‘And they will come soon, the happier times,’ said Scarpia. ‘Bonaparte has been defeated. The new Pope is on his way from Venice. We expect him to reach Rome in around ten days’ time. Then my work –’ he gestured towards the table piled with papers – ‘my work will be done.’
‘Couldn’t you be the sbirro of a pope as well as a king?’ asked Tosca with an impertinent smile.
Scarpia did not react to the insult. ‘You must be hungry,’ he said, ‘if you have had no lunch.’
Tosca was hungry, but how did Scarpia know that she had had no lunch?
He led her into a dining room next to his study. It was dimly lit, with candles in a silver candelabrum. They sat opposite one another at a polished table with an inlaid veneer. While one footman filled their glasses, another served first Tosca and then Scarpia with fresh langoustines and mayonnaise. They talked easily together, as former lovers often do. Tosca told Scarpia malicious stories about her rival divas and Scarpia gave her the gossip about the court in Palermo. The langoustines were eaten and followed by freshly made ravioli and then guinea fowl in a chanterelle sauce. Tosca ate with gusto. ‘And is it true,’ she asked, ‘that you drank the blood of your enemies out of a skull?’
Scarpia smiled. ‘No. But I saw things I do not like to remember. All war is terrible and civil war worst of all. Men descend into savagery and behave worse than beasts.’ He looked up from his food. ‘And that is the point, Floria. There are always many things wrong with a settled order – inequality, injustice, a chasm between the rich and the poor – but disorder is worse, and to force change leads to chaos, destroying all the certainties upon which people base their lives. Their brute instincts are unleashed. Cain turns against Abel. That is why I pursue men like Angelotti. They use liberty, equality or fraternity as slogans to stir up the people in pursuit of their own ends.’
Tosca laughed. ‘But, Vitellio, you are so handsome when you talk like that. Just like Mario.’
Scarpia gave a brief snort of exasperation. ‘Cavaradossi is unworthy of you,’ he said. ‘He is a third-rate painter, a posturing Jacobin, a would-be demagogue, a gigolo . . .’
Tosca felt her face flush at the word ‘gigolo’; if only he knew how reluctant dear Mario had been to accept the gifts she had pressed upon him; but instinct told her that if Bonaparte had indeed been defeated and the return of a Roman republic postponed, then Scarpia would retain great influence and might be persuaded to protect Mario.
‘Mario is an idealist,’ she said firmly. ‘He risks his life for liberty.’
‘He risks his life for Angelotti,’ said Scarpia irritably, ‘because he knows there will be rich pickings with the return of a republic.’
‘Oh, politics bore me,’ she said with a wave of her hand. ‘Can’t we talk about something else?’
A footman came into the room to take away their plates, refill their glasses and serve them with sorbets.
‘You are to sing in Il barbiere di Siviglia?’ Scarpia asked Tosca.
‘Yes,’ said Tosca. ‘I hope you will attend.’
‘Of course.’
‘With your wife, perhaps?’ She gave a mischievous smile.
‘Perhaps with my wife,’ said Scarpia, ‘although she now regards the theatre as frivolous. She has become very devout.’
‘Devout? Why devout?’
‘She did penance in a convent. It seems to have changed her.’
‘Penance for what?’
‘Sleeping with Jacobins.’
‘Huh. You will not find me in a convent for that.’
‘No. I don’t see you in a convent.’
‘And where do you see me, Baron Scarpia? Beneath an olive tree in Taormina?’
Scarpia smiled sadly. ‘No longer.’
Tosca leaned across the table and looked intently into Scarpia’s eyes. ‘And that is quite right, Vitellio, because I love Mario and I can only be happy with him.’
‘And will he be happy with you?’
‘Of course.’
‘I am glad you are so sure.’
‘He loves me.’
‘The priests would say –’
‘The priests!’
‘They would say,’ Scarpia went on, ‘that the love of a man and a woman is meant by God only for marriage and the procreation of children.’
‘Then God means me to love Mario because I would like to be his wife and bear his children.’
‘Truly?’
‘Truly!’
‘And would he like to be a husband and a father?’
‘I am sure.’
‘We can ask him.’
‘When?’
‘In a moment.’
‘How?’
‘I have invited him to join us with his friend Angelotti.’
Tosca was confused. ‘But . . .’
Scarpia turned his head towards sounds of movement that came from the other room. ‘This must be them.’
‘But how did you find them?’
‘One of my men followed a maidservant in a sediola.’
‘Dio mio!’
The door opened. Cavaradossi, dishevelled, his hands tied behind his back, was pushed into the room by Spoletta. He looked first at Scarpia, then at Tosca, both with equal contempt.
‘Mario!’ She ran forward to embrace him.
Cavaradossi spat in her face. ‘Puttana!’
Scarpia, who had also risen from the table, looked at Spoletta. ‘And our other guest, Angelotti?’
Spoletta shook his head. ‘Nowhere to be found.’
‘But he must have been there. There was no time to send him somewhere else.’
‘He had certainly been there – there were the women’s clothes. And he could not have escaped – the house was surrounded – but we looked everywhere. We pulled up the floorboards. We searched the barn and the stables.’
Scarpia frowned and turned towards Cavaradossi. ‘Well, we shall have to ask our guest to tell us where we can find his friend.’
‘Never,’ said Cavaradossi.
‘Then you will have to be persuaded.’
‘Never,’ said Cavaradossi again.
‘If you tell us,’ said Scarpia, ‘then we will cut loose your hands, set another place at table, and I have no doubt that His Sicilian Majesty will show his appreciation –’
‘Never,’ said Cavaradossi for a third time. Then, with a look of loathing directed at Tosca, ‘It is only weak women who betray their friends.’
‘Ah, no, Mario,’ said Tosca, now weeping, ‘I did not betray you. I was followed. I swear on the Madonna, I did not know.’
‘Weakness is not unique to women,’ said Scarpia. ‘The strappado has revealed weakness in men.’
‘No,’ cried Tosca.
‘You would not dare,’ said Cavaradossi.
‘I have no choice,’ said Scarpia. ‘There it is, waiting in the street below. I am commanded to recover the prisoner Angelotti. It is my duty.’
‘Have mercy,’ cried Tosca.
‘Did they show mercy to Gennaro Valentino?’
‘Valentino was a lackey of the Bourbons,’ said Cavaradossi.
‘And I too am a lackey of the Bourbons,’ Scarpia replied with a mock bow, ‘and it is my king’s command that I use any means necessary to apprehend Cesare Angelotti.’
‘Do your worst,’ said Cavaradossi.
‘As you wish,’ said Scarpia.
He turned to Spoletta. ‘Take him down.’
‘Tre tratti di corda?’
‘Yes.’
Cavaradossi gave a last look of disdain at Tosca as Spoletta pulled him to the door and out of the room.
Tosca, weeping, turned to Scarpia and fell to her knees. ‘I beg you, no, do not torture him, do not be so cruel.’
Scarpia looked into the face now smudged with mascara. ‘I have no choice.’
‘You once loved me, Scarpia, and for that moment I loved you. Is that not enough?’
Scarpia looked at her sadly. ‘I wish you well, Floria, but I must d
o my duty.’
Tosca looked away towards the window then, with a flushed face and a desperate expression, back at Scarpia. ‘And if I were to tell you where to find Angelotti?’
Scarpia looked sharply at Tosca. ‘You know?’
‘Would you then spare Mario the corda?’
‘Of course. There would be no need.’
‘And release him?’
‘Yes.’
‘I trust to your honour, Scarpia.’
‘I will keep my word.’
‘In the garden of the house, there is a well. In the well, there are rungs set into the side. Halfway down, there is an opening to a cistern. That is where you will find Angelotti.’
Scarpia went to the door and gave orders to a sbirro. He returned and gestured to Tosca to sit back at the table. Her appetite had gone, but she dared not refuse. Both cut into their sorbets with their silver-gilt spoons, but only Scarpia raised his to his mouth: on Tosca’s plate the cold crystals melted into a pool of coloured liquid. There was a commotion in the salon. They both rose from the table and went through to find Cavaradossi, still with his hands tied behind his back, held not by Spoletta but two sbirri. He looked furiously at Tosca. ‘You told them.’
‘I told them nothing.’
‘I heard them. You told them about the well.’
‘For you, Mario.’
‘For me. There is no me. I am shamed, dishonoured, brought down by a whore.’
‘I could not bear for you to suffer,’ said Tosca. Her tone was that of a nursemaid who has been cruel to be kind.
‘And now? Do I not suffer?’
‘Mario, you are alive!’
A lackey entered and handed Scarpia a letter. He opened it with his silver knife, read it rapidly, frowned, then turned to Cavaradossi. ‘It may alleviate your suffering, cavaliere, to know that we were misinformed about the Battle of Marengo. Bonaparte counter-attacked. Melas is defeated. The French have won.’
‘Vittoria!’ cried Cavaradossi.
Scarpia looked again at the letter, his brow puckered, then said: ‘Marengo is a long way from Rome.’
‘Release me, you viper,’ said Cavaradossi, ‘and I will put in a good word.’
Scarpia smiled. ‘The Pope will reach Rome before Bonaparte and my orders are to wrap up our business here before he comes.’ He nodded to the sbirri. ‘Take him to the Castel Sant’Angelo. Lock him up while we wait for Angelotti.’
‘You are done for, Scarpia,’ shouted Cavaradossi as he was dragged from the room. ‘You cannot stop history!’
*
Scarpia and Tosca were once again alone together, but neither spoke. Scarpia returned to his desk to prepare the passports and safe conducts that he had promised Tosca. He was tired. He wished it all to be over. He glanced at the letter telling him of Bonaparte’s triumph at Marengo. Would the French now march on Rome? Would the new Pope be deposed? A second republic installed with Angelotti revered as a martyr and Cavaradossi acclaimed as a hero? Scarpia would have to flee once again, but this time Paola and the children would come with him, and how much happier he would be than he was now, playing with Francesca in the garden of the villa in Bagheria, or riding with Pietro among the pine trees in the hills above Castelfranco. Cavaradossi was welcome to fame and fortune – and to Tosca.
Tosca was also tired, and she too was thinking, struggling against the befuddlement caused by the wine to think through what had happened and what should be done. She had betrayed Angelotti. So what? She owed nothing to that pig, who had treated her with contempt, and if his death was the price for saving Mario, it was a bargain. But Mario did not see it that way. Clearly, he believed that she was the accomplice, if not the mistress, of Scarpia. Why else would she be dining so intimately with a man she did not know? How could she persuade him that Scarpia was not her lover? That he was merely her friend? A friend! The man who drank his enemies’ blood out of a skull! Would friendship be any more excusable than love? What if Mario continued to spurn her? What if he despised her for saving his life? What could she do to win back his love? How could she convince him that she had not sold herself to Scarpia? What could prove beyond doubt that he was her only love?
An hour passed. Both Tosca and Scarpia were preoccupied with their own thoughts. The low light seemed to change the man whom Tosca glanced at every now and then, from the handsome Sicilian, so gallant in Venice, so attractive in Taormina, into a hooded falcon waiting to pounce on two innocent lovers, tear them to pieces and eat their flesh. But his days were numbered. Bonaparte had won the Battle of Marengo. The French would return to Rome. The republic would be restored, with Cavaradossi a hero and perhaps Tosca a heroine should she, like Luisa Sanfelice in Naples, do something heroic for the cause.
*
A footman came in, renewed the candles and offered both Tosca and Scarpia glasses of Marsala which Tosca accepted but Scarpia refused. When the footman had left the room, Scarpia got up from his desk and crossed to Tosca.
‘Listen, Floria,’ he said. ‘This is what I propose. When Spoletta returns with Angelotti, he will be taken to join Cavaradossi in the Castel Sant’Angelo where both men will be shot at dawn.’
‘So you will break your promise?’
‘No, I shall keep my promise. Cavaradossi will not die. There will be no shot in the soldiers’ muskets. You will be allowed to see him before his execution, and you must tell him that when he hears the shots he must pretend to be dead. Then when the firing squad withdraws, you can both leave. I have prepared passports and safe conducts for you both.’
Tosca took the papers from Scarpia, but felt no gratitude: she was merely receiving, after all, no more than the fee for her betrayal of Angelotti. And while she might have saved the life of her lover, Mario, she had by no means secured his love. Would he accept clemency he believed she had bought with her body? She knew Mario. He would rather die than be dishonoured. He might well refuse to play dead.
Sounds came from the outer chamber. The door opened and Spoletta entered accompanied by a sbirro but no one else.
‘Angelotti?’ asked Scarpia.
‘He cheated us,’ said Spoletta. ‘He slipped from our grasp and threw himself down the well.’
‘He is dead?’
‘Yes. Drowned. We climbed down and fished him out.’
‘You have his corpse to prove it?’
‘We do.’
‘Good. Send it to Naselli.’
‘And the other?’ said Spoletta.
‘He must be shot. A firing squad at dawn but, Guido, it is to be an execution like that of Count Palmieri.’
‘The same as Count Palmieri?’
‘The same as Count Palmieri.’
‘Are you sure?’
‘I am sure.’ Scarpia glanced at Tosca. ‘La signorina Tosca is to be allowed to see him before his execution.’
Spoletta bowed. ‘Very well.’
*
Spoletta left with the sbirro. Scarpia turned to Tosca. ‘Go to the Castel Sant’Angelo,’ he said. ‘Tell Cavaradossi what he has to do. Spoletta knows what has been arranged. And when the pantomime is over, leave Rome. Go north to the French. Later, when they retake Rome, you can return and fulfil your engagements.’
‘But you will not be there to hear me sing,’ said Tosca, going towards the door, and standing before a gilt-framed mirror to straighten her dress and adjust her hair.
Scarpia came up behind her, holding open her cloak. ‘No, this time it really is addio.’
‘Yes, Scarpia, addio.’ Tosca drew out the pearl-handled stiletto, turned, and thrust it through the white silk of his shirt into his chest. The blade met no resistance. She pushed it to the hilt, straight at his heart. Scarpia gave a choking cry and looked down as blood spurted from the wound onto the bodice of her dress. Then he looked up into her eyes. ‘But, Floria . . .’ A look of astonishment was followed by one of sadness and then, as he staggered and fell, again that melancholy smile. He fell to the floor and, after some further convulsions, lay st
ill.
*
Tosca’s coach was waiting outside the Palazzo Farnese. She had left a shawl on the seat and now wrapped it around her shoulders to keep out the damp of the dawn, and cover the blotch of blood on the bodice of her dress. She did not have long. She had dragged Scarpia’s body behind the curtains, and no doubt the footmen would not disturb their master alone with a woman until well after dawn. In her hands she held the papers which would take her through gates and past guards, and when they were alone she would pull back the shawl and show him the bloodstains to prove that her love for him knew no bounds. She had killed the viper. And she had saved his life.
At the outer gates of the Castel Sant’Angelo, Tosca showed the laissez-passer signed by Scarpia. The gates were opened. Her coachman whipped the horses to take the coach up the steep road through the cavernous interior of Hadrian’s Mausoleum, over the drawbridge and onto the concourse at the top. There, after a further scrutiny of her papers, she was shown into the governor’s quarters. The officer of the guard rubbed his eyes, looked with puzzlement at Tosca, then at the papers, then asked her why she was there.
‘I am permitted to see the prisoner Cavaradossi before his execution.’
The officer looked at the order signed by Scarpia, then told a soldier to fetch Spoletta. Tosca sat, waiting for Spoletta to appear. When he did so, he showed no surprise at her presence. ‘You wish to see the prisoner? Of course. I will take you to his cell.’
Tosca followed him out of the guardroom and along the ramparts to the room where Cavaradossi was held. His hands were no longer tied, but when he saw Tosca he made no attempt to embrace her. He looked away from her, his head tilted in a heroic pose.
Tosca turned to Spoletta. ‘I wish to talk to him privately.’
‘Of course.’ Spoletta smiled, a smile that was somehow terrible, but Tosca did not pause to wonder what it might mean. He went to the door. ‘You must be quick. The sun is about to rise.’
Tosca crossed the room to Cavaradossi. ‘Mario, you are saved. There will be no balls in the muskets. You are to fall and play dead and then, when the soldiers withdraw, we may leave the castello. I have passports – we can fly from Rome.’
Cavaradossi turned, as she knew he would, with a look of contempt. ‘And what price have you paid for this clemency?’
Scarpia Page 34
