Love in a Bottle

by Antal Szerb

  “You must pray, young page—pray most diligently for our good lord and master. His star has entered a malign phase and his life is in danger. They tell me you are very attached to him. Is that true?”

  “It is,” the boy answered, almost shamefacedly.

  The astrologer looked at him with real curiosity, as at a miraculous sign or portent.

  That night the two of them became quite friendly, although the friendship was rather one-sided. The enthusiasm with which the astrologer sought to initiate him into his not very interesting little technical mysteries left the boy rather cold.

  Long after he had become thoroughly bored with the incomprehensible chatter about houses, planets in the ascension, phases of the moon, transitions and periods, he suddenly asked the astrologer:

  “What makes the stars move in the sky?”

  The man’s face filled with reverence.

  “What moves the stars is Love, my child. They are attracted to one another as a man is to a woman. They roar across the endless plain of heaven in pursuit of each other.”

  “Then what can they have to do with the fate of humanity? Surely their own love lives keep them quite busy enough?”

  “My boy, my boy, what you haven’t grasped is that the same Love also directs humanity. Even as we walk the road of Lesser Love down below, we follow in the steps of the Greater.”

  “But what about a person who loves no one?”

  “There is no such person. Such a person isn’t human. He is the Antichrist,” the astrologer replied, and made the sign of the cross.

  Lytto took his leave and made his way rapidly down from the tower. He was aquiver with excitement. The astrologer’s words, filled as they were with superstition, had struck a very deep chord. No one could live without love. So Galeazzo, in his tower of solitude, on his truly horrible throne of ‘freedom’… how could he ever stand and look the God of Love in the eye?

  Like a fugitive he ran down the dark corridors, between their long lines of columns, his head buzzing with the ancient Italian superstition of the One with the False Face who will appear at the end of the world. Perhaps he had heard of it as a child, or simply knew of it through some ancient folk memory. He sought refuge in ardent prayer, begging for the mercy of enlightenment amidst his terrible doubts, and eventually fell asleep.

  That night he had a truly beautiful dream. He and Galeazzo were riding across a wide, sunlit plain. Huge white birds came and sat on their shoulders, and ate scented berries from their hands. Then Galeazzo dismounted, adjusted Lytto’s saddle, and looked into his face with anxious concern. “Aren’t you tired, Lytto? Are you really not tired, my boy?”

  And when he woke next morning, and lay stretching out pleasantly in his bed, he felt that he had solved the riddle. The portrait had simply presented what the mad Milanese painter had dreamt up in his uncomprehending phantasmagoria. And the things Galeazzo had said that evening about power and solitude, those blood-chilling and godless words, were nothing more than the result of a sick and ageing man’s momentary bitterness, not to be taken seriously. There was undoubtedly love in Galeazzo’s heart, as there was in every man’s. His hand was capable of caressing, his eyes of smiling, kindly and gently, like everyone else’s. And above all, Galeazzo loved him, the quiet little pageboy. That was the wonderful, the miraculous thing, that such a great man should love such an insignificant child. If the people of Milan ever knew about that, they would instantly throw away their weapons of hatred.

  And when he entered the bedchamber next door to rouse the Duke and draw back the curtain around the enormous bed, he smiled at him, intimately, confidently. And, just as he had every other morning since his fever had left him, Galeazzo beckoned Lytto to him, made him sit on the side of the bed, and, in the simple, almost child-like tones of a man only half awake, jested with him about why he had not let him sleep on, when the day had only just broken.

  “So what did you dream about, young Lytto?” he asked that morning.

  “I’m not telling,” the boy replied, blushing.

  Mornings like this fully compensated Lytto for his nights of solitary pensiveness.

  By now Galeazzo had made a full recovery. The same penetrating, steely look was back in his eye, and he was working as tirelessly as ever. Thinking back over the course of his illness with his usual cool objectivity, he was forced to admit that he had too often let himself go, had on too many occasions been soft-hearted, even sentimental. But at the same time he could not reflect on that illness without seeing, time and again, the boy’s faithful figure, leaning solicitously over him or strumming his lyre to drive away his gloomy convalescent thoughts, with the promise of recovery shining in his kindly eye. In truth, whichever way he looked at it, he was now deeply bound to this lad, once his nurse and now his confidant. So when Lytto drew back his bed curtain in the morning, he felt it would now be almost his duty to address him in more intimate terms, and treat him with every kindness. It was now his due.

  That idea tormented him endlessly, because for the first time in his life he was in someone’s debt and thus in a dependent relationship. So he decided he would reward him with princely generosity and thereby annul the debt to him once and for all.

  One day he summoned Lytto before him. He was seated in the Council Chamber in session with his secretaries and his mercenary captains. Lytto bowed low, and Galeazzo made a sign to his Chancellor, who read out the following proclamation:

  “We Galeazzo, lawful Duke of Milan, being mindful of the many services rendered to us by our noble page during our recent illness, and further mindful that the highest pleasure of princes is the rewarding of true desert, do hereby acknowledge our noble page as rightful heir to the name and fortune of his late mother the Contessa di Franghipani, now with God, and herewithal entrust the management of his estate to our noble Chancellor, Father Morone, until he be of age; and further, as a mark of our satisfaction with Count Ippolyto di Franghipani, we appoint him henceforth to attend on us in person.”

  At first Lytto found this great—and quite unexpected—honour overwhelming. He saw it as powerful evidence of the Duke’s love, and confirmation that, in his dream, he had indeed solved the mystery that had so vexed him. The tower of solitude and the throne of ‘freedom’ were no more than a lie—a lie that had now been dispelled, like a fog.

  Henceforth he had a new subject for his reveries. Now that he knew himself as Count Franghipani he was determined to be worthy of the ancestral name. His previously formless yearning for romantic, heroic action took on a new intensity. When no one was watching he would pace out the empty, stone-slabbed rooms, with a heavy, solemn stride. He pored over his books with even greater diligence, seeking a suitable model from among the ancient heroes. He gazed lovingly at his little dagger, still his only weapon, and tested its sharpness, trembling in the anticipation of mighty deeds.

  But the next morning, when he went to wake Galeazzo, the Duke responded with a haughty toss of the head, murmured, “Thank you, Franghipani,” and gestured for him to leave. He never called him Lytto again, treating him instead with the formal courtesy due to a count. The friendship was at an end, and Lytto concluded, despairingly, that legitimising his birth had been neither more nor less than remuneration, wages for a faithful hired servant, and that Galeazzo valued him no more than any of his other salaried attendants. And his old doubts rose up again, with renewed force: could there be any love in this man if he were capable of paying him off in such a cold way for the devotion he had shown? He felt humiliated, that that he had been reduced to the level of a menial. He threw his books in a corner. They could no longer console him. In fact he no longer spent much time thinking. He just gave himself up to his grief.

  No one noticed what he was feeling. In fact, it seemed to him that everything was working against him. Finally one day, when he realised that for the third time in a row Galeazzo was not waiting for him to wrap him up in his furs but had entrusted the task to a black footman, all his bitterness welled up
inside him and he came to a sudden decision. As soon as he could he slipped out of the room, packed his most essential belongings, secured the dagger in his belt and, stealing along the walls, made his escape from Galeazzo’s castle and out into the world.

  He did not strike out towards the city. The thought of its unfamiliar atmosphere terrified him. Instead he headed north, across open land, keeping a good distance from the peasants working in the fields. If he came face to face with anyone, even a child, he would draw his dagger, and he took instant fright at the squawking of birds as they fluttered into the air behind his back. Everything was strange and new to him. He felt like a bat driven out of its cave in broad daylight, and he pressed on in inexpressible uncertainty, without aim or direction, already regretting that he had set out at all. Towards twilight he stopped in the centre of an immense field. His legs were shaking. Count Franghipani was afraid—afraid of the falling darkness, afraid of the totally alien landscape.

  Suddenly he heard the thudding of hoofs behind him. He was still debating what to do when the horsemen were upon him. They were two Hungarian guards from the Duke’s personal entourage.

  “We’ve been looking for you, young man. You’re such a fine young fellow the whole troop has been riding around after you. Get yourself home immediately, or there’ll be trouble.”

  Lytto begged them to leave him alone, to let him make his own way in the world. No one needed him at the castle any more.

  “Don’t talk rubbish. You’re the apple of his lordship’s eye,” said one of the guards.

  Lytto stared at him in surprise, then, without a word, allowed them to haul him up onto the saddle and take him home.

  Sitting at dinner that evening, the Duke had noticed that Lytto was not at his usual place behind his chair. To his question, where was the young Count Franghipani, no one could offer an answer. He instructed the servants to go and find him. By the time the third course was being served the boy had still not appeared. Galeazzo was overcome by a strange restlessness. He leapt up from the table, seized a torch and set out to look for him in person, with the whole Court following in his wake, calling out “Lytto, Lytto!” in room after room. After a long and fruitless search he finally found someone who had seen the boy leaving the castle through a small gate on the northern side. The Duke immediately ordered his guards to scour the countryside and bring Franghipani back, dead or alive.

  He was still pacing up and down the great hall when a tearful and thoroughly demoralised Lytto was brought before him. His face brightened momentarily, then instantly became even more severe than usual. He did not enquire into the reasons for this truancy; he was quite sure they were no more than an adolescent longing for adventure and the urge to wander—nothing of more particular significance. Not for a moment did he doubt his ability to read the boy’s state of mind, and he rebuked him thoroughly, in his most coldly domineering manner.

  But Lytto was happy. He felt that he had defeated Galeazzo. The Duke’s insistence on getting him back had been a silent admission that he loved him.

  And so it was. That night Galeazzo did not sleep a wink. He allowed no one anywhere near him, and spent the whole time pacing up and down three large rooms. He had revealed his true feelings to himself. What he had always denied was now incontrovertible—that Lytto mattered to him. He would miss him in his absence, would worry about him. He needed him. In short, he loved him.

  He was filled with a rage he would never have believed himself capable of. The tower of solitude, his whole life’s work, was tottering. Once you loved someone, what was to stop others laying siege to your heart, and then others again? First the boy, then some friend, then a woman, a mistress, and finally, in the twilight of his life, he too would become the slave of passions, of other people, and an unknown fate—just like all the others he so despised. Once the canker took root inside him he would never be able to tear it out. He would have to nip it in the bud, cauterise the wound, however painfully, before it was too late. He wrestled with himself until dawn, and was ready with his answer. He would send Lytto away. A separation in space and time would do the rest.

  So the next day he summoned Lytto back to the Council Chamber, and addressed him as follows:

  “Count Franghipani, we commend the study of the French language to your attention. It is true that Latin will suffice for general purposes; but nonetheless, if you are to make yourself fully understood wherever you are, it is essential to speak in the local idiom. It is a courtesy that makes us at home in the country we are visiting. Now, it is our resolve to send you, with a view to developing your talents, to Paris, to a renowned university there to study the disciplines of law and philosophy. As one of our future statesmen, and as a thoughtful person with a tendency to melancholy, you will need both. We confess we have often felt our own lack of a university education, and we desire that you should want for nothing in your adult life and be able, through your studies, to render even greater service to your country. We shall see to it that you have provisions and an escort appropriate to your rank. We have assigned St Lawrence’s day, which falls three weeks from today, as the date of your departure.”

  Struck dumb with terror, Lytto uttered not a single word of thanks.

  Galeazzo stood up and put his arm around the boy’s shoulder.

  “I want you to be happy in Paris. Enjoy yourself. Take part in the varied life of a student. Don’t hold back on the liquor… And the ladies there, they say, are very good looking. The years will pass, and when you return you will have many tales to tell of your fine and amusing adventures.”

  In a flash, Lytto saw through Galeazzo’s intentions. This too was part of the duel between them. It was Galeazzo’s way of freeing himself from the love he felt towards him. He felt sure, from the way Galeazzo’s arm had flinched when it touched his shoulder, that a real struggle was going on in the Duke’s soul, and he promptly resolved never to submit. Three weeks was a long time. Perhaps he might still manage to get the better of him.

  He doubled and redoubled his attentions. His skill was almost magical. And now that he looked at it more closely, it became clear in just how many aspects of palace life he was indispensable. There were so many things, the minutiae of Galeazzo’s personal habits and requirements, and where his bits and pieces were kept, that only he understood. It was he who held the keys to Galeazzo’s cupboards. The black servants, in contrast, though they danced attendance on the Duke, were clumsy and heavy-handed, which deeply irritated their fastidious master. Only Lytto knew how to tuck him up in bed the way he liked, to pull his boots on without hurting him and pour his drinks with a pleasing, graceful movement of the hand. These and a thousand similar tiny but significant and interconnected details had become associated with his person. The Duke’s querulousness seemed to grow from day to day, and his absolute insistence on what he was accustomed to made the ever-attentive Lytto an even more necessary presence, more important than the Chancellor himself. Lytto forgot nothing, was party to everything, and every evening alike the Duke could have had nothing but praise for him.

  Then one evening, as Lytto accompanied him to his bedchamber, the Duke’s cold hand grasped the boy’s face, and he gazed into it, searchingly, for what seemed an age. Lytto withstood the gaze manfully, in a kind of challenge. Galeazzo was the first to relax.

  “You’re so like your mother!” he said, and his face darkened.

  Lytto did not know what to think. He had forgotten how much the Duke despised women.

  The next day Galeazzo informed him that he was to be relieved of his personal duties so that he could devote all his time to mastering the French tongue. Lytto studied and studied, but every word of the language, already so harsh and barbaric-sounding to the Italian ear, now seemed even more repulsive and grating. He simply waited for a miracle, desperate to carry out some unprecedented act of heroism that would change everything at the eleventh hour.

  Meanwhile something happened that had not occurred in ten years: Galeazzo summoned the highest
-born citizens of Milan to the castle to announce his new tax arrangements. He received them in full princely pomp in the Council Chamber, sitting on his throne in a long, dark-green cloak, surrounded by his secretaries in their robes of state, with Lytto, in a crimson doublet, at the foot of the throne. On either side stood serried lines of guards, armed to the teeth. The townspeople were seated at the far end of the hall, the nearest of them a full hundred paces away. In the faces of their proud leaders there was a look of defiant hatred, but their grave formality concealed an element of fear, and when they spoke, their subdued voices were barely audible.

  The proposals were duly read out, and no objection was raised. The Duke gestured for the three principal delegates to come forward to receive the new instructions from his hand and make them public.

  The three nobles approached. Two of them were old men with beards, in long fur coats. The third was much younger. Lytto was struck by the haggard look on his sharp-featured face. The men knelt before the throne and the Duke held out his hand with the parchment. In that instance the young nobleman leapt to his feet, brandishing a long dagger—no one saw where he drew it from—and let out a blood-curdling scream. And Galeazzo’s star trembled.

  But before he could land the blow, Lytto, with the unimaginable speed that only the undeveloped frame of a boy would be capable, appeared alongside and with unerring aim plunged his dagger into him. The assassin fell without a sound, and sprawled onto the steps of the throne, writhing grotesquely.

  Lytto flung himself down on the bloodstained carpet at Galeazzo’s feet, trembling from head to toe with emotion, his head bowed low in full humility—while his heart sang with joy amidst the flood of tears. It had happened. The miracle had happened!

  The next moment the line of guards had surrounded the throne and turned their lances on the citizens, who fled the chamber in a stupor of fear. The body was pushed to one side and covered over.

  After what seemed an immensely long time, Lytto raised his head and met Galeazzo’s gaze. The eyes betrayed nothing. Neither joy at his escape, nor fear of the danger he had been in; neither hatred for his assailant, nor affection for his saviour. Nothing. A complete absence of human expression. Staring stiffly ahead, he remarked, very quietly and very calmly: