A Dancer in Darkness

by David Stacton

  “Where is the child?” he asked.

  “I will not tell you that.”

  “If you have it, I know who it is. Tell him I know who it is.”

  “I do not have it.” She paused for a moment. “The Cardinal is here. He has been here for some time. But he has no use for you. There is nothing I can do.”

  “Are you afraid of him, too?”

  She dropped her eyes, flushed slightly, seemed to grow angry, and then thought better of it.

  “There has been unrest here. Someone is stirring up the bandits and the gipsies in the hills. He thought it better to come here to control them. He has the child. He will be regent.”

  “So he knew she would die.”

  “Of course he knew,” she said angrily. “What is that to me?”

  “You serve a good master. How does he keep you under his thumb?” he asked. For it was true. There was a new edge of fear in her eyes that he had never seen there before. She did not answer him. Somewhere in the building they heard clattering noises. Bosola became tense.

  “The workmen,” she explained. She stood up. “Very well. You cannot stay here. I will find some way to speak to him. But he will not help you until he has a use for you.” She seemed anxious to get rid of him. “Disguise yourself and hide in the hills. You know your way there.”

  “Do you hope the bandits will kill me?”

  She flinched. “They will not kill you,” she said wearily. “You are practically one of them.”

  He did not believe that she would intercede, but it was the best he could do, until he found out where the Cardinal was and what his humour was. He turned and left her.

  II

  The safest conduct through bandits and murderers is to be one of them. Dress like the mob and keep your mouth shut, and no mob will hurt you. Destroy what they destroy, and they will love you for it. Bosola did not dare to go to the palace. In his own way he found a lazzarone dress, such as he had worn when he escaped from the galleys, left its owner gagged under the waterfront, and put it on. Once he had donned it, he felt stronger and safer. He rode through the early streets unnoticed and headed for the hills.

  In two hours Amalfi lay below him, and he was not frightened any more, except when, far over the sea, he caught a glimpse of the dim shape of Ischia. He had done better as lazzarone than as a courtier. He would do better now.

  Below him Amalfi seemed squalid and insignificant. He turned inland, over the uplands and the sudden ravines, peppered with trees. He had a pistol and a knife. What food he could not kill he could steal. He met no one.

  Yet Sor Juana had spoken the truth. There was uneasiness and revolt in these barren hills. Something was stirring there. He could sense it all around him. People seemed to be watching him, though they had no cover from which to do so, and he saw no one. Not all the birds that abruptly shrilled out into the air sounded quite like birds. And out of the corners of his eyes he sometimes thought he saw someone draw back along the ridge.

  This did not seem furtive. It seemed planned.

  That night he camped under an oak tree, beside a small stream, charring a rabbit over a small fire. The dry grass rustled from time to time. A twig snapped. There was more the sense than the sound of someone moving treacherously through the underbrush. He pretended that he did not hear, but he slept lightly. His horse whinnied and he sprang up, in time to stop some lumbering shadow from leading it away. But he could not tell the features of the shadow. He lay down again.

  In the morning the landscape was once more empty. He did not care for that. If someone would come forward, then he could identify himself, and so pass safe. The deeper he got into the hills the stronger the feeling of being watched became.

  Then, unexpectedly, a few miles above Arosa, he came upon a small band of gipsies. As he approached several of the men took horse and rode away, but not before he had caught a glimpse of one of them. It was a gipsy bravo, tricked out like the others, but there was no mistaking that white face. It was Antonio.

  Bosola trembled. If his part in the Duchess’s death were known, or even if the Duchess’s death were known, he would be dead himself by nightfall. He dared not alarm the gipsies. He bought a flask of wine, and then got out as quickly as he could, and worked his way backward towards the coast.

  Drawing rein upon the cliffs, he saw a dark boat slowly approaching the harbour. The air was so clear that he could see every detail. He thought his own disguise adequate. Cautiously he worked his way down towards the town.

  It was a boat bearing the Duchess’s body back to Amalfi. It had been decided to give her a state funeral. This was to be held the next day.

  The reason for that Bosola soon learned in a tavern. He learned other things as well. Someone was sending spies into the hills. Duke Ferdinand had arrived. The Cardinal was shut up in the palace. The Amalfitani were restless and terrified. They feared an insurrection from the hills, and they were without a ruler or a leader. Very seldom did the bravos and gipsies rouse themselves to sack a town, but when they did so, their violence was deadly. That night Bosola slept at the tavern.

  The funeral next day was sullen and full of pomp. The authorities had heard rumour that Antonio was in the hills, and was behind the unrest. They hoped the funeral would bring him down.

  Antonio did not appear.

  State funerals take some time to organize, so this one had no panoply. The coffin was lowered from the ship and carried from the town to the cathedral, where a Mass was to be sung over it. The crowds along the streets said nothing. They were absolutely silent. The wheels of the catafalque made the only noise to be heard.

  Bosola had slipped into the cathedral early. From the shadow of a Corinthian column, he watched the catafalque enter the square. The coffin was shouldered, tilted, and carried up the stairs, as though it had been the statue of some saint. It seemed to stare at him. Far over his head the cathedral bell tolled, and with each thunderous note a cloud of doves rose into the air like shredded pieces of paper in a gust of wind. The air was full of the stench of street filth and iodine.

  There was a second coffin on that catafalque. The faces of the pall-bearers ran with sweat, but it too was shouldered and started its slanting passage up the stairs. It was somewhat larger than the first, but plainer. The crowd now murmured ominously, and glanced up towards the hills.

  Bosola fell back, his eyes widening. They carried Cariola past him and into the church. He could almost see her body through the sides of the coffin, and the startled look on her face, above her folded hands. Despite himself he was drawn into the cathedral after it. But by a side way, for only the Duchess’s faithless courtiers were allowed inside.

  This was a death of the quality. It had its own protocol. The people had no part in it.

  The shadowy cathedral was tall, dim, and choked with incense. It took him a while to become accustomed to the light. Then, as though it were materializing in a haunted room, the figure of the Cardinal became visible. It was not to be told that the Duchess had been murdered. It was given out that she had caught the plague. But everybody knew. The Cardinal moved supplely through the motions of a Mass, a red wraith against the gloom. The courtiers seemed indifferent to the occasion, but they watched him. In the turn of their heads you could see that they knew who their new master was.

  Then Bosola caught sight of Ferdinand. The man was standing directly before him. Bosola panicked and drew deeper into shadow. Ferdinand was unrecognizable. It was he who had brought the body here. His eyes seemed blind, and something shuffling had happened to his gait. He was dressed in black from head to foot, theatrically. On his chest he wore a medal with the Duchess’s portrait. Marcantonio stood compassionately close to him, with something maternal in his stance, as though he were a nurse, or a trainer with a dancing bear. Tears streamed down Ferdinand’s face, and yet he was not precisely weeping. He was only containing himself. Violence welled out of his eyes.

  He broke from the crowd, rushed forward, and flung himself against the
coffin. His voice was an animal bellow. The Cardinal glanced round, frowned, and waved a pale hand. Even Marcantonio seemed shocked. Then he sprang forward, with his two bravos, and pulled Ferdinand off. The sound of Ferdinand’s fists against the coffin had been deafening. Ferdinand snarled.

  The Cardinal seemed to hold his breath. Marcantonio spoke to Ferdinand earnestly. A crime against public decorum was the worst of all crimes. The Mass droned on. Ferdinand was led away.

  Bosola was shivering. He had caught the look in the Cardinal’s eyes, and knew what it meant. He slipped out of the church and went immediately to his sister’s convent. If Ferdinand was here, then no one was safe. He would need sanctuary for a while. He must know if she had spoken to the Cardinal.

  He was about to enter, when a porter stopped him at the door. He was denied admittance. He lost his head and shouted. It did no good. He explained that he was Sor Juana’s brother. The order was specific and detailed. It was her brother who was not to be admitted. She had betrayed him. She had always wanted to, and now she had the excuse. She had her position to maintain.

  He had nowhere to go, but he could not stand there and call attention to his presence in the street. Raging against her, he slunk off down a dark alley. He must wait for nightfall before he dared to leave Amalfi. With Ferdinand here, it would not be safe for him to try to storm his way in to the Cardinal. He felt sick. The loyal servant should not be rewarded thus. He was a worse fugitive even than Antonio.

  Antonio at least had power in the hills. Antonio could defend himself.

  He wandered round the slums of the town, working himself up. So that, at dusk, when four heavily cloaked men swept out of the town, and he recognized Marcantonio’s voice, anger boiled over in him. Out of this rotten mess he decided that at least someone should escape undefiled. He himself was trapped. If die or fall he must, then he would cheat his enemies of their satisfaction. He took horse after them, with the advantage that he knew the route. He would get there first and carry a warning. He did not stop to think beyond that. Despair had swept away all his cunning, and uncovered one last remaining shred of decency. Decency, too, could be revenge.

  It was the one altruistic act of his life, no matter what his motives were. But the moonlight was deceptive. He lost his way.

  III

  Antonio did not want to defend himself. Gipsies, too, had been at that funeral. They had ridden at once into the hills. He had learned the truth. There would be no insurrection now.

  Three weeks ago he had arrived at the coast and established himself at Arosa. It had taken him a week to make contact with the gipsies and the bravos. He did not know what had happened. He had sent agents to Naples, but they had arrived too late. He learned only that the Duchess was not there. It was he who was responsible for the unrest in the hills. These men were loyal to him, and he had given them the promise of plunder. The sack of Amalfi would cover the escape of the Duchess. So much he had planned. Knowing that they would be together again had made all things possible. He had worked well.

  Now she was dead.

  It did not seem possible she was dead, for she was all around him. They had been happy in these hills. It was the one place where they had been happy. Her laughter was here everywhere. And lately he had felt more aware of her presence than ever, during this last day or two. He dismissed the gipsies. They waited to offer him grief, but he could not accept it. He could not accept the fact that she was dead. He did not know what to do next.

  When we learn that someone we loved has died we feel much the same as in the instant when we realize someone has stolen our purse. We reach for it to pay. We turn to the one who has just died and say, What shall we do tomorrow? Neither is there. We are suddenly naked and nonplussed. But we know it is only a mistake. We shall do thus and so tomorrow anyway. Grief comes later. Like a man mortally wounded by an arrow, we go on with what we were doing before, through an emotional no-man’s-land, as though nothing had happened. Only later do we drop in our tracks. Only later are we surprised by grief.

  Antonio had been walking down towards the chapel when the news came. Automatically he continued down the hill, through the meagre ruins of Arosa, past the abandoned house that was to be built for their child. Perhaps his walk became a trifle uncertain. That was all.

  He heard the Duchess rustling beside him, as she would when he liberated her from Amalfi, and they ruled the gipsies in the hills, or fled the country altogether. The gipsies fell back before him. They made a space for sorrow. Then, frightened by something immobile in his manner, they began quietly to melt away back into the hills.

  He did not notice. He reached the door of the chapel, pushed it ajar, and shambled inside. Then it hit him. Just as he looked around that empty, dusty room, it hit him.

  The chapel was never used now. Dust lay heavy on everything. The light was dim. The church was damp. He did not notice. He sank to his knees. He did not know how long he stayed there. He was not praying. He was not thinking. He was aware only of emptiness.

  The Church frowns on suicide. St. Augustine and the Egyptians saw to that. Martyrs might allow themselves to die, ascetics might torture themselves, and virgins might kill themselves to preserve their virginity, if they were Christian virgins. But to all others voluntary death was impossible. We are not allowed to incinerate ourselves. Hell is set aside to accomplish that. We must not infringe upon its prerogatives. But he did not want to kill himself. He wanted to throw himself away.

  Slowly the world settled into place. He looked around him at the deserted room. Then, glancing up, his eye caught the altar-piece. He saw himself, kneeling, and the Duchess, as the Virgin, before him. She had a special way of saying, Antonio. He could hear it now. He gazed at the picture.

  It was at this moment that Bosola drew rein above Arosa, was about to start down, and then drew back hastily. Four riders had appeared in the gully below him. They moved swiftly through the ruins of the town, shouting to each other, with a military clatter. Then they spotted the open door of the church, jumped off their horses, and ran in.

  In the chapel Antonio heard none of this. He continued to look at the painting, and anger began to stir in him. He would rouse the gipsies after all. They would sweep down on Amalfi and destroy it utterly. There would be fighting, and in the fighting he might die. Both the Sanducci were down there, so the gipsies had said. He would cut them down.

  With a last wistful glance at the painting, he scrambled to his feet and turned to run out of the church. In the centre of the village there was a large gong. He would beat upon it, rouse the gipsies in the hills, and they would start at once.

  He never reached it.

  In the vestibule four figures jumped on him. He was not armed. He lost his footing and fell. They were quick about the business, and brutal. Something cut into him. He was bloody. He felt himself dragged along the stone floor and out into the dirt. Someone bent over his body with a knife, sobbing with rage. The figure turned, held something up, and then, lifting a spurred heel, kicked him in the face repeatedly. As he lost consciousness his last thought was of the Duchess. He thought she was standing beside him. Then he was dead.

  From his hill-top Bosola saw the four riders drag the body out. He saw what they did to it. Then they leaped on their horses and galloped off. The landscape waited. Bosola shivered, but despite himself he had to ride down to make sure. Uncertainly he pushed his horse forward.

  He drew to a halt before the church, but did not dismount. There was not much left of Antonio. They had kicked his skull in. That would have been Marcantonio’s touch. But they had also castrated him, and Bosola knew who had done that. As he looked down something snapped inside him. He had not known before that he had loved Antonio. As he saw that raped torn thing lying beside the body, he lost all control of himself.

  Automatically his spurs dug into the flanks of his horse. The horse jerked forward, almost throwing him. Cursing and sobbing, he took off after Ferdinand.

  When he reached Amalfi he took re
fuge in a tavern. There he lay for a day and a night trying to find some means of revenge. It was there the messenger found him out. That was the Cardinal’s doing. For once in his life the Cardinal was angry and afraid.

  IV

  It would be a mistake to think that the ambitious madmen of the Renaissance were a horde of sadistic undisciplined brutes. The guards of a torture chamber enjoy what they do. Therefore they will never rise. A love of cruelty limits them. But the Commandant is above pleasures. He is an executive. Certain things must be done. He deputizes them to those best suited to the work. His genius is to know his servants thoroughly. But they are only servants. He has no part in their concerns.

  Yet occasionally the machine runs wild. Even the Commandant cannot stop it. That is what had happened to the Cardinal, and certainly he did not like it. There comes a time when we must sacrifice even ourselves to our ambitions, for ambitions are omnivorous. First they eat others. Then our relatives. Then our lovers. Then us. A great man is thus always a phoenix. He rises from his own ashes into success. Therefore he is always a trifle impersonal: he has left himself behind. And if there was one flaw in the Cardinal’s nature, it was that he never realized that he was not a great man.

  Therefore he drove on. And Ferdinand stood in his way.

  Sitting in the Piccolomini Palace, drawing up his own plans for a regency, the Cardinal was aware of every rumour. The whole palace rocked and creaked with whispers, as a building rocks and creaks before a tornado comes. And many of these rumours concerned Ferdinand.

  Ferdinand had gone mad. He could overturn everything. Yet he could be removed in no ordinary way. That was troubling. But decision brings a kind of peace. The Cardinal, having reached his, felt once more serene, a little sorry, but serene. He called for a litter and had himself carried to Sor Juana’s convent. He had not visited it before. He looked around him curiously, feeling faintly amused. Yet he shared her views. If religion was not gorgeous, it could scarcely be said to exist. But she had spread herself too thin. Some of the plaster-work was decidedly trumpery. That would not do.