by Susan Sontag
Everything has changed and nothing is changed. He did not acknowledge his need for company. But when his friend and protégé the painter Thomas Jones, about to return for good to England, gave up the house he rented, the Cavaliere offered him hospitality for a few months and came often in the morning to the room fitted out as a studio for Jones. He watched him filling small monochromatic canvases on his pretty olivewood easel with what seemed to him studies of emptiness: the corner of a roof or a row of top-floor windows of the building opposite.
How curious—but Jones must have his reasons. Everything rhymed with the Cavaliere’s condition.
But what are you painting, said the Cavaliere politely. I do not understand the subject.
Moments of slippage, when anything seems possible and not everything makes sense.
Permission from the Foreign Office for his third leave home came in June, and he set sail. With Catherine’s body in the hold of the ship and in his cabin a Roman cameo vase thought to have been made early in the reign of the Emperor Augustus, one of the rarest antiquities to come on the market for decades, which he had bought last year in Rome and was bringing back to England to sell. It was the most valuable item that would ever pass through his hands.
The Cavaliere had felt the bite of passion when he first saw it. Brought up two centuries earlier out of a newly excavated imperial burial mound just south of the boundary of ancient Rome, it was then and still is considered the finest piece of Roman cameo glass in existence. Nothing could be lovelier than the Thetis depicted on the frieze, reclining languidly on the nuptial couch. After he brought it back from Rome, the vase was often in his mind. He never tired of gazing at it, of holding it aloft so as to see the true color of the ground, a midnight blue indistinguishable from black except when pierced by light, and brushing the tips of his fingers over the low-relief figures incised in the creamy white glass. Alas, this was not an object he could afford to be in love with. Though Catherine’s will had left everything, unencumbered, to him, he always needed more money. The vase was too famous for him to think of keeping it. Having got it for rather a good price, a thousand pounds, the Cavaliere had high hopes of making a substantial profit.
After depositing the vase in London, and receiving condolence visits from some friends and relations, he had brought the casket to the estate in Wales, now his in title as well as fact, set off in a light rain with Charles to see it slotted into the floor of the church, sent Charles away, and lingered in the house for several weeks. It was high summer. The rain pumped Catherine’s native earth with green. He walked the estate and sometimes far out into the countryside every day, often with his pockets filled with small plums, and sat for a while staring at the sea. Mourning brought its distinctive languor. Mourning-thoughts, fond memories of Catherine, mingled with self-pity. Peace, peace for Catherine, poor Catherine. Peace for us all. The green leaves rustled over his head. This was the sun and temperate light that would prosper one day over his rotting body; and this—he’d entered the cool church for a moment—the tombstone that one day would bear his name as well.
Even before he had arrived, the London of collectors was astir about his Roman vase. News from Charles that the willful elderly Dowager Duchess of Portland coveted his prize brought him back to London. He asked for two thousand pounds. The duchess flinched. She said she would think it over. A month or two went by; the Cavaliere knew not to insist. Amusing himself as best he could, he toured her private museum of branches of coral, cases of iridescent butterflies and jewel-like seashells, insect fossils, mammoth bones (thought to be those of a Roman elephant), rare folio volumes on astronomy, antique medallions and buckles, and Etruscan vases. A grouping of objects no odder than many other collections of the period (its main oddity was that the collector was a woman), but decidedly too whimsical for the Cavaliere’s taste. The duchess’s son, already middle-aged and mindful of his inheritance, advised her against the purchase, for what was then a staggeringly high price. The duchess began seriously to want to buy the vase.
The Cavaliere spent less time at court and more with Charles, and allowed himself to be flattered and coddled by the exuberant, charming girl whom Charles had taken to live with him three years ago, and who, on Charles’s instruction, called him Uncle Pliny and kissed him daintily on the cheek. She was tall and full-figured and her head, with its auburn hair, blue eyes, and ripe mouth, would rival the beauty of certain classical statues, thought the Cavaliere, if her chin were not so small. He already knew her story from his nephew: a village blacksmith’s daughter, who had come to London at fourteen as an under-housemaid, was seduced by the son of the house, soon found more dubious employment, including posing semi-dressed as a “nymph of health” in the chambers of a doctor who claimed to cure impotence, was taken to the country estate of a baronet who cast her out when she became pregnant (her small daughter was being boarded in the country), and whose close friend, to whom the girl turned in despair, was … Charles. Sixteen years older than she, her rescuer did not marvel that so many eras had been crowded into a mere nineteen years. Women like her were supposed to climb as far as they could and be used up, quickly. There was, then, nothing special about her, apart from her physical charms. But there was. Charles wanted to be fair. He also wanted to boast. Just imagine, said Charles. She is actually quite gifted, Charles said. I’ve taught her to read and write and now she reads whole books of the self-improving sort, she’s very fond of reading, and remembers everything she’s read. The Cavaliere noticed that she remembered every word said in her presence. While her speech was vulgar and her laugh too hearty, when she was silent she seemed transformed. The Cavaliere saw her watching, observing, her eyes humid with attentiveness. And her judgment about pictures is rather fine, Charles went on, as well it might be, since she has lived with me for three years and since our friend Romney is obsessed with her. He has used her for dozens of paintings and drawings and will not hear of another model, except when I refuse to lend my girl to him. This reminded the Cavaliere that he must make time to sit again for Romney, for he wanted another portrait of himself.
The duchess counter-offered sixteen hundred pounds. The Cavaliere held firm.
He had not spent much time at court, thoughts of preferment or another appointment to Madrid or Vienna or Paris having long been abandoned. He felt older without Catherine at his side. He sat for his portrait. He told himself it was time to go back. He told others.
Eighteen hundred pounds, said the duchess angrily. Done. He made a few purchases, including Romney’s painting of Charles’s girl as a priestess of Bacchus, to take back with him to Naples.
He returned, he relapsed into his life, first addressing a backlog of duties, claims, and displays of well-being—he was still good at occupying himself. And he understood that one must combat apathy with new exertions. He undertook a vast project, one that would consume several years: designing fifty acres of English garden in the park of the palace at Caserta. He went on collecting and climbing and cataloguing. He got better at removing treasures from the excavations at Pompeii and Herculaneum under the very eyes of the King’s archaeologists. Anything can be done in this country if you know whom to pay off.
Several agreeable, picture-loving English widows of his acquaintance seemed to be proposing to remedy his loneliness, one in London on the eve of his departure, another in Rome, where he stopped for a few weeks on his way back, principally to confer with Mr. Byres, his favorite picture agent there. The lady of Rome tempted him. She was rich, in excellent health, and she played the harp skillfully. With a certain glee he gave Charles an account of her charms, knowing how nervous this would make his beloved nephew, who was counting on being his childless uncle’s heir. True, the age of the lady precluded children. However, being a decade younger than the Cavaliere, she still was likely to survive him. But the Cavaliere soon put aside the thought of a rational marriage. Even this lady, so dignified, so inhibited, portended a certain disruption of his habits, a readjustment. What the Cava
liere wanted above all else was calm. He had been meant to be a bachelor … and a widower he would end his days.
What he least wanted, consciously, was any change. He was as well-off as he could be. Yet the groin ached. Fantasy could not be denied. The inner fire was not entirely damped. And so, today, against his better judgment, he was allowing her to arrive. This naïve, innocent girl—she was innocent, the Cavaliere could see that, for all her experiences—arriving here, with her mother. Because Charles had his eye on a rich heiress (what was the second son of a lord to do?), Charles had to be serious. That is, he could no longer be guided by his affections. That is, he must be cruel to a woman. But having decided to get rid of the girl, he had not the heart to tell her and, further, had wondered if his newly widowed uncle might not enjoy her companionship. The uncle inherit the nephew’s mistress? The Cavaliere knew that Charles was not simply relieving himself of an encumbrance and putting his uncle in his debt; he was also hoping to head off the possibility that his uncle might decide to console his late years with a new wife. He might soon find himself no longer his uncle’s heir. But if his uncle liked the girl (whom clearly no one could marry) well enough, Charles was safe. Clever Charles.
She had left London with her mother in March, in the company of an elderly Scottish painter, a friend of the Cavaliere, who was returning to Rome and had agreed to take the two women under his protection. Valerio had been sent to Rome to bring them the rest of the journey. The Cavaliere was having breakfast and reading when he heard the great gateway swinging open. He went to the window and looked down at the traveling chaise pulling into the courtyard, being converged on by footmen and pages. Descending from the seat next to the driver, Valerio offered his hand to the young woman, who stepped lightly to the ground, then helped the stout older woman emerge from the carriage. As they crossed the courtyard toward the red marble staircase on the right, several maids reached out to fondle the girl’s dusty yellow dress, and she dallied for a moment, smiling, touching the outstretched hands, responding with delight to the effect she was having. What the Cavaliere noted was a hat, a large blue hat, moving above the play of light on the cobblestones.
Suddenly he thought of Jack, and missed him. He returned to the breakfast table. It’s all right to keep her waiting. A bookseller is waiting, too. He finished his cocoa, then went toward the Small Drawing Room, where he had directed that the girl and her mother be told to wait.
Passing through the door held open for him by Gasparo, he saw them sitting in the corner, whispering. The woman noticed him first and stood up hastily. The girl was holding the hat in her lap, and she turned and put it behind her on the seat as she rose. At that contrapposto of the body and then the turn back, he experienced a physical shock, as if his heart had plummeted into his belly. He hadn’t remembered she was that beautiful. Stupendously beautiful. He must have seen how beautiful she was last year, since when he had possessed this beauty in the form of an image, as the Bacchante in Romney’s picture hanging in the hall to his study, which he sees every day. But she is much more beautiful than the painting.
Heaving a deep and joyful sigh, he crossed the room and acknowledged the girl’s shy curtsy and the awkward lurch the mother intended as one. He directed Stefano to show Mrs. Cadogan the two rooms in the rear of the second floor that he was giving them. The girl leaned forward impulsively and brushed her lips against his cheek. He started back as if he had been scratched.
She must be exhausted from the long journey, he told her.
She was so happy, she told him. It was her birthday, she told him. She found the city so beautiful. She took his hand, she burned his hand, and drew him out on the terrace. And it was, indeed, beautiful—he could see that again—bathed in a sunlit haze, the red roofs tumbling down, the flower gardens and mulberry and lemon trees, the upthrust of cacti and slim, tall palms.
And that, uncle? she exclaimed, pointing to the mountain and its reddening plume of smoke. Will there be an eruption soon?
Are you afraid? he said.
Lordy, no, I want to see it! she cried. I want to see everything. It’s so … fine, she said, smiling, pleased to have found such a genteel word.
She was young, still engulfed in the ecstasy of being alive, which touched him. And he knew of her virtues—her abject devotion to Charles, who had been campaigning for almost a year to make his uncle agree to receive her. Her passion is admiration, Charles wrote to the Cavaliere. She already admires you, said Charles. The Cavaliere thought he might enjoy behaving toward her more disinterestedly than other men had done. He will give her shelter—perhaps it would be better to put the two women in the four front rooms on the third floor—and show the girl the admirable sights.
You may make of her what you like, Charles had said. The material, I can guarantee, is good.
But he did not feel very pedagogic at first. For the moment he just wanted to look at her. He cannot yet master the emotion her beauty provokes in him. Is it a sign of old age that he so instantly doted on her? For he is old. His life is over. Add this beauty to his collection? No. He would polish a little. And then send her home. Charles really was a dastard.
So the Cavaliere temporized and delayed over the next weeks, unable to believe that he was being given another chance, that life erupts anew. What had such youth to do with him? Though he knew she was his for the possessing (or so he thought), he was afraid of making a fool of himself, and he was genuinely moved by her credulity. She really did believe that Charles was coming to fetch her in a few months. Still, he would be a fool not to take the gratification offered him, without fuss, without sentimentality. Surely the girl understood. She must be used to men and their wicked ways—being passed from one to the next. True, she did love Charles. But she must be expecting his advances. Poor Emma. Wicked Charles. And he put his bony hand on hers.
The sharpness of her rejection, her tears, her cries irked him—Charles had promised someone tractable—and impressed him, too. In the age-old way that men judge women, his esteem for her mounted because she refused him. Yet she seemed genuinely to enjoy his company, not only to look up to him. To be eager to learn. Surely then, happy. He gave her a carriage for her own use. He showed her—her placid, homely mother always in attendance—the marvels of the region. He took her to Capri, and together they visited the gloomy ruins of Tiberius’ villa, stripped by predatory archaeologists of its ravishing floors of inlaid marble only a generation ago. To Solfatara, where they strolled on the scorching, sulphurous plain. To the dead cities, where they peered into a cluster of sunken houses. And to Vesuvius, setting out at four one morning beneath a full moon in a carriage that took them to Resina, where mules and Tolo were waiting to bring them as far as the lava sprawling three miles from the top. He watched her watching. She was enthralled by everything he showed her, he could tell; she besieged him with questions. She seemed only to want to please him; and if sometimes when he joined her on the terrace to admire a sunset her cheeks were wet with tears, that was understandable, she was far from home, that rogue his nephew really should have told her the truth, she was very young, what had Charles said? (He’d been vague about her age.) She must be twenty-three now. Which made the Cavaliere, at fifty-six, the age of the Elder Pliny when he succumbed to the noxious smoke, some thirty-three years older than this country Venus.
* * *
In fact, the difference between them was thirty-six years. She turned twenty-one the April day she arrived in Naples.
Oh Charles on that day you allways smiled on me & staid at home & wos kind to me & now I am so far away. From her first letter.
Charles was to follow in the autumn. He had told her. She wrote him every few days. The heat mounted, the fleas and lice multiplied. She tried to appear cheerful to the Cavaliere, who lavished gifts upon her, chief among them his own presence.
He breakfastes dines supes & is constantly bye me looking into my face, she reported to Charles. I cant stir a hand or a legg or foot but what he is marking it as graceful
l & fine. Their is two painters in the house painting me but not as good as Romney. I wore the blue hat you gave me. He as given me a camels shawl & a beautiful goun cost 25 guinees & some little things of is wife. He tels me I am a grate work of art & I am sorry to see that he loves me.
Her letters to Charles became more abject, more pained. She tells her dear Charles, Charles, that she belongs to him, and to him only will she belong, and nobody shall be his heir apparent. She tells him of all the marvelous sights she has seen, which she would so much prefer to see in his company. She pleads with him to write her; to come to Naples as he has promised, now. Or to send for her to come back to him.
After two months there was a letter.
Dear Charles, she replied, oh my heart is intirely broke. And Charles Charles how with that cool indeference to advise me to go to bed with him. Your uncle! Oh that worst of all—but I will not no I will not rage. If I wos with you I wood murder you & myself boath. Nothing shall ever do but going home to you. If that is not to be I will go home to London & their go into every excess of vice tell I dye & leave my fate as a warning to young whomen never to be two good. For you have made me love you—you made me good—& now you have abbandoned me & some violent end shall finish our connexion if it is to finish. She ended: It is not to your intrest to disoblidge me for you dont know the power I have hear. Onely I never will be his mistress—if you afront me I will make him marry me. God bless you forever.
This was written on August 1st. She continued to write, to plead, to say goodbye, and held off the Cavaliere another five months. In December she informed Charles that she had resolved to make the best of things. I have decided to be resonable, she wrote. I am a pretty whoman & one cant be evrything at once.