All of a sudden, Nina came to a halt, stiffening her ears.
“Who’s there?” cried out Simone Lampo.
On the parapet of a small bridge along the highway he thought he perceived in the darkness someone lying on his back.
“Who’s there?”
The person lying on his back scarcely lifted his head and let out a sort of grunt.
“Oh, it’s you, Nazzaro! What are you doing there?”
“I’m waiting for the stars.”
“Are you going to eat them?”
“No, I’m going to count them.”
“And then what?”
Irritated by these questions, Nazzaro sat up on the parapet and shouted angrily through his long, thick, wadded beard:
“Don Simo’, go away! Don’t bother me. You know perfectly well that at this hour I’m through doing business and that I don’t want to chat with you!”
So saying, he again lay back on the parapet, belly up, and waited for the stars.
Whenever he earned a few cents, either by currying a couple of animals or by doing some other odd job that would quickly leave him free, Nazzaro felt he had the world in his hands. A couple of cents worth of bread and a couple of cents worth of fruit. He needed nothing more. And if someone ever asked him to do some other job that could bring in perhaps even a handsome sum, in addition to those few cents he had already earned, he would turn him down, answering in that peculiar way of his:
“I’m through doing business!”
He would set off and wander through the fields, or along the seashore, or up through the mountains. One ran into him everywhere, even where one least expected to find him. There he would be, barefoot and silent, his hands behind his back, and his eyes, clear, wandering, and smiling.
“For heaven’s sake, will you or will you not go away?” he shouted, getting up again to sit on the parapet and growing angrier, since he saw that Simone had stopped with his donkey to watch him.
“Don’t you want me either?” Simone Lampo then said, shaking his head. “And yet, come on now, you’ve got to admit that the two of us would make a fine pair.”
“You and the devil would make a fine pair!” muttered Nazzaro, lying back again. “I’ve told you, you’re in mortal sin!”
“On account of those little birds?”
“Your soul, your soul, your heart… don’t you feel anything gnawing at your heart? Those are all creatures of God that you’ve eaten! Go away… It’s a mortal sin!”
“Giddyap,” said Simone Lampo to his little donkey.
After traveling only a few feet, he stopped again, turned around and called:
“Nazzaro!”
The vagabond didn’t answer him.
“Nazzaro,” repeated Simone Lampo, “do you want to come with me and set the birds free?”
Nazzaro sprang to his feet.
“Are you speaking seriously?”
“Yes.”
“Do you want to save your soul? It’s not enough. You should also set fire to the straw.”
“What straw?”
“All the straw!” said Nazzaro, drawing near as swift and agile as a shadow.
He placed one hand on the donkey’s neck, the other on one of Simone Lampo’s legs, and, looking into his eyes, again asked him:
“Do you really want to save your soul?”
Simone Lampo smiled and answered him:
“Yes.”
“Really and truly? Swear it! Mind you, I know what’s best for you. At night I do my thinking, not only for you, but also for all the thieves and all the imposters who live down there in our town. I know what God should do for their salvation and sooner or later — have no doubt — always does! Now then, do you really want to free the birds?”
“Why, yes, I’ve just told you that.”
“And set fire to the straw?”
“And set fire to the straw!”
“Okay. I’ll take you on your word. Go ahead and wait for me. I still have to count up to one hundred.”
Simone Lampo set off again, smiling and saying to Nazzaro:
“Mind you, I’ll be waiting for you.”
By now one could catch sight of the dim lights of the little town down there along the shore. From that road atop the loamy plateau overlooking the town, the mysterious emptiness of the sea opened wide in the night, making that little cluster of lights down below seem even more miserable.
Simone Lampo heaved a deep sigh and frowned. This was how he always greeted ■ he appearance of those lights, seen here from afar.
For the people who lived down there, oppressed and crowded together, there were two authentic madmen: himself and Nazzaro. Fine, and now they would team up to increase the town’s fun! Free the little birds and set fire to the straw! He liked this exclamation of Nazzaro’s and repeated it several times with increasing satisfaction before arriving at the town.
“Set fire to the straw!”
At that hour the little birds cooped in the five rooms on the ground floor were all sleeping. That would be the last night they would spend there. Tomorrow, away! Free. A great flight! They would scatter throughout the sky. They would return to the fields, free and happy. Yes, he had really been cruel. Nazzaro was right. A mortal sin! It would be better to eat dry bread and nothing else.
He tied the donkey in the small stable and, with an oil lamp in his hand, went up to wait for Nazzaro, who was supposed to be counting, as he had told him, up to one hundred stars. What a madman! Who knows why? But perhaps it was a devotional practice-After waiting and waiting, Simone Lampo began to feel sleepy. One hundred stars? More than three hours must have passed. He had had enough time to count one half the stars of the entire firmament… Enough! Enough of this! Perhaps he had told him he would come as a joke. It was useless to wait for him any longer. And he was about to throw himself down on his bed, dressed though he was, when he heard a loud knocking at the front door.
Lo and behold, it was Nazzaro, panting and extremely cheerful and fidgety.
“Did you come running?”
“Yes. It’s done!”
“What’ve you done?”
“Everything. We’ll talk about it tomorrow, Don Simo’! I’m dead tired.”
He plunked himself down on a chair and began rubbing his legs with both hands, while his eyes, like those of a wild animal, shone with a glimmer of strange laughter. A trace of this laughter formed on his lips, which emerged from his long thick beard.
“The birds?” he asked.
“They’re downstairs sleeping.”
“Good. Aren’t you sleepy?”
“Yes. I waited such a long time for you…”
“I couldn’t come any sooner. Go to bed. I’m sleepy too. I’ll just sleep here in this chair. I’m fine. Don’t trouble yourself! Remember, you’re still in mortal sin! Tomorrow we’ll take care of atoning for it!
Simone Lampo, blissfully leaning on his elbow, gazed at him from his bed. How he liked that crazy vagabond! He no longer felt sleepy, but wanted to continue the conversation.
“Tell me, Nazzaro, why do you count the stars?”
“Because I like counting them. Go to sleep!”
“Wait. Tell me, are you happy?”
“About what?” asked Nazzaro, raising his head, which he had already nestled between his arms resting on the coffee table.
“About everything,” answered Simone Lampo. “About living like this…”
“Happy? We’re all suffering, Don Simo’! But don’t worry about it. It’ll pass. Let’s sleep.”
Again he nestled his head between his arms.
Simone Lampo poked his head out from under the covers to put out the candle, but at that instant, he held his breath. The idea of staying in the dark with that lunatic bothered him a little.
“Tell me, Nazzaro, would you like to stay with me forever?”
“One shouldn’t say forever. As long as you wish. Why not?”
“And will you be friendly to me?”
“Why not? But you can’t be the master, nor I the servant. Together. I’ve been watching you for quite a while, you know? Knowing that you talk to your donkey and even to yourself, I said to myself: ‘He’s almost ready…’ But I didn’t want to approach you, because you kept birds imprisoned in your house. Now that you’ve told me that you want to save your soul, I’ll stay with you as long as you wish. In the meantime, I’ve taken you on your word, and the first step has been taken. Good night.”
“How about the rosary? Don’t you say it? You talk so much about God!”
“I’ve already said it. My rosary is in the sky. A Hail Mary for each star.”
“Ah, is that why you count them?”
“Yes, that’s why. Good night.”
Simone Lampo, reassured by these words, put out the candle. A little later both of them were sleeping.
At daybreak the first chirps of the imprisoned birds immediately woke up the vagabond, who had left the chair and thrown himself down on the floor to sleep. Simone Lampo, who was already used to that chirping, was still snoring.
Nazzaro went over to awaken him.
“Don Simo’, the birds are calling us.”
“Ah, yes,” said Simone Lampo, waking with a start and opening his eyes wide at the sight of Nazzaro.
He no longer remembered anything. He led his companion into the other little room and, after lifting the trapdoor over the floor-boards, they both climbed down the wooden ladder under the opening and reached the ground floor. The musty enclosure reeked from the droppings of all those little birds cooped up in there for so long.
The birds, frightened by their entrance, began to screech all at the same time, and, flapping their wings furiously, flew upwards toward the ceiling.
“Oh, how many, how many there are!” exclaimed Nazzaro compassionately, with tears in his eyes. “Poor creatures of God!”
“There were even more!” exclaimed Simone Lampo, shaking his head.
“You deserve to be hanged, Don Simo’!” the other shouted at him, showing him his fists. “I don’t know whether the atonement I’ve had you make will suffice! Come on, let’s go! We have to first make them all go into one room.”
“That’s not necessary. Look!” said Simone Lampo, grasping a bunch of small ropes that by means of an extremely complicated mechanism kept the screens flush against the openings of the large and small windows.
He hung on them and yanked downwards. At that moment all the screens came crashing down together, making a devilish racket.
“Now let’s chase them out! Let’s chase them out! Freedom! Freedom! Shoo! Shoo! Shoo!”
Since the birds had been cooped up in there for several months, they at first didn’t know how to take wing in that sudden commotion. Dismayed, they hung suspended, fluttering their wings. It took several of the more spirited of them to hurl themselves out like so many arrows, with a screech of jubilation and fear at the same time. The others then followed suit, flocks and flocks of them having been chased out in great disorder. At first they scattered themselves as if to recover a bit from their confusion. They flew throughout the neighborhood, onto the ridges of roofs, onto small chimneys, onto windowsills, onto the railings of balconies. They stirred up a great clamor of amazement in the street below. In response, Nazzaro wept from great emotion, and together with Simone Lampo continued to shout throughout the now empty rooms:
“Shoo! Shoo! Freedom! Freedom!”
Then, they too, went to look out the windows in order to enjoy a view of the street invaded by all those little birds set free in the early light of dawn. But already some windows were opening. A boy and a woman laughingly attempted to catch this or that little bird. Then Nazzaro, infuriated, stretched out his arms and began yelling like a madman:
“Leave them alone! Don’t be rash! Oh, you rascal! Oh, you sacrilegious thief! Let them go!”
Simone Lampo tried to calm him down.
“Come on, don’t worry! They won’t let anyone catch them any more …”
They returned to the upper floor, relieved and happy. Simone Lampo went over to the little stove to light a fire and make some coffee, but Nazzaro took hold of his arm and pulled him away vehemently.
“Coffee? Who needs coffee, Don Simo’! The fire is already lit. I lit it last night. Come on, let’s run and see the other sight over there!”
“The other sight?” asked Simone Lampo, stunned. “What sight?”
“One over here, and one over there!” said Nazzaro. “The atonement for all those birds you ate. ‘Set fire to the straw,’ isn’t that what I told you? Let’s go saddle the donkey and then you’ll see.”
Simone Lampo felt a flush come over his face. He was afraid he understood all too well. He took hold of Nazzaro by the arm and, shaking him, shouted:
“What have you done?”
“I burned the grain in your field,” answered Nazzaro calmly.
Simone Lampo turned pale at first, then, transfigured by his rage, hurled himself at the lunatic.
“You! The grain? Murderer! Are you speaking seriously? You burned my grain?”
Nazzaro pushed him away with a violent shove.
“Don Simo’, what sort of game are we playing? Do you say one thing and mean together? You told me: ‘Set fire to the straw,’ and for the good of your soul I did set fire to the straw!”
“But now I’m going to send you to jail!” roared Simone Lampo.
Nazzaro burst out in a great laugh and said to him plainly:
“You’re mad! Your soul, huh? Is that the way you want to save your soul? Nothing doing, Don Simo’! We won’t do anything about it.”
“But you’ve ruined me, murderer!” shouted Simone Lampo in another tone of voice, and now on the verge of crying. “How could I imagine that this is what you meant, that is, that you intended to burn my grain? How can I pay the tax to the bishop, the tax that weighs heavily on my field?”
Nazzaro looked at him with an air of disdainful pity.
“Infant! Sell the house, since it’s of no use to you, and free your field from the tax. It’s quickly done.”
“Yes,” sneered Simone Lampo, “and in the meantime what will I eat, now that I don’t have my birds and my grain anymore?”
“I’ll take care of that,” answered Nazzaro calmly and in all seriousness. “Won’t I be at your side? We have the donkey and we have the land. We’ll do some hoeing and we’ll eat. Take courage, Don Simo’!”
Simone Lampo was amazed to see the serene confidence of the lunatic who remained standing there in front of him, with his hand raised in a gesture of disdainful nonchalance and a smile of keen lightheartedness both in his blue eyes and on his lips which emerged from his long, thick, wadded beard.
A Horse in the Moon
In September, on that arid plateau of blue loamy soil whose crumbling cliffs fall sheer to the African sea, the countryside, already parched from the furious rays of the long summer sun, was gloomy. It still bristled everywhere with blackened stubble, with only a few almond trees and some century-old trunks of the Saracen olive scattered here and there. Nonetheless, out of respect for the bridegroom, it had been arranged that the bridal pair would spend at least the first few days of their honeymoon in this place.
The wedding feast, held in a hall of the ancient, solitary villa, was hardly a joyful occasion for the invited guests. Not one of them managed to overcome the embarrassment, or rather the consternation, inspired by the appearance and demeanor of that plump young man, barely twenty years of age, with the flushed face and those darting eyes — small, black, and shiny like those of a madman. The young man no longer understood anything; he neither ate nor drank, and his coloring became, from one moment to the next, more and more purplish, almost black.
It was common knowledge that when he had fallen madly in love with the girl who now sat beside him as his bride, he had begun to behave irrationally, going so far as to attempt suicide. Though he was quite wealthy, being the sole heir to the ancient Berardi estate, he had
wanted to marry a girl who, after all, was merely the daughter of an infantry colonel transferred to Sicily with his regiment the year before. But the colonel, who was prejudiced against the inhabitants of the island, would have preferred not to grant his consent to this marriage, so as not to have to leave his daughter there, virtually among savages.
The consternation which the appearance and demeanor of the bridegroom inspired in the guests increased the more they noticed how different the spirit of the very young bride was from his. She was still but a child, vivacious, fresh, and carefree, and it seemed that she always shook off annoying thoughts with certain sudden bursts of sprightliness at once charming, naive, and crafty. Her craftiness, however, was like that of a cheeky youngster who as yet knows nothing of the world. A half-orphan, reared from infancy without a mother, she seemed quite clearly to be entering marriage without any preparation at all. At a certain point after dinner, everyone laughed, but then felt a chill when she turned to the bridegroom and exclaimed:
“My goodness, Nino, why are you squinting so? Let me… no, you’re burning! Why are your hands so hot? Feel, Papa, feel how hot his hands are. Do you think he has a fever?”
The colonel, who was on tenterhooks, hastened the departure of the guests from the villa. Of course, he did so in order to bring an end to that spectacle which he considered indecent. They all climbed aboard the six carriages. The one in which the colonel rode—the widower seated beside the groom’s widowed mother-proceeded slowly down the road and lagged a little behind because the bridal couple, she on the one side and he on the other, each holding hands with his respective parent, had wanted to follow a short distance on foot up to where the highway that led to the distant city began. At that point the colonel leaned down to kiss his daughter on the head. He coughed and muttered:
“Goodbye, Nino.”
“Goodbye, Ida,” said the bridegroom’s mother laughingly; and their carriage moved on at a fast trot in order to catch up with the other ones transporting the guests.
Tales of Madness Page 8