The Etruscan Net

by Michael Gilbert

  ‘I know very little about these things,’ said Ferri. ‘I expect you’re right. Let me get you another drink.’

  The room was filling up. Broke spotted Doctor Solferini, curator of the Museo Archeologico, talking to a severe-looking lady in black and made his way across to join them. The Doctor greeted him warmly, introduced him to the lady, who turned out to be his wife, and said, ‘Is this the first Rasenna party you’ve been to?’

  ‘It’s the first party I’ve been to since I’ve come out here.’

  ‘A severe baptism of fire,’ said the Doctor.

  ‘What actually happens?’

  ‘We drink, and eat. In a modified version of the Etruscan style.’

  ‘Modified?’

  ‘We could hardly go the whole way. Wine served by naked slaves! Orgies under the table!’

  ‘I’m afraid,’ said Broke, ‘that I never really believed any of that. I think their paintings show the slaves waiting on them as naked in order to demonstrate that they were slaves. It was a convention. Like always showing women dressed in chiton and himation, or men in chlamys and tebennos. And as for the orgies–’

  ‘Orgies,’ said Professor Bronzini, popping up behind them like a porpoise out of the waves. ‘Lies. Lies invented by that Greek gossip, Theopompus, and propagated by the Romans, in a deliberate attempt to vilify the Etruscans. Your glasses are empty, gentlemen. More to drink.’ He clapped his hands again and a boy slid through the crowd towards them. The Professor disappeared as suddenly as he had arrived.

  ‘Where on earth does he get all these servants from?’ asked Broke.

  ‘He breeds them,’ said Doctor Solferini.

  ‘My dear!’ said his wife.

  ‘I don’t mean literally. I mean that he has two or three large properties in the neighbourhood of Volterra, and the young men from the farms come up and help at the Villa. I expect they enjoy it.’

  ‘I see,’ said Broke, trying to keep the disapproval out of his voice.

  One of the difficulties, he foresaw, was going to be the disposal of drinks. He had no idea how long the preliminaries were going to last, and the idea of consuming half a dozen beakers of wine before dinner was not one which appealed to him at all. At a civilized cocktail party there would have been a number of useful little tables on which you could have deposited one nearly full glass before accepting another. The furnishing of this room inhibited such tactics.

  He edged his way towards the entrance at the far end. This gave on to a small and much darker room. It seemed to be some sort of conservatory. There were plants growing in pots, arranged on slatted shelves, and other plants trained on trellis-work. Broke tipped the contents of his glass into a pot which contained a very large and very prickly cactus, and was on the point of retiring when he heard a low chuckle behind him.

  He swung round and saw a young man watching him. Seen even in the half-light of the ante-room, it was a remarkable face. It was the blond, straight featured, Anglo-Saxon face which came over with the Crusaders, and has never died out in Northern Italy; a remarkable contrast to the coarser, black-haired, thick featured farm boys. The features had more than regularity. They had a sort of prettiness which was startling. This was a young divinity, descended for a whim from Olympus, to consort with hinds and satyrs. The fashionable Florentine drawl dispelled the illusion.

  ‘I don’t blame you,’ said the youth. ‘Personally I’d prefer a martini every time, but unfortunately martinis weren’t invented in the fifth century bc. My name’s Mercurio, by the way. I’m the son of the house. The adopted, not the natural son.’

  ‘My name’s Broke – I’m running the Galleria delle Arti for Welford Hussey.’

  ‘Oh yes. I heard he’d gone off chasing Incas. Whilst you’re here, would you like to look at the holy of holies? The old man will take a conducted tour later, I expect.’

  Broke said, ‘Thank you. If you think your father wouldn’t object.’

  The young man led the way across the conservatory and down three steps to a low door. ‘Have to mind your head here,’ he said. ‘The whole thing’s constructed to look like a tomb. Ghoulish sort of idea. Typical of the old man though.’ He took out a key and unlocked the heavy wooden door, which swung back with a soundless ease which betokened good workmanship. Mercurio clicked on the electric light.

  The room was in two parts, divided by an arch. It was paved with stone and walled in naked brick. A low stone bench ran the length of one wall, continuing through into the far part of the cellar, and along the short wall at the far end.

  ‘That’s for the corpses,’ said Mercurio.

  The other long way was covered with shelves of varying depths. On them were set an astonishing collection of objects; terracotta vases, hydria and kraters; figures human and animal, kouroi and kriophoroi; candelabra, stampiglia, small oil lamps, locks and keys, pots and pans, mirrors of polished bronze, and a bewildering array of personal ornaments, fibulae, diadems, bracelets, earrings and finger-rings in worked and knurled gold and set with precious stones. Hidden lighting from behind the shelves showed up these treasures in artful relief.

  ‘Sort of mixture between a funeral parlour and museum,’ said Mercurio. ‘Do you know anything about these things?’

  ‘A certain amount,’ said Broke. He was particularly interested in the terracotta figures. It was impossible, without a closer examination than he could make as they stood on their shelves, to be certain whether they were genuine Etruscan relics or very fine copies.

  ‘I always feel a bit embarrassed about this one,’ said Mercurio, with a giggle. He indicated an incense burner. It was in sculptured bronze, and the stem in the form of a dancing boy, naked except for the leather shoes which came halfway up the calf. ‘That’s me.’

  ‘I see,’ said Broke. ‘Are the others all modern copies too?’

  ‘Some are, some aren’t. I believe most of the pottery things are real. There wouldn’t be much point in faking them, would there? I mean, they’re so ugly.’

  Broke made no comment on this. He was wishing that he could have a few hours alone in the place, with direct instead of indirect lighting, and a strong glass.

  ‘I take it the rule is, don’t touch?’ he said.

  ‘As long as you don’t drop anything,’ said Mercurio. ‘The old man thinks rather highly of these bits and pieces. They’re the ones he means to take with him into the next world.’

  ‘Do you mean to say he intends to be buried here?’

  ‘That’s the big idea. Embalmed, and laid out on that shelf.’

  ‘But would the authorities allow it?’

  ‘I’ve no idea,’ said Mercurio. ‘But since the old coot’ll be dead, it’ll be no skin off his nose if he does end up in the cemetery, like other people.’

  Broke had nothing to say to this. Presumably Mercurio owed anything he had to the Professor. He thought that he might have spoken a bit more kindly about him.

  Mercurio was looking at him with a curious glint in his almond-shaped eyes. It reminded Broke of something, a fleeting likeness, which he could not pin down.

  ‘You don’t like me, do you?’ he said. ‘Very few people do. If you want to look at anything, you’d better hurry. You may not get another chance.’

  Broke was examining a black-figure amphora. He was fairly certain that he had seen one like it, either in the Antikensammlungen at Berlin, or in the Metropolitan Museum at New York. It had a scene, painted continuously round the base, of lions pulling down a deer. It was full of the brutal detail which the Etruscans loved. The claw of one of the lions was sunk into the eye of the deer. Another lion had his fangs deep in one haunch which it seemed to be detaching from the living animal.

  Broke had his hand out to pick it up when a deep voice behind him said, ‘I am sent to call you to dinner.’

  It was the burly janitor who had opened the front door to them. He had a beefy, but placid face, and moved like an athlete.

  ‘All right, Arturo. We’ll come when we’re ready.’
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  ‘Your father particularly told me to find you. The other guests are already seated.’

  For a moment it seemed as though the boy would refuse. Then he said, ‘I suppose we’d better go. The old man gets terribly touchy about his meals.’

  He stumped out. Arturo held the door open for them to leave, turned out the lights, and pulled the door shut. It closed with a click against its spring lock.

  Broke had half expected that they would be required to eat their dinner reclining on couches, but he found a conventional table laid in the garden-room at the back of the house. The seats were solid, and well cushioned. The guests, most of whom had been standing about for a couple of hours, seemed glad to be sitting down. One Etruscan custom, at least, was faithfully observed. There was no hurry about bringing on the food. Dishes of nuts and olives were circulated, and the wine goblets were kept topped up.

  There were twenty-four of them at table. Broke found himself near to his host, separated from him only by Doctor Solferini’s wife, with the doctor next to him. Opposite sat a swarthy young man whose face seemed vaguely familiar. He was not left long in doubt. The young man said, ‘Antonio Lucco, from Rome.’

  ‘Robert Broke, from England.’

  A whisper from Signora Solferini said, ‘The celebrated association football player.’

  Broke remembered him then. He also remembered an account of a very ugly incident in the European Cup semi-finals the year before, in which an English player had broken his ankle.

  Lucco said, ‘I had thought you might be English. You speak Italian well, but by no means perfectly.’

  ‘I will hope to improve during the year I am here,’ said Broke. And to Doctor Solferini, ‘I imagine you have seen the remarkable treasures which our host keeps in his’ – it seemed indelicate to say ‘tomb’ – ‘in his strong-room?’

  ‘I have indeed. But I have had no real chance–’

  ‘The English,’ announced Lucco, ‘invented the game of football. But they have forgotten how to play it.’

  Since this remark appeared to be directed to him, Broke turned away, reluctantly, from the doctor, and said, ‘Oh?’

  ‘They make the mistake of treating it as a science. We recognize it as an art.’

  ‘We seemed to do all right in the World Cup.’

  ‘On English pitches. With selected referees.’

  The insult was too childish to upset Broke. He laughed. ‘I don’t think we could afford to bribe all the referees. We’re a very poor country, you know. You were saying, doctor–’

  ‘I was saying,’ said Doctor Solferini, ‘that although I have been permitted to walk through the strong-room on more than one occasion, I have never yet had an opportunity of examining the contents in detail. If they are as fine as I suspect they are, one would wish that they could be on public exhibition in one of our museums, for part of the year, at least.’

  ‘Where do they come from?’

  ‘All of them, I imagine, from the complex of tombs near Volterra which are being gradually explored. The tombs are, of course, on the Professor’s own property, and are being opened under his control.’

  ‘Are the public allowed to watch the process?’

  ‘They are not available to the public, but you could certainly get permission.’

  ‘Direct and virile play,’ said Lucco to his neighbour, a wide-eyed girl, ‘is confined now to Continental and South American teams. We play football. The English play at it.’

  ‘That’s right,’ said the girl. She knew nothing about football, but she thought Lucco was terrific.

  ‘Now, Signor Broke,’ said the Professor from his throne at the top of the table, ‘you shall tell us what you think of the Etruscan way of life.’

  It was on the tip of Broke’s tongue to make a complimentary and entirely non-committal reply; but he was hungry, was conscious that he would have been much wiser not to have come, and had been provoked by Lucco. He said, ‘I find it extremely interesting, Professor. It corresponds so exactly, in my opinion, to the stage we have reached in our own modern western civilization.’

  The Professor cracked a nut with his teeth, and said, ‘And what do you mean by that?’

  ‘The Etruscans were, at the start, an aristocracy founded on prowess in war, but it degenerated into an aristocracy of wealth. As soon as an aristocracy loses its martial character, it loses its true spirit and its will to lead. It is like a football team which buys its stars from abroad, instead of breeding them for itself.’

  ‘Because we have a Brazilian centre-half–’ said Lucco, angrily.

  ‘Quiet, Antonio,’ said the Professor. ‘We are talking about something more important than football. Can you justify your generalization, Mr Broke?’

  ‘It was only a generalization, I agree. We know too little about the Etruscans to be certain of anything. But I would say, on the evidence available, that they were a nation who preferred to pay other people to do things for them, rather than doing them for themselves. A Greek gentleman could compose a set of verses, play a musical instrument, or run a mile in the games. We’ve lost the Etruscan language, so we’ll never know about those verses. But we do know that the Etruscan had his music played for him, by slaves, and his sports performed by professional gladiators. Wouldn’t you agree, Professor Bartolozzi?’

  Professor Bartolozzi, a mild old man with a goat-like beard and a sad face, said, ‘I think that comparisons between Greeks and Etruscans have been over-stressed. The Etruscans are sometimes held to be mere copyists. Now, that is a view I will never accede to.’

  ‘I agree,’ said Broke. ‘Rather talented youngsters learning from a revered elder, and then producing minor masterpieces of their own.’

  ‘Minor?’ said Bronzini. ‘If you call Vulca of Veii a minor master you must have very odd ideas of what constitutes a major art, Mr Broke.’

  ‘There are exceptions, of course.’

  ‘I perceive that you are at heart a Roman. The Romans,’ the Professor was now addressing the company at large, ‘were the traditional enemies of the Etruscans. The enmity was based on envy. The Etruscans had made the Romans what they were. They had transformed Rome from a second-class village, on a swamp, into a city with temples, places of entertainment, paved roadways, municipal government–’

  ‘And drains,’ said Broke.

  ‘You laugh at their achievements?’

  ‘Far from it. The drains were their most important achievement. The Coliseum may be in ruins, but the cloaca maxima is still working.’

  ‘I find your attitude, Mr Broke, a typical Roman compound of ignorance and arrogance.’

  ‘Don’t let’s quarrel over it,’ said Broke. ‘The Etruscans were a fine people. They enjoyed life more than any of their contemporaries. More than most people do today, I should say. Wherever they’ve gone to, from those lovely tombs of theirs, I wish them nothing but well.’

  Doctor Solferini said, ‘Hear, hear,’ in a loud voice, and conversation was resumed all round the table. Boys appeared carrying tureens of soup, and the dinner got under way at last. Professor Bronzini still looked ruffled, but he confined his comments to his immediate neighbours. Fish stuffed with almonds followed the soup. Duck stuffed with chestnuts and sage followed the fish. A rich but unanalyzable Florentine confection followed the duck. The lengthy intervals between the courses were occupied by talking, listening to the musicians, and drinking.

  As the evening went on, Broke found it more and more difficult to keep awake. If he had been doing anything more than sip at his constantly refilled goblet of wine he might have managed to keep his end up better. He felt that he had exhausted every possible conversational gambit with the Doctor and his wife. He was so tired that he found himself thinking, and framing his sentences, in English and then translating them belatedly into Italian.

  Opposite him, Commander Comber was enjoying himself with a vivacious Italian brunette. He seemed to be reciting to her Macaulay’s ‘Lay of Horatius’, translating it into Italian as he we
nt along. When he reached the verse about the grapes in the vats of Luna being trampled under the feet of laughing girls whose sires had marched to Rome, his rendering of it reduced his neighbour to such extremes of mirth that she leant her head on the Commander’s chest and was quietly and elegantly sick down the front of his shirt. At this point Broke felt a thud on his own shoulder and found that Signora Solferini had fallen asleep. He shifted her head round until it was comfortable, and closed his own eyes.

  At an immeasurable time after this there was a general stir amongst the guests, and Broke realized that dinner was over. He propped the Doctor’s wife in a vertical position, and rose stiffly from his seat. A glance at his wrist told him that it was a quarter to four.

  He strolled out on to the terrace to smoke a cigarette. It was the darkest moment of the night. In less than an hour, as the earth completed one more of its uncounted rotations, the stars would be going out, the mountain peaks in the east would be hardening as the sky paled behind them, and another day would be born.

  ‘“But look, the morn, in russet mantle clad”,’ said Comander Comber, from behind him, ‘“walks o’er the dew of yon high eastern hill.” Wonderful chap, Shakespeare. He didn’t need stage lighting. He gave it all to you in the script. Do you think we could find our host, and be slipping quietly away?’

  ‘What have you done with that brunette?’

  ‘I surrendered her, without too much of a struggle, to one of her compatriots. He has taken her down into the olive grove, to listen to the cicadas.’

  ‘Then let’s go.’

  As they turned back into the house Comber said, ‘I did warn you it wouldn’t be an ordinary cocktail party, didn’t I?’

  ‘You did,’ said Broke. ‘And next time, I’ll pay some attention to your warnings.’

  They found Professor Bronzini with the hard core of the party in the reception room. He was demonstrating his prowess on the double pipes and had just finished a rendering of what sounded like the ‘Flowers of the Forest’.

  ‘Go?’ he said. ‘Of course you mustn’t go, my dear fellow. The night is still young. You have work to do tomorrow? No true Etruscan ever thinks about tomorrow. But I had forgotten. You are not an Etruscan. You are a Roman. The disciplina Romana! A code which starts with self-control, but always ends by imposing control on others. The axe and the rods, eh?’