Consalvo, anyway, did his best to destroy the effects of parental meanness. When, from high on a brake or stage-coach in elegant clothes sent specially from Florence, he drove a team of four horses like an expert coachman, stopping to pick up friends whom he met on his way, overtaking all other carriages, whipping coachmen who dared cross his path as his ancestors had, people would stop to admire and repeat his name and title with pride, as if some of his lustre was reflected on those who could greet him or at least knew him by name in the very town where he was born. If he bought or sold a pair of horses, if he dismissed or re-engaged a servant, if he won or lost at the tables, news of these events was the small-change of every conversation. His dislike of his stepmother was generally praised and explained by his respect for his mother’s memory. All were either self-interested or enthusiastic about finding him a wife, and every now and again the rumour of a possible marriage would go round everywhere until, repeated before him, it made him burst into roars of laughter. For the moment he wanted fun; there would be plenty of time to shackle himself later. And his assiduous visits to this or that lady, the showy presents which he made to singers and actresses explained that reply. For Pasqualino Riso the high old days of Count Raimondo were back. His young master made him earn his keep.
His energy had another outlet, less elegant but just as widely known. He and some of his wildest friends had formed a group which was the terror of half the town by night. Armed with swordsticks, revolvers or sometimes just daggers, they meandered round with street-women, singing at the tops of their voices, putting out gaslamps, starting quarrels with passers-by, forcing taverns and brothels to open by yelling and flinging stones at the windows, playing tocco and briscola with pimps, ordering suppers ending with every plate broken; innkeepers let them be, since they were usually ready to pay for any damage they did.
Sometimes, however, from a whim or the pleasure of bullying and of exercising the Viceroys’ hereditary power, the young prince refused to pay up or paid in blows. While squandering sums on women he was also capable of taking for fun off one or two poor wretches the few coins they had in their pockets, compensating them later but meanwhile leaving them sobbing or blurting out strings of oaths which made him double up with laughter.
Often he and his band went down to the port and caused uproar in taverns where English sailors got drunk like savages. He would jump on to a table, holding the floor boldly, preach on the rule of St Benedict, repeat his uncle’s and Giulente’s political opinions. Without knowing a word of English he held long, serious discussions with the sailors, making up for his own use and consumption a language no one understood. Such evenings often ended with a boxing-match, bruised ribs and broken crockery … What would Fra’ Carmelo have said? The lay-brother still appeared now and again at the palace, looking thinner and wilder every time, to sing his usual chant of, ‘They’ve thrown me out … they’ve thrown me out …’ Nothing else could be got from him.
When Consalvo happened to go near San Nicola on his nightly excursions, he was always meeting the Brother, wandering round the local streets like a soul in torment, or standing still and staring at the dark mass of the monastery walls. The young prince would alter his voice and call out mockingly, amid the others’ laughter, ‘Father Prior!… Father Abbot!… Where are the pigs of the Lord?’
He was life and soul of the group, their acknowledged and obeyed leader. Often Giovannino Radalì would go with him, but though he was now free, rich and a baron, his moods were uncertain; sometimes he did wild things, at others reining in his companions; usually he took part in these excursions with a deep frown and a false laugh. Now and again he vanished, went off to Augusta, to the estate left him by his uncle, where no-one could get at him until, in a sudden change of mood, he decided to return. Then Consalvo would drag him off on his revels.
One night the band came to blows with a group of townees, barbers and shop assistants, about some women. Staves fell, knives flashed, but luckily the police arrived and all took to their heels. Those beaten up, tricked husbands, victims of bullying, dared make no complaint; anyone threatening to go to the police was dissuaded as the culprits were nobles: the Baron Radalì, the young Prince of Mirabella, the young Marchese Cugnò! And the police, if anyone did have recourse to them, arranged matters; a few bank-notes and all was smoothed over. But such was the prestige of those names that few dared complain. Most considered themselves honoured to deal with such nobles, admired them and talked of them with deepest respect.
In carnival time, the favourite disguise for urchins and carters was that of ‘baron’. They would go round dressed in ragged trousers, mended shirts, an old swallow-tail coat, a huge paper collar and a paper top-hat high as a chimney-stack, calling each other, amid laughter from passers-by, by the names of real ‘barons’. ‘Bye-bye, Francalanza!… How’re things, Radalì?… Just off to the theatre, Marchese!…’
What could workers have done, such thought, without those nobles whose luxurious way of life, pleasures, even follies, were chances for poor folk to work and earn?
And the young prince was a regal spender. His father paid for his horses, carriages, guns and dogs, and allowed him a hundred lire a month for small pleasures. But Consalvo sometimes lost in one night his allowance for the entire year, and next day he would go round to the moneylenders, who gave him whatever he wanted against his signature on an I.O.U. As for his relations, they either encouraged him to squander or ignored his extravagance, or were taken in by his wiles, as he knew how to get round each one of them by encouraging them in their various whimsies. Benedetto alone realised that this manner of life must be costing a great deal and suspected his debts, but the young man won him over by playing on his vanity as a patriot, ‘a wounded hero of the Volturno’, a future deputy; and when Benedetto told his wife of his fears to be passed on to the prince, Lucrezia jumped at him.
‘What are you putting your nose into? Let him be! D’you think my nephew’s a beggar who can’t allow himself such a luxury? He can pay his own debts, anyway!’
Donna Ferdinanda for her part would go into ecstasies at her protégé’s success and show her pleasure by every now and again giving him a five-lire note, which the youth thanked her for profusely, then left as a tip to a café waiter.
The duke, deep in his own affairs, heard rumours of his grand-nephew’s debts, but the youth only had to call the Deputy ‘saviour of his country’, ‘great statesman’, and prophesy a ministerial post, to quieten him down. A little later, to ingratiate himself more with Donna Ferdinanda, Consalvo would agree with her complaints of the duke’s treachery; and in this he was sincere, for though he took no part in politics he was all for absolute government, which protected nobles and kept the mob in order. These sentiments, however, did not prevent him from being pleasant to his Uncle Giulente, though he did not call him ‘Excellency’, but simply Vol. Later he sympathised with his Aunt Lucrezia if she complained of her ‘swine of a husband’.
So in spite of his cold relations with his father, he followed the latter’s example and treated each Uzeda according to his particular fixation. His Aunt Chiara would talk to him about adopting her maid’s bastard, and he approved her decision. His Uncle Ferdinando, who had thought himself to have every conceivable disease when full of health, now that he was visibly wasting away thought himself robust and could not endure being advised to see a doctor. Consalvo would congratulate him on looking so well.
Don Blasco had not shown himself at the palace for some time. Since he had lived in his own home and dealt with his own money, his mania for criticising the whole family had gone; when he happened to be with his relations he chatted of this or that and soon left. So as not to be alone at home he had brought in the Cigar-woman, her husband and daughters. Thus he was served hand and foot and needed for nothing. For some time he was not to be seen at all.
‘What’s uncle doing?… what’s Don Blasco doing?…’ But no one knew a thing. The prince, the marchese, Lucrezia, and to some extent
even Benedetto, were trying to ingratiate themselves with him because of the money he must have tucked away; but he evaded them all and if he heard them make smiling allusions to his riches, started shouting as before, ‘What riches or poverty?… What …?’ and out came more newly-coined swear words.
One day, though, when Benedetto was reading in the Prefect’s Announcements the list of latest purchases of Church lands, he came across the name of Matteo Garino.
‘Isn’t that the Cigar-woman’s husband?’ he asked his wife.
‘I think so. Why?’
‘He’s bought the “Cavaliere”, one of the best of the Benedictines’ properties.’
Without an instant’s hesitation, Lucrezia exclaimed, ‘Garino? It’s Uncle Don Blasco who’s bought it.’
Shortly after the truth came out. Garino was a cover-name for Don Blasco, who had put up the money and was already in possession of the estate. A monk, a Benedictine monk, one who had made a vow of poverty, buying land from his own monastery and so flouting Divine Law! The scandal was tremendous; Donna Ferdinanda was all vituperation of her brother. The duke smiled sceptically, remembering the furious threats of eternal damnation spat out by the monk. And the prince himself, although not wanting to get on the wrong side of an uncle who could buy such estates, shook his head. And all zealous Catholics, supporters of the Curia, homeless monks, pro-Bourbons who had once been Don Blasco’s close friends, turned against him. But if anyone mentioned these critics he would shout:
‘Yes, sir, the “Cavaliere” was bought on my account; and why not? Who’s criticising? My sister who’s been a moneylender for fifty years? My nephew who ‘as robbed all his relations? Are they scrupulous and fearful of wrong doing?… I’ve no scruples about it at all! If I myself hadn’t bought the “Cavaliere”, someone else would have. Anyway it would never have stayed with the monastery, for the good reason that the monastery no longer exists!… In fact, it’s the same in my hands as if it were still with San Nicola. Why, I’ve had the chapel restored, and say Mass in it every day when I go there. If it had gone into anyone else’s hands, it would be used as a pigsty by this time …’
Actually he only said Mass now and again, as he was so busy ploughing up the enclosure, tearing away old trees, scooping out a well, enlarging the farmhouse and adapting it as a villa to stay in, moving the surrounding wall so as to tidy up his boundaries; then he had to keep a watchful eye on builders and diggers lest they steal. In the country, to be ready for wind or rain, he wore a shooting jacket and half-length boots; back in town he put off his habit and scapular, but designed himself a black suit like a Protestant clergyman’s, with a waistcoat buttoned to the top and a clerical collar. He disapproved, though, of two or three of his former colleagues who had stripped off everything and plunged without reserve into secular life, like the revolutionary Father Rocca; and of those who without putting off their habits gave cause for gossip by their conduct, like Father Agatino Renda, who spent all day with the widow Roccasciano, gambling from morn till night. Father Gerbini had gone to Paris, where he had been made rector of the Madeleine; others who had stayed in Catania were leading priest’s lives. But Don Blasco proposed himself as a model to the lot. Fra’ Carmelo, who often came to visit him as he did the prince, seemed not to notice the change in His Paternity as he repeated with desperate gestures his eternal refrain, ‘They’ve thrown me out!… they’ve thrown me out!…’ Don Blasco would give him money, a drink, comfort him with fine words. But whenever the madman had taken drink, he would be less sane than ever and begin reviling the devil worshippers who had stripped the monastery.
‘Assassins and thieves! Thieves and assassins! The biggest monastery in the kingdom!… And those thieves went and took its property! To hell with them! To hell with them, they’re excommunicated …’
Once, more delirious than usual, he fell on his knees declaiming and making great signs of the Cross. ‘In the Name of the Father, of the Son, of the Holy Ghost! In God’s name I adjure you … Restore your ill-gotten gains to San Nicola! Thieves!… Swine!… Are you Christians or Turks! Think of your souls! Of hell-fire!’
Don Blasco finally lost patience, took him by a shoulder and pushed him out.
‘All right, all right, we understand. But be off for the moment. I’m busy …’
And he banged the door in his face as Donna Lucia appeared.
‘He’s beginning to interrupt my devotions, that old loony. If he comes back again, just throw him downstairs, d’you hear?’
ONE NIGHT, while Lucrezia was snoring away in bed and Benedetto studying the Council accounts at his desk, a sharp ring at the bell made husband start and wife awake. Benedetto went to open the door, and found himself facing the young prince, who was white as a sheet.
‘Can I wash?’ he asked his uncle, drawing from his jacket pocket a hand red with blood.
‘Consalvo! What’s happened? What’s the matter?…’
‘Nothing, don’t shout … To open a window … I broke a pane … and cut my hand … Let me wash!… It’s nothing.’ But it was a deep wound, beginning from the back of the hand, twisting under the thumb-joint and ending at the wrist. It had been treated with lint, but must have opened again as the handkerchief wound round the hand had not a white corner on it, and blood was dropping, marking suit and shirt.
‘I couldn’t go home in this state …’ the youth explained as he kept his hand immersed in a basin of reddening water. But suddenly he lost the confidence that had sustained him till then and began to tremble, his forehead covered with cold sweat, staring round with a stunned look in which Giulente could now read shock at sudden aggression, fear of death glimpsed in a blade flash.
‘Tell the truth. What happened?…’
‘Again?… A broken pane, I told you … Now go and call Giovannino, who went to the chemist’s with me. He’s waiting down below …’
Consalvo’s friend, even paler, confirmed his story. The truth came out next day. For some time Consalvo had been after the daughter of Gesualdo Marotta, the Belvedere barber. She made a living as a ladies’ hairdresser, and although always in the streets, took no notice of men for fear of her brothers, who did not jest on matters of honour. But when the young prince got a whim into his head he would not rest till it was satisfied, and in spite of pleading and the Marotta brothers’ warnings he set every pimp in town on to the job of overcoming the resistance of the young woman and her family, promising to take her off the streets and away from her wearisome job that exposed her to perils, and set her up in a dressmaker’s shop, and also assure her the custom of all his relatives and friends. It had all been useless. Then, seeing he could achieve nothing by fair means, one day he had the girl kidnapped and kept her with him for three days up at the Belvedere. For a time the brothers were silent, as if in the dark. Then one night, as the young prince was leaving the Café de Sicilia in the company of Giovaninno Radalì, he felt a slash with a sharp blade on the hand he put out instinctively to defend himself. ‘We’ll meet again!…’ the aggressor called as he ran off at Radalì’s cry.
The prince said nothing when he saw his son with a bound hand. He made show of believing the story of the broken pane and even tended him together with the princess, who watched beside Consalvo’s bed as devotedly as a real mother. The youth scarcely bothered to hide his irritation at these unwelcome attentions, and greeted as liberators the friends who visited him morning and evening. The danger he had been through, the blood lost, filled these comrades-in-play with admiration; but on recovering he never put his nose outside the gates.
The Marotta brothers had let him know that they were ready to start again when they next saw him by night or day, and that the second time he would not get off with just a scratch, and that they were waiting to do their own justice as well as denouncing the matter to the law.
The Uzeda, worried about the heir’s life, had recourse to the duke; he alone, with the authority which came from his political position, could get Prefect or Questor or magistrates to s
ee the rascals left the youth in peace. The duke, on hearing of the incident and what was wanted of him, instead of siding with his grand-nephew, unexpectedly flew into a rage, all the stranger as it was not in character.
‘Serves him right! These are the consequences of the life he leads! Why don’t you put him under lock and key? Are you proud of his exploits? What d’you want from me?’
No-one had ever seen him so put out; he looked almost like his brother Don Blasco. The fact was that his adversaries were trying every means of attacking him again, and Consalvo’s silly imbroglio played right into their hands. The Deputy had not been to the capital for two years and had quite abandoned public affairs in favour of his own. What a great patriot, eh? Such unselfishness he showed, such love of his homeland! When he had irons in the fire at Turin and Florence he used the excuse of public affairs to keep away from Catania, even if the Chamber was locked and ministers scattered; nothing could have torn him from Turin during the troubles of ’62. He had only come home to be re-elected. The last time he had not even bothered to do that, considering his constituency as a feudal right which no one could take from him. Now that he wanted to settle his own affairs, although most serious matters were being discussed in Parliament, he did not move. But even if he did go what would he do there? What had he done in all his eight years as a deputy? He had raised and lowered his head like a puppet, to say yes or no as he was bid! Why, if he’d opened his mouth just once! His excuse was that the public put him off. But the truth was that he hadn’t the shadow of an idea in his noodle and could not even write a line without several mistakes, and he thought to hide his supine ignorance by an air of presumption and self-confidence! And a person like that was entrusted with all the affairs of the town and province, allowed to dictate his opinions on every kind of question: public education, engineering, music, ships … Not content with exercising so much personal power he also got his adherents in everywhere to play his game; so that Giulente uncle had been given charge of the Bank and Giulente nephew been made Mayor.
The Viceroys Page 46
