by Igor Štiks
As I approached Rab by boat, he lay almost motionless, imprisoned in the Benedictine monastery, maybe just a bit more at peace in the false conviction that I at least was safe. Here then. This is how it all happened.
The heart attack had destroyed him. Afterward he was taken care of by old Ivanka, long since a member of our family, a woman who’d been my second mother and nanny. My mother had been cut down by pneumonia back in 1940.
After his expulsion from the party, my father was saved from harsher punishment by his firm commitment to Communism and his considerable contribution, as it used to be said, to liberation efforts in our region. Or I’m mistaken, for maybe the authorities’ leniency, which consisted of subjecting him to isolation, was caused simply by the fact that someone in the right place—and in those times, such was the rule—had put in a good word for him, in the same way that some falsehood or other had been attributed to him before.
Because of my father’s convictions and quick decision to join the people’s struggle against Fascism, I spent my early days hiding in the homes of partisans on our island. And that’s the explanation for why, to your surprise, I speak Croatian so well to this day.
The end of the war changed our situation only for a short time. The difference turned on the fact that before, we had hidden in other people’s homes, while now we hid in our own.
After the heart attack, my father was seized by a fearful panic for my future. The news of the clash with the Russians only added to it. From the day he was confined to his bed, he often spoke angrily, as much as he was able, about how there was no longer any life for us there, how the authorities were going to look for scapegoats among us first (he meant the Italians) and how the meek would single themselves out. Then he would add bitterly that things had turned into a mess, that the story had come to an end, and that world Communism would have to find some other place to show its feasibility. Still, even until the night when we heard about the Resolution, he had never definitively set the day for my departure. Today I think that my presence dispersed the gloomy thoughts that come to the mind of a man in such a position and hasten the final hour. I comforted him as much as I could, along with old Ivanka, and closed the blinds and pulled the curtains shut. I tried hard to prevent anything from disturbing him and secretly prayed in the kitchen for his salvation. I could not let him see, in his condition, that reactionary forces flourished in his very own house.
Why didn’t I listen to him and go from Trieste to somewhere else in Italy? Why didn’t I listen to my dying father? Did I think I could survive on the island? How could it be that the departure of my family and friends did not suggest to me that I should follow their example? Why did I want to remain in a town that was becoming less and less mine, and in which there were fewer people every day who were glad to see me? I assume that these are the questions running through your mind.
They all have just one answer. But let’s do things in order. Let’s present them in their true light, without forgetting the details. Let’s expose the traps of fate.
CHAPTER THE SECOND
Catarina’s appearance at the moment she entered the Mardi dining hall caused Enzo to renounce all the caution and moral scruples that had periodically tormented his conscience while he relaxed in his warm bath; the devil himself could not have made her more beautiful for that altogether unexceptional lunch. Then again, if Enzo had not had such a captivating smile and promising build, perhaps the lady of the house would not have dared disturb her peaceful idleness.
“So you’re the gentleman from Lombardy,” she said briefly and coquettishly. “I am honored you’re to be our guest. Now that I’ve taken a closer look, I completely understand my maid’s flush.”
Gazing upon the apparition that had uttered these words, Enzo shivered, but then, more soberly and with a slight sense of resentment, thought, Does she take me for a child? What maid, dammit? It’s my custom to first address the master upon entering another’s house. That motto, which made him laugh silently, brought the blood back into his face.
Raising an eyebrow, he dared to toss out his first bait: “Where the maidservants are in competition with their mistresses, the people must be truly marvelous.”
It seemed to Catarina in the first instant that the youngster was rather crude, but also, to an equal if not greater extent, sweet. After several moments of indecision, her initial attraction gained the upper hand. Mardi laughed aloud and added, as if God himself were his prod, “It would already seem, dear Enzo, that in this country you will find a wife, too!”
In pronouncing these words, Mardi confirmed that it is entirely possible to follow a blind course despite healthy eyes. He looked straight at Maria, while the maid, having quickly hidden her face behind the fragile barrier of her hands, reflected, From your mouth to God’s ear, Master. Had Enzo known by some chance that happiness betrayed is easily avenged, he wouldn’t have ended up where he ended up but would have immediately heeded Mardi’s blindness and married the child. She wasn’t such a bad catch, if you know what I mean.
But God so desired that on that very evening the bishop’s courier should arrive, and Mardi should issue orders for his horses to be readied. Several hours later Francesco was received at the Rimini episcopal headquarters, where he was given this confidential information: Habsburg spies and sycophants were all around; there was a terrible leak of information; anyone might be guilty; and while strengthening all defenses, internal controls should also be redoubled.
As Mardi cursed himself and his noble forefathers for leaving him such obligations, in his house a much less uncomfortable scene was taking place. As soon as the master had disappeared from sight, it was as if a breath of freedom wafted through his great home. As was her custom, Catarina gave orders that the guards should raise the Mardi banner above the main tower. In her understanding, this would serve as notification that the master was not at home but that his right hand, which was pictured on the banner as the claw of a lynx rampant, still watched over the fate of his subjects. As some clever little head decided, the guards had to be doubled, and upon learning of the beloved master’s return they were to blow all the available trumpets regardless of the time of day or night. Mardi had tried to talk Catarina out of at least the nighttime trumpeting—“for the world, my dear, is in no way to blame for my return”—but she insisted on this in particular, arguing that her love was stronger even than sleep (this declaration, you understand, comes from an anthology of banalities) and that, whatever happened, she wanted to be awake to greet her one true love, and so on and so forth.
And on this occasion, as on every other when she was deprived of his company for dinner by some pressing political matter, Catarina gladly abandoned herself to a feeling of neglect. Persuaded by Maria, long before the young Lombardian appeared on her horizon, one similar evening, she had allowed the servants to kill time at the master’s table. That this had become an established custom by the time of Enzo’s arrival was clear from the haste with which the servants rushed through the halls, their extraordinarily elaborate dress, and their frequent conversations about the state of Umberto’s voice and of his lute, for they were excitedly waiting for the Mardi stable boy, should he be in the mood, to rain a hail of punches upon his faithful companion, to everyone’s joy and delight.
Well then, all this murmuring, screaming, and shouting woke Enzo from his afternoon slumber. The moment he was up, little Beppo burst into his room with an invitation from the mistress to join her at dinner as soon as he could. After Beppo had announced his message, he rushed to join the treadmill of servants and, in part, gentry—which was, you’ll agree with me, an unusual thing and would be even in our time—but Enzo brought him to a stop in the doorway by asking, “Is it always like this here, boy?”
“Only when the old . . . forgive me, when Master Mardi is not here, Master Strecci,” he answered, bluntly but preciously, which earned him a box on the ear but also, it must be said, a fine silver coin. Beppo concluded that this was truly an exceptio
nal man.
When Enzo entered the dining hall, the company had finished eating what there was to eat, and Umberto had already sung the one about the plum girl and the cowherd, as well as the one about the old master and the young servant girl. The company bowed to Strecci, and Umberto hurried to finish his song, which made him fumble the final lines where the priest says to the harlot in conclusion, “So, sinful soul, take into yourself my Jericho horn with all your heart.”
Everyone turned and, after Catarina had introduced Enzo as an important guest, the company as a whole gave him an even warmer welcome.
“You enjoy yourselves thoroughly here, in truth, just as in Milan!” he began, but at that moment some obviously tactless soul interrupted him by crying out, “Long live Milan!”
Enzo, however, overlooked the fellow’s delight and continued solemnly: “I grew up with servants in my parents’ home, which is why I am happy to see such a sight here. Happy servants serving one worth worshipping.” With these words he cast a gentle glance upon Catarina, which garnered a sigh from several simple girls from the kitchen, and then the applause resounded. Would that he had known, though he could not, that this gesture would take such an unpleasant, painful root in Maria’s heart, amidst all the wondrous fruit of that garden in bloom for our insanely charming Enzo!
“Pass me that instrument!” said the young man, floating on the waves of admiration, and in his hands the usually noble lute became the magical means of emerging adultery, infidelity, betrayal, perversity, crime, and all that is unpleasing to God.
And the lady to whom Enzo sang that evening had, in place of eyes, two suns; and hair of life-giving star beams, exactly like our Catarina’s; and a complexion paler than milk, exactly like our Catarina’s; and two pigeons beneath her gown; and a gait that made one ache, strangely, exactly as our Catarina’s. The lady was simply a gift from God, but this was not Catarina, for a divine gift would not have come from the devil’s lair, as had the gift of her beauty. A divine gift would not make a man want to scream, as our Enzo wanted, and we together with him, “I want her body, even if it should be the last thing I have!”
The final rhymes of that beautiful song evoked another round of applause, and then, tactfully, Enzo excused himself from further participation, saying he was tired. And I can tell you that the adoration that accompanied his departure did not go unnoticed by Catarina.
3
Had my father ordered me to leave as clearly as on the night after the radio broadcast of the Resolution, when he was already exhausted by illness, had he told me to go months earlier, believe me, I would have obeyed eagerly. Because in all truth, for an eighteen-year-old Italian boy from a family of an expelled party member and disempowered partisan, there was no place in the new Yugoslavia. Perhaps for others, those who had managed not to take sides during the war, temporarily turning their backs might have given them the chance of a better life later, but somehow it seemed to me that from the day the regime betrayed my father, the future became for us just a part of his defiance, which at the time, in that room upstairs, had already begun to slowly die out. Besides, before the Resolution, I had wanted to be closer to relatives and friends who had already left Rab, the exiles looking for a new home in the north of Italy.
When he finally told me to get ready to leave the very next day, it was already too late. By then his stubbornness, his firm desire to survive, had made it possible for me to catch a glimpse of her.
It was the middle of June. Our garden, which perched above the road, blossomed with color. Standing in it when the sun began to descend into the lulling night, which was followed by a chorus of crickets, you could see that the house threw a shadow across the whole garden, and it seemed as if, compared to the surroundings, the yard were covered by a dark sheet. At such moments you could also see that our house was one of the largest in town and was visible from almost any corner of Rab, while from it, if you wanted, you could make out the little boats in the bay of Saint Euphemia on one side of town, and the still water of Rab’s harbor on the other.
It had not yet reached that time of day at the moment when she and some of her friends stopped by the fence and began picking blackberries, which were still red and sour. I wouldn’t have noticed anything if one of them had not conspiratorially said, “Be careful, those are Fascist blackberries.” It didn’t bother me too much. I was only worried about my father’s sleeping. I started off to check on him but then heard one of them make the condemnable, politically dissident statement, “I like them even if they’re a hundred percent Fascist.” The first girl replied that our resolute time would not tolerate such things, but I didn’t understand what she meant by it: her answer, us, or the blackberries. I heard her impertinent voice again. “So report me, if you’re up to it.” This I had to look into; the threads of destiny are forever intertwined.
After having assured myself that my father was sleeping, I went onto the balcony, where my appearance was immediately noticed.
“Death to Fascism, Comrade Niccolò,” said the first girl in greeting, as was proper for the times though was now less belligerent than formerly. I recognized her as Anđa, an attractive blonde and the leader of Rab’s Communist youth organization. From everything I’d heard, it seemed to suit her.
“Freedom to the people, Anđa. How come you don’t like my blackberries?”
She lowered her head, blushed slightly, and said, “That’s not what I meant, Niccolò. You know how people talk.”
“So that means they’re good after all,” I joked, and Anđa laughed in such a way that almost nothing was left of the Communist youth leader, and I was happy that my previous playful flirting had yielded some fruit for the sake of duty.
But at that moment the rebel spoke: “They’re good, very good, even if they are Fascist.” She stuck her tongue out at me and went slowly off down the road, while Anđa saw this as a sign to turn serious.
I decided to find out who the girl was before Anđa ran after her friends. “Who’s that, Anđa?”
“She came from Šibenik the other day. Her name is Petra,” she said quickly. “Her father is the new police captain.”
And that was the beginning. A funny, completely unimportant encounter that one might easily forget, you could say. But, you see, that was the rock I would build my destiny upon.
CHAPTER THE THIRD
What is not hidden in the forests of Romagna? Such game, such pleasures! Mardi returned home after midnight, with a face that seemed to say that politics was a very hard bread. As a faithful wife, Catarina told him as soon as he came in, “And I’m a hard woman.” Francesco thought he knew what she had in mind, so he gave orders to have his horses prepared early the next morning, this time for a hunt. It is important to add that the bishop’s words did not allow him much sleep.
Enzo’s first impulse that day was to swear aloud when, at the break of dawn, Umberto’s horn cut like a knife into his consciousness. He went to the window and caught sight of Mardi, who seemed to him somewhat absorbed in thought or worried as he waved his banner toward Enzo and then propped it atop his pouch. Not Mardi but Catarina answered the question Enzo had posed, “Where to, my friends, at this time of night?” with the little bit of goodwill remaining to him.
“Master Strecci,” she said, “the sun is about to rise in the east. This is the best time to examine our woods more closely if you wish to.”
After these words, which it would be hard for any man to know what to make of, the beautiful Catarina rode away, dragging Mardi and twenty servants still befuddled from the party of the night before behind her.
Enzo caught up with them at the brook that divided the wondrous grove, where the company, gladdened by the morning freshness and the excitement of the hunt, was considering how to surround a family of rabbits. The first thing he made out from the crowd was Maria’s charger, which the girl—filled with the strange hope that, regardless of what the mind might be saying, transforms love into drama or, more often, tragedy—turned in his direc
tion. Enzo could see her breath curl with every word she so hurriedly sent toward him, the collection of which carried necessary information about the plan for rabbit stew made by Mistress Mardi herself. They could not count on the support of Master Mardi in the mistress’s favorite game, for it was clear from the first glance that Master Mardi was completely absentminded. Maria accompanied her last sentence with a smile, to which Enzo replied kindly but not especially pleasantly. Maria thought quickly, clearly, and correctly, but, unfortunately, on an unsound foundation, that love needed to be fought for, and she took firm hold of the tail of Enzo’s horse, which, it seemed, willingly allowed her to take it as it made its way toward Catarina.
“Dear Enzo,” poor Mardi called, “you were all that was lacking to ensure the success of my wife’s endeavor.”
“Of course, to the fullest and without hesitation,” Catarina said in a tone Enzo knew well, accompanying her words with an irresistible movement of the hand so graceful that a man would be most willing to give up his soul to her, at once and in full consciousness, come hell or high water.
“Leo is my middle name,” Enzo responded playfully and, you will agree, rather unoriginally.