by Morris West
“Never think that! In a strange way, we have completed each other. And there is something perhaps, which you can do for Luisa.”
“Anything in my power. You know that.”
“I do, but we’ll talk about it after dinner. Now I want you to finish this meal which I ordered so carefully. We’ll talk about Luisa over coffee. So, for the moment, no more of my affairs. Talk to me about the conclave and what you think will happen there.”
Once again, though his heart was breaking for her and for himself, he bent to her wishes and talked about what would happen when the hinge-men met to elect a new Pontiff.
It was nearly half past ten when the waiter wheeled out the trolley and they were alone. Isabel looked suddenly weary. Rossini told her he would leave in fifteen minutes. She would not hear of it.
“Please, Luca! I know that look of yours. You are closing yourself to me.”
“Not to you, my love! Never believe that. My life has been lived so long behind a façade, I lack the words of common speech. I am not sure of the moment when my hand’s-touch may become an intrusion instead of a comfort. But please believe, I am not, I never have been closed to you.”
“But you must let me talk. I have other things to tell you.”
“I am listening.”
She set down her cup, folded her hands in her lap, took a deep breath to steady herself, then she told him: “Luisa is your child, Luca.”
It was then that she saw what the spartan years had done to him. There was the faintest flicker of surprise in his eyes, but his lean features were frozen into the predator’s mask. When he spoke, his voice was soft as the rustling of silk.
“Well! This is a gift I didn’t expect!”
“Is it truly a gift, Luca? Some men in your position would find it a poisoned cup.”
He stared at her in silence for a long moment, then, in the same subdued fashion he explained himself.
“I don’t think I have ever said this to you before, but my hardest moments as a young priest were when I held a baby in my arms at the baptismal font and knew that I had renounced for ever the right to fatherhood. I am telling you the truth, you have given me a gift. My problem is I am handling it very awkwardly. Does Luisa know I’m her father?”
“No.”
“Does Raul know?”
“No.”
“So, let’s pause here. Tonight I visit you, an old-time lover, yes, but a constant one, remembering happiness, celebrating the bonds that have held us together. Suddenly, you open a box and these big secrets pop out. You have a mortal illness. I have a child who is a grown woman.”
“I debated a long time before I decided to tell you.”
“Thank you for trusting me,” said Luca Rossini. “Yet I would never have thought to find myself so poor in words or in resources. I am a man in bondage. What can I offer you but a helpless love? What can I offer to Luisa? She won’t thank me for invading her life, nor will she thank you for rocking the foundations of it. Am I missing something here?”
“I wondered for years whether I should tell her. I respected your right and hers to live in ignorance.”
“But now you think differently?”
“That happens when they read you the death sentence. My courage failed me. I couldn’t any longer carry the secret alone. That’s why I’m putting the question to you now. Should Luisa be told?”
“I don’t know,” said Luca Rossini. “I truly don’t know. However, I’m sure of one thing, if she is to be told, you and I should tell her together.”
Suddenly he laughed: a dry humourless chuckle of self-mockery. Then he stretched out a hand to touch her cheek and told her:
“Now, why don’t you start again and explain this old-fashioned opera about which you have told me nothing all these years.”
“I think a drink might help.”
“Pour one for me, too, please; but only mineral water. I need to be very sober for this performance. And please, sit opposite me so I can see your eyes.”
“Why? Don’t you believe me?”
“Oh yes, I believe you; but I want to read your face as you tell me. Don’t you understand? You’ve just endowed me with a love-child. It’s a strange experience. It would have been easier in olden times when prelates bred quite large families and endowed them with wealthy livings or arranged noble marriages for them.”
His taut features relaxed into a grin. Isabel gave him an uncertain smile.
“Luisa is quite well-endowed – from my father’s estate. She will also inherit from Raul. What I don’t want to risk is Raul trading her off into a marriage of convenience.”
“What happens if he tries? Luca comes riding in like Julius II in full armour crying ‘Stop! Stop! Unhand the girl!’? Isabel, you’re telling yourself fairy-tales! Please, pass me my drink and sit down.”
She huddled herself in the big armchair, facing him as he had directed. She gagged a little on her first mouthful of brandy, mopped her mouth with a paper napkin and then started slowly with her story:
“You’ve probably forgotten some of this, but I remember it by days and even by hours. When Papa went into Buenos Aires to bargain for your life – and indeed for mine – we were left together on his friend’s estancia near Cordoba. We lived in the guest house and, for everybody’s sake, we kept away from the workers. For the first ten days, you were very sick. You were also in great pain from the wounds of the beating and the infection. It was not until the fourth week, just after my period had finished, that we began to make love. Figure it then, our honeymoon lasted a few more weeks. I thought I was being careful; but I wasn’t careful enough. At the end, you were spirited away to fly back to Rome with the Nuncio. Papa, according to the agreement, took me back to my home in Buenos Aires. Fortunately – or so I thought – Raul was away on business in Chile and Peru. I was home nearly five weeks before he returned. Meantime, I had missed my period. When Raul came back, I gave my usual performance as a loving wife until, as usual, Raul got bored. Then I missed another period; after which I went to a doctor, not just any doctor but one recommended by my Aunt Amelia, my father’s sister – a tough old lady, wise in the ways of male society in Argentina. When my pregnancy was diagnosed – and remember, Luca, you were thousands of miles away back in the warm bosom of mother Church! – Aunt Amelia gave me wise counsel. ‘Think ahead, Isabel! Your father has told me everything that happened. You shot a militiaman, and slept with a priest. If your husband, or your husband’s family ever turned nasty, you’d be in deep trouble. What you don’t want to happen is to pop your baby six weeks early and then have to explain it. So, think ahead. We’ll find you a good physician in New York and a good medical excuse to visit him. Then you’ll set a date for a Caesarian birth in his hospital – a date that fits the facts and creates the convenient fiction. The Caesarian won’t hurt the baby and it will save you a lot of trouble.’ Well, that’s exactly what I did, with help from Papa and Aunt Amelia. Even Raul was happy with the idea. He was able to build his contact list in New York and romp in some old playgrounds. When Luisa finally arrived, beautiful and healthy, he was enchanted. His father and mother showered her with gifts and attention. The fairy-story was complete …”
“But not for you?”
“No. I was in total confusion. During all the celebrations, I was living a lie. I was deceiving Raul. I was making a mockery of his real joy. If the truth ever came out, it would be a devastating shame for him. On the other hand, it was your child I had borne. I was happy about that but the happiness turned sour because I could not share it. For a while, I lapsed into deep depression; but I recovered and began to count my blessings.”
“And Raul never asked a single question about my sojourn with you?”
“Not one, not ever. I doubt he could ever perceive a country priest as a rival. Besides, all the papers were in order, my medical history in order, too. So what misgivings could he have?”
“So, I ask again,” Luca Rossini was suddenly another man, an imperious inquis
itor. “Why did you have to raise the question with me after all these years?”
She did not flinch but thrust herself forward in the chair to confront him.
“Because I wanted you to know! I wanted to share her with you, to have you see what we made together in that country bed in Cordoba. I didn’t expect you to acknowledge her. I still don’t, but yes, yes, yes, I wanted you to know. I hoped you might find some happiness in the secret – the last, probably, we shall be able to share.”
“I can understand that.” Rossini’s tone was carefully neutral. “That takes care of you and me. What did you plan for Luisa?”
“I hoped – God knows why I hoped – that you might be a gift for her, too. When I saw and heard you together this evening, I knew you would be good for each other.”
“That’s a guess, a gamble. You have no right to take it with your daughter’s life!”
“She’s your daughter too, Luca. Or don’t you believe what I’ve told you?”
“Oh yes! I believe Luisa is my daughter – but she’s mine by nature; by nurture she’s yours and Raul’s. There’s a precarious balance here. If you tip it the wrong way, who knows what damage you may do? I have to think about this. We’ll talk about it again tomorrow.”
“Do you still want to take me to your hermitage?”
“I do.”
He stood up and stretched out his hands. He drew her close, and held her to his breast, his lips brushing her hair.
“I love you. Nothing changes that. I shall love you from now until doomsday. But I’m sad, too, because you’re suffering and there’s nothing I can do about that, except pray, and my praying isn’t very good these days. Then there’s Luisa. I’m sad about her, too, in another way. There was a spark between us, wasn’t there?”
“There was.”
“Then let’s push the gamble a little further.”
“What do you mean?” She drew away from him so that she could look into his face. He was smiling again.
“I was thinking about tomorrow. These days there are few graces in my life, but my little country place is one of them. I wanted desperately to share it with you. Now …”
He broke off, hesitating over the next phrase.
“Now what, Luca?”
“Now, much to his own surprise, Luca Rossini, Cardinal Presbyter is a family man! I’m suggesting we invite our daughter to join us on our picnic.”
“You mean you’re going to tell her?” There was a note of alarm in Isabel’s voice.
“I have no idea – except that I’m going to take her into the kitchen to prepare lunch with me, while you sun yourself in the garden. We’ll talk – and see where the talk takes us. How do you feel about that?”
“What can I say? The grace of your garden may touch us all.”
“Good! Now I’d better call Piers Hallett and cancel the pick-up arrangement. He’ll be very disappointed.”
“Have you thought what we’ll do if Luisa doesn’t want to come?”
“So be it. Let her do what she wants. There will be other times and other seasons.”
“Don’t count on that, my love,” said Isabel sombrely. “Remember I’m on call for the last act of this opera!”
They parted that night in the shadows of mutual griefs. The passion of their long-awaited encounter had spent itself, like a firework in a fine dazzle of emotion. Now they clung together in a dark landscape, under a moonless sky, bereft of all but the most primitive physical comfort: hands’ touch and brief body-warmth and the trailing of yesterday’s dreams. It was Isabel who found the few words that needed to be said:
“I know what you’re thinking, Luca my love. We should lock the door and shut out the world and sleep together until morning. But we can’t, and even if we could, we’d wake and feel ridiculous when the sun came up.”
“To me, you were the most beautiful thing in the world. You always will be.”
“Go home now, please, Luca.”
“You have my address, my telephone number.”
“Everything. We’ll see you at ten. Goodnight, my love!”
It took him more than an hour to walk home through a city sinking slowly into sleep, but still turbulent with traffic and night noises, still foetid with the smog that lay along the Tiber, and coiled like a lethal snake through the antheaps that covered the ancient hills.
For all his iron self-control, he was still in shock. Isabel was the rock upon which his ravaged manhood had been rebuilt. Now the rock was crumbling, like a sandcastle in an encroaching tide. He could do nothing but watch helplessly while the foundation of his fragile inner life was swept away. Luisa was another kind of grief: a daughter whom he could not acknowledge, whose childhood he had never shared, whose future he might well put at risk. The anguish rose in him again: anguish for the illusions he himself had nurtured, and which now lay scattered at his feet like the petals of last week’s roses.
He walked fast, but heedlessly, head down, shoulders hunched, bearing vaguely in the direction of his house, but caring not at all when he arrived there. Lovers embracing in doorways ignored him. A drunk jostled him. A motorcyclist with a girl riding pillion roared past him with an eloquent Roman curse. A pale Madonna, imprisoned in a little glass shrine with an oil-lamp guttering in front of her, gazed at him with blank plaster eyes.
The sight of her woke childhood memories of a Neapolitan household in the slums of Buenos Aires, with a picture of the Dolorous Virgin over the matrimonial bed and, tacked over his own, a First Communion card representing the mythical Virgin Martyr Philomena for whom his mother was named.
The passing years had made him more and more sceptical of the mythography of the Church, yet more and more conscious of its potency and the deep human need for mystery and miracle which sustained it. The irony was that, while rejecting one set of myths, he had adopted another: the myth of the ideal lover, enshrined in memory, endowed with heroic virtue, immune from the risks of mortality. This was a creature he could dream without guilt, desire without remorse, because she was set beyond his reach like the street-corner Virgin behind the dusty glass.
He had been warned, of course, a thousand times. His earliest teachers in the spiritual life had cautioned him against attachments to perishable things and perishable people. They had tried vainly to cauterise his emotions – and the cautery had lasted until a brute with a whip had stripped the hide from his back and left the raw tissue exposed.
Tonight had been another kind of exposure: to the pain of the beloved, now perilously mortal, to whom he could offer neither healing nor heartease nor even company beyond a few short hours. Even if he quit the Church and took the long road to nowhere to maintain his own precarious identity, what could he offer Isabel? She was stronger than he. The love she gave and the love she took carried no price-tags. She had accepted like the she-wolf to live and die in her own place, in her own skin.
And where did that leave Luca Rossini? In love, he could not, would not ask for more than had been given him. He understood the obsessive element in his own nature. His sense of the ridiculous, his refusal to compromise the personal dignity for which, as he saw it, he had paid in blood, had kept him safe from folly, if not from questions about what might have been.
One thing, at least, the evening had done for him. It had separated Isabel from the question of his relations with the Church itself as a baptised believer. The question was now radical and simple. Was he still a believer? If so, he must renew his assent, and serve in that office to which he was called. If not, he must withdraw with dignity and make no scandal for others. He could not see himself as a seedy renegade, piping his protest in the forecourt of the temple, neither could he beg the charity of the faithful or their pity for his reduced estate.
By the time he had wrestled his confusions into this elementary order, he was home again. There was a notice pinned to the elevator, Fuori Servizio, which meant he had to trudge up the long stone staircase to reach his apartment. Then, because custom and ritual were the last
fragile armour against fear and grief, he opened his breviary and read the compline of the day:
“Hear, O Lord, my prayer and let my cry reach you … My life has vanished like smoke, I am alone like a pelican in the wilderness.”
Seven
It was Rossini’s custom to say his early morning Mass in the chapel of a small convent a few blocks from his apartment. The convent was the property of a community of women who called themselves the Sisters of Redemption. They devoted themselves to charitable works, one of which was based in the convent itself: a halfway house for women who had served prison time or were released on conditional bail.
The community was small; funds were low; so in traditional Italian fashion, two nuns went out each day, professional mendicants, begging alms from local residents and shopkeepers. It was a thankless task. The community was ageing and few young women offered themselves for service, but the Sisters themselves managed to preserve a wry Roman humour, which matched the often anarchic wit of their gaol-birds.
Rossini had met them first on one of his bad days when, dressed as a layman, he was preparing to set off for his hermitage. He gave them a donation, then fell into talk with them. A slum child himself, born to an emigrant Neapolitan family, he had a traditional respect for beggars and a deep-seated hate for the indifferent who despised beggary but accepted it as a social imperative.
In the course of his dialogue with the Sisters, he revealed his identity and offered a continuing subvention in cash and his occasional service as celebrant to the community. Many times later he was to regret the impulse, as he found himself drawn more and more into the position of confessor, counsellor and friend of last resort to the community and those whom it protected. He was cool-headed enough to recognise the system for what it was: old-fashioned ecclesiastical charity, no substitute at all for an overdue but impossible reform in the Italian social system.
So the women in the convent became for him a small private constituency where he could function as he had done years before in his upland parish in Argentina. The nuns trusted him. The other women were cautious at first. He understood that they could hardly be otherwise. They knew the harshness of life around the campfires on the Annulare where the truck drivers pulled in for a quick tumble on a greasy blanket. They had suffered the violence of pimps and the bullying of police and prison staff.