The Prince

by Vito Bruschini

  Rizzo was out riding with his campiere, hunting partridges, when he saw the marquis in the distance and rode toward him with a shout of recognition. The campiere remained behind at a distance for the entire length of their talk; whether the encounter was accidental or deliberately sought, no one ever knew.

  “Marquis, I heard about what the bandits did to you,” he began, leading his horse alongside. “I think you are right to insist on harsh methods.”

  “I’m glad to hear you say that, onorevole,” Bellarato replied guardedly. “They destroyed my entire herd and set fire to the storehouse.”

  “We can no longer tolerate such barbarism,” Rizzo said emphatically.

  “But those of you up there in Rome, what do you say?” the marquis challenged him directly.

  “Rome is far away, my dear Bellarato,” Rizzo replied. “However, I want to prove to you that some people up there think about us. I will have a special team sent to investigate the fire and identify those responsible. Will that satisfy you?”

  “I hadn’t hoped for so much.”

  “An example is needed. They must understand that there’s no place here for anarchists and subversives,” the politician continued. He was silent for a few seconds and then added: “Nevertheless, Marquis, you might also be less inflexible with friends.”

  Bellarato went on the defensive. “What do you mean? Which friends?”

  “Well, if I do you a favor today, I expect that you will consider me a friend. I don’t know if I’ve made myself clear.”

  “I don’t follow you,” the marquis replied.

  “Yet it’s simple. We must stand united.” At last, he came to the point: “Why don’t you withdraw the preemptive offer on the Baucina estate? It’s all rocky land; not even a turnip would grow there, no matter how much effort you put into it. Plus, it makes no sense for anyone to start a quarrel over nothing.”

  Marquis Bellarato finally understood the reason for the encounter. He dropped all show of diplomacy and asked abruptly, “Did Prince Licata send you?”

  Niní Rizzo was stung to the quick. “Why, my dear Bellarato, that’s no way for a gentleman to talk. No one sends me anywhere, keep that in mind.” So saying, he touched the brim of his hat with two fingers and rode off at a gallop, followed at a distance by his campiere.

  * * *

  By now only two days remained before the Veterans cooperative would see its option to purchase the former Baucina estate expire. That morning, most of the 395 shareholders gathered in front of Salemi’s town hall, near the Cassa Rurale. In Sicily at the time, as elsewhere in Italy, no family was spared from unemployment. Field workers and sharecroppers, supported by the socialist leagues and the Popular Party, went on strike, refusing to work. The most enterprising competed for the little bit of land that could be obtained illegally. When the Falcioni decree of April 1920 ruled that even lands illegally occupied prior to that date could be lawfully assigned to the squatters, the landowners as well as the more enlightened overseers declared that abandoning the law that way was an injustice to all those who had remained law abiding. Above all they insisted that it was extremely dangerous to endorse the concept that armed rebellion could sometimes “pay off.”

  Also present that morning in front of Salemi’s town hall, along with the 395 members of the Veterans, were representatives from another cooperative, the Farm, which was supported by the Socialist Party—specifically, by the party’s delegate: a certain attorney named Nicola Geraci from Petralia Sottana. They too were demanding ownership of lands to be shared among the members.

  The mayor, seeing the piazza packed with people, began having serious concerns. The four carabinieri assigned to the town were out in the field that day, occupied with various duties, and the fifth couldn’t leave the station.

  Not knowing which way to turn, the mayor got the idea of having u patri intervene. The prince, among all the aristocrats in the region, was the one closest to the people. Maybe he might be able to control the crowd. Ferdinando Licata didn’t wait to be asked twice and shortly thereafter arrived at the town hall astride his black horse. Someone whistled in protest, but the others silenced him.

  The mayor explained the situation, and Licata, with his usual composure, reassured him.

  A few minutes later, he had representatives from each of the two cooperatives brought into the council chamber. The mayor and his entire council had taken their places on the high-backed chairs. Ferdinando Licata, standing, positioned himself at the center of the dais. When everyone finally fell silent, the prince began to speak.

  “Well, my friends. The time has come for justice. Many of you went to war, and it is to many of you that we owe the victory. So let’s come to an agreement and bring about this blessed socialism.”

  The peasants couldn’t believe what they were hearing. Many nodded, satisfied, and an old man wiped his eyes.

  After a short pause to let what he had proposed sink in, he continued. “Now, I’ll call you one at a time. You,” he said addressing the clerk, “get a new register and start writing.” Then he turned to the assembly again. “So then, let’s get started right away, given that there are so many of you.” He pointed at the farmer nearest to him. “You, come forward.” The man, a peasant around the age of forty, scorched by the sun, approached with some hesitation.

  “State your name.”

  “Alvaro Di Paola, son of Giuseppe Di Paola, deceased,” he replied, stammering.

  The clerk glanced at the mayor, awaiting his assent which was not long in coming, and quickly began writing in the big records book.

  At that point Nicola Geraci, the Socialist Party delegate, was granted the floor. He was defiant and self-assured. “Excuse me, but what’s the purpose of all this? Is it a new census?”

  “Be patient, Mr. Geraci,” interjected the mayor, who had figured out what the prince was leading up to. “Let the prince carry on, since all of us here place our confidence in him.”

  “So then, Alvaro,” the prince resumed, “tell us what you own, whether the house is yours, the animals, the vineyard, the olive trees—in short, declare all the things in your possession.”

  Alvaro Di Paola was puzzled and suspicious, like all peasants when asked what they own. The interrogation smelled like a trap. Nevertheless, he answered diligently.

  “Yes, the house is mine. I have three acres of vineyard and twenty olive trees. Then I have two cows, a mare, and a donkey, that’s all,” he hastened to say.

  “Clerk, did you write it all down?” Licata asked the man, who nodded. “Good. Next, please, step forward.” The peasants, in orderly fashion, went before the prince and declared the things they owned.

  This went on for a few minutes before Nicola Geraci interrupted the assembly again. “Now, hold on a minute! I don’t care for this business.” He moved toward Licata, as if to confront him on an equal footing. “Why are you taking down all this information? Where I come from, we say, ‘Where’s the catch?’ ” His laughter was echoed by a few others.

  Ferdinando Licata remained impassive. “We have to institute socialism, don’t we? First we have to record the possessions of all the members in the register, then we’ll add them all up and divide everything equally, according to what’s fair. It may turn out that someone who owns two cows will have to give one to someone who doesn’t have any, and a person who has ten olive trees will have to relinquish three of them to someone who only owns four, so that each of them will have seven trees. That’s socialism.”

  Everyone in the room was taken aback. “So that’s what this socialism is all about?” more than one man asked his neighbor.

  From the center of the hall, an elderly peasant called out, “Well, I don’t like it! If that’s what socialism is, count me out.”

  The others agreed with him. “It’s no good; cross my name out of the book.” “Mine too.”

  There was a headlong stampede from the socialist revolution.

  Nicola Geraci was demoralized. All his efforts to p
ersuade the men to stand together had been fruitless. He addressed Prince Licata harshly, his eyes flashing with hatred: “You think you’re clever, don’t you, Prince? Well your days are numbered, individuals like you. We no longer have any use for your class of people: in Russia, we hanged them from lampposts.” He spun around and left the council chamber, followed by the compassionate looks of those in the room who saw him as a doomed man.

  Chapter 12

  – 1920 –

  That afternoon, Marquis Pietro Bellarato returned earlier than usual to his palazzo in the oldest district of Salemi. He was irritated and in a bad mood. With increasing frequency in recent months, his brain was assailed by a flurry of images at that hour that drove him to seek ever more intense and extreme forms of excitement. He would begin fidgeting, yawning, though he wasn’t sleepy; rather, it was a lack of oxygen—a restlessness—that forced him to get on his horse and go charging through his lands looking for someone who could satisfy his insane cravings.

  The shepherd boys had at first considered it an honor to be able to satisfy their master, but since he’d begun hurting them, they now went to hide as soon as they heard the distant gallop of his horse. They abandoned the flock and ran to take cover among the rocks and cliffs, where the horse couldn’t get to them. Terrified, they watched him prowling back and forth near the flock like a hungry wolf, looking for them. The marquis called to them, whistling and shouting, his mouth thick with dust and saliva. He cursed them because they were supposed to stay with the sheep.

  Then, when he realized that they would not come out of hiding, he galloped off to the next flock, his head about to explode, in the hope of finding another victim on whom to vent his brutal impulses. And if the unfortunate boy was found, he paid the price for himself and for the other ones who had been smarter than him.

  His campieri, with no disrespect, but firmly, had informed the marquis that there was risky gossip about him floating around. But Bellarato was too sure of himself and his authority: no one could stop him. That afternoon had been one of those instances when he’d been unable to satisfy his desires. Returning home, he poured some marsala into a glass and then sprawled on the couch, exhausted by the long ride. He sipped his drink, his hand lying loosely on the armrest.

  Tosco, the servant who had grown up with him, finished stoking the fire and asked if the marquis had further need of him. But his master did not answer. The devoted servant had learned when to disappear from the marquis’s sight. Tosco left the room shaking his head. He was furious over the marquis’s decline. It tore him up to see him in that state. But there was nothing he could do about the insanity that seized Bellarato more and more often lately. If the old marquis, his father, had seen him like that, he would have died of a broken heart.

  The marquis closed his eyes partway and fell into a deep lethargy; when he opened them again, he wasn’t able to immediately collect his thoughts and had to strain his memory to remember that it wasn’t morning but late afternoon. He looked straight ahead—and saw a dark figure, completely covered by a cloak, with a hood lowered over his face.

  As soon as he saw the stranger, he leaned forward, frightened. It was then that the mysterious individual let the hood drop and revealed himself.

  The marquis recognized him and relaxed. “Oh, it’s you,” he said, sinking back on the couch. “What are you doing here?”

  Then it occurred to him that the unexpected guest had appeared in his study without being shown in by the servant. He didn’t finish that thought because, all of a sudden, the figure drew a long knife from under his cloak. He was on him immediately, trying to pin down his arms, but the marquis broke free of his grip and ran toward the door. The man was quicker, however, and with a lunge gave him a powerful shove that sent him spinning to the fireplace. Bellarato crawled backward, looking for something he could use to defend himself; he reached for the poker, but the man kicked it away from him. The marquis, desperate, then grabbed a burning log from the fireplace and threw it at the intruder. But the man dodged it, continuing his relentless advance. The marquis tried to get up, but the man jumped on him, forcing him to the floor. He stuffed his mouth with a lace doily from the sofa that was used as a headrest. Holding him down, he stunned him with two powerful blows to the head. The assailant then stood up and with the tip of the knife sliced off all the buttons on the fly of the marquis’s trousers.

  Bellarato, though dazed, was still terrified of the threat posed by the long knife; spitting out the doily, he shouted: “Why are you doing this to me?”

  The man’s only response was to force him to lie on the couch and then plant a knee on his chest, to prevent him from moving. Realizing that he was going to die, the marquis fought back, kicking with his last ounce of strength and thrashing about like a man possessed. So his attacker punched him as hard as he could, this time squarely in the face. He felt the nose bone crack and a spurt of blood gushed onto his hand. Despite the pain, the marquis did not lose consciousness. He began to cry. The figure in black opened Bellarato’s pants all the way and with one hand grabbed his member, stretching it out as much as he could. The intruder’s facial expression held no trace of compassion. He brought the sharp blade of the knife to the flesh— the marquis was rasping in terror—and then one clean stroke hacked off the culprit guilty of so many rapes. The marquis let out a bestial howl as a stream of blood began to pulsate rhythmically from the wound, pooling on the couch. The assailant, who had not yet had his fill of revenge, stuck what was left of the limp organ into the shrieking mouth, crammed it down the marquis’s throat with two fingers, then held his jaws closed until he began to gasp and sputter, struggling for air. The last words Pietro Bellarato heard were those spoken by his executioner.

  “Today Salemi will drink a toast to your death, Marquis.” It was his epitaph; with a last desperate rasp, Bellarato expired, his eyes bulging from their sockets.

  A dense cloud of smoke invaded the room. The killer turned and saw the heavy velvet curtains go up in flames as the fire swept quickly to the other wall coverings and antique furniture. The man began coughing. Shielding his mouth with his cloak, he made his way through the blaze, heading for the door. But as soon as he opened it, fresh oxygen burst into the room, reviving the flames that licked at his cloak.

  * * *

  When by dawn the following day the fire was completely put out, very little of the palazzo was left standing. All the antique furnishings, paintings, tapestries, and mirrors had perished. Salemi’s carabinieri recovered the unfortunate remains of two people: one was certainly Marquis Pietro Bellarato, according to the testimony of his servant who had left him dozing in the palazzo’s drawing room. But he knew nothing about the other person. Nor could the individual’s name be ascertained by his identification papers, since they had been completely destroyed.

  Chief Brigadier Mattia Montalto arranged for the remains of the two bodies to be transported to the morgue at the nearby hospital. Then he summoned the town physician, Peppino Ragusa, and requested an autopsy. He wanted to know how those two people had died and whether the doctor could identify them.

  From a brief preliminary inspection, Ragusa established that it was a man and a woman. But afterward, he had to change his opinion, because upon a more thorough examination of one of the two corpses, he discovered that the one he had mistaken for a woman had in his throat—something that looked like a male member. And it was his own.

  They were therefore dealing with an explicit Mafia symbolism, according to which severed genitals, stuffed in a corpse’s mouth, were meant to settle an affront committed against the wife of a “friend” or some other offense of a sexual nature.

  The murder of Marquis Bellarato caused quite a sensation throughout the territory of Salemi and, as the mysterious killer had glibly predicted, many people drank a toast to his death that day.

  But the greatest satisfaction over Marquis Bellarato’s demise belonged to the 395 members of the Veterans cooperative. The farmers were unable to conta
in their elation. Some even wept for joy: with the marquis dead, they no longer had to fear that a competitor might steal the Baucina estate away from them.

  The term of the Veterans’ option expired the very morning on which the corpse was discovered, and the cooperative had still not obtained a loan from the Cassa Rurale.

  As soon as news of the death spread through the town, Don Antonio Albamonte headed immediately for Prince Ferdinando Licata’s palazzo to tell him what had happened. The priest found him starting his breakfast of oranges, biscotti, and jam. Sitting down opposite him as the prince spread some jam on a crispy biscotto, the priest asked, “Have you heard about the Marquis Bellarato?”

  “What a terrible death, poor fellow,” Ferdinando Licata remarked, and went on eating.

  “The fire broke out yesterday afternoon, and they managed to extinguish the flames only this morning at dawn,” the priest continued, breaking a biscuit as if it were a host. “I spoke with Tosco, the servant. He is the only witness. He says he has no idea who the second corpse might be, because he swears he didn’t let anyone in to see his master.” After a brief pause, the priest continued. “Prince, don’t you think it’s quite a strange coincidence that Bellarato died a day before our option was to expire?”

  “Of course, Bellarato can no longer acquire the Baucina estate now. We no longer have his option hanging over us like the sword of Damocles. This time destiny played out in our favor,” Ferdinando Licata pronounced.

  “Could it be that someone guided destiny’s hand?” the priest asked boldly.

  The prince spilled some orange juice on his shirt. “Don Antonio, do you mean to suggest that the marquis may have been killed over that transaction?” he asked, wiping it off with a linen napkin.

  “Many of our farmers were seriously worried about losing their savings. I wouldn’t be surprised if someone decided to settle the matter by creating an inferno.”