A Shadowed Fate

by Marty Ambrose

  Glancing at me dispassionately, his crooked index finger tapped the book cover. ‘You forget, Signora Clairmont, that I have known him all of my life … even before he took on the holy robes. We grew up together and, as a young man, he shared my early dissolute years, but he learned how to pretend at righteousness.’

  ‘You lie.’ I glared at him, affronted at the slander.

  But Matteo did not even flinch. ‘What is the point in lying? I am staring my own death in the face and have no desire to add to my sins. I am telling you the truth: Father Gianni was not all that he seemed.’ The tapping stopped.

  No.

  It could not be true.

  And yet … something inside of me shifted slightly as I watched Matteo’s calm demeanor remain unchanged in spite of my accusations. ‘Is this why you agreed to see me? So you could demean Father Gianni’s memory? For God’s sake, have you not done enough by taking his life?’

  He paused, then continued, ‘I wanted you to know that I was not the only evil man at the Basilica di San Lorenzo that day when you spoke to Father Gianni. Many deceptions surrounded that meeting. It is true that I wanted your letters from the English poets; they would have fetched a large sum, and I would have done anything to obtain them. But Father Gianni would have sold his soul to keep some parts of the letters hidden. Both of us stood before God that day with something to hide, and we will answer for our sins.’

  ‘You are the only one who will answer for his sins,’ I said, but doubts began to creep into my mind – tiny glimmers of mistrust. I refused to give in wholly to it. I would not. ‘Even if Father Gianni had a past he wished to hide, that is hardly the same as theft and murder.’

  ‘Can you be so sure?’

  ‘Enough of this nonsense!’ Trelawny circled around my chair and stood in front of Matteo, looking down at him with dismissive contempt, as if he were already among the dead. ‘We came here to find out whether you were involved in vandalizing Signora Clairmont’s apartment last night. A very valuable drawing was stolen – one that held great sentiment for her.’

  He raised a brow. ‘How could I have done such a deed when I was imprisoned here? In case you have not noticed, the walls of Le Murate are thick and impenetrable.’

  ‘You did not answer my question,’ Trelawny pressed, his hands clenched at his sides. ‘And I hardly believe that your network of thieves and criminals does not extend beyond this prison.’

  ‘You overestimate my influence, Signor.’

  ‘Not likely.’

  Just then, I heard footsteps coming down the corridor outside, and I realized that our time was almost up. Leaning forward, I continued, ‘Lieutenant Baldini is returning, so I implore you to tell me if you know who took my drawing. If it is returned, I could sell it and would be able to give Paula and Georgiana a future beyond our present poverty.’

  His glance fastened on my mother’s gold locket. ‘You might consider selling that piece of jewelry; it is quite unusual and might be worth something – should you want to part with it.’

  ‘Never.’ I drew back, covering it with my hand. ‘My father gave it to my mother, so it is very precious to me – more than anything that I own.’

  ‘A family heirloom?’ His eyes gleamed – ever greedy.

  ‘Yes – and the last link to my parents.’

  ‘Of course.’ Matteo stared at me for a few seconds, then switched to rapid-fire Italian as he slipped an intricately carved ivory bookmark out of Byron’s poetry volume. ‘In that spirit, take this – it is my gift to make up for the ill that I have done to you, though I know nothing about the theft of your sketch. I could have sold it many times over but could not bring myself to do so since my own deceased father gave it to me. He brought it back from a trip to India, so it has some value.’ He handed it to me as he lowered his voice. ‘I have lived a sinful life, but that is between God and me. I told the truth about the priest – he knew more than he revealed to you about your daughter and what happened to her. Trust no one, Signora Clairmont. Even now, there are powerful people who want to hide what happened in Ravenna all those years ago—’

  ‘How would you know that?’ I demanded, taken aback by what he seemed to know – and what he seemed to suggest about Father Gianni.

  ‘What did he say?’ Trelawny exclaimed. ‘I cannot follow his Italian.’

  Baldini cleared his throat; he stood in the doorway of the prison cell. ‘Your time is up; you must leave now.’

  No! Let him finish, I exclaimed inside.

  Fighting to control my frustration, I slipped the bookmark in my bag as I rose from the chair. ‘Perhaps we could speak another time.’ I stressed the last words.

  ‘That is not possible,’ Baldini said, gesturing for us to exit the cell. ‘I just received orders that Matteo will be transferred immediately to Rome for trial.’

  I shall never see him again – or find out what else he knows.

  My throat ached in defeat.

  ‘Come away, Claire.’ Trelawny grasped my arm. ‘There is nothing more for you here.’ He drew me toward the doorway, and I took one last glance over my shoulder at Matteo before we exited.

  ‘Addio, Signora.’ Matteo folded his hands in a prayer position as a sly smile spread across his face, telling me he knew more than he had just revealed. In that moment, I felt scant pity for him and his descent from a rich and opulent life to a bleak, cramped space of a jail cell. He would die a criminal’s death.

  A wretched last act, but perhaps well deserved.

  Baldini shut the door behind us, thumped down the iron bar, and locked the dead bolt. Then he placed the key in his jacket’s breast pocket. ‘I assume he denied being involved in the vandalism of your apartment.’

  I nodded.

  ‘Did you believe him?’ he queried.

  Wavering, I finally answered evasively, ‘He seemed to be making peace with his life – or at least acknowledging his sins.’

  ‘People say many things when driven by desperation.’ Trelawny peered up and down the deserted corridor, always on alert. ‘Like Doctor Faustus, that type of man will always seek forgiveness in the eleventh hour to save his soul, but it is only because he faces the gaping pit of hell. Let him be damned.’

  ‘I fear that is so.’ Pulling the drawstrings of my bag tightly closed, I slipped them around my wrist.

  ‘Did Matteo say anything else to you?’ Baldini inquired as we strolled down the hallway toward the stairs.

  ‘Nothing of significance …’ Biting my lip, I added, ‘He said something in Italian, but I could not catch all of it since he spoke so quickly.’

  Trelawny stiffened – he knew my Italian was impeccable.

  Without further questions, the lieutenant escorted us downstairs and then out of the entranceway. As we emerged from Le Murate, the midday heat bore down with a breathless intensity, and I was grateful that Raphael had already pulled up the carriage; he sat in the driver’s seat, leaning forward with the horse reins in hand. Trelawny helped me on to the seat and took his place beside me.

  ‘I shall come by tomorrow afternoon,’ Baldini promised with an enigmatic look. ‘Just in case you remember anything else.’

  Extending my hand to him, I smiled. ‘I look forward to it.’

  Raphael flicked the crop and the horse took off at a brisk pace. Once we were out of sight, Trelawny turned to me. ‘What exactly did Matteo say to you?’

  I related Matteo’s accusations against Father Gianni as we made our way through the crowded midday streets. Trelawny said little in response as the carriage creaked and groaned its way across the Ponte Vecchio and down the Via Romana until we halted outside the Palazzo Cruciato.

  Trelawny helped me descend the carriage steps and finally spoke: ‘We must take back the carriage before the horse becomes overheated. You need to rest—’

  ‘But—’

  ‘Please, do this for me.’ He waited until I acquiesced, then he climbed on to the seat next to Raphael. ‘We shall not be long.’

  I w
atched them drive off and then made my way upstairs.

  As soon as I entered the apartment, Paula appeared and began fussing over me. ‘Aunt Claire, what happened? You were gone so long that I grew worried … This hot weather cannot be good for someone of your age.’

  ‘I am fine – really.’ Removing my bonnet, I decided to ignore the comment about my advanced years. At times, I felt as if my niece considered me as decrepit as the aging furniture in our rented apartment.

  ‘While you were gone, I straightened the mess from last night and found nothing else missing besides the sketch … at least as far as I could tell.’ She ushered me into the sitting room and on to my favorite wingback chair. ‘I want to hear everything about your visit with Matteo, but first I have to retrieve Georgiana. Perhaps you can rest until I return.’ She did not phrase it as a question.

  ‘Of course. Thank you for attending to our apartment, my dear.’ Leaning back, I settled into the soft cushion. ‘I am a bit tired, but I promise to fill you in later over a nice cup of tea.’

  She hugged me tightly and then let herself out.

  After I heard Paula exit and close the door behind her, I immediately straightened, then reached inside my bag to retrieve the bookmark that Matteo had given to me. How ironic that it had been placed inside his copy of The Prophecy of Dante – the poem that Byron had written at the suggestion of my rival for his affections: Teresa Guiccioli. It had not been a hugely popular poem in England, and it had received only modest acclaim in Italy – both of which facts pleased me since it was dedicated to his Italian mistress.

  Even now, after all these years, the thought of another woman as Byron’s muse caused a dull ache in my heart, blunted somewhat by the distance of time, but there nonetheless. A jealous echo that stretched through the years, growing ever fainter with each stage of my life, but not completely gone. Still with the power to taunt me.

  We each had our time with him, forever fixed by the verse that he had written to us – she as Beatrice to his Dante, and I as ‘Beauty’s daughter.’

  And what of Matteo’s comments about Father Gianni? Had the priest been conspiring to obtain Byron’s letters for himself? If so, why? All I knew for certain is that whatever happened in Ravenna all those years ago held the missing pieces to the puzzle of Allegra’s fate.

  I knew what I had to do.

  Slowly, I walked into my room, retrieved Bryon’s lost Ravenna memoir from my desk, and began to read …

  Palazzo Guiccioli, Ravenna, Italy

  December 7, 1820

  La Mia Confessione …

  I was ready to begin my life anew.

  Poised for change in the way a man can do only when he has exhausted the senses and delved into the inner realms of utter depravity … all the nights in Venice where women came to me as the famous poet, flesh met flesh, but it never satisfied. Afterwards, I would slide into the cold canal water to cleanse myself but found only dank filth that permeated my skin with more grime – an ‘oyster with no pearl.’ It took me months and months of seeking the beauteous gem before I realized the shell of this Sea-Sodom on the Adriatic held only emptiness for me. Pain taught me truly how to feel beyond the body. It gave me my soul back.

  It will soon be Christmas – the one-year anniversary since I, George Gordon, Lord Byron, first came to Ravenna. From the moment I entered the Porta Adriana’s marble archway during the city’s annual celebration of the Corpus Domini, I realized that I was fated to come to this ancient city. Just outside the gate, I waited until the procession passed, watching priests wave their incense as they chanted prayers of salvation, and young girls pacing behind in white dresses and bejeweled headdresses.

  Ravenna.

  Once the westernmost outpost of the Byzantine empire – city of light in the Dark Ages, where one empire ended and another began.

  A fitting place to find my purpose anew.

  After all the years of creating heroes in my poetry – Childe Harold and Manfred – men who aspired beyond their mortal limits, perhaps now I could aspire to be one.

  My last journal was written in 1813 when I wrote that ‘no one should be a rhymer who could be anything better’ – it was true then, and it is true now. In my youth, I thought to have a career in parliament and transform the country toward a true republic – to be a leader in truth and honor such as the great Washington. Not a dictator but a ‘First Man’ of the people. Instead, I became a poet, and all political ambitions of creating a new England were cast aside into the dustbin of lost dreams. What an ironic twist of fate – especially after the rise and fall of Napoleon. Europe reverted to the same old, decayed systems of kings and fools.

  And I decided to live as if nothing mattered.

  I hurt those whom I loved the most, left England in disgrace, and became the most dissolute of beings. Eventually, it seemed pointless even to entertain the notion that I could ever be more than the wretch I had become … until I arrived in Ravenna.

  I found love again.

  I found inspiration to write again.

  And I became a revolutionary in deed as well as word with the Carbonari – the freedom fighters who were trying to unify Italia.

  Honor and glory may not have eluded me after all …

  I am not certain how all of this will end, so I am keeping a record of my activities in Ravenna, which I will entrust to Angelo Mengaldo – he will make certain that it reaches the right hands in England. If the worst happens and I do not survive, at least there will be some sort of record of my role in this revolution, a testament that I tried to overthrow the Austrian oppressors of Romagna.

  My belief in liberty has driven me to these actions, and I do not regret what I have done.

  Freedom.

  Italia deserves to be free, and I am willing to give my life for that freedom.

  How did I come to fight for this great cause? Revolution had not been my intent when I moved here, but fate conspired to send me north to Dante’s world.

  Mi amore. Teresa Guiccioli. My last love.

  My life in exile seemed empty without a true companion of the heart. I now intend to live in strictest adultery. Teresa knows how to be pleasing in every setting and has a family that live and breathe revolt – an irresistible combination.

  And what of Claire, my daughter’s mother?

  With all the secrecy and passionate talk of revolution, I could almost forget the wrong that I have done to her. Almost. But I miss her fire and light. Her fearlessness had enthralled me from the moment we met in London, and then later in Geneva, but it was too dangerous to have her in my life.

  Political change was coming … it promised to be violent and savage.

  For now, I keep rifles and ammunition hidden in my study at the Palazzo Guiccioli. Teresa’s younger brother, Pietro, had smuggled in the firearms last night with a friend, knowing it would be the last place that the polizia would look for them – the room where I was composing The Prophecy of Dante – my homage to the great Italian poet.

  I had heard only vague rumors of the Carbonari before I arrived in Ravenna from fellow poet, Ludovico di Breme, who, sadly, died six months ago. Some said they were an offshoot of the Freemasons, much like the Bavarian Illuminati, with their lodges and ancient rituals. But I found them more like frame-breakers in northern England, driven to desperate measures because of their oppression. They wanted equality and independence, so I joined them, believing their cause would be my chance of atonement.

  Once I had become a trusted ally, Pietro and his father, Count Gamba, took me, blindfolded, to their lodge and inducted me into their secret society. During the ceremony, a Grand Master made me take an oath with two axes across my chest; when I swore my loyalty, the blindfold was removed as I saw the ‘truth’ of the brotherhood. The axes symbolized that arms would be raised against me if I betrayed them, but I had no intention of ever playing Judas.

  Weeks later, I was placed in charge of my own regiment, called a turba.

  Even as I write these words, I am
somewhat amused by the fact that I have become an aging idealist, writing The Prophecy of Dante even as I compose cynical new cantos of Don Juan. High-minded grandeur and farcical absurdity. But those are the contradictions of my nature. I live in sin with a married woman and long for my lost love, Claire.

  No one could know how much I still thought of her, still dreamed about the passionate union that produced our daughter.

  Allegra – my love child.

  Mia cucciola.

  Since arriving in Ravenna, Allegra has become close to Teresa – calling her mammina, a fact that would have broken Claire’s heart. But I wanted my daughter to forget her real mother; it was safer that way. It cut into my heart as well, but I had no other choice.

  No more – no more – Oh! never more on me

  The freshness of the heart can fall like dew,

  Which out of all the lovely things we see

  Extracts emotions beautiful and new,

  Hived in our bosoms like the bag o’ the bee:

  Think’st thou the honey with those objects grew?

  Alas! ’twas not in them, but in thy power

  To double even the sweetness of a flower.

  When I wrote those lines in Don Juan, I thought it unlikely that I would ever feel passionately committed to anything again, but this revolution has lifted me out of the dark waters of Venice into the light of hope.

  At one time, Shelley had tried to make me believe in the power of nature to inspire humanity to create a world of beauty and perfection, but I could never accept his hopeful view of mankind. Truly, he was a much-maligned social reformer. Never willing to compromise, Shelley had paid dearly for his principles.

  As I no doubt would, too.

  But I would risk it for Italy’s and Allegra’s future.

  If only the world could see me now as the champion of the oppressed, they might not treat me so unkindly.

  Later that evening …

  It has begun.

  While I sat in my study with Allegra after dinner, I lapsed into a waking dream … and heard the sound of an organ playing a vaguely familiar song in the streets below. My ears strained to hear the melody, and I realized that it was a waltz that I had heard hundreds of times during the London season of 1812 when I was lionized by one and all after publishing Childe Harold; it was the turning point in my life when I shifted from wanting to be a man of action to accepting the role as a man of society.