Casanova and the Faceless Woman
Page 34
‘You are mistaken. I want to stay with you for the rest of my life. If it weren’t for the difference in our situations, I would ask you to marry me.’
‘If I found myself alone with you in all the world, I would be no more reassured as to your constancy,’ replied Chiara, bitterly.
Casanova paled very slightly.
‘Why do you doubt me, and the constancy of my love?’
Chiara’s expression was grave.
‘Quite simply, Giacomo, because constancy is not in your nature.’
It was the first time she had called him by his first name. He felt an upsurge of joy in his heart at the sound, as from a lover’s caress.
‘I love you, I adore you.’
He had taken her hand and covered it with kisses, lingering over the blue veins of her wrist. She pulled it away.
‘You do not love one woman, but all womankind. And in order to love womankind, you feel the need to love us all.’
For the first time in a long while, Casanova lost his self-control. His mouth was dry, as if crammed with dust. He swallowed hard.
‘There have been many women in my life,’ he stammered, ‘and I remember them all. They have loved me as my mother never did…’
Chiara cast him a sorrowful look and answered in the tone of an adult addressing a child.
‘It is not you that I love, Giacomo, and you will never find your mother’s love through me.’
Casanova froze. So that was it! His mother Zanetta’s face came to him in a flash—so beautiful, so wondrously beautiful. Chiara’s face!
He rose heavily to his feet. All at once, Chiara found him old, weary and desperately sad. She called him back.
‘Giacomo?’
‘Yes?’
‘You will end your days alone, without wife or children, friends or mistresses, because no one will be drawn to you in old age. You will cherish no memory of good deeds done, other than to have taken, and given, pleasure: great pleasure, indeed, as I now know. But what suffering follows.’
She held back her tears.
‘I do not know whether you will ever find your mother,’ she continued, in a broken voice, ‘but take my advice: stop along the way, and take the time to be happy.’
Casanova’s face was deathly white. He bowed before her.
‘Chiara,’ he said, ‘my memories are a constant source of happiness. I’d be a fool to make regrets that serve no purpose.’
Casanova emerged into the courtyard once more, his heart frozen in eternal darkness. His mind was beset with contradictory thoughts. Habitually, in such circumstances, he would hasten to forget his woes in a gaming parlour, or a brothel. But nothing appealed to him now. His latest love left nothing but the scalding pain of nameless sorrow. He found Volnay waiting for him at the bottom of the steps.
‘Good to see you, dear friend,’ he declared, with forced bonhomie.
Volnay raised his head, fixing his rival with his steely gaze. His veins were torrents of fire, yet he felt cold as death. He gripped the hilt of his sword and took a step forward. For a second, he glanced away from Casanova, to the windows of Chiara’s apartment. He thought of her, of their encounter, and the looks they had exchanged. A sense of a missed rendezvous floated on the air, exacerbated by the Venetian’s impertinent presence.
‘I have two things to say to you, Chevalier de Seingalt,’ he said.
XIX
He cannot love, who can say farewell.
CRÉBILLON FILS
Daybreak.
Volnay sat stroking his magpie for a long while, before writing a letter—his first—to his father, asking him for his forgiveness, and to take care of the bird if anything should befall him.
My dear Papa,
I have decided to fight a duel with the Chevalier de Seingalt, this morning. I know that you will not approve of my decision, but I can no longer live with the knowledge that that adventurer has seduced and dishonoured my Chiara. There must be blood, or I shall be driven mad. I know that I am making the wrong choice, yet again, but this is the only path I can take.
I hope that I shall return to you very soon, and clasp you in my arms. If it is not to be, forgive me, and hold me in your heart, and your memory. I entrust my magpie to your care.
Your most loving son.
He hesitated, then wrote a second letter for Chiara, before walking to meet his fate. It contained only a few words:
Later, when I am dead, you will love me more and more…
*
A delicate veil of mist seemed to float over the field. Slowly, with a long hiss of steel and wounded nerves, Volnay drew his sword. Casanova smiled and drew his own weapon. He had recovered his spirits since his visit to Chiara, but the pain endured.
‘One mystery remains to be solved, Inspector—your purpose throughout all this.’
‘I don’t understand,’ said Volnay, simply.
Casanova gave a frivolous wave of the hand.
‘Come, come—you are the final mystery! Solving these murders was not your chief purpose, am I right?’
‘Indeed.’
‘Your primary objective was to kill the king, was it not?’ asked Casanova amiably, while putting himself on guard.
Volnay gave no answer. Coldly, he slashed the air with his sword. As a confirmed dueller, the Chevalier de Seingalt made no show of bravado, but maintained a conventional stance, at a reasonable distance from his adversary, ready to strike if necessary.
‘May I ask, then, why you saved the monarch’s life from Damiens’s attack?’ he insisted.
‘The people were not ready,’ said Volnay. ‘To kill a tyrant is one thing, but to replace him is quite another.’
‘But you were in the king’s presence just lately. You could have—’
‘It was not the place for it!’
He raised his sword, to warn his adversary, then struck out. Casanova parried the thrust.
‘I fear, Volnay, that you may not be as thoroughly trained as I am,’ he said calmly. ‘If you only knew the number of jealous husbands I have confronted, sword in hand! And I am still here to tell the tale!’
He launched a well-judged attack that almost hit Volnay, who pulled back quickly. Both men took a few steps back, eyeing one another firmly.
‘The wrong moment, the wrong place! You’re a mightily cautious assassin, Volnay. Unless…’
Casanova’s blade whistled through the air.
‘But yes! The right place and time—you wanted to kill the king in the Parc-aux-Cerfs! A king assassinated in the midst of his harem of children could never aspire to martyrdom!’
Volnay launched a furious attack.
‘I can answer you, since one of us will soon be dead. That king wanted to burn my father at the stake! That’s why I joined the Brotherhood of the Serpent.’
‘And you wished to act alone?’
‘The history of kings is the history of the martyrdom of their peoples!’ hissed Volnay between his teeth. ‘I ran out of patience!’
Casanova allowed himself to be fully engaged in quarte, parried in a half-circle, then thrust in tierce on the arm. His blade tore out a square inch of Volnay’s white shirt. The move had a sudden, calming effect. With a cold gleam in his eye, the inspector engaged in quarte, parried, then with his weight firmly on both feet, launched a false attack. Casanova did not allow himself to fall into the trap, but parried calmly, and stepped back. He seemed barely out of breath.
‘As I was saying, my dear fellow, I’ve fought many a duel, and have often been forced to run a cuckold through or bite my tongue. Though I am no killer, believe me.’
‘You are full of nothing but our own self!’ fumed Volnay. ‘A puppet without a soul, spouting nonsense!’
Casanova sighed.
‘I fear you have no idea how crude and callous are the words you have just spoken. That was uncalled for! If we had not been rivals, we should have become friends.’
Their swords clashed again.
‘I care nothing for your
friendship,’ growled Volnay. He attacked in quarte on the arm and met with a parry and riposte for his pains.
Casanova thrust immediately and touched Volnay’s arm.
‘You are wounded,’ he said chivalrously. ‘I suggest we stop there.’
Volnay gave no answer, but hurled himself at Casanova. Their swords scraped briefly, and Casanova dodged to one side. His sword shone in the first rays of sunshine. It was stained with blood.
‘You are quite mad, Volnay!’
With one hand pressed to his bloodied side, Volnay threw himself into the fight, yelling:
‘Buffoon! You had to have her, too!’
‘We are cast in our roles by womankind, not the reverse,’ panted Casanova, parrying with all haste.
‘And Chiara cast you as the romantic lead,’ growled Volnay, stepping back.
‘Fool that you are!’ cried Casanova. ‘I had her, indeed, but it’s you she loves.’
The declaration seemed to goad Volnay to still greater heights of fury. He lost all self-control, swiping the air with his sword, and slashing his adversary’s jacket left and right. Casanova thought himself hit, and stepped back, still on guard.
‘Volnay!’ he yelled. ‘Life is a gaming table. I accept my gains, and my losses. I have banished jealousy from my life—it complicates relations and makes those it torments ugly. Banish it as I have, I implore you!’
Contrary to all expectation, the inspector lowered his sword and began pacing around Casanova.
‘What did she say when you left her bed?’ he yelled. ‘That you were a magnificent lover? That she had never known such pleasure?’
Casanova was breathing heavily. He was no longer a young man of twenty.
‘She told me that there are caresses that wound, like repeated blows.’
He shivered suddenly. Volnay was roaring like a man possessed. The point of his blade split the air, aiming straight at Volnay’s heart.
‘Get back or I’ll kill you!’ Casanova cried, as Volnay impaled himself on his sword. Slowly, the Venetian pulled the blade free of his adversary’s body. Volnay was released and sank slowly towards the ground.
Volnay watched as his life passed before his eyes, like a host of bright butterflies. He noticed one shining brighter than all the rest, before the darkness fell. Speedily, Casanova clutched the nape of his neck, to save his head from striking the ground. He held him suspended for a second, then placed him gently down. Volnay lay motionless in the grass. And so, the Chevalier de Seingalt bent over him. In an astonishing act of gentle contrition, he kissed him on the lips.
EPILOGUE
My dear Volnay,
I was delighted to have news of you from our beloved mutual friend, and I am comforted to learn that you are in good health. We are fortunate indeed that after impaling yourself so unfortunately on my sword, the comte and your monk came so speedily to your aid and administered such exceptional care. They are both remarkable men, in very many ways, as you well know.
As for me, as you have doubtless learnt, I was forced to leave France in some haste. Twenty girls, each prettier than the last, were employed in my workshop making painted fabrics. A modest, and most charming seraglio. I became curious to know my worthy workforce better, but they—and my curiosity—exacted a high price. Indeed, I ‘knew’ them all, wonderfully well, and when I tired of one, I was obliged to assuage another’s jealousy (I cannot bear jealousy, as you know), while at the same time sparing her predecessor’s pains, by continuing to pay her a wage!
My fortune was lost—indeed, I was ruined by my own workforce! And so, I was forced to sell shares in my workshop to a swindler who took me to court and ordered the seizure of my business. People will attack a man when he’s down! The wrath of a great many bad people was unleashed against me, all of them determined to see me brought low, and accusing me of every misdemeanour: forged signatures, abduction… I was even accused of fornication with a number of holy sisters. I, a respecter of religion, and its practitioners, to the very highest degree!
In short, I decided to liquidate my remaining assets and repair to Holland. My health is good, never better. When I have a little time, I shall write the Story of My Life. A tale worth the telling!
What of our delightful Italian friend? She loves you, you may be sure of that, though she has returned to the country of her birth. But beware, when the pearl of great price is located, the guardian dragon is never far away.
Take good care of yourself and be attentive when destiny calls. Sometimes, the gods intervene in the affairs of men in strange, even indecipherable ways. They bring many, seemingly irresolvable matters to their proper conclusion. And things often turn out not at all as expected…
Your devoted friend,
Giacomo Casanova
Chevalier de Seingalt
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ABOUT THE AUTHOR
OLIVIER BARDE-CABUÇON is a French author and the creator of The Inspector of Strange and Unexplained Deaths, who has featured in seven bestselling historical mysteries so far. Casanova and the Faceless Woman won the Prix Sang d’Encre for crime fiction in 2012 and is the first of the series to be translated into English.
COPYRIGHT
Pushkin Press
71–75 Shelton Street
London WC2H 9JQ
Original text © Actes Sud, 2012
English translation © Louise Rogers Lalaurie, 2019
Casanova and the Faceless Woman was first published as Casanova et la femme sans visage in 2012
First published by Pushkin Press in 2019
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ISBN 13: 978–1–78227–463–6
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise, without prior permission in writing from Pushkin Press
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