“We have people to sell us the goods. We’re spice merchants and we have our own skiff. My brother-in-law will bring us the merchandise every month. We just need time to settle down and then we’ll sort out everything else.” Paolo is on the defensive, even though he doesn’t want to be, but this man is provoking him, laughing at him, putting him on the spot.
“Oh, then you’re sellers. Not aromatari.”
The young man elbows the older one. He doesn’t even take the trouble to speak softly. “What did I tell you? I thought it seemed odd . . . There’s been no application made to the College of Aromatari, or even the Apothecaries. They’re storekeepers.”
The other man replies, “Yes, you’re right.”
Paolo wants to throw them out: they’ve come to stick their noses in his business, they’ve sized him up, and now they’re even mocking him . . . “Now, if you don’t mind, I need to carry on working.” He indicates the door. “Good day.”
The older man rocks on his heels, gives him a look of contempt, then clicks his heels, as though obeying an instruction, and leaves the store without saying goodbye.
The other man, however, lingers to look at the shelves. “I give you two months before you’re out begging on the streets,” he says. “Two months before you close down.”
* * *
When Ignazio comes back, he finds Paolo looking drawn, his hands trembling. He’s moving jars and bottles, looking at them, shaking his head. “What happened?” Ignazio asks. He knows something must have happened. His brother is upset.
“Three people came by a little while ago. Two men and a woman. They were asking me all these questions. Who are you, what do you do, how do you trade . . .”
Ignazio lifts some of the beams he got from the ship carpenter to repair the chairs and the shelves. “Nosey people.” He takes a nail, pushes it in, and starts to hammer it. “So what did they want?”
“It’s not just about what they wanted but who they were.”
Ignazio pauses. The annoyance in his brother’s voice isn’t just dislike: it’s unease, maybe even fear. He frowns. “Who were they, Paolo? What did they want from us?”
“The boy Bottari sent us told me. He was so scared he didn’t even want to come close.” He puts a hand on his brother’s shoulder. “It was Canzoneri. Canzoneri and his son-in-law, Carmelo Saguto—you should have seen how he behaved.”
Ignazio puts the hammer down on the counter. “The Canzoneri? The spice wholesaler who also sells to the Royal Army?”
“And to all the aristocracy, that’s right.”
“So what did he want here?”
Paolo indicates the aromateria. The void between his open arms is filled with the afternoon half-light of this weary autumn. “To tell us we won’t get very far.” The discouragement and resignation in his voice touch Ignazio to the quick. He can’t bear it.
He picks up the hammer and grabs a nail. “Let him talk.”
He slams down the hammer.
And, as though he is giving him back the thought he shared with him in Bagnara, when his brother told him he wanted to leave, “Let them all talk, Paolo. We haven’t come here to starve or run back to Calabria in the middle of the night like beggars.” His voice is harsh. It doesn’t conceal anger, indignation, or pride. Another nail, another blow. “We’ve come here and we’re staying.”
* * *
After Canzoneri, other aromatari come to nose about. They loiter outside the store, peep through the windows, send their store boys to take a look.
Their faces are hostile, contemptuous, or commiserating. One of them, a certain Gulì, comes to tell them, all friendly, not to feel too clever, because Palermo is a “ruthless” place.
Palermo is studying the Florios. Studying them closely. And she makes no allowances.
There are just a few customers.
And to think that now they have the spices, and top-quality ones, too.
Therefore, when, a few weeks later, they hear the door creak, they almost can’t believe their eyes.
A woman. She wears a scarf over her head and an apron around her hips. She’s holding a piece of paper in her hand. She hands it to Paolo, who’s nearest to her. “I don’t know what it says here,” she explains. “My husband has a stomachache and a high fever. They told me to buy these things but I don’t have much money so I can’t go to the apothecary. I went to Gulì’s but he said that what I have won’t buy anything. Can you folks sell them to me?”
The brothers exchange a glance.
Paolo reads, “‘Medicines for constipation.’ Let’s see what we can do.” He lists the herbs. “Rue, mallow flowers . . .”
Ignazio climbs to the shelves and brings down the jars. The herbs end up in the mortar while Paolo listens to the woman.
“My husband’s been in pain for four days and can’t get out of bed.” She casts sidelong glances at Ignazio, who’s crushing the herbs with the pestle. “Will these cure him? Because I have nowhere to go. I had to pawn my earrings to call the physicians because the barber didn’t understand anything.”
Paolo rubs his chin. “Is it a high fever?”
“He’s taken to his bed and hasn’t gotten up.”
“He can’t get comfortable, poor man . . . Of course, if the fever’s high . . .”
Ignazio indicates a large jar behind him. Paolo understands.
A spoonful of dark bark ends up in the mortar.
She looks at Ignazio with suspicion. “What’s that?”
“It’s bark,” Paolo explains patiently. “It comes from a tree in Peru, the cinchona, and it helps bring down the fever.”
Still, the woman is worried, and puts her hands in her pockets. Ignazio hears the jangling of coins as she counts them.
“You don’t have to pay this time, don’t worry.”
She almost can’t believe it. She takes the money and puts it on the counter. “But the others . . .”
Paolo puts a hand on her arm. “The others are the way they are and do what they like. We’re the Florios.”
And that’s how it all begins.
* * *
The weeks go by, one after the other. Christmas is approaching.
One day, Giuseppina comes to see them shortly after the bells have tolled midday. She finds her husband and brother-in-law putting aside jars and scales. “I’ve brought your lunch,” she says. She is carrying a basket of bread, cheese, and olives. Ignazio gives her a chair but she shakes her head. “I must go. Vittoria is on her own with Vincenzo.”
Paolo takes her by the wrist. “I wish you wouldn’t always rush off.”
He says it with an odd tenderness. So, cautiously, she comes back to her husband and he hands her a slice of bread soaked in oil.
“I’ve already eaten.”
He squeezes her hand. “So? A little something more?”
Giuseppina accepts but keeps her eyes downcast.
Ignazio chews slowly, watching them.
They’re teasing. Or rather, Paolo is the one teasing. Giuseppina accepts the morsels he gives her but her brow is still furrowed.
Someone knocks.
“Can’t we have some peace and quiet?” Paolo wipes his mouth on his sleeve. He goes into the store while Ignazio swallows the last piece of cheese and is back on his feet.
Giuseppina grabs him by the sleeve. “Ignazio.” Her tone is harsh, almost like his brother’s.
“What’s the matter?”
“I need your help. I . . .” There’s a sound of clinking bottles in the next room. “I wanted to send Mattia a letter. Could you write it?”
Ignazio turns back. “Can’t Paolo help you?”
“I did ask him.” Giuseppina’s hand is on the table. She clenches her fist and stretches until it touches him. “He says he hasn’t got time and I shouldn’t make him waste any more. The truth is he doesn’t want to, I know it, and when I told him he lost his temper. Mattia doesn’t know how we are, if we’ve settled in . . . Before, we’d see each other every day in church.
Now I don’t even know if she’s alive, and I want to at least write to her . . .”
Ignazio sighs. These two are like water and oil: they can be in the same bowl but they’ll never mix.
She drops her voice. She touches him and squeezes his hand. “I don’t know who to ask. I’m not close to anybody here yet and I don’t want to tell my business to a stranger. At least you help me . . .”
Ignazio keeps silent and thinks. No, he tells himself. She should ask a scribe. He doesn’t want to know why Giuseppina looks so unhappy or why Paolo tries to approach her, knowing he will be rejected.
But it’s pointless: he sees them and listens to them every day, even if they don’t argue out loud. Because there are things you can feel with your soul and your instinct. He loves them both, and he’s caught in the middle.
That’s when he, the meek brother, the one who’s generous and kind, feels a hidden little snake, a venomous grass snake, rear up its head. Ignazio has learned to throw stones at it, because it has no right to slither out. He can’t tell Paolo what to do with his wife.
Giuseppina is now practically speaking in his face. “I beg you.”
Ignazio knows he shouldn’t butt in. He should go, he should tell her to ask Paolo again.
That’s when he realizes that their fingers are interlaced.
He comes away abruptly, and says, with his back to her, “All right. Now go.”
* * *
When Paolo asks him why he’s brought paper and ink home, he tells him. He sees his brother’s face darken. “Suit yourself. I don’t want to put up with her complaints also in a letter.”
They say little over dinner; they help themselves to morsels from a single dish on the table. Afterward, there are grapes and a little dried fruit. Vittoria is walking up and down the room with Vincenzo in her arms. She is singing.
Look at this little boy of mine
This lovely little child
Sleep, yes, sleep
Sleep peaceful and mild
For now is the hour, now is the time
Come, sleep, come take this little boy of mine
Giuseppina dries her hands on her apron, goes to Vittoria and kisses her. “Go to bed, you two. I have business with your uncle.” She slumps onto the bench and brushes her hair away from her face. “So?”
“I’ll get the paper.”
Ignazio goes into the bedroom he shares with Vittoria to fetch the ink. He listens to what is happening in the kitchen.
“Why didn’t you ask me?” Paolo says.
“You told me you didn’t have time.” Giuseppina’s voice is full of bitterness.
“That’s right.” A chair creaks. “In that case I’m going to bed.”
Ignazio rushes in, blocking his brother’s exit. “Here it is, Paolo, come, why don’t you dictate a few words of greeting, too?”
Giuseppina is now looking at her husband. Stay, she seems to be saying.
So Paolo stays.
He sits back down, and writes. He has a difficult temper, but it couldn’t be otherwise, given how he grew up. And he’s proud, like all Florios.
Then he returns the paper to Ignazio, who grabs the pen and encourages Giuseppina to start.
“Dear Mattia . . .” She pauses and takes a breath. Then she starts and it’s as though she can’t stop. “The child is growing and doing well, your brothers work from morning till night . . .
“The house is small but close to the aromateria . . .
“They don’t have here the green vegetables we used to pick together in the mountains . . .
“Palermo is very big and I only know the streets that lead to the harbor . . .”
Ignazio is concentrating.
He feels what Giuseppina is really trying to say.
Vincenzo, at least, makes me happy, while Paolo and Ignazio leave me alone all day and I’m losing my mind in this hole. That’s right, because the house is little more than a warehouse at the service of the store and I spend my days alone, wretchedly alone, with my son and Vittoria, and there’s no room for me in this huge city, you’re not here, and I’m getting lost among these walls, the mud, and the nothingness.
In the end, Giuseppina falls silent.
Paolo approaches his wife and gives her shoulder a squeeze. “I’ll send the letter tomorrow,” he says. He strokes her hair. It’s a very long caress, made up of regret, tenderness, and fear. He opens his mouth to speak but doesn’t, and walks out of the room before his wife’s bewildered eyes.
And yet he should do it, Ignazio thinks. He should talk to her. Listen to her. Isn’t that what marriage is about? Isn’t it about bearing life’s burdens together?
Isn’t that what he would do?
* * *
“Thanks again, Don Florio, good day to you.”
“Always here to help. Goodbye.”
Christmas 1799 went by quickly. Another year has gone by and the aromateria has grown. They, the Florio brothers—after much struggling—have become known. For a long time they were crushed by the mistrust of Palermo residents and by the rumors circulated by Saguto, Canzoneri’s son-in-law. Partly through fear and partly not to upset Canzoneri, the other aromatari kept away from their store. Paolo still remembers the days he spent on the doorstep, waiting for a customer to come in, or another seller to reserve a supply of spices. Above all, they had to tolerate the looks Saguto gave them whenever he walked past the store, almost gloating at seeing it deserted. Paolo swore to himself that he’d wipe that superior smirk off his face.
The new year, 1800, has brought a wave of frost and rain. The door closes with the usual, now familiar squeak. For a moment, the sound of rain enters the store, along with the winter wind and the smell of burned wood.
Paolo looks around, and puts away the bottles left on the work counter.
At the end of last year, there was a violent fever epidemic. Christmas carols alternated with lamentations of many funerals.
The provisions of bark almost ran out. The larger aromaterie, like Canzoneri’s, were selling it literally at the price of gold and so many people needed it.
Then Barbaro unexpectedly brought a load of spices. He came with the new year: with chests full of spices that had filled the store. And the news spread overnight. There’s a rule of fate in life, u’ risu cammina nzemmula cu li vai: “What makes one man laugh makes another man cry.” That’s what happened: the day after, the store was crowded, and not just with wretched people needing medicinal herbs.
Aromatari. Small apothecaries. A few physicians.
There they were outside the door, hats off and money in their pockets, begging to buy the bark they couldn’t find anywhere else.
Paolo still remembers the time Carmelo Saguto, walking past Piano San Giacomo, stopped to look, incredulous, at the comings and goings of spice sellers who had come to these Calabrians nobody used to trust. He rushed into the store, pushing the other customers out of his way, and asked Paolo to show him the bark, because it couldn’t be true, he shouted, they were taking people for a ride . . .
Paolo grabbed a handful and poured it on the counter. “Peruvian bark. Just arrived and already sold out. Eat your heart out, Saguto.”
The man had taken a few steps back, surrounded by the embarrassed looks of other aromatari and physicians. His face was swollen, twisted by a sneer. He stood still, then spat and said, “Mud of the earth.”
The next day, Canzoneri spread the word that he had other spices, had dropped his prices, and that he’d give special deals to loyal customers. But the damage was done.
“Never mind who dies, as long as you’re alive,” Paolo said.
Now he realizes that’s how it works.
The moment he stopped being a simple man from Bagnara and became Don Paolo Florio.
And now this name is written on exchange bills, documents, and countersigned on the contracts by storekeepers who sampled the quality of their goods and have returned to buy from them.
Paolo puts the last jar away on the shelf.
True: that load of bark was a stroke of luck. But what happened next was not by chance.
Outside the windows, Michele, their store boy, is running. He is clutching a box covered in oilskin to his chest. He enters and shakes off the rain. “It’s really coming down,” he says, placing the box on the counter. “Here it is: nutmeg and cumin. I’ve also brought some fraxinella because I noticed we’re running low.”
“What’s it like in the warehouse?”
“It’s cold. There’s damp but not much we can do about it with all this rain.”
“Damp ruins the fragrance,” Paolo huffs. “Later on, you and Domenico go and store all the bags high up and put paper in the gaps in the doors.”
The boy nods, then vanishes to the back room. They have replaced the curtain with a door and painted the shutters.
This is not the only change to their business.
The store is no longer big enough.
Paolo and Ignazio have rented a warehouse in Via dei Materassai, in the Castellammare district. There they can store the merchandise that arrives from the entire Mediterranean. A step up in quality is essential since they’ve started wholesaling to other merchants.
He calls Michele.
“Yes, Don Paolo.”
“I’m going out. Ignazio’s late, I hope there are no problems at customs. Mind the store.”
The roar of rain that greets him sends a shiver through him. He walks across Piano San Giacomo and looks at his house: there’s light filtering through the shutters. Giuseppina must be cooking.
And Vincenzo . . .
Vincenzo is an intelligent child. In the evenings, Paolo watches him play with Vittoria or sees Ignazio trying to teach his nephew and niece the letters of the alphabet.
But shortly afterward, his wife comes out to pour out a basin of dirty water. She’s seen him, of that he is sure, but nothing, not even a wave.
He draws his head into his shoulders and picks up the pace toward Palazzo Chiaramonte. Giuseppina does not love him. He knows that and it has never bothered him: he has his work. He often travels across the sea, and the spice store fills his days.
The Florios of Sicily Page 4