Shortly before the new session was opened, the bishop asked the Grand Captain if he’d spoken with the widow. The prince slapped himself loudly in the forehead.
“I forgot! I’ll go after the session of the Council.”
He had not forgotten. He’d done it on purpose. It was donna Eleonora who had to be at his disposal, not the other way around.
The session began, with open doors. The Grand Captain had given the order to leave them open so that anyone passing outside the hall could see him seated in all his glory.
One question nagged at him, however. Before speaking, was he or was he not obliged to turn and look at the royal throne, as don Angel used to do? He decided not. Raising his arms to enjoin the councillors to silence, he began to speak.
“We are gathered here for a sorrowful task that we could never have imagined, much less desired. This morning the Lord God recalled to his side the noble soul of don . . . don . . . don . . . ”
The ringing stopped and he fell silent, eyes agape and gazing at the back of the hall. Don Cono Giallombardo feared he might be having the same sort of attack as don Angel. All heads turned towards the entrance.
At the edge of the doorway stood a tall, slender woman, all dressed in black, face hidden behind a dense black veil, arms and hands covered in long velvet gloves, also black, naturally. As she began to walk, she looked as if she was floating above the floor, feet not touching the ground.
Amidst the leaden silence, she came forward to the center of the hall and said in a strong, clear voice:
“Yo soy Eleonora de Guzmán, marquesa de Castel de Roderigo, and I request la palabra.”
An ice-cold shiver, for whatever reason, ran up the Grand Captain’s spine like an evil serpent. It cost him great effort to speak, as his jawbones were stuck together and his gullet parched as if he hadn’t drunk anything for days.
“Request granted.”
“Con humilidad, I request of this Holy Royal Council, y, de manera particular, of the Gran Capitan de Justicia, that my husband’s mortal remains not be solemnly buried. Sólo la benedición para los difuntos. The bier shall remain en mi apartamento till the day of our departure para España, lo antes posible.”
The silence grew thicker and weighed down like a boulder on the shoulders of all present.
The Grand Captain’s eyes sought out the councillors one by one. But they were all looking at the ground. Ah, so the spineless bastards didn’t want to take sides? All right, then, he and only he, don Giustino Aliquò, prince of Ficarazzi, would see to putting the Signora Marquesa de Castel de Roderigo in her place.
“My lady,” he said, “I understand perfectly the reasons for your request, but I am sorry to say that I must reject it in the firmest manner possible. The magnificence of the funeral shall let the people see what it means to be Viceroy of Sicily; they shall understand that our beloved King of Spain . . . ”
And here he stopped. Because donna Eleonora had turned her back and was on her way out of the hall.
“The session shall resume,” the prince said, after a brief pause.
The bishop made a sign that he wished to speak. The prince granted him permission.
“Allow me to point out to you that an agreement could have been reached with donna Eleonora.”
The prince turned red with anger.
“Let me remind you that you pledged obeisance to me.”
“What has that got to do with this? Obeisance is one thing, having a difference of opinion is another.”
“So, in short, you do not agree with me?”
“It’s not that I do not agree, but if you had simply gone to speak with donna Eleonora this morning when she sent for you—”
“Let it be recorded that Bishop Turro Mendoza does not agree, and then let us proceed. Does anyone have any observations to make?”
Nobody said anything.
At this point the Grand Captain started talking without cease for an hour and a half, discussing down to the finest details the manner in which the solemn funeral should be organized.
First he described how the Cathedral should be decorated and how the chairs should be arranged. Then he explained how the procession, which would start at the palace and end at the Cathedral, should be constituted. At the head, a platoon of soldiers-at-arms, followed by another of sailors, and then the funeral hearse, entirely covered with flowers. Then would come a file of one hundred open carriages bearing the highest authorities in Sicily. The first carriage would have the widow and, naturally, himself, in his capacity as acting viceroy.
The succession of carriages would be determined on the basis of the rank of each authority constituting it. And a great deal of time was wasted working this out. For example: who should come first, the prince of Vicari or the duke of Sommatino? According to heraldic protocol, the prince should come first, but one had to bear in mind that the duke of Sommatino was a dignitary of the Court, while the prince was not.
In short, evening soon fell, and the candelbra were lit.
The secretary’s right arm was in spasms from having written so much, while the protonotary got a terrible headache.
But the Grand Captain seemed to have nine lives and kept on fidgeting on his thronelet. The pleasure of power gave him endless energy.
“And now let us determine where the pop . . . the pop . . . ”
He wanted to say “populace” but was unable, because through the halflight he’d glimpsed, in the doorway, the tall figure of donna Eleonora.
So she was already back?
And what did the ballbusting woman want this time?
The marquesa, an envelope in her hand, came forward into the middle of the hall, excused herself for the interruption, and asked for permission to speak.
“Oh, all right,” the Grand Captain said rudely.
Donna Eleonora said that when looking through the drawers in her husband’s desk she’d found a letter addressed to the Holy Royal Council.
“Is it important?” asked the Grand Captain.
“I no open it.”
“Secretary, please take the letter from the lady. We’ll read it at the end of the session.”
“It must be read con urgencia,” donna Eleonora said firmly.
“I’ll decide what’s urgent here,” said the Grand Captain, face red as a pepper.
“Es lo que dice on the envelope,” the marquesa retorted.
“Perhaps it’s better if we read it,” the bishop intervened.
“Let’s read it,” don Cono Giallombardo and don Severino Lomascio said in unison.
The Grand Captain shot them a withering glance but gave in.
“Very well, then. Secretary, open the letter and read it.”
He didn’t know that with these words he was consigning himself to his ruin.
CHAPTER THREE
Donna Eleonora Becomes Viceroy
and Wins Everyone Over, with a Few Exceptions
The secretary stood up, went and took the envelope, looked at it carefully, and said:
“Indeed it’s written on the outside, To be submitted to the Holy Royal Council and read at once in the event of my sudden death. There’s even don Angel’s seal and signature. What should I do, break the seal?”
“Of course,” said the Grand Captain.
The secretary broke the seal, opened the envelope, extracted a sheet of paper, and held it up for all to see.
“It is written in the viceroy’s hand,” he said.
“Go on, go on,” the bishop said impatiently.
At last the protonotary began to read aloud.
I hereby express my last will, which I make manifest to all of you in full possession of my faculties and in the exercise of the powers granted to my person by the grace of God and His Majesty King Carlos III of Spain. In the event of my sudden death, my beloved wife, donna Elenora
di Mora, marquesa of Castel de Roderigo, is to accede in full to the office of Viceroy of Sicily, with all the honors and burdens, duties and rights associated with said office, while waiting for the Holy Person of His Majesty Carlos III to confirm this, my will, or, failing that, to send another person of his own choosing. For such reason the customary rule that the Grand Captain of Justice should take the office of acting Viceroy in the absence of the latter, is hereby no longer in effect. This is my will, and I wish that it should be accepted and respected by all without delay.
Signed: The Viceroy, don Angel de Guzmàn, marquès de Castel de Roderigo.
The silence was so deep that one could actually hear a fly buzzing around the protonotary’s head.
“Holy shit!” were the first words to break it.
It was the bishop who’d said them.
This was followed by a buzz of whispers, muttering, gesticulation and general agitation punctuated here and there with an occasional laugh immediately suppressed.
The prince of Ficarazzi, shaking himself from the tremendous blow that had just stunned him, numbed him, and nearly given him a heart attack, managed with some effort to stand up on the thronelet, as if to tower even more above the others, and shouted:
“This testament is completely worthless!”
“Why?” asked the bishop. “It’s written in the viceroy’s own hand, and there’s even his seal!”
“Because . . . because . . . ,” the Grand Captain began, desperately searching for any reason whatsoever for what he’d just said. But not a single one came to mind.
“Let us hear the opinion of the protonotary, who knows the law well,” don Cono Giallombardo suggested.
“Hear! Hear!” the other Councillors shouted in chorus, assuming a power of decision they didn’t possess.
Don Gerlando Musumarra stood up. Despite the dim light, he was visibly pale and worried.
“There is little to say. The law speaks clearly on this and leaves no room for doubt. The will of the viceroy is supreme and incontestable, whether it is expressed vocally in the presence of witnesses or in written form. As in this case. And it must be applied, even if the entire Council is against it.”
“But it’s the will of a dead man!” the Grand Captain cried.
“Aside from the fact that this should grant it greater weight, this will of don Angel’s was declared, in writing, when he was still alive,” the protonotary replied coldly.
The Grand Captain, though he felt in his gut that the entire Council was against him, wouldn’t give up the bone.
“But the rule can’t be changed by the viceroy; it can only be changed by the King himself!”
“But the rule has not, in fact, been changed,” the protonotary replied. “Indeed the deliberations conducted today have been signed by you, my prince, subsequent to the viceroy’s death. Therefore, after his death, the viceroy has continued, through your agency, to manifest his will. If we call into question his testament, we must of necessity also call into question all the deliberations conducted by the Council this morning, since they do not bear don Angel’s signature.”
This was a low blow on the part of the protonotary. It implied that all the misdeeds, favors, abuses of power, and outrages that the Councillors had enacted into law while pretending that the viceroy had merely fainted and not died, risked never seeing the light of day.
The prince of Ficarazzi remained silent for a moment. And the bishop took advantage.
“Why don’t we put the approval of the testament up for a vote?” he asked, his face an expression of cherubic innocence.
The Councillors took to this like fish to water.
“Vote! Vote!” they said in chorus.
The Grand Captain realized he’d lost. He sat back down on the thronelet.
“Do as you wish.”
“Whosoever considers the testament valid, raise his hand,” said the protonotary.
Five hands went up. Don Angel’s testament had been approved.
They all then turned around to look at donna Eleonora, who had remained immobile and silent all the while in the middle of the hall.
“You’re in my place,” she said to the prince, though there was nothing imperious in her tone.
But the prince took fright at the very lack of arrogance in her voice. The woman’s coldness made his blood freeze. Bowing his head, he descended from the thronelet and returned to his place as Grand Captain.
Donna Eleonora crossed the great hall before the spellbound eyes of all present, stopped in front of the empty throne of the king, bowed her head, stepped aside, gracefully ascended the three steps, sat down on the thronelet, adjusted her dress, then slowly raised the black veil, uncovering her face.
It was as though there had suddenly appeared, in the darkness of the hall, a point of light brighter than the sun so dazzling that it brought tears to one’s eyes.
“You must all give me el signo de vuestra obediencia.”
This time, too, there was nothing peremptory in her voice. It was only a simple, polite request from a lady of the high nobility.
The Councillors, no longer giving a damn about hierarchy, all shot straight to their feet, including the Grand Captain, who was likewise spellbound, and raced towards the thronelet, shoving and elbowing one another, congregating at the bottom of the three stairs and then kneeling, hands over their hearts and heads bowed.
At that moment don Cono Giallombardo couldn’t refrain from whispering:
“So lovely!”
“So lovely!” said the other five Councillors.
“Really really lovely!”
“Really really lovely!” the others repeated.
“A heavenly woman!” said don Cono.
“A heavenly woman!” chanted the others.
Donna Eleonora interrupted the adoration.
“Go back to your places.”
They walked away regretfully, heads still turned towards her, like someone having to leave a fresh spring while still thirsty.
Donna Eleonora spoke.
“I confirm that no habrà any solemn funeral y ninguna visita de condolencias. El Holy Royal Council will meet again the day after tomorrow a la misma hora que hoy. La sesión ha terminado.”
How was it that, in the twinkling of an eye, while the Council was still in session, all of Palermo found out that the viceroy, who’d died that morning, had been replaced by a woman? Most people didn’t believe it, and concluded that it was a joke. It was inconceivable that a woman could be in a position to govern Sicily.
You couldn’t really say they were wrong, once you considered how things had gone in recent times.
In sixteen hundred and eleven, one week after landing in Palermo, the Viceroy of Sicily, the Duke of Osuna, had written to the king, in these exact words: “No one here is safe, not even in his own house. This Kingdom recognizes neither God nor Your Majesty; all is for sale, including the lives and possessions of the poor, the properties of the King, even Justice itself. I have never seen or heard of anything comparable to the criminality and disorder here.”
And since he was a man with cojones, he sought to make law and order prevail again. And he succeeded, in part, using an iron fist. But then he had to return to Spain, and the situation got worse than before.
Taxes, duties, levies increased by the day, without any apparent reason, and they were applied to everything: wheat, flour, chickpeas, fava beans, silk, cloth, eggs, cheese . . . All that was missing was a tax on the air, just to complete things.
And, as if this weren’t enough, the plague and cholera also played their part, having taken a shine to the city, and every so often they would drop in to say hello, leaving behind a trail of corpses and starvelings who could no longer scrape by.
Then even the animals on the farms began to die of hunger, because the peasants no longer had any money to buy
fodder. The viceroys had no idea how to deal with the gravity of the situation. As if this weren’t enough, a great famine broke out.
In 1647, drought and the frightful increases in taxes finally triggered the bloody Palermo uprising.
There were hundreds of deaths, as well as looting, fires, whole families slaughtered. The people’s rage against the merchants, the rich, and the nobility knew no bounds. Spanish soldiers were drawn and quartered in their barracks.
Then, by the grace of God, little by little the carnage ceased. But the consequences lasted a long time, in the form of orphaned boys and girls of all ages who had nothing to eat and resorted to stealing and alms-begging; widows and girls who had nothing to sell but their bodies; and continuous acts of violence and rampant corruption common to all.
These consequences were still present, and perhaps even aggravated, at the moment of don Angel’s death. Therefore, if a man hadn’t been able to resolve them, certainly a woman couldn’t either.
Since, in fact, it was well-known that a woman was worth far less than a man. And sometimes even less than a good animal.
And if, by chance, she should get it into her head that she was worth more, she must be put back in her place at once. And indeed . . .
Palminteri the tailor dashed home and, the minute he entered, started thrashing his wife.
“Wha’d I do? Wha’d I do?” the woman asked, crying.
“Nothing. I just wanted to remind you who gives the orders around here!”
Michiluzzo Digiovanni, a twenty-five-year-old strong as a bull, likewise went home, stripped his wife, laid her down on the bed and got down to work on her for three hours straight, as if she was an animal. And when his wife begged him to stop because she felt her spine cracking and asked him why he was doing this, Michiluzzo replied that he was getting his revenge.
The Revolution of the Moon Page 3