Secretum am-2

by Rita Monaldi

  Until that moment, so intent had we been on finding traces of the presence of the three august members of the Sacred College of Cardinals (and we had indeed discovered footprints) that we had not deigned to accord our attention to what was most interesting in this hall: the rich collection of paintings hung on the walls. Atto stood by my side as I focused on the paintings, realising that the only subject of the collection was, as might have been expected, a set of graceful women's faces.

  Abbot Melani began to pass rapidly from one picture to the next without even needing to read the names on the frames, which showed the identity of the ladies in question. He knew each face to perfection (and meant to show that off), having seen them either in the flesh or in so many other portraits, and he told me their names.

  "Her Majesty Anne of Austria, the late, lamented mother of the Most Christian King," he recited, almost as though he were presenting her to me in flesh and blood, showing me the sweet, haughty face of the deceased sovereign, that rather penetrating look, the forehead not excessively high, the round but noble neck embraced with loving respect by the low-cut organza collar of her sumptuous black taffeta gown, enriched by a bodice of pleated brocade on which the diaphanous royal hands were limply abandoned.

  "As I had occasion to tell you when we met, the Queen Mother loved my singing, I could say, in no ordinary way," he added with a touch of vanity, adjusting his wig with a rapid and discreet gesture. "Above all, sad arias, sung in the evening."

  He then passed on to the portraits of the Princess Palatine, Countess Marescotti, and the late lamented Henrietta, sister- in-law of the Most Christian King, all so nobly and realistically depicted that it seemed as though they might just have lunched at the great table nearby.

  It was then that we came to the last portrait, a little in the shade by comparison with the others, yet still visible.

  Since our regard is subject to desire, while the word is ruled by the intellect, my eyes were swifter to embrace that feminine visage and to recognise it among my memories than was Abbot Melani to announce her name.

  That was why, when he said: "Madama Maria Mancini," I had already recognised her. It was without a doubt the young maiden we had glimpsed through the hedge, in the park.

  "Of course, all this was the play of your imagination," said Atto, after listening to my explanation, as we left the great hall, taking a door to the left. "You were unduly influenced by an agreeable and unexpected encounter. That can happen, and I can assure you that when I was your age it happened often."

  When proffering those words, he turned his head away from me.

  "Still, I do not understand where the maiden and her companion can have disappeared to," I objected.

  Atto did not reply. On the walls of the chamber there were various prints in the form of pictures which, using a skilful optical illusion, represented ancient bas-reliefs with singular grace and lightness. What was more, here too was a series of portraits, this time, of men.

  Here also, the openings in the wall were ornamented with sayings concerning life at court.

  THE GOOD COURTIER To acquire merit:

  Serve with punctuality and modesty

  Always speak well of your Lord and ill of no one

  Praise without excess

  Practise with the best

  Listen more than you speak

  Love good men

  Win over the bad

  Speak gently

  Operate promptly

  Neither trust someone nor mistrust everyone

  Neither reveal your own secret nor listen willingly to those of others

  Do not interrupt others' speeches and be not prolix in your own

  Believe those who are more learned than yourself

  Do not undertake things greater than you

  Do not believe easily or answer without thinking

  Suffer, and dissimulate

  THE COURT

  In Courts, there are always some wolves in sheep's clothing

  Against treachery in Courts there is no better remedy than withdrawal and distance

  The Court often takes light from the streets

  The Court and satisfaction are two excessively great extremes

  In the air of the Court the wind of ambition must of necessity blow

  The affairs of Courts do not always move at the speed desired by the most zealous

  In Courts, even the most sincere friendships are not exempt from the poison of false suspicions

  Most courtiers are monsters with two tongues and two hearts.

  "Yet, to me she does seem to be the same young maiden!" I decided to insist, while Atto was pointing his nose in the air to read the maxims. "Are you sure that today Maria Mancini is nearly sixty years of age? The maiden we saw… well, I tell you, she is identical to the woman in the picture, but seems rather young."

  He stopped reading brusquely and looked me straight in the eye.

  "Do you think I could be mistaken?"

  He turned his eyes away from mine and turned to the pictures, to explain them for me. The subjects of the pictures were this time illustrious names from France and from Italy: pontiffs, poets, men of science, sovereigns and their consorts, ministers of state.

  "His Holiness the late Pope Alexander VII; His Holiness the late Pope Clement IX, the Cavalier Bernini, the Cavaliere Cassiano del Pozzo; the Cavalier Marino; His Majesty the late King Louis XIII; His Reigning Majesty Louis XIV.."

  While he reviewed the list of names, passing hurriedly from one picture to the next, it seemed to me that Atto was still annoyed by my question about the age of Maria Mancini. In reality, he must be right: I could not have seen Maria in the park, not only because she had not yet reached Rome, but because, being the same age as the Most Christian King, she must, like the Sovereign, be sixty years of age or more.

  "His Eminence the late Cardinal Richelieu; His Eminence the late Cardinal Mazarin; the deceased Minister Colbert; the deceased Superintendent Fouquet…"

  He stopped.

  '"Suffer, and dissimulate'…" said he to himself, repeating one of the maxims he had just read on the walls of the room.

  "I beg your pardon?"

  '"Most courtiers are monsters with two tongues and two hearts'!" he smiled, quoting another of the maxims theatrically, as though he wished to mask some unwelcome thought with a joke.

  "It is getting late," the Abbot commented as soon as we had left the Vessel, scrutinising the violet of the sky.

  The search of the premises had not led to much. Apart from a few footprints, we had found no trace of the three cardinals and in any case there was not enough time to explore the whole villa.

  "Now, go back and work in the gardens at Spada. Keep your mouth closed and behave as though nothing had happened."

  "To tell the truth, I must repair the damage done by the thief before Cloridia returns…"

  "For that I shall reimburse you at double its value, so your little wife will soon be consoled. You must be present this evening, after Vespers. Now, be on your way!" he exhorted me rather brusquely.

  Atto was nervous, very nervous.

  Evening the Second

  8th July, 1700

  While I was making my way towards the garden shed in order to collect my tools, I reflected that Atto had not once asked me about Cloridia: how she was, when he would be seeing her again, what she was doing now, and so on. Never a word, and not even now that he had mentioned her did he take the trouble to ask me anything, however circumstantial, about her. And this despite the fact that he had read in the memoir which he had stolen from me the whole incredible story of Cloridia. A story which, many years before, at the time of the Locanda del Donzello, he could never have imagined. Not that they frequented one another at the time. On the contrary, as far as I could recall, they had not exchanged a single word, deliberately ignoring one another. I had never heard Atto pronounce her name, save scornfully. The castrato and the courtesan: I could surely not expect a friendship to be born…

  "Y
ou are dismissed! Your work is disgusting."

  For a moment, my heart almost failed me when that strident voice caught me unawares.

  I turned around and saw him a few paces from me, seated on a branch while he stroked his beak with his hooked talons.

  "Dismissed, disss — missed!" Caesar Augustus repeated, amusing himself as he was wont to do whenever, between one task and another, I allowed myself a short break. He had probably learned that disagreeable phrase in some shop during his peregrinations across the city.

  "What are you doing up there?" I asked him in my turn, irritated by the surprise. "Why do you not get back into your cage?"

  He held his peace, as though there was no need to reply and rocked his head rhythmically to show his displeasure. It was one of those days, frequent during changes in the seasons, when Caesar Augustus was melancholy and irritable. Days on which, to vent his anxieties, he would always end up by doing something awful.

  Giving immediate and troublesome substance to his malaise, Caesar Augustus went into action. He took flight, sped past brushing my face, turned, plummeted down, landed next to me and, with his beak, boldly seized the small sickle which I had left on the ground.

  "No, for goodness sake, give that back to me at once!"

  "Dismiss him, dismiss him!" he repeated again with a malign glint in his little round eyes. The small sickle, grasped firmly in his beak, in no way prevented him from imitating the human voice to perfection, the sound issuing, not from the throat, like ours, but from some unimaginable guttural cavity. He spread his great white wings, beating them clumsily in the still summer air, and took off.

  In a few instants I lost sight of him; but not only because he had rapidly disappeared over the horizon. While watching Caesar Augustus's departure, I had in fact been distracted by a small detail. Out of the corner of my eye, I seemed for a few fleeting moments to catch a glimpse of a shadow observing me from behind a hedge. But it was very hot, perhaps I was mistaken.

  "Move aside, boy."

  I was at once roused from such ephemeral impressions by that firm and impatient voice ordering me to stand aside. Making their way between the hedges of the little drive were two valets escorting a third person: in lay apparel His Eminence Cardinal Spada was advancing, his expression even more livid than the day before.

  I bowed respectfully while the trio passed me and proceeded towards the gates of the villa. When I rose and dusted down my breeches, I seemed again to hear rustling and once more had the indefinable impression that I was being watched by malign and inquiring eyes. I looked all around me, but without catching sight even vaguely of the dark silhouette which I could have sworn I had seen only moments before, moving behind the surrounding hedges. While at the end of the drive Cardinal Spada disappeared from sight with his two escorts, above their heads I saw instead Caesar Augustus fluttering silently.

  Once I had finished my work trimming the hedge and accomplished my duties at the aviary, I realised that no little time remained to me before my appointment with Abbot Melani after Vespers.

  I decided to make a quick visit home. There, alas, I found the same painful chaos to which, only a few hours before, I had awoken. For a few moments I fell a prey to anguish as I saw with what rabid fury those faceless strangers had with impunity disrupted the fine order of Cloridia's and my alcove.

  When I had rearranged everything properly, I returned to the Villa Spada. There, in the garden, the heat was rather oppressive. I took off my shirt and curled up in the shade of a tall beech, in a little secret place on the heights, under the outer wall, where I and Cloridia were wont to meet during brief pauses in our work, away from curious glances. From that point, one looked out over the drive below, but, concealed by the leaves, it was almost impossible to be seen. The act of putting our possessions back in order after the devastation wrought by the vandals had made the absence of my sweet wife all the more bitter. And as I sighed and moaned with nostalgia and impatience at the thought of her, 1 found myself thinking of the amours of the Sun King with Maria Mancini, and of the strange passion which seemed to unite Maria and Atto who, after thirty years in voluminous and secret epistolary correspondence, had still never again seen one another.

  In truth everything surrounding Atto was bizarre, unusual, arcane. What could one say of the strange phenomena at the Vessel? And was there a connection between the death of the bookbinder, Atto's wounding and the strange circumstances in which this had taken place? On top of all that, there was the extremely troubling fact of the double raid on Buvat and myself, after we had both been safely drugged.

  Again, I felt confusion, even desperation clutching at my breast. The languor of love for my Cloridia had given way to fear.

  What was really happening? Were we perhaps the victims, as Melani had written to the Connestabilessa, of some pro-imperial plot? Or was this to do with the cerretani, as Sfasciamonti maintained? Or both things at once?

  I began once more to reprove myself for having let myself get caught up again in the Abbot's webs. This time, in truth, even he seemed to be groping in the dark. What was more, I had seen him confused and upset during our strange visit to the Vessel. My thoughts then returned confusedly to Maria, and I recalled that she now seemed to be residing in Madrid. In Spain, the very place where, as I had learned from the letters between the two, the fate of the world was now being played out…

  Suddenly, a sensation of warm silk enveloped my naked back and drew me softly from the grey torpor into which I had slipped unawares. A murmur soothed my ears:

  "Is there room for me?"

  I opened my eyes: my Cloridia had returned.

  When we were sated with silent kisses and by our embrace in the warm light of sunset, Cloridia began.

  "You haven't asked me how it went. If you only knew what an adventure it has been!"

  For days and days, my wife who, as I have said, had for years been exercising the profession of midwife, had stayed far from me and from our conjugal bed in order to assist an expectant mother. Now she had returned and I could not wait to tell her everything and to receive comfort and counsel from her. She, however, seemed as impatient as I to tell me her latest news. So I considered that it would be better to let her speak first. Once the natural womanly loquacity of my Cloridia had been placated, I would have all the time I needed to tell her of the sudden reappearance of Abbot Melani and of my torments.

  "The little ones?" I asked before all else, for our two daugh ters had gone with their mother to assist her.

  "Have no fear, they're down below snoring happily with the other servant girls."

  "Then," I said with feigned enthusiasm, "tell me all!"

  "The factor of the Barberini farm is now the father of a fine, plump and well-formed infant. Healthy and with everything in the right place just as God ordered!" she murmured proudly. "Only…"

  "Yes," said I, hoping that she would not prolong her account.

  "Er, he was born after five months."

  "What, that's not possible!" I exclaimed in a strangulated voice, pretending surprise, although I knew full well what she was leading up to.

  "Those were the very words which the factor cried out when his poor wife was in the travails of childbirth. And yet, it is possible, my love. I spent hours and hours calming down that great ignorant beast and convincing him that, while it is true that the time assigned for a human birth is normally nine months, there are, however, cases of births in the fifth month, just as, on the other hand, there are births that take place only in the twelfth month…"

  I freed myself from my wife's embrace and looked her in the eyes.

  "… Pliny bore witness before a tribunal in defence of a woman," Cloridia continued candidly, "whose consort had returned from the wars only five months previously, and swore that it was possible to give birth after only five months. It is, moreover, true that, according to Massurius, under the Praetorship of Lucius Papirius, a sentence was pronounced against someone in a certain controversy concerning heredit
y, because his mother attested that she had been pregnant for thirteen months; but it is also incontrovertible that the great Avicenna saved a mother from stoning by giving testimony before a judge that it is also possible to give birth after fourteen months."

  I was trembling from my anxiety to speak to her.

  "Cloridia, listen, I have so many things to tell you…"

  But she was not listening. The air was still warm and my beautiful spouse, after all those days of absence, seemed no less so.

  "I was good, was I not?" she interrupted me as though she had not heard me, pressing her cool bosom against my chest. "I explained to that madman that, among all animals, man is the only one to have an indeterminate period before coming into this world. Beasts all have a fixed time: the elephant always gives birth in the second year, the cow in the first, the horse and the donkey in the eleventh month and the pig and the dog in the fourth, the cat in the third, while the hen always hatches her chicks after twenty days' brooding, and finally, the sheep and the goat drop their young in the fifth month…"

  Indeed, their husbands — I commented to myself — Master Ram and Master Billygoat, both have a fine pair of horns on their heads.

  My Cloridia was utterly incorrigible. I had lost all count of the number of cases of dubious paternity resolved by the midwife's skills of my consort. In her love for children (whoever their father might be) and their mothers (whatever the fidelity of which they were capable), Cloridia did everything possible, swearing and forswearing, in order to convince suspicious husbands. She would stop at nothing. With a ready tongue, a smile on her lips and the most open expression in the world, she would furnish clarifications and examples in abundance for all husbands: from the freshly discharged soldier to the shepherd who had been absent for the transhumance, to the travelling vendor, even the grim mother-in-law or the meddlesome sister-in-law. And she was invariably believed, in despite of the sage's law that one should not believe all that is said by someone who talks much, for in many arguments one can almost always find lies.