"At midday. Take care, I beg of you," said Cloridia, with a slight hint of anxiety in her voice.
I smiled to myself. The news was too important for my wife not to pass it on to me. At the same time, my suspicions about Cloridia were now confirmed. Her initial impulse to help us had already cooled: she feared for me.
"Fear not, I shall watch over your husband," said Melani in honeyed tones, lying brazenly.
"I thank you," replied my wife, bowing her head slightly. "How magnificent! This is the first time that I have set foot in the Vessel," she added at once, looking all around her in astounded admiration.
Fortunately, the beauty of the villa had distracted her from her fears."Our Buvat cannot say as much. After all, I do not think he saw very much last time he was here," laughed the Abbot, remembering how Buvat had come to us covered in blood from the Princess of Forano's childbirth.
Atto's secretary did not hear what was said; he was already engrossed in reading the inscriptions on the walls of the room in which we stood.
"This villa is in rather good condition for one that has been abandoned for years: one would say it belonged to the Fortunate Isles, also known as the Isles of Folly, for there that goddess was born, there everything grows without sowing or ploughing, nor is there weariness, old age or disease; not, at least, according to my countryman, the learned Erasmus," added Cloridia quite spontaneously.
Atto and I gave a start. I was shocked by Cloridia's bold observation. I had not yet had occasion to tell her of the extravagant Dutch musician or his obsessive playing of one tune, the folia, spiced with curious maxims on folly. Yet she seemed to have guessed at all that, and what was more, as though it were the most natural thing in the world: the Vessel and folly. Not only that, she too, who had grown up in Amsterdam, had, like Albicastro, often heard of the encomium which their countryman from Rotterdam had composed in honour of madness. Certainly, I thought, my spouse's long familiarity with the arts of divination must have played its part. Atto seemed of the same opinion:
"You were once a past-mistress at reading the lines of the hand, if I remember rightly," said he, hiding his unease. "May I ask you what, in your opinion, bestows eternal youth on this uninhabited villa?"
"Simple: it is what the Greeks so rightly called a 'good state of mind' and which we for our pleasure may call folly."
"So you possess some arcane art which enables you to judge that the place in which we stand has a soul, a mind of its own?"
"What woman worthy of the name does not possess that art?" replied Cloridia with a facetious smile. "But now, tell me, I hear that you want to enter Palazzo Spada."I summarised for her the complicated situation in which we found ourselves (and she listened with many expressions of wonderment); then I explained to her that we should need to search in the museum of the late Virgilio Spada.
"You happen to be talking to the right person: within a few days, the wife of the Deputy Palace Steward is due to give birth. For months now, I have been going regularly to check on her. It will be a long, difficult thing, the woman is very fat and I shall certainly need her husband's help. Thus, the palace will be unguarded."
"But there will be other servants around," I observed.
"You seem to have forgotten that they have all been transferred to Villa Spada as reinforcements for this week's festivities," retorted Gloridia with a sly smile. "Indeed, I'll tell you more: the Deputy Steward and his wife are temporarily lodging in a room on the ground floor, the better to keep watch now that the palace is empty. They, too, were supposed to be sent to Villa Spada, but because of the pregnancy they were left in the caretaker's lodge. That opens up a golden opportunity for us," she concluded confidently.
How sure of herself my Cloridia had become, I thought with some amusement. She feared for me when I was going around without her, but if, as now, she could accompany me or be nearby, she became emboldened, almost as though she felt herself to be a powerful goddess whose presence alone sufficed to make me invincible.
"And is there really no one else in the palace?" Atto asked dubiously.
"Of course, the guards are still there, but they make their rounds outside the palace, and that's all," explained Cloridia.
"We, however, need to enter Palazzo Spada as soon as possible," objected Atto. "We cannot wait for your delivery to arrive at its term."
"And where's the problem? I'll go and visit her today for a check on her progress: a few tisanes with good stimulating herbs. . . and 'tis done.""Do you mean that you can make her give birth earlier?" I asked, taken aback, for my wife had never told me that midwives had that ability. "How is that possible?"
"Easy. I shall make her womb sneeze."
Atto and I fell silent, fearing that Cloridia was mocking us.
"Do you mean that a woman's uterus can sneeze?" the Abbot asked circumspectly.
"Of course. Just as though it were the nose. Take a dram of marjoram, half a dram of love-in-a-mist, add a scruple of very finely pounded cloves and white pepper for luck, half a scruple of nutmeg, white hellebore and castor and mix it all to prepare a fine, almost impalpable powder. One must blow several times into the woman's womb with a quill, and that will provoke sneezing marvellously. If that should not prove sufficient, one can throw a paste prepared by mixing the same powder with fat onto hot coals so that it produces smoke to make the womb sneeze. Obviously, it will first be necessary to open up the passage as wide as possible in advance, and that can be done by attaching a sheet tightly to the woman's navel."
"Excuse me," interrupted Abbot Melani anxiously, "are you sure this is not dangerous?"
"Of course not. On the contrary, these are remedies greatly appreciated by women's wombs, just like bringing odours of musk and amber before them: they have the effect of pulling them downwards, for they are attracted by such odours. I am sure that, thanks to such stratagems, the Deputy Steward of Palazzo Spada will soon be calling for me with all haste, as the infant will be about to come into the world."
"And what if it should not work?"
"It will work. Otherwise I shall make use of some simples which work extremely rapidly because of their occult properties, such as the aquiline stone tied to the thigh, or the doeskin, or seed of porcelain to be drunk mixed with white wine, or even a bitch's placenta pulverised and spread on the vulva; or the skins that serpents leave in March, to be fed into the womb. But this last remedy is less prudent."
Abbot Melani paled on hearing Cloridia list all those venereal manoeuvres so insouciantly."When would you expect that..." I began.
"Judging by appearances, as she's so fat, labour should not begin before tomorrow afternoon. Is that too late?"
"No, that will do well. Only, how shall we manage to enter and leave the palace?" asked the Abbot.
"Today, when I go to Palazzo Spada, I shall discreetly gather information and study the situation; tomorrow morning, I shall be able to tell you. There is only one thing you will have to see to on your own: the keys to the rooms."
"That will not be a problem," answered Atto with a little smile.
I knew who he had in mind.
Evening the Sixth
12th JULY, 1700
*
This time, my work place was in the garden, of course, need I say dressed as a janissary, setting up the artificial lights for the opera galante which was about to be staged. I was to work under the guidance of the Major-Domo, Don Paschatio Melchiorri, who in his turn had been well instructed by the architect of the scenery. The latter had in fact had a rather original idea: to make of these preparations, which were in fact quite unusual, a spectacle in its own right, to attract and entertain the guests while they awaited the start of the performance.
The area had been provided with a work table and, in the middle, a fire, on which a cauldron of water had been put to boil. A group of cardinals drew near, intrigued by these activities.
"We shall now put up various transparent colours for the embellishment of this evening's scenic jest, and first
of all the colour sapphire, or sky-blue, which is also the most beautiful," announced Don Paschatio, resplendent in dress livery, in town crier's tones. I, meanwhile, followed him with a barber's basin and a brass vase under my arms, as well as a shoulder bag.
"Master of the Fowls, take a piece of sal ammoniac from your bag. Rub it on the bottom and the sides of the basin until it is all used up, then add a little water, but very little. The more the salt, the more splendid the colour."
I obeyed, after which he made me filter the water with a felt pad and pour it into the brass vase. I was astounded to see that the water which came out of this was sapphire-coloured. He then made me pour part of this into two large glass jars of a curious half- moon shape, one half of which was convex, the other concave."And now," proclaimed Don Paschatio, "we shall make Emerald Water." Thereupon, he drew from the bag a little jar containing a certain yellow powder which looked just like saffron.
He poured a little of this into one containing sky-blue water, stirred it quickly with a spoon and the liquid at once changed colour, becoming green.
We then dissolved some rock alum in the cauldron of boiling water, made it foam and decanted it through a piece of felt into five different containers, the last of which was almost as big as a cauldron.
"And here is the colour ruby," declaimed Don Paschatio to the bystanders, pouring into the first jar a few drops of highly coloured vermilion wine, which promptly dyed the water a rather bright red.
"And now for the Afghan red!" exclaimed the Major-Domo, pouring red wine and white together into the second jar.
Into the last two containers, he poured a Frascati wine and a little bottle of Marino red.
"And here for you, last but not least, the colour page-grey, and topaz!" said he smugly, while stupefaction was painted on the faces of all those lords and eminences.
"And this?" asked Cardinal Moriggia, pointing at the biggest receptacle.
"This remains as it is: it will reproduce the colour diamond, which is that of the sun in the Greek Islands," said Don Paschatio, who had never been to Greece and was with some success repeating parrot-fashion the instructions passed down to him by the scenery designer.
With this, the spectacle of the preparation of the colours came to an end. What we were about to accomplish next, explained Don Paschatio, was to be kept out of sight of prying eyes.
"Otherwise, if they discover the trick, there's an end to the wonder of it," said he, talking furtively.With the help of other servants, we took the jars behind the painted backcloth, representing the countryside in Cyprus. There, we found a wooden panel with holes in it. We positioned the jars so that they filled these holes with their convex sides, standing them on tripod supports. On the concave side, so as better to receive the light, we placed a lamp designed to provide light of constant intensity.
"Lift the biggest container up there," the Major-Domo ordered me, "and instead of a lamp, put a big torch behind it. Then, behind that, place a well-polished shaving bowl so that the light from the flame is reflected forward as much as possible."
Great was my surprise when, emerging from the wings to admire the results of all these preparations, I beheld a lusty sun sparkling like a diamond in the painted Cypriot sky of the back- cloth and shining paternally on fresh, luminous greenery and flowers coloured ruby, red and topaz, while the sapphire glint of the distant sea was capped by the page grey foam of the waves.
The stage had, moreover, been decorated with trees, hills, little mountains, grasses, flowers, fountains and even rustic huts, all fashioned from the finest of many-coloured silk. Thus, the liberality of the munificent Cardinal Spada and the art and skill of the architect, both enemies of ugly parsimony, had led to the destruction of much of the work of the Master Florist, so that all these things might be recreated in silk, making them even more praiseworthy than if they had been natural. The sea was rich in little cliffs, conch shells, sea snails and other creatures, coral trunks of every colour, mother-of-pearl and marine crabs nestling between the rocks, with such a variety of beautiful things that were I to attempt to describe them, I should expatiate for far too long.
The stage was simply lit with pairs of hanging torches, since the spectacle was to begin in the late afternoon when daylight is still bright and generous. Other lamps also gave both actors and spectators not only splendid lights but superb perfumes: bowls of camphor water were suspended above chandeliers or torches, so that, in accordance with the architect Serlio's formulae, they spread gentle glimmers and soft effluvia, thus preparing the hearts and minds of those present for the pleasures of the performance.In the meanwhile, the terraces, furnished with comfortable sateen-upholstered armchairs, had filled with the noble public. I too stopped briefly to admire the stage: obviously, sitting on the ground. From my awkward position, far too much to one side, I could however overhear some of the comments of the guests seated in the front rows. A trio of gentlemen was particularly voluble; I heard them exchanging jokes while the actors were coming on stage.
"The last performance I recall attending was in March, at the Palace of the Chancellery: Scarlatti's oratorio 'La Santissima Annunziata" said one of the three.
"That for which Cardinal Ottoboni wrote the text?"
"That one."
"What was the Cardinal's verse like? Was it good?"
"Terrible. Far from an Ottobonbon, 'twas truly awful - just a load of Ottobombast," replied the other.
The three gentlemen laughed heartily as they joined the audience's applause welcoming the actors.
"Apropos things terrible, what do you think of Giovan Domenico Bonmattei Pioli's play?"
"The one that was published in January last year?"
"A real horror. It was commissioned by Ottoboni, who is a member of the most learned Academy of Arcadia, but Pioli's plays are really quite nauseatingly crude."
Smiles all round. It goes without saying that the Scarlatti oratorio in March, a good four months earlier, was by no means the last spectacle the gentleman "remembered" attending. . . What was, however, abundantly clear was the trio's scant sympathy for the Ottoboni faction. This cardinal enjoyed a considerable following at that moment and they were - like all good theatregoers and participants in the Roman social round - enjoying the opportunity for malicious gossip, with an elegant exchange of salacious jokes at their victim's expense.
"His Holiness must again be suffering from poor health," said the third gentleman, changing the subject. "Today was the ninth anniversary of his accession. At the Quirinale, they held a service in the Pontifical Chapel, but he did not attend."
"I can tell you what was wrong with him: he was suffering from the jostling he's been given by the Spanish Ambassador and his cronies.""Really?" said one of the other two. "Do you mean that they have at last succeeded in convincing him?"
"A sick old man like him could hardly stand up for long to sly foxes of that calibre."
"Poor man, the thing must have lasted until lunchtime," added the third speaker. "His Holiness came out only in the afternoon, when he went forth into the city and received much applause."
"All merited, for that poor saintly, martyred Pope."
"Let us hope that the Lord will soon call him to his glory, to put an end to his sufferings; after all, there's nothing to be done now..."
"Quiet, lupus in fabula," said the third, pointing towards the drive from which Cardinal Spada was arriving, followed by the bridal couple, greeted by a renewed salvo of applause.
With a brief gesture, the master of the house called for the play to begin. This was a farce from the pen of the Roman Epifanio Gizzi, entitled Love, the Prize of Constancy. Both title and content were consonant with noble sentiments and with the gifts of fidelity and perseverance called for by the sacred bonds of matrimony.
The stage, still empty of actors, opened onto a series of effects most pleasing to the spectators. The architect had arranged for a number of sets of little lay figures to be prepared, cut out from thick cardboard and coloured,
and these crossed an arch placed on stage, running along a wooden rail placed on the ground with a dovetail joint. The operator, who was none other than the architect himself, remained hidden behind the arch and the scene was accompanied by quiet music both vocal and instrumental. At the same time and by means of the same cardboard cut-out technique, the moon and the planets crossed the heavens, pulled invisibly by a black wire.The operetta was well made and the public enjoyed it no little. The scene was set on the Isle of Cyprus. The protagonists were two gentlemen, Rosauro and Armillo, the latter accompanied by his coarse servant Barafone. With numerous ups and downs, the pair vied for the favours of two damsels, Florinda and Celidalba. After innumerable tricks and turns of fate (duels, shipwrecks, famines, disguises, fires, attempted suicides) it was revealed that Armillo was really called Alcesti and that he was Celidalba's brother, while her real name was Lindori. Florinda, meanwhile, after several times disdaining Rosau- ro's attentions, gave in at the end and even married him, thus showing that love is indeed always the prize of constancy.
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