Secretum

by Rita Monaldi;Francesco Sorti

  "Very well, then. One thousand two hundred scudi in Roman coin. But not one more. And the memoirs are to become two."

  It was thus that Abbot Melani purchased the lengthy memoir in which I had described our first encounter and all the adventures which had arisen thereafter. In the second place, he was, for that sum, advancing payment for another memoir, or rather, a journal: a description of his sojourn at the Villa Spada.

  "At the Villa Spada?" I exclaimed incredulously, as we resumed our stroll.

  "Precisely. Your master, the Secretary of State, is present and the conclave is imminent; do you imagine that the flower of the Roman nobility and of the ecclesiastical hierarchy, not to mention the ambassadors, would assemble here merely for the pleasure of the occasion? The chess game of the conclave has already begun, my boy; and at the Villa Spada, many important pawns will be moved, of that you may be sure."

  "And you, I suppose, would not wish to miss a single move."

  "The conclave is my trade," he replied, without so much as a hint of modesty. "Do not forget that the illustrious Rospigliosi of Pistoia, whose guest I am honoured to be, owe me the distinction of numbering a pope among their family."

  I had already heard tell, seventeen years previously, of how Atto went around boasting of having favoured the election of Clement IX, of the Rospigliosi family.

  "So, my son," concluded Melani, "you will pen for me a chronicle in which you will give a judicious account of all that you see and hear during the coming few days, and you will add thereto whatever I may suggest to you as being desirable and opportune. You will then deliver the manuscript to me without retaining any copy thereof or thereafter reproducing any of its contents. There, those are my terms. For the time being, that is all."

  I remained perplexed.

  "Are you not content? Were it not for writers, men and their fame would die together on the same day and their virtues would be entombed with them, but the mem'ry thereof which remains written in books - that can never die!" Thus spake the Abbot with courtly prose and honeyed voice, in his endeavours to flatter me.

  He was not so mistaken, I reflected, while Atto continued with his homily.

  "Thus spake Anaxarchus, a most wise and learned philosopher, saying that one of the most worthy things that one can possess in this life is to be known by the world as intelligent in one's own profession. Indeed, even where there are millions of men learned and expert in one and the same art, only those who take pains to make themselves known will be held worthy of praise, nor will their fame die out in eternity."

  Abbot Melani wished, if I had understood him well, for a sort of biographer to celebrate his deeds during those days: a sign that he was intent upon accomplishing memorable feats, so I bethought myself, as I anxiously recalled the Abbot's enterprising audacity.

  ". . . Wherefore I, considering these things," continued Atto with an air at once pompous and vigorous, "took great pains, when young, to learn, and when I had come of age, to put into practice that which I had learned; and now I strive so to act that the world may know me. Thus, having through my words pleased several princes and great men, and having penned for them divers masterly reports in the art of diplomacy, many there have been who have availed themselves and who yet avail themselves of my skills."

  "But not all profited thereby," thought I to myself, recalling the cavalier manner in which Atto would transfer his fidelity from one master to another.

  With two little lasses to bring up, all that money was an extraordinary blessing for me and Cloridia. I had therefore not hesitated to accept Atto's offer to acquire from me what he had already stolen, well aware that I would never have my memoir back. "Just one thing, Signor Atto," said I at length. "I do not believe that my pen is worthy to bear witness to your deeds."

  In reality, I was terrified by the thought that multitudes of gentlemen and eminent persons might one day hold writings of mine in their hand. Atto understood.

  "You fear the readers. And such is your fear that you would prefer simply to continue exercising your peasant's calling, is that not so?" he asked, stopping to pick a plum.

  I replied with a look which confessed all.

  "Then, in your foreword, instead of addressing the 'kind reader', you must address the 'unkind reader'."

  "What do you mean?"

  Melani drew breath and, in didactic prose and with a presumptuous little smile on his face, he polished the plum with his lace handkerchief while instructing me as follows: "You know, many years ago, when I first gave some of my essays to be printed, I too followed the common and vulgar custom of presenting to the gentle reader my excuses for such errors as might, through my own fault, be discovered in my opus. Now, however, experience has taught me that the gentle reader, prudently perusing the works of others, will, being replete with goodness, discover the good where'er it may be, and, where he finds it not, will accept the author's goodwill. Thus was I persuaded that it was far more opportune to dedicate the foreword to my books to malign and maledicent readers, whose ears are so tender that they will be scandalised by the minutest error."

  Biting the little plum, he stopped to scrutinise my distracted expression.

  "To suchlike nasuti (to use the Latin expression), to suchlike slanderers and detractors, to whom every book appears superfluous, every work imperfect, every concept erroneous and every endeavour vain, I do proclaim my desire that they should refrain from reading my works and turn away from them, for as little as the said works will please them, so much the more will they please others. Do you know what I reply when one of those birds of ill omen importunes me with his acid considerations?"

  I responded with a questioning air.

  "I reply: if Your Worships find my work long, they should read but half of it; if short, let them add thereto whate'er they will; if it seemeth too clear, let them console themselves, knowing that they will have less trouble understanding it; if too obscure, let them make comments in the margin; if too lowly the matter and the style, so be it, for it will suffer less in falling than it would have, had it fallen from a great height."

  The Abbot closed his disquisition, sharply spitting out the plum stone almost as though it were a detractor's pen. I stood in admiration before his sagacity; from Atto Melani, thought I, one never ceased to learn.

  "I have never read your works, Signor Atto, but I am sure," I flattered him, "that the worst one could say of them would be that they are too learned."

  "Have no fear!" he replied easily, speaking with his mouth full. "That they are too learned, they will never admit; for that too is praise and such is the nature of these crows that they would not know how to give praise, even unintentionally. However, remember that most ancient oracle according to which the greatest misfortune that could befall a man is to be loved and praised by the wicked, and the greatest favour, that of being hated and blamed thereby. The truth is that the works of men are imperfect owing to the defects of our poor wits and they find detractors because of the infelicity of our times. So may it please the Lord our God to grant us the grace to acknowledge our faults, thus to emend them, and others, not to blame us for what was well meant; that the Divine Majesty be not offended either by our own errors or those of others. Do you understand?"

  I nodded in affirmation.

  Melani looked at me with an air of satisfaction and handed me a letter of exchange, payable by a moneylender in the ghetto. Slowly, I took it. It was done: I had sold myself to Atto for, so to say, a literary service, which nonetheless included in the price (as all too often happens when the pen is a means of gain) my placing myself completely at his disposal. Torn between love, disgust and interest, while the sweet and sour savour of the cherries lingered on in my mouth, I was already at his sendee.

  We had meanwhile turned back towards the great house, before which we found the massed carriages of the guests who had just arrived. In the end, what was most dreaded had happened: the guests from Rome had also arrived at the festivities two days early. Knowing that ther
e would already be banqueting from that evening onwards, no one (Atto included) had had the patience and good taste to await the official opening of the celebrations.

  Atto seemed to be scrutinising attentively the coats of arms borne by the carriages, doubtless guessing at who might be sharing the magnificent hospitality of the Spada family with him throughout the week's revels.

  "I have overheard someone tell a servant of your master that Don Livio Odescalchi is about to arrive, accompanied by the Marchesa Serlupi. Wait. . ." said he, holding me back and looking towards the carriages, far enough removed to be able to see without himself being noticed. "That is a well-known face; it seems to me... Yes, indeed, it is Monsignor D'Aste," said Atto as in the distance we saw descending from his carriage a hoary and emaciated little old man who seemed almost lost in his cardinal's vestments. "He is so small, scraggy and ill-favoured that His Holiness calls him Monsignor Stracetto - little rag!" he tittered freely, showing off his familiarity with Roman gossip.

  "I see a great movement of lackeys over there," he continued. "One of the Barberini or the Colonnas will be arriving and wants to give himself airs; they always think themselves to be the centre of the world. The carriage behind seems to bear the arms of the Durazzo family, it must be Cardinal Marcello. Of course, to have come from Faenza, where he is Bishop, is quite a journey; he'll need to take a good rest if he wants to enjoy himself. Ah, here is Cardinal Bichi," he commented, peering more intently. "I did not expect him to be on such good terms with Cardinal Fabrizio."

  "Apropos, Signor Atto, I myself did not know you were acquainted with Cardinal Spada," said I, deliberately interrupting his show of recognising guests from a distance.

  "Oh, but he was for years Nuncio in France, did you not know? At one time we frequented one another quite assiduously in Paris. He is - how can I put it? - a most accommodating person. His first concern is not to make enemies. And he does well to act thus, for in Rome that is the best way to reach high office. I'll wager that he well remembers his time in Paris, since it was then that the cardinal's hat was conferred upon him; if I am not mistaken, 'twas in 1676. He had already been Nuncio in Savoy, so he had a certain amount of experience. He has taken part in three conclaves, that of Innocent XI in 1676, that of Alexander VIII in 1689 and that of the present Pope in 1691. The coming election will be his fourth: not bad for a cardinal who is but fifty-seven years of age, what?"

  The years had passed, but not Atto's habit of recording in the greatest possible detail the careers of dozens of popes and cardinals. His Most Christian Majesty could count upon an agent who was perhaps no longer athletic but certainly enjoyed a still excellent memory.

  "Do you think that he could be elected pope this time?" I asked in the secret hope that I might one day be able to become part of a pontiff's army of servants.

  "Absolutely not. Too young. He might reign for twenty or thirty years; the other cardinals have but to think of such things to take to their beds with a fever," laughed Atto; "Now with me, he will be somewhat distant, for he will be afraid to be taken for a vassal of the King of France if he salutes Abbot Melani. Poor things, one feels for these cardinals!" he concluded, grinning scornfully.

  In the meanwhile, we continued to loiter by the gate until there appeared from the street that passed before the villa a man ancient and hunchbacked with a tremulous air and two hairs on his head, bearing on his hump a great basket full of papers. Humbly he stopped, hat in hand, to ask something of the lackeys, who responded rudely, trying to chase him away. Indeed, whoever he might have been, he ought to have presented himself at the tradesmen's entrance, where the lowly run no risk of provoking the disdain of the villa's noble guests by their mere presence.

  The Abbot drew near and gestured that 1 should follow him. The old man had rolled-up sleeves and his stomach was covered by a blackened apron; he was plainly an artisan, perhaps a typographer.

  "You are Haver, the bookbinder from the Via dei Coronari, is that not so?" Atto asked him, coming out from the gate and standing in the middle of the road. "It was I who called you. I have work for you," and he drew forth a little bundle of papers.

  "How do you want the cover?"

  "In parchment."

  "Any inscription or sign on the spine or the cover?"

  "Nothing."

  The two rapidly agreed on other matters and Atto placed a handful of coins in the old man's hands as an advance on payment.

  Suddenly we heard a piercing scream coming from the greenery by the roadside to our left.

  "After him, after him!" called a stentorian voice.

  Out darted a swift shadow and passed between us, colliding heavily with the bookbinder and Abbot Melani and causing the latter to tumble onto the gravel with a dull cry of rage and pain.

  All the papers which Atto was holding in his hand were scattered into the air in an unhappy and disorderly swirl, and the same fate befell the bookbinder's basketful of papers, while the shadow which had dashed against us rolled on the ground in a series of dramatic and indescribable somersaults.

  When at last it stopped rolling, I saw that it was a dirty and emaciated young man with a torn shirt, several days' growth of beard and a dazed and lunatic expression following the wretched accident. Around his neck he bore a poor pouch of cheap material from which various filthy objects had fallen: it seemed to me a leathern bag, a pair of old stockings and a few greasy papers, perhaps the miserable fruit of a visit to some rubbish heap in search of something edible or useful for survival.

  1 did not, however, have time to observe any better or to offer assistance to Atto or the stranger, for the uproar which I had first heard was growing louder and more violent.

  "Catch him, catch him, by all the blunderbusses!" yelled the powerful voice which I had heard before.

  1 heard a clamour of cries and curses coming from the building housing the catchpolls guarding the villa. The young man rose to his feet and began to run again, disappearing once more into the bushes.

  Atto meanwhile was propping himself up and trying unsuccessfully to rise to his feet. I was coming to assist him and the bookbinder was starting humbly to gather up the papers in his basket, when a pair of catchpolls from the villa rushed shouting out into our midst and joined the pursuer. The latter, alas, collided again with poor Atto, who collapsed on the ground. The pursuer rolled over in his turn, by some miracle avoiding the lackeys, two nuns whom I often saw bringing small hand-made objects to offer Cardinal Spada, and a pair of dogs. What with the cries of the nuns and the barking of the dogs, the road was in utter turmoil.

  I rushed to assist Abbot Melani, who lay groaning disconsolately.

  "Aahh, first one madman, then the other. . . My arm, damn

  it."

  The right sleeve of Atto's jacket, which seemed to be soaked with some blackish liquid, was badly lacerated by what looked like a slash from a knife. I freed him from the garment. An ugly wound, from which the blood gushed freely, disfigured the Abbot's flaccid and diaphanous arm.

  A pair of pious old maids, who dwelled in the great house, where they worked in the linen-room, had seen all that had happened and gave us some pieces of gauze with a little medicinal unguent which, they assured us, would soothe and bring sure healing to Atto's wound.

  "My poor arm, it seems to be my destiny," complained Atto as they bandaged his wound with gauze. "Eleven years ago I fell into a ditch and injured my arm and shoulder badly; indeed, I came close to dying. Among other things, that accident prevented me from coming to Rome for the conclave after the death of Innocent XI."

  "One might almost say that conclaves are bad for your health," I commented spontaneously, earning an ugly look from the Abbot.

  Meanwhile, a little crowd of curious onlookers, children and peasants from the neighbourhood, had gathered around us.

  "Good heavens - those two!" muttered Melani. "The first was too fast, the second, too heavy!"

  "Zounds!" exclaimed the stentorian voice. "How say you, heavy? I had almost c
aught him, the cerretano."

  The circle of people opened up suddenly, growing fearful upon hearing those rough and grave words.

  The speaker was a colossus, three times my height, twice my girth and weighing perhaps four times more than I. I turned and stared at him fixedly. Fair he was, and of virile appearance, but an old wound, which had split one of his eyebrows, conferred upon him a melancholy expression, with which his rough and youthful manners contrasted sharply.

  "In any case, and that I swear upon the points of all the halberds in Silesia, I had no intention of causing you any offence." Thus spake the uncouth giant, stepping forward.

  Without so much as a by-your-leave, he lifted Atto from the ground and effortlessly set him on his feet, as though he were a mere pine-needle. The huddle of bystanders pressed around us, greedy to know more, but was at once dispersed by the lackeys and valets from the villa, who had meanwhile arrived in large numbers. The bookbinder was busy carefully recovering all of Atto's papers, scattered here and there on either side of the gateway.

  "You are a sergeant," observed Atto, tidying himself and dusting down his jacket, "but whom were you following?"