Secretum

by Rita Monaldi;Francesco Sorti

  All in all, my dear, Lamberg senior rendered Austria the worst of services, just as we rendered France the very best. If the son's abilities are equal to his father's, it is certain that neither I nor French interests in the Spanish succession will be in any danger. However, I shall soon know how matters stand: the arrival of the Imperial Ambassador is expected at any moment. And you? When will you be here?

  Silvio was proud, 'tis true, but he venerates the gods, and was one day vanquished by your Cupid. Since then he has ever bowed down before you, calling you his.

  Altho' his you were not.

  Emotion caused me to raise my eyes after reading those last lines. Poor Abbot Melani: in reminding the Connestabilessa of the love he had borne her for forty years, in the end he was reminding her only of his immutable castrato's condition; Maria had never been his, nor could she ever have been.

  As a post scriptum to the letter, a fleeting reference to that Lidio:

  I come now to our Lidio. 'Tis enough to speak of him: You have won, for the time being. But what you will receive when we meet will convince you. Then you will change your opinion. You know what value he sets upon your judgement and your satisfaction.

  I closed the envelope and began to reflect. Judging by his epistolary exchange with the Connestabilessa, it seemed that Atto's diplomatic interest was concerned solely with the Spanish succession and the risks (including physical ones) connected therewith. Not a word about the forthcoming conclave, for which he had told me that he had come to Rome. Not only that, but, according to the letter, Atto feared that he might be a target for an imperial stiletto (or poison) because of the Spanish succession, while he said absolutely nothing about the conclave, where he would, after all, be defending French rights at the expense of those of Austria. I might even have said that Atto cared nothing for the conclave.

  For a moment, I suspended my cogitations: that impression, I told myself, seemed unreasonable, indeed unfounded. I really could not believe that Atto did not care about the conclave that seemed to be approaching.

  It seemed absurd. But had I not learned from the Abbot in person, so many years before, to reason on the basis of suppositions and not to back down before truths that seemed utterly improbable? The conclave and the succession. . . or perhaps the succession and the conclave? Indeed, it seemed as though the success of the conclave depended upon that of the Spanish succession.

  I skimmed rapidly through the rest of the correspondence, in the hope of casting some light on the identity of the mysterious Countess of S. The envelopes were all as bulky: confidential and extremely detailed reports on the kingdom of Spain and King Charles II. They were all numbered, with almost invisible figures written in a corner. I opened the first of them. It must have dated from some time previously; the Connestabilessa was writing from the Spanish capital.

  Observations

  which maybe of use in relation to

  Spanish affairs

  Here in Madrid, everyone wonders what will become of the Kingdom after the death of the Sovereign. Any hope of an heir has long since disappeared; el Rey is ill and they all say that his seed is already dead. With the Sovereign's poor body devoured by illness, all is moving towards the setting of the sun in this Kingdom on which the sun never sets: the power of Spain, the splendour of the Court, even the glorious past is obscured by the miseries of the present time...

  I read with surprise those disconsolate, bitter, definitive lines. Who then was Charles II of Spain, el Rey, as the Connestabilessa called him in her letters to Atto? I realised that I knew nothing, absolutely nothing, about that dying sovereign and that limitless kingdom. I therefore plunged into the gloomy reading of that report, engulfing myself in the sense of disaster hanging over those lines which, like a skilfully distilled poison, infused my entire spirit during my furtive reading.

  Let the curtains be drawn and the shutters closed on ample windows, let the sun be banished from the throne room, let a moonless night descend mercifully upon the Escorial: the body of el Rey is falling horribly apart, my friend, and with it his entire lineage. Let the wind rise and sweep away the foul stench of regal death; we are all drinking from the waters of Lethe, lest proud Spain recall the insult of so repugnant an end.

  The Connestabilessa's groan of pain touched me profoundly. I read on: those were not mere metaphors that the letter evoked. Life in the royal palace really was being lived away from the light of day, by the glimmer of the occasional candle: thus they tried to attenuate for courtiers and visiting ambassadors the dreadful spectacle of the King's body and face.

  His nose is swollen and cankered, his enormous forehead disfigured by threatening carbuncles, his cheeks livid, his breath stinks of rotten innards.

  His eyelids the colour of flayed flesh hood the deep black and bubonic bags of the eyes which now move with difficulty and are half blind. Even his tongue no longer obeys him. His speech is uncertain, reduced for all those who have not frequented him for all his life to a babbling, an incomprehensible mutter.

  Exhausted, limp, wheezing - the Connestabilessa recounted in her report - el Rey was subject to continual fainting fits. He would swoon, throwing the court into a panic, then he would recover, suddenly rising to his feet before collapsing on the throne like a marionette without strings. He would switch from somnolence to sudden, exceedingly violent fits of epilepsy. He walked, dragging himself along with great difficulty and could stay standing only if he leaned against a wall, a table, or someone's shoulder. It was an effort for him even to bring his hand to his mouth. Both organs and limbs were worn out. His feet and his knees were ever more swollen. He was becoming dropsical. They tried to cure him with a diet based on cocks and capons fed on serpents; to drink, fresh cow's urine. For several months now, el Rey had been dragging himself from his bed to an armchair and from that back to bed. His body was already in a state of decomposition. And he was only thirty-nine.

  I left off reading for a moment: so the King of Spain was barely two years older than me! What horrendous illness could have reduced him to such a state?

  I scanned rapidly through those pages in search of a reply.

  Attacks of the falling sickness, my friend, are devastating el Rey's flesh more and more with each passing day. At Court, we have by now learned to recognise the warning signs: His Majesty's lower lip first becomes as pale as that of a cadaver, then becomes blotched with red, blue and green. Soon his legs are seized with tremors and then his whole body is shaken by the most painful squirming and spasms: once, twice, ten times.

  Charles II of Spain vomited several times a day. The Catholic King's horrible lantern jaw, inherited from his Habsburg ancestors, is not just ugly: when the monarch closes his mouth, his lower set of teeth, which protrude too much, do not meet the upper row. One could easily place a finger between them. King Charles cannot chew. Unfortunately, from his forebears, particularly the Emperor Charles V he also inherited the appetite of a lion. Thus, he ends up eating everything whole. He gulps down goose livers as though he were quaffing water, while the court stands by, gloomy and powerless. Then, a little while after rising from table, he throws up the entire meal. Vomiting is accompanied by fevers and violent headaches which confine him to his bed for days on end. He struggles to follow his counsellors' reasoning, and never smiles. Not even the buffoons, the court dwarves or the marionettes, which once made him laugh so much, can amuse him any more.

  Not that his spirit, memory and ready wit have completely abandoned him; but for most of the time he remains taciturn and melancholy, torpid and listless, his days marked by the sad rhythms of asthma.

  His subjects have, with time, grown accustomed to having for a sovereign a man reduced to this state. The ambassadors of foreign kingdoms, however, cannot believe their eyes; as soon as they take up their posts and are received at court for the first time, they find themselves facing a man at the point of death, his gaze empty and his speech fading. In his presence, one can find relief only by turning away one's eyes, and one's nose.


  I completed my reading with my heart swollen with anxiety and sorrow. All that I had just learned from my clandestine perusal of Atto's papers threw much light on Maria Mancini's letter and the reply from Atto which I had read the day before. The great diplomatic agitation around the Spanish succession was not just so much febrile preparation for future confrontations between the great powers but a war already begun. It was clear that a sovereign in that state might die from one moment to the next. Of the mysterious Countess of S., however, I found no more trace. I would have to take my search further: there was still much correspondence to be read.

  I looked up. Outside the window, Atto and Buvat had for some time disappeared over the horizon. I noticed walking down the avenue a lady who showed every sign of advanced pregnancy. This must be the Princess of Forano, that Teresa Strozzi whose health Cloridia had been called to watch over that evening. I dedicated a sweet and rapid thought to my spouse, whom I would soon be seeing again.

  It was not prudent to remain any longer in Atto's lodgings; I might have been found out by him, and in any case my prolonged absence from work would sooner or later be noticed. It was better that I should be seen by Don Paschatio, who had, alas, ordered me to be a torchbearer at dinner that evening too. Fortunately, I was exempted from serving at table.

  While I carefully returned the letters to their place, a mass of thoughts accumulated in my poor tired head. As ever, I feared that head was too small for great questions of state and too big for the minutiae of diplomacy.

  It was clear from her letters that the Connestabilessa habitually resided at the Spanish court; but what could ever have brought her there? The report by Madama the Connestabilessa (who obviously had the most confidential sources at that court) presented a cruel and apocalyptic picture which contrasted singularly with the tender, and in truth somewhat daring words which Atto dedicated to her at the end of the letter. The correspondence was a bizarre chimera, a cross between love and politics, gallantry and diplomacy. Knowing Abbot Melani, at least two of those ways - sentiment and conspiracy - must, however, be leading up to a practical goal. The way of the heart led to the imminent encounter, after thirty years' separation, between Atto and Maria. The way of politics, however, led to a still unknown objective.

  If one were to judge by his words, Melani was interested only in the forthcoming conclave; from what I read in those letters, however, the succession to the Spanish throne was a far more burning question. Atto must have some secret project, said I to myself; secret enough, at least, not to wish to reveal it to me.

  Yet I too had eyes and ears; I too knew how to snatch precious details, revealing gossip, murmuring and betrayals from the eminences and princes who were then visiting the Villa Spada. Of course, Atto knew how to interpret these with a skill a thousand times greater than my own. Inured to all the dastardy and cunning intrigues of state, a true artist in behind-the-scenes activity, a handful of pebbles was enough to enable him to compose an entire coloured mosaic. I, however, had relative youth on my side. Was it not I who had snatched from the lips of Cardinal Spinola di Santa Cecilia the words which had put us on the trail of the secret meeting between Spada, Albani and the other Spinola?

  My overarching intention, however, was to favour Cardinal Spada my master, even if that meant at the same time helping the reckless Abbot Melani. He, a French subject, was acting on behalf of the King of France. I, in the service of a magnanimous cardinal of the Holy Roman Church, would spy in the name of fidelity and gratitude.

  Imprudently, I failed to take into account the fact that he had received a mandate from his lord, while I had not.

  While exercised by these cogitations, I had by now rejoined the servant who was distributing the Turkish costumes. Now it was time to transform myself into a human candelabrum to illuminate the table of all those gentlemen and eminences and to satisfy my thirst for knowledge of the highest society, drinking at the freshest of fountains: the court of Rome, that school excelling in all forms of dissimulation and guile. I hoped only that to such intellectual refinement there should not, as on the evening before, be added Melani's expediencies, which could cost me dear. Fortunately, that evening's dinner had been announced by the Steward as being a trifle more modest than the inaugural one the evening before: the nuptials were due on the next day and stomachs were until then to be sheltered from any risks of indigestion that might affect participation in and enjoyment of the magnificent nuptial banquet.

  While I was getting dressed, I caught sight of my Cloridia moving briskly towards the pergola, resplendent in the fine festive gown which she had been given for her evening in the gardens, keeping vigilant watch over the Princess of Forano. Knowing her to be near at hand gave me a feeling of great peace and serenity. She too saw me and approached briefly to tell me that the Princess did not feel like attending the dinner and was resting under the pergola.

  "The little ones?" I asked, since in the event of lying in, Cloridia would need the assistance of our two daughters.

  "They are at home. I do not want them wandering about in these parts, at least, not during the festivities. In case of need, I shall send for them."

  I mentioned that the Connestabilessa would yet again not be arriving, as well as reporting the contents of the letter which I had just read.

  "I already have some information for you," said she, "but now there's no time. Let us meet here this evening."

  She kissed my forehead and rushed off, leaving me a prey to curiosity about the news which she had in so short a time already gleaned from her women, as well as full of that admiration which her estimable promptness of spirit always aroused in me.

  ". . . And 'tis most curious, if we come to think of it, that the Jubilee should for the first time have been opened by one pope, yet may, God forbid, be closed by another," slurred Cardinal Moriggia with his mouth full of pike cooked in apple juice, "which is what would happen if the Holy Father were to pass to a better life and a successor be elected before the end of the year."

  "Most sad, you must mean, Eminence, most sad," retorted Monsignor d'Aste, Apostolic Commissioner for Arms, choking on his poached turkey alla Suizzera. "This turkey is really excellent; how was it cooked?"

  "Larded with tripe, Your Excellency, pricked with cloves and cinnamon, cooked in wine and water, garnished with peaches in syrup, carved and interspersed with slices of lemon and covered with toasted eggs and sugar," the Steward hastened to explain to d'Aste, murmuring the recipe in his ear.

  "This evening our greedy little Straccetto is making so bold as to correct those higher than he," whispered Prince Borghese ironically, using the nickname expressly chosen by the Pope who, as Atto had told me, had called D'Aste Monsignor Straccetto (or "little rag") because of his minuscule and unattractive form.

  "Most sad, goodness knows, indeed most sad: that is, I think, just what I said," Moriggia defended himself, blushing as he gargled with a fine glass of red wine to clear his throat and free himself of his verbal embarrassment.

  "Boor," someone commented without revealing himself, having evidently drunk too much.

  Moriggia turned sharply but could not manage to find out who was so rudely insulting him.

  "The fried crab is excellent," said D'Aste, trying to change the subject.

  "Oh, exquisite," agreed Moriggia.

  "Boor," came the insult once again, without anyone being able to identify who had spoken this time either.

  "How did the Holy Father's visit to the hospice for poor orphans at San Michele go?" asked Cardinal Moriggia with skilfully simulated interest, in an attempt at distracting attention.

  "Oh, magnificently, there was a great crowd and many pious persons who wished to kiss his feet," replied Durazzo.

  "Incidentally, the expeditors of the Datary's office have been granted an indult to obtain remission of their sins by visiting the four basilicas once on the same day during the Jubilee."

  "Quite right too! Even the prisoners and the infirm enjoy special prerogati
ves," someone commented from the end of the table.

  "A holy and enlightened decision: poor expeditors of the Datary, their condition deserves to be taken into account too," approved Moriggia in turn.

  "Boor."

  This time, two or three guests turned around to see who dared aim such epithets at a member of the Sacred College. But the flow of conversation continued.

  "'Tis a truly extraordinary Jubilee. Never has there been in Rome an atmosphere of such Christian fervour. And never, I'd say, have so many pilgrims been seen; not even on the glorious Jubilee of Pope Clement X. Is it not true, Your Eminence?" said Durazzo, turning to Cardinal Carpegna, who had personally taken part in the prodigious Jubilee celebrations a quarter of a century earlier.

  The Carpegna family was among other things related to the Spada, which on that evening conferred even greater attention upon his every word.