At cocktail time Stephen wandered miserably onto the terrace. New guests had arrived, among them a celebrity—Louis Duhamel, one of the foremost interpreters of Debussy. Busily the Princess was laying the groundwork for a performance très intime after dinner. At the proper time Duhamel would be cajoled to the piano and the evening would be spent listening to his exquisite renditions.
Stephen hesitated to spoil the party by telling the Princess of Roberto’s change for the worse. To whom should he confide his fears that Roberto’s burning forehead and wandering speech were symptoms of a generalized blood poisoning? Ghislana Falerni was the only person who would be really interested. In a low voice he told her of Roberto’s condition. “I don’t want to frighten the others, but I really think we should get him to a hospital.”
“That means driving to Rome?”
“Yes. I suppose there are cars we could borrow.”
“The Princess has several.” Ghislana considered the best and simplest course of action. “I’ll throw some things into a bag and meet you at the garage in twenty minutes. We’ll slip away without spoiling the Duhamel show.”
Stephen put in an awkward demurrer. “Will it be necessary for you to—come with us?”
Edge of realism sharpened the contessa’s answer. “Not if you can drive a European car with a left-hand gearshift across mountain roads in the dark—and take care of a delirious patient at the same time. Can you manage these things by yourself?”
“Maybe not … perhaps you’d better come.”
With Umberto’s help Stephen prepared his patient for the journey to Rome. At twilight they carried Roberto down the back stairs and lifted him into a Fiat roadster that Ghislana had commandeered. Stealthily she eased the car down the gravel driveway in the dusk; not until the oaks screened them from the house did she slip into high gear.
“We made it!” she exclaimed. They were conspirators now.
Under the same florin moon that had shone down on the preceding evening, they drove toward Rome. Stephen had never seen a woman handle a car so competently. Over wretched winding roads Ghislana jockeyed the open Fiat. Only once did she lose her way in the labyrinthine maze. Descending from the cool mountain atmosphere, they were passing through a hamlet in the Sabine foothills. A forked road confronted them. The only visible light in the village came from a sooty lantern hanging at the door of a tavern.
“Please find out which road leads to Vicovaro,” said Ghislana. “I think we turn left, but I’m not sure.” Stephen pushed open the tavern door. A group of contadini, bleary-eyed with smoke and wine, were still at their never-ending game of bris-cola.
“Which way to Vicovaro?” asked Stephen.
The players looked up, startled by mention of a world outside their card game. “Turn left,” said one of them. The others nodded, as if to say, “Why yes, of course. One always turns left to Vicovaro.”
Stephen thanked the man and leapt back into the car. “Bear left,” he said. In putting his arm around Roberto again, he inadvertently touched the contessa’s shoulder.
As they passed through Vicovaro, Stephen remembered the night that he and Roberto had spent at the inn overhanging the waterfall. Blithe and footloose they had been—Americus and Eagle Feather—wrestling and laughing together on an innocent holiday. And now, three days later, both heavy with infection—one grievously stricken in body, the other morally imperiled in soul—they were retracing their course to Rome.
Only by flashes was Roberto lucid; he flung his body about and babbled in disoriented speech, mentioning names and places unknown to Stephen. “Do you understand what he’s saying?” he asked Ghislana.
“He thinks we are children again.” She was sobbing. “Hold him tighter, Stephen. He jostles the wheel.”
It was nearly midnight when the Fiat drew up to the Franciscan Hospital on the Via Reggio. A dozing porter helped Stephen lift Roberto from the car.
“I’ll wait here,” said Ghislana.
Half an hour later she was still waiting at the curb when Stephen came down the hospital steps. “What do the doctors say?” she asked.
“They called it ‘fulminating septicemia’—the worst type of blood poisoning.” Stephen slumped into the seat beside her, heaping self-reproach on top of weariness. “I should have brought him in yesterday.”
Womanlike, she minimized, soothed. “Don’t blame yourself, Stephen. He’ll get good care now.” Ghislana tried to impersonalize her voice. “You must be hungry. Would you like to come to my apartment for a bite?”
Stephen’s desire was neither for food nor drink; he wanted only the solace of being alone with Ghislana Falerni. Impossible. By definition, an occasion of sin.
“It’s late. You’d better drop me off at my place.”
Through the steaming city she drove slowly as if trying to prolong the few moments remaining to them. The shared experiences of the past two days, their common love for Roberto Braggiotti, gave them the illusion that they had spent years together, and that by some miracle they would continue to go on doing so. But the miracle failed to materialize. At the gate of Stephen’s lodging he opened the door of the car and took the first step in his lifelong journey away from Ghislana Falerni.
IT WAS two o’clock when Stephen fell into an exhausted sleep. At nine next morning he was awakened by a telephone message from the Franciscan Hospital, telling him that Roberto was sinking rapidly. In tears and prayer Stephen knelt beside Roberto’s bed while the last rites of the Church were administered.
At noon, the most promising of the Vatican’s younger diplomats sank into a final coma. Two hours later, this gay, attractive human being died of an acute generalized septicemia.
That week marked the end of Stephen’s youth. A phase of his life ended when the vault door clanged shut on Roberto Braggiotti’s clay.
CHAPTER 5
EXCEPT for its bell tower and cross, the Benedictine monastery on the rim of the Roman Campagna might have been a powder magazine, a military prison, or a pesthouse for contagious diseases. At various times it had been all of these. Inside its bullet-pitted walls Garibaldi’s enemies had languished; against its walls they had been shot. And in its gloomy cemetery, now filled with frightful examples of baroque statuary, their bones lay in sterile dust alongside the victims of cholera, smallpox, and other epidemics no longer in fashion. After 1870 the building had fallen into shunned neglect, but around the turn of the century a group of Benedictines had taken it over as a monastery. By diligence and skillful management the disciples of St. Benedict had rebuilt the moldering pile, dispersed the unwholesome vapors surrounding it, and given the place a quiet reputation in the fields of science and religion. The present Superior, Dom Arcibal Tedesco, was both a noted seismologist and a cunning restorer of souls. From all parts of Europe visitors came to the Benedictine monastery, either to inspect Dom Arcibal’s wonderful new instrument for recording earthquakes or to make a spiritual retreat under his saintly direction.
Monsignor Stephen Fermoyle had little interest in seismology as he approached the monastery on a September afternoon shortly after the death of Roberto Braggiotti. The dust of a three-mile walk from the nearest village lay on Stephen’s black coat as he tugged at a bellpull dangling from the front door. He was dubious, depressed, about making this retreat. Dom Arcibal might be able to detect a temblor at the bottom of the China Sea, but could he lay his finger on the fractured foundations of a human soul?
Stephen yanked the bellpull again. A little wicket opened, and the tonsured head of a young man popped out as from a cuckoo clock. The young man had a soup-bowl haircut and a cast in one eye—a combination that made him look not too bright.
“I wish to see Dom Arcibal,” said Stephen.
The tonsured one revolved this idea in his head like a child rolling a marble in a cup. “Dom Arcibal is in the observatory. He is having a hard time with Stromboli today.” Evidently the young man thought Dom Arcibal’s instruments kept the volcano in check. “Is your business importan
t?”
“Not particularly. I’ve come to make a spiritual retreat.”
“In such cases”—there was an inner rattling of bolts—“Dom Arcibal’s orders are to let the retreatant in and show him courteously to his cell.”
The door swung open, and Stephen saw a lubberly lay brother who had outgrown his coarse, brown tunic. Red wrists projected from short sleeves; he was barefoot, and a blast of kitchen odors gushed from him as he reached for Stephen’s suitcase. Stephen dubbed him “Fairhands” on the spot, and followed his guide down a stone corridor to an iron-hinged door. Fairhands bunted the door open, then with courtesy more gracious than manners motioned Stephen to precede him into the cell.
“When Dom Arcibal comes in, I shall tell him you are here. There is fresh water in that jug.” With these advices Fairhands seemed to run out of ideas. Mysterious occupations awaited him elsewhere; he was off to perform them.
Stephen surveyed his cell, furnished with standard anchorite gear: an iron cot, a straw mattress, one blanket, two clothes hooks, a rush-bottom chair, a kneeling bench, and a crucifix at eye level hanging slightly askew on a rough plaster wall. Stephen’s first act was to straighten the cross; the next was to gulp three large swallows of water. He then removed his collar, hung his dusty coat on a hook, and gazed out the curtainless window at the ornate monuments in the cemetery. When Italian taste falters, he thought, it really falls on its face. Unable to pray or meditate, he rolled the rough blanket into a bolster, lay down on the straw mattress, and gave himself up to thoughts of two people, one dead, the other throbbingly alive, whom he could not drive from his mind.
Again he knelt with Ghislana Falerni beside Roberto’s coffin and prayed for the repose of his friend’s soul. Once more, and for the thousandth time, he underwent the pitiful, dumb ordeal of riding back to the city with Ghislana after the funeral. Through a veil of black chiffon her face was a grieving cameo. Comfort of physical endearments was denied them; their suffering must be shared without a caress.
“What will you do now? Where will you go?” Stephen had asked.
“There are always places, things, friends—eager to help one forget. And the pity of it is, they succeed. The dead are so defenseless. Other voices drown them out; other images overlay their memory. After the first grief passes, the problem becomes how to remember.”
“Do you really believe that?”
“The evidence is strong—so strong that Italians have made a proverb of it: ‘Love makes time pass: time makes love pass.’ There is wisdom in that proverb, Stephen.”
Wisdom perhaps, but of a kind not provable (as Stephen discovered) in a month or year. His daily routine became a meaningless squirrel wheel; tasks once light as straws took on the heft of teak logs. A malaise coupled of grief and desire seized him. Days were saltless; at night the nether world of dreams, bubbling up in scarcely disguised form, shook him with waking sweat. The imperious voice of duty could not drown out a single syllable that Ghislana Falerni had ever spoken.
Stephen realized that he needed guidance not to be found in the ordinary confessor-penitent relationship. Once when Quarenghi made some mild comment on a poorly handled assignment, Stephen almost confessed his inner turmoil. But he was ashamed to tell the ascetic Quarenghi of his love for Ghislana Falerni; instead, he contrived to make it appear that his wretchedness stemmed solely from Roberto’s death. It was Quarenghi who had finally advised the spiritual retreat under the direction of Dom Arcibal Tedesco.
“This Benedictine is a true physician of the spirit. Put yourself completely in his hands for a month,” counseled Quarenghi. “He will skim the froth of misery off the surface of your soul. But more important, he will search the springs of confusion that seep into … ah, every life. I shall write him a note.”
And now, tossing on his monastic cot, Stephen waited for the wonder-working Dom Arcibal to appear. At intervals he heard male voices chanting the liturgical hours—Vespers, Compline. The bronze leaves of the graveyard oaks deepened into purple, then lost all color as Stephen, lying face downward on his mattress, prayed to be released from servitude to Ghislana Falerni.
Clearly enough he saw the nature of his attachment to her. There it stood, third in the list of capital sins—lust, a virus tide inflaming the membranes of his heart. But how treat the disease? The keenest instruments of self-scrutiny, the severest physic of discipline, had failed him. Sincerely Stephen wished to be cured, yet he was weary, too, of flogging himself with whips of remorse. That wasn’t the remedy. …
What was?
Dark the cell, darker yet the storm of guilt and confusion in Stephen’s soul. Hideous voices were taunting him, when he heard the sound of footfalls, one slightly heavier than the other, coming down the corridor. Stephen sat up as a cowled monk carrying a lighted candle entered the cell. The visitor, a compact, roundheaded man in his late fifties, placed his candle on the window sill and seated himself in the rush-bottom chair.
“I apologize for this delay in greeting you,” said Dom Arcibal in a bass rumble somehow pleasant to hear. “You must blame my tardiness on Stromboli. The Passy savants claim that the old volcano has been quieting down lately, but if today’s indications mean anything, we shall see a pretty show of fireworks within twenty-four hours.” Frank glee at the prospect of confounding a rival school rose in Dom Arcibal’s throat. He quelled the uprising. “But let us speak of you, my friend. Monsignor Quarenghi’s note was a masterpiece of discretion. It gave me no hint as to the nature of your difficulties. If you care to discuss them”—Dom Arcibal spread his hands in a savory, wholesome gesture—“I am free to listen.”
Dom Arcibal’s casual opening was the skilled maneuver of a serenely confident soul. It reminded Stephen of an incident of which Orselli had once told him. An Italian officer, taking command of sullen troops after Caporetto, had lined up his regiment in parade formation. Drawing his sword, he tossed it high in the air. The steel blade glittered upward, hung suspended for an instant, then began its downward plunge. At exactly the right moment the officer reached out, seized the falling weapon, and thrust it wordlessly into its scabbard.
“Can you imagine,” Orselli had asked, “what would have happened if the officer’s eye or nerve had failed?”
It occurred to Stephen that Dom Arcibal had taken an even greater risk. A fumbling approach, a single false note, would have aroused distrust or hostility. But the Benedictine’s friendly overture combined just the right mixture of scentific detachment and professional interest. His reference to Stromboli said, in effect: “Two things fascinate me: disturbances deep in the earth and similar upheavals in the secret places of the soul. Both can be recorded—the one, by a needle scrawling indicative ink on drum-turned paper; the other, by words discharged under pressure of buried emotions. I have listened to Stromboli’s story all day, and now I am prepared to spend the night listening to yours.”
Load-weary, Stephen began to unpack his heart. Tentatively at first, then with increasing confidence, he traced the course of his relationship with Ghislana Falerni. During the recital, Dom Arcibal watched the younger man’s lips as a seismologist might watch a jagged graph reporting a fracture in the earth’s crust. At times the line grew faint, retraced itself hesitantly, then stumbled forward again. Not until it had stopped altogether did Dom Arcibal make his first comment.
“Everything you have told me thus far, Monsignor, has occurred within the past few months. I should like to hear more about your earlier life. Suppose we go back a bit. Tell me something of your youth, your family, and your general background.”
“As you wish.” Stephen took a deep breath, then shot down the foaming rapids of memory. “I am the oldest of six children; my father and mother are devout Catholics who brought me up in a home of great piety and warm parental love. My outstanding recollection of childhood is the early sense of responsibility I developed while taking care of my younger brothers and sisters. I was a kind of—of lieutenant father to them, and exercised a natural authority
over their actions. I dressed, fed, and bathed my brothers and sisters till I was fifteen years old. The only privilege denied me was the right to punish them when they were disobedient.”
“Did you resent this curtailment of your authority?”
“Sometimes. But when my father explained to me that parents received this authority directly from God, and could not delegate it to anyone else, I accepted his explanation without question.”
“Go on.”
“During adolescence I felt a strong urge to be first in everything: studies, sports, popularity. I wanted to lead my classes, be captain of all the athletic teams, go with the prettiest girls. I burned to excel. When competition threatened, I put forth greater energy, prayed harder for success. When it came, I accepted it as my due. I always had the feeling that I was one of God’s special favorites.”
“As I remember,” said Dom Arcibal dryly, “Lucifer cherished a similar illusion. How do you account for such a grotesque notion on your part?”
“I never thought of it as grotesque. I saw that God had blessed me with special gifts, and believed I must demonstrate His favor by the excellence of my performance.”
“‘Performance’ is a word used by actors. Are you a strolling player or a priest?” Without waiting for an answer, the monk continued: “Come, let us get into deeper material.”
Stephen took the plunge. “From my fourteenth year—the age at which I felt my first call to the priesthood—I liked girls. My mind throbbed with fantasies circling about the female secrets. I felt the need to enter upon and explore these mysteries. Between the ages of fifteen and eighteen I was strongly tempted to do so.”
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