Pirandello's Henry IV (3 page)

DOCTOR
   Good. Let's make a start by getting a few things clear. How did this portrait come to be here? Did you give it to him back at the beginning?

MATILDA
   No, how would I? I was just a girl—like Frida—not even engaged. I let him have the picture three or four years after the accident because Carlo's mother wouldn't leave me alone about it.

DOCTOR
   (
to Di Nolli
) Your mother being his sister?

DI NOLLI
   Yes. We're here because we promised her. She died a month ago. But for that, Frida and I would be on our honeymoon.

DOCTOR
   With your mind on other things—I understand.

DI NOLLI
   Mother died convinced that her brother was about to get better.

DOCTOR
   And can you tell me why she thought so?

DI NOLLI
   It was a conversation they had not long before she died.

DOCTOR
   Did they now? It would be useful to know what he said.

DI NOLLI
   I wish I could help you. All I know is she came back obviously upset. I gathered he'd spoken to her with unusual tenderness, almost as if he knew it was the last time . . . and on her deathbed she made me promise not to abandon him, to have him seen . . .

DOCTOR
   And here we are. So first, let's see . . . sometimes the tiniest event can . . . This portrait, then . . .

MATILDA
   Oh, heavens, we mustn't exaggerate its importance—it was just that I hadn't seen it for so long.

DOCTOR
   Please . . . patience . . .

DI NOLLI
   Well, quite—it's been there for about fifteen years.

MATILDA
   Nearer eighteen.

DOCTOR
   Please!—you don't know yet what I'm asking. In my belief these two portraits may be crucial. They were done, I suppose, before the famous—or should I say infamous—pageant, is that right?

MATILDA
   Of course.

DOCTOR
   When he was still in his right mind—that's the point I was making. Were they his idea?

MATILDA
   No, not at all. Lots of us who took part decided to have our portraits done as a souvenir of the pageant.

BELCREDI
   I had mine done—Charles of Anjou.

DOCTOR
   You don't know if it was he who asked for it?

MATILDA
   I've no idea. It's possible. Or it might have been Carlo's mother's idea of humouring him.

DOCTOR
   Now, another thing. Was this pageant his idea?

BELCREDI
   No, it was mine.

MATILDA
   Don't take any notice of him. It was poor Belassi's idea.

BELCREDI
   Belassi?

MATILDA
   (
to the Doctor
) Count Belassi, poor man, who died two or three months later.

BELCREDI
   But Belassi wasn't even there when I . . .

DI NOLLI
   Excuse me, Doctor, does it really matter whose idea . . .

DOCTOR
   It could be important.

BELCREDI
   It was mine! This is too much! Do you think I'd brag about it after what happened? You see, at the Club we'd been thinking of putting on a show for the next carnival. So I suggested this historical pageant, I say historical, it was more of a hodgepodge, everyone had to choose a character from this or that century, a king, or emperor, or prince, with his lady—queen or empress—beside him, also on horseback. The horses had all the period trappings, too, of course. That was my suggestion and it was adopted.

MATILDA
   Well, my invitation came from Belassi.

BELCREDI
   Theft. Belassi wasn't even in the Club that night. Nor was
he
.

DOCTOR
   So then he chose Henry?

MATILDA
   That's because, my name being Matilda, I said off the top of my head that I'd be Countess Matilda of Tuscany. He said, in that case he'd be Henry IV.

DOCTOR
   I'm sorry, I don't see the connection.

MATILDA
   I didn't either at first. He said he'd be at my feet just like at Canossa. I knew about Canossa but only vaguely, and when I looked it up I found I was the Pope's most zealous ally against the German King Henry. I blushed from top to toe. I understood why he'd chosen to be Henry IV.

DOCTOR
   You mean, perhaps, because . . .

BELCREDI
   Dear God, Doctor—because he was mad about her, and she couldn't stand him.

MATILDA
   That's not true! I didn't dislike him; quite the opposite. But whenever a man gets all serious about a woman—

BELCREDI
   He turns into a complete ass . . .

MATILDA
   No, he wasn't like you, my dear.

BELCREDI
   But I've never asked to be taken seriously.

MATILDA
   Don't we know it. But with him, you had to take him seriously back. (
to the Doctor
) Among the misfortunes we women have to put up with from time to time is suddenly being confronted by a pair of eyes gazing at us with the solemn promise of lifelong devotion. (
She bursts into laughter
.) There's nothing more ridiculous. If only men could see themselves doing their lifelong devotion look. It always made me laugh. More so in those days. But now, after twenty years, let me confess something. When I laughed at him, it was partly out of fear, because, coming from him, you felt he could mean it. And that would have been extremely dangerous.

DOCTOR
   Now this, this is something I want to know about. Extremely dangerous, you say?

MATILDA
   (
lightly
) Well, because he wasn't like the others . . . and I wasn't brave enough not to laugh it off. . . anyway I had no patience for anything serious, I was just a girl, I hadn't done my share of living, so I laughed along with everyone else. I was sorry later . . . I hated myself, actually, because my laughing at him got all mixed up with those fools laughing at him.

BELCREDI
   Like they do with me, more or less.

MATILDA
   You make people laugh by humiliating yourself—that's the opposite.

DOCTOR
   So, as I understand it, he was already in a bit of a state.

BELCREDI
   Yes, but in his own way.

DOCTOR
   What do you mean?

BELCREDI
   Dispassionately in a state.

MATILDA
   Dispassionately!? He threw himself into life—

BELCREDI
   I'm not saying he was putting it on. Not at all. He was often worked up. But I'd swear he'd immediately dissociate himself from the state he was in, observing himself—even, in my view, when he was at his most spontaneous. I think, furthermore, it had a harmful effect on him. Sometimes he'd get into these hilarious fits of rage against himself.

MATILDA
   That's true, he did.

BELCREDI
   And why was that? (
to the Doctor
) The way I see it, that outside view of himself, like someone watching himself playing a part, separated him from what he was feeling—which then seemed to him not exactly fake, because he wasn't faking his feelings, but something he had to act out as a self-conscious intention, to make up for the authenticity he couldn't feel. So he would go to extremes, improvise, exaggerate, anything to lose his self-awareness . . . that's why he'd come across so erratic, frivolous, even at times ludicrous.

DOCTOR
   And . . . antisocial, would you say?

BELCREDI
   No, not at all! He was game for anything—he was famous for organising dances, tableaux vivants, benefits—all
for the fun of it, you see. But he was a very good actor, that's the point.

DI NOLLI
   As a madman he's even more impressive, magnificent, terrifying.

BELCREDI
   From the word go. Imagine it, when the accident happened and he was thrown . . .

MATILDA
   It was dreadful. I was right next to him. I saw him under the hoofs, the horse bolting . . .

BELCREDI
   At first we didn't think he was seriously hurt. There was some commotion, and the cavalcade came to a halt. People wanted to know what had happened, but he'd already been picked up and carried into the house.

MATILDA
   There was nothing, not a scratch, no blood . . .

BELCREDI
   We thought he'd just passed out.

MATILDA
   Then, when a couple of hours later—

BELCREDI
   Yes—he showed up in the hall, that's what I was coming to.

MATILDA
   The look on his face—I noticed straight away.

BELCREDI
   No you didn't, none of us did. We didn't realise, you see . . .

MATILDA
   Well, of course
you
didn't—you were all acting like lunatics.

BELCREDI
   We were acting our parts, having fun; it was a beargarden.

MATILDA
   You can imagine the shock when we realised he wasn't pretending.

DOCTOR
   Ah, you mean, because he . . .

BELCREDI
   Yes, he joined in. We thought he'd recovered and was acting up like the rest of us—and better than us, because, as I said, he was very good. We thought he was playing along with everyone else.

MATILDA
   They started flicking him with their whips . . .

BELCREDI
   And then he drew his sword. He was armed as a king, of course. He started slashing his sword around at people . . . a terrifying moment for all of us.

MATILDA
   I'll never forget it, those faces . . . distorted, appalled in the face of his fury, which was no longer a masquerade but madness unmasked—

BELCREDI
   Henry IV himself, in a towering rage.

MATILDA
   He'd been obsessed with the pageant for a month or more—it occupied him in everything he did. I'm sure that was part of the reason.

BELCREDI
   And the way he did his homework! Every detail, no matter how trivial.

DOCTOR
   Well, it's classic. Fall from horse—hits head—brain damage—temporary obsession made permanent, fixed, causing a disturbance of the balance of the mind . . . up to insanity itself.

BELCREDI
   (
to Frida and Di Nolli
) See what life has got up its sleeve, my darlings? (
to Di Nolli
) You must have been four or five. (
to Frida
) Your mother had her portrait done before she had any idea that one day she'd have a daughter who'd replace her in it. And I've gone grey. As for him, (
pointing at the portrait
) one bang on the head and time stops, he's Henry IV.

DOCTOR
   So, ladies and gentlemen, to sum up—

But Bertold enters looking upset.

BERTOLD
   Sorry! . . .

FRIDA
   (
panicked
) It's him!

MATILDA
   Is it him?

BERTOLD
   Sorry.

DI NOLLI
   No—it's all right . . .

DOCTOR
   Who is he?

BELCREDI
   A leftover from our masquerade.

DI NOLLI
   He's one of the young men we have here to keep him company.

BERTOLD
   I'm sorry, Your Lordship—

DI NOLLI
   Sorry! I gave orders we were not to be disturbed!

BERTOLD
   Yes, sir, but I can't take any more, I want to give notice.

DI NOLLI
   Oh, you're the one who was joining today.