Goliarda Sapienza - The Art of Joy

‘You aren’t crazy, Princess.’

‘Is that really what you think?’

‘Really. You’ve decided what’s best for you, and it’s only right to do it.’

‘ Brava , Mody! But I’m selfish, is that what you think?’

‘Of course I think so.’

‘Indeed. I never said I was altruistic … Now get to work! And you, Carmine, tell me what’s new, given this insidious peace that has fallen upon us.’

‘What’s new, Princess, is that everything is going up. Naturally, increases were expected, but costs are rising sky-high, and unless we take steps…’

As he spoke, Carmine looked at me with admiration. It was the first time. I had managed to gain the respect of that man of honour. Two victories in one morning. Now I knew for certain that the will was in the house. I bided my time, and in just three months Gaia told me so in her own words. Until that moment I had searched the study and her bedroom, but only very perfunctorily. Because it’s one thing to hope and another thing to be certain. And now I was certain: the will was not far off. I went back to rummaging through the study and the bedroom more meticulously than before. I discovered the secret drawers in the study. I leafed through her personal books, page by page, and carefully examined the bindings. In so doing, I learned the type of reading she preferred; there weren’t many volumes and they were all poetry. It took me about a month to complete this operation, until I was certain that it could not be in those two rooms. It would take me an entire year to search the whole house as thoroughly as I had the study and the bedroom. The only solution was to study her, hoping to find some small hint that would lead me to uncover the hiding place. Using the pretext of not understanding poetry, I asked her permission to borrow some of her books.

As I read all those French and English poets, I realized that I had never understood poetry, not really. Of course, I had read Dante, Petrarch, Leopardi, but without grasping the secret of their verse. Truthfully, I had preferred reading philosophical essays, historical and political texts, and biographies. I was so struck by that discovery that I almost forgot about the will. I must have shown such persistence in my reading that even the Princess noticed it.

‘Look, Mody, reading all that poetry isn’t making you unfocused, is it? I won’t lend you anything anymore if you keep staring into space with those big wide eyes. It’s like you’re searching for something…’

It was curious, however, that in the midst of all those books of exceptional poetry there were two prose works: Manzoni’s I promessi sposi and the Tales of Edgar Allan Poe. This made me very suspicious. Leaving aside I promessi sposi , with which I was familiar, I began reading Poe’s Tales . That night I came across the finest stories I had ever read. I couldn’t stop reading, not even at dawn, when lack of sleep made my eyes burn a little. Those mysterious lines, in which the even more mysterious faces of young women appeared in magical settings and underground gardens, had so captured my emotions that I failed to understand a sentence in ‘The Purloined Letter’ which was the key to my feverish search: ‘Perhaps it is the very simplicity of the thing which puts you at fault…’ I was about to go on to ‘The Gold-Bug’ when I jumped up in bed, turned off the light — by now it was broad daylight — and began leafing through the pages of that story, until I realized that the will, like the famous purloined letter, might be somewhere in plain view where I had never thought to look. I quickly checked the desk in the study — I confess I had been hoping — as well as the tables and bookcases in the library, the musical scores …

I found it on Ignazio’s nightstand, in a folder of sketches. Our destiny lay there, among those drawings signed by Ignazio, who stared at me, troubled, from the photograph above. Not a speck of dust on that night table which, like everything else, was dusted each day. Who would ever think of rummaging through those drawings made by the hand of a dead man? In fact, my fingers were shaking when I picked up the document. Ignazio’s eyes froze me. That gaze wanted to live on, to pin us all in place by his death. But I too wanted to live, and though shaking, I put the will back in place. Slowly, Modesta: make sure no one suspects that anything has been touched. The venom of fear can make us slip up.

* * *

The next morning, buoyed by my discovery and by sleep, the last thing I would imagine was that Ignazio’s wrath would show itself so soon. A thunderbolt had struck in the night, shattering the large window in her room, and all of Aunt Adelaide’s birds were found dead. Terrified, I went with Beatrice to verify that what Argentovivo said was true. In the large cage, all of her remaining little birds lay stone-dead, or dying. To make matters worse, at the sight of them Beatrice doubled over, pressing her mouth with clenched fists. I held her in my arms as she vomited a dark liquid mixed with blood. Argentovivo began screaming so loudly that I had to slap her as best I could, still holding Beatrice in my arms, in order to bring her to her senses.

‘Run, instead of screaming! Go and find the doctor while I lay her on the bed.’

Even there on the bed, the vomiting continued. I got a basin and with a damp towel, one of Aunt Adelaide’s, I tried to wipe her brow which, once the vomiting stopped, had suddenly turned yellow and cold as marble. Then the vomiting resumed and with it her face started burning up, covered with red spots. An eternity passed in that spasmodic seesawing before the doctor arrived. I too felt like vomiting, due to fear and the sour odour of decay that had filled the room.

‘It’s started! Just yesterday I got word that Catania has been infected by it. All the hospitals are full, corridors, stairwells, every available space … If you feel like vomiting, don’t hold back. Better to throw up and release the poison.’

‘But what is it?’

‘The spagnola , Modesta, the Spanish flu.’ 26

‘The Spanish flu?’

‘It appears that the soldiers returning from the front are carriers. Forgive my bluntness, but I must be frank with someone: it’s quite serious. It hasn’t been a week since the outbreak began in Catania and already there are countless dead. I was hoping it wouldn’t reach here, so far from the populated areas and with all this clean, fresh air. I didn’t say anything, so as not to scare you unnecessarily … No, no, don’t worry. Beatrice can’t understand me; she has other things to worry about. Her fever is high. Help me lift her so I can listen to her lungs. Now go and give orders that no one should approach. Everyone’s in quarantine. Don’t let the Princess come here. We need to get Lysoform. Boil everything in the kitchens. All the bed linens must be boiled. Good, Modesta, I see you’ve recovered. May I feel your pulse? Your tongue? Normal … Has the nausea passed?’

‘Yes, it’s gone. It was just the power of suggestion. Tell me what else I must do.’

* * *

In a week’s time the villa became a hospital. The stink of disinfectant and vomit was everywhere. And everyone, dragged down by the sickly sweet, sour stench of death, sprawled in beds that had to be changed three or four times a day. Except for me, Pietro and Carmine, who was assigned to maintain contact with the outside world, they were all burning up with fever. Two nurses arrived from Catania, but within days they, too, took to their beds. In the servants’ wing only Argentovivo and two others were still standing. The doctor, also ill, sent orders from his home. Don Antonio, from his bed, sent word telling us to pray. The small dance instructor no longer came, but he hadn’t died like so many others in the area.