FORTVNE
Friend, look well upon this figure,
Et in arcano mentis reponatur,
Ut magnus inde fructus extrahatur, Inquiring well into its nature...
"Here is the first clue!" exclaimed the Abbot triumphantly.
"Perhaps Capitor's three gifts which we seek are not far from here," I ventured.
We kept looking all around us. We saw that the semicircular loggia too, as well as the window openings and shutters, were covered in proverbs and sayings. One caught my eye.
'"From the private hatreds of the great spring the miseries of the people'," I read aloud.
Atto looked at me in some surprise. Was that not just what he was teaching me with his tale of the Sun King's misfortune in love, which had ended up by turning into a force of destruction?
"Look," said he suddenly, in a voice stifled by surprise.
Fascinated until that moment by the frescoes, the proverbs, the displays of arms and by the round loggia with its fountain, we at last turned our gaze to the other end of the gallery, facing north.
Despite all the time that has passed since then and the seemingly endless series of unusual experiences, I still recall the vertigo that overcame me.
The gallery was endless. Its two converging sides stretched out to infinity, it was almost as though my eyeballs had been torn from their sockets and projected helplessly into that abyss. Overcome by the unbearable dazzle of the light from outside, I saw the walls of the gallery melt into the displays of arms, the frescoes of the ceiling and, lastly, into the potent, solemn, fearful image outlined against the horizon, framed by the glass window as in a hunter's gun-sights: the Vatican Hill.
"Bravo, bravo Benedetti," commented Atto.
It took us a few minutes to realise what had happened. The northern end of the gallery consisted of a wall in which was set a window which gave onto a quadrangular loggia. The wall around the glass had been hung with mirrors which replicated and prolonged the gallery, making it appear endless. But that happened if the observation point was far enough away and equally distant from the two long sides: then and only then. In the middle of the wall, and thus at the point where the perspective of that architectural tunnel converged, the vista of the Vatican palaces was right at the centre of the frame; it was enough to approach that great window to include in the panorama the cupola of St Peter's Basilica.
So the prow of that ship-shaped villa pointed directly towards the seat of the papacy. It was not clear whether the coincidence was a sign of virtuosity or, rather, a threat.
"I do not understand. It seems to be aiming the barrel of a cannon, almost as though we could fire at the Vatican palaces," I commented. "You knew Benedetti. In your opinion, was it or was it not a matter of chance that the Vessel was thus oriented?"
"I'd say that..."
He broke off. Suddenly, the sound of footsteps could be heard in the garden. Atto did not wish to give the impression that he was alarmed, yet, forgetting what he was about to say, he began to pace up and down nervously.
We explored the rooms giving onto the gallery, which were four in all. First, there was a little chapel, then a bath chamber. Above the entrance of the first was written "Hic anima" and above the second, "Hie corpus".
'"Here is for the soul' and 'here is for the body'," translated Atto. "What a witty fellow!"
The bath chamber was most richly furnished and decorated with stuccoes and majolica tiles. It contained two baths. In each, the water was dispensed by two taps, above one of which was written "calida" while above the other was inscribed "frigida".
"Hot and cold water, on demand," Atto commented. "Incredible. Not even the King enjoys such conveniences."
We again heard a pronounced crunching of gravel outside. The footsteps sounded more hurried than before.
"Do you really not wish to go out and see whether the two... Well. . . whether there's someone outside."
"Of course I want to," he replied. "First, however, I intend to finish exploring this floor. If we find nothing interesting here, we shall move on to the floor above."
As was easily foreseeable, the chapel too was decorated with dozens and dozens of holy maxims, from the walls to the shutters of the windows. Atto read one at random.
"'Ieunium arma contra diabolum' 'Fasting is a weapon against the Devil'. We should remind all those eminences stuffing themselves at the home of Cardinal Spada of that one."
The two remaining rooms were dedicated to the papacy and to France respectively: a little chamber with portraits of all the pontiffs and another with effigies of the kings of France and of Queen Christina of Sweden. Above the two doorways, two inscriptions: "LITERA" for the popes, "ET ARMA" for the kings.
"To popes the care of the spirit, to kings the defence of the state," explained Atto; "Benedetti was certainly no friend of the temporal power of the Church," he guffawed.
In the little chamber dedicated to France, two splendid tapestries of bucolic scenes hung on the walls, which captured Abbot Melani's attention no less. The first depicted a shepherdess, with a satyr in the background attempting to abduct another one, dragging her by the hair, but failing because the maiden wore hair which was not her own. In the second tapestry, a young man with bow and arrow leaned over a nymph wounded in her side and attired in a wolf's skin, the whole enclosed in a floral frame punctuated with scrolls and medallions in relief.
"There are Corisca and Amarillis, and here is Dorinda wounded: these are two scenes from The Faithful Shepherd, the celebrated pastoral tragicomedy by the Cavaliere Guarini which for over a century has enjoyed such success in all the courts of Christendom," he recited with satisfaction. "Admire, my boy, these are without question two of the finest tapestries from the French manufactories. They come from the Faubourg Saint-Germain, admirably woven by the skilled hands of Van der Plancken - or de la Planche, if you prefer," he specified, speaking with all the mannerisms of an expert. "I persuaded Elpidio Benedetti to purchase these when I came from France some thirty years ago."
"They are truly beautiful," I assented.
"Originally, these were part of a set of four but, at my suggestion, Benedetti brought two of them to the Palazzo Colonna as a gift for Maria Mancini, who was then in Rome. Only I knew how much she would appreciate them. When I returned to Rome, I found that she had hung them in her bedchamber, just in front of her writing desk. She always loved risk: she kept them for years under her husband's nose and he never noticed a thing!" said he, sniggering.
"The husband did not notice that the tapestries had been hung?" I asked, not having understood.
"No, no, I do not mean that he never discovered them. . . Come, forget it," replied Atto, becoming suddenly evasive.
"I imagine that this Faithful Shepherd was one of the favourite readings of la Mancini and the King at the time of their amours," I guessed, trying to understand what Atto had meant to say.
"More or less," he mumbled, drawing suddenly away from the tapestries and pretending to take an interest in a picture of a wooded landscape. "I mean, it was the favourite reading of many at the time. It is a very famous play, as I said to you."
The Abbot seemed reticent, and then aware that I had noticed this.
"I detest gossiping about the love secrets of Maria and His Majesty," he declared in familiar tones, "above all, those they shared when they were alone."
"Alone? Yet you are informed of them," I commented dubiously.
"Yes, I and no one else."
I found it distinctly curious that Melani should be seized now by qualms of conscience: he seemed never to have had any whenever he had complacently revealed to me whole series of secret and intimate episodes in the life of the Most Christian King. On the contrary...
I was on the point of replying when I heard the same footsteps yet again. They were drawing near at an alarming pace. They were coming up the stairs. We both turned to the spiral staircase which we had climbed at the far end of the hall.
As stiff as stockfish,
both frozen by a fear which neither was willing to admit to the other, we waited with bated breath for the strange presence to manifest itself. The echoes created in the gallery by the footsteps on the marble stairs were so scattered that, without knowing where the staircase was, it would have been impossible to tell which way to turn. The footsteps drew nearer, then very near, so near that one would have sworn that they had reached the level of the gallery. Then they ceased. We both had our gaze fixed on the far end of the gallery. There was no one there.
Then he came. The shadow came between us, enormous, inconceivable. We had been deceived. The being was behind us, almost upon us, on the threshold of the loggia from which one could see the Vatican.
At that instant my mind struggled to understand how he had managed to materialise there behind us in complete silence. Simultaneously, I felt my left shoulder in his grip and knew that I was defenceless.
Transfixed by terror, I turned my head and saw the phantom. It was a small, aquiline, ill-dressed figure. His eyes were sunken, his skin, drawn. It was not necessary for me to lower my gaze to know the rest. The smell was enough: from his neck to his lower belly, his shirt was soaked in blood.
"Buvat!" cried Atto, what are you doing here?"
He did not reply.
"Your. . . your wife," stammered the pale spectre, turning to me. "You must run. .. at once."
He leaned against the wall. Then he slid to the ground and fainted.
Evening the Third
9th July, 1700
*
I ran until my chest was bursting. Helped by the now late afternoon and the first evening breezes, I covered the short yet by no means negligible distance between the Vessel and the Villa Spada at a speed which not even the fear of my own death could have given me. "Cloridia, Cloridia," I kept repeating to myself in anguish, "and the little ones? Where can they be?" The whole of the ground to be covered was quite clear in my mind, carved into it by the scalpel of anxiety: I must take the main entrance of the villa, run up the avenue, enter the great house, take a couple of short cuts inside the house, climb to the first floor, run to the apartments of the Princess of Forano. . .
Yet, the moment that I came in sight of the walls of the Villa Spada, I saw that it was going to be very difficult.
In front of the villa, absolute chaos reigned. At that moment, on the esplanade before the main gates, for hours already packed with carriages, retainers, hangers-on and servants, the party of one of the principal guests was making its entry: this was Louis Grimaldi, Prince of Monaco and Ambassador of the Most Christian King of France.
I tried to make my way through to the entrance of the villa, but in vain. From the neighbourhood there had gathered a multitude of peasants and plebeians, hungering for the sight of influential personages. All wanted to gain at least a glance at the eminences, princes and ambassadors invited to the nuptials. The crush had been worsened by the flow of persons entering and leaving the villa, under the eyes of two armed guards. Immediately outside the gates, the crowd was indescribable, the hubbub insufferable;
one could see nothing for the dust raised by the horses' hooves; the human tide oozed and swelled, repelled in vain by those (coachmen, footmen, members of the escort) struggling to manoeuvre or to make their way into the villa.
"Make way, make way! I am a servant of the Villa Spada, let me through!" I cried out like a madman, struggling to traverse the heaving mass; but no one heard me.
Just then, a carriage moved backwards. Two women managed somehow to dodge it, screaming in terror. One of them fell on top of me. I fell to the ground and, in my attempt to cling on to something, pulled down another unfortunate with me. He in turn pulled down his neighbour, so that I found myself embedded in a bizarre heap of legs and arms; hardly had I regained my feet than I saw the harmless incident had degenerated into a brawl. Two footmen were flailing wildly in all directions with their staffs. Another two coachmen were pushing one another, one drew a knife; a voice rang out calling for the sergeants. The Prince of Monaco's procession ground to a halt, lurching and creaking like one immense carriage.
Ignoring the altercation, I ran again towards my Cloridia with my heart in my mouth; but the carriages barred my way and there was no way of getting through. I put my head down and plunged into the melee, trying to force my way through a forest of legs, boots and clogs. This gained me, first, an elbow in the chest, then a shove from a small boy. Like a ram, I hurled myself headlong, preparing to fight my way through. The boy's great blue eyes stared at me, helpless and shocked. I attacked.
Instead of encountering a soft belly, my forehead met with a surface that enveloped it firmly. It was a hand, enormous and invincible, which grabbed me by the hair and hauled my head up by brute force.
"By all the culverins! What are you doing here, boy? Your wife needs you urgently."
Still holding me by the hair, Sfasciamonti was looking at me in amusement and surprise.
"What has happened to Cloridia?" I screamed.
"To her, nothing. But something good has happened to the Princess of Forano. Now, come."
He raised me up, placing me on his massive shoulders and led me to the gate of the villa. From the height of that mount, I, like some new Hannibal on the back of an elephant, could enjoy a panoramic view of the situation.
The crowd was again becoming noisy and agitated: from his carriage, the Prince of Monaco was throwing money to the people. With a broad theatrical gesture he would hurl dozens of coins from a little purse, showering the heads of the public with shiny denari. His face betrayed all his pleasure at seeing the plebeians at each others' throats, fighting over what, for him, was nothing.
"The Prince of Monaco is truly a blustering jackass," murmured Sfasciamonti as we passed the armed guards at the gates of the villa and entered the grounds at last. "One may throw money to the populace from the balcony of one's own palace, not in front of someone else's villa."
"So," I began, at last a trifle calmer, as I dismounted from Sfasciamonti's shoulders, "is Cloridia well? And how are my little daughters?"
"They are all very well. But did not Buvat tell you? The Princess of Forano has given birth to a fine little boy. While she was assisting the birth, your wife needed help. She called for the little girls and in the meantime asked for you. No one knew where you were, then Cloridia said to look for Abbot Melani. He too was nowhere to be found, so Buvat offered to help. The first thing that they asked him to do was to carry out the bloodstained sheets with which he made his shirt all filthy. Then he became very pale, saying that the sight of blood made him ill, and off he went to fetch you. By the way, where the deuce were you?"
At that very moment our eyebrows arched in amazement, when into the piazza came the procession of the bride, Maria Pulcheria Rocci. The retinue comprised no fewer than eleven carriages and innumerable others sent by cardinals, ambassadors, princes and the principal cavaliers of the court of Rome.
The equestrian procession was led by a team of six which, as everyone knows, is called the Vanguard; there followed the first three teams, that is, carriages, pulling ornamental floats, all of which merit a faithful description (but of which I, owing to my small stature, had only a partial and limited view).
In the first carriage, immediately applauded, sat the bride. The body of the carriage was all gilded, with nude figures representing Autumn and Winter in front and Summer and Spring behind. In the middle sat the Sun enthroned in majesty, the clear bringer of the said seasons, at the foot of which two rivers were depicted whose courses were united in the end, the whole surrounded and embellished by various frolicking cupids.
There followed, as is the custom with noble nuptials, a plain, empty black carriage.
The third carriage, finally, simply upholstered in crimson within and without any retinue, announced with deliberate self- effacement he whose triumph this celebration truly was, the Secretary of State, Cardinal Fabrizio.
From the richness and brave embellishment of the coaches, the
Cardinal's generosity was visible for all to see in his gift to his nephew's spouse of so memorable a display of magnificence; but this one could appreciate all the better if one reflected upon the incredible sum which - so the people murmured that evening - that splendid gesture had cost him.
"They speak of twenty thousand scudi," stammered a young lackey, taking advantage of the anonymity to be found in the humble crowd of plebeians, crushed one against the other.
The procession moved into the long avenue leading to the great house, acclaimed by the dense multitude of onlookers lining the route. Arriving at the space before the gracious fagade of the great house, it wheeled to the right, passed the orange trees and at last disappeared from my sight behind the plum orchard, wending its way towards the chapel. I made haste. I wanted to embrace my wife again as soon as possible. I raised my eyes to the first-floor window, where I knew that the Princess of Forano had her lodgings, but could descry nothing. I resolved to go up to the noble lady's door: I could surely not dare to knock but perhaps I might be able somehow to approach Cloridia. I imagined her to be rather busy, what with the infant, the care of the mother and the various recommendations that must needs be made. I found the corridor deserted: everyone had gone down to watch the arrival of the bride. I heard my wife's silvery voice through the half-open door.
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