowers....'
The old man did not hear him. He looked at his dead daughter, saying
not a word, giving no sigh; he bent his great frame and knelt down
in the doorway, holding out his arms for forgiveness, like old Lear
before the sweet corpse of Cordelia.
THE END
BILLING AND SONS, LTD., PRINTERS, GUILDFORD
* * * * *
TRANSCRIBER'S NOTES
Italic text is denoted by _underscores_.
A number of words in this book have both hyphenated and
non-hyphenated variants. The trend in the original book was to
hyphenate compound words. Therefore the hyphenated variant was chosen
in most of the cases.
Obvious punctuation and other printing errors have been corrected.
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