The Leopard (2 page)

But the garden, hemmed and almost squashed between these barriers, was exhaling scents that were cloying, fleshy, and slightly putrid, like the aromatic liquids distilled from the relics of certain saints; the carnations superimposed their pungence on the formal fragrance of roses and the oily emanations of magnolias drooping in corners; and somewhere beneath it all was a faint smell of mint mingling with a nursery whiff of acacia and the jammy one of myrtle; from a grove beyond the wall came an erotic waft of early orange blossom.

It was a garden for the blind: a constant offense to the eyes, a pleasure strong if somewhat crude to the nose. The Paul Neyron roses, whose cuttings he had himself bought in Paris, had degenerated; first stimulated and then enfeebled by the strong if languid pull of Sicilian earth, burned by apocalyptic Julies, they had changed into things like flesh-colored cabbages, obscene and distilling a dense, almost indecent, scent which no French horticulturist would have dared hope for. The Prince put one under his nose and seemed to be sniffing the thigh of a dancer from the Opera. Bendic6, to whom it was also proffered, drew back in disgust and hurried off in search of healthier sensations amid dead lizards and manure. But the heavy scents of the garden brought on a gloomy train of thought for the Prince: "It smells all right here now; but a month ago...

He remembered the nausea diffused throughout the entire villa by certain sweetish odors before their cause was traced: the corpse of a young soldier of the Fifth Regiment of Sharpshooters who had been wounded in the skirmish with the rebels at San Lorenzo and come up there to die, all alone, under a lemon tree. They had found him lying face downward in the thick clover, his face covered in blood and vomit, his nails dug into the soil, crawling with ants; a pile of purplish intestines had formed a puddle under his bandoleer. Russo, the agent, had discovered this object, turned it over, covered its face with his red kerchief, thrust the guts back into the gaping stomach with some twigs, and then covered the wound with the blue flaps of the cloak; spitting continuously with disgust, meanwhile, not right on, but very near the body. And all this with meticulous care. "Those swine stink even when they're dead." It had been the only epitaph to that derelict death.

After other soldiers, looking bemused, had taken the body away (and yes, dragged it along by the shoulders to the cart so that the puppet's stuffing fell out again), a
De Profundis
for the soul of the unknown youth was added to the evening Rosary; and now that the conscience of the ladies in the house seemed placated, the subject was never mentioned again. The Prince went and scratched a little lichen off the feet of the Flora and then began to stroll up and down; the lowering sun threw an immense shadow of him over the gravelike flower beds.

No, the dead man had not been mentioned again and anyway soldiers presumably become soldiers for exactly that, to die in defense of their King. But the image of that gutted corpse often recurred, as if asking to be given peace in the only possible way the Prince could give it: by justifying that last agony on grounds of general necessity. And then, around, would rise other even less attractive ghosts. Dying for somebody or for something, that was perfectly normal, of course; but the person dying should know, or at least feel sure, that someone knows for whom or for what he is dyingi the disfigured face was asking just that; and that was where the haze began.

"He died for the King, of course, my dear Fabrizio, obviously," would have been the answer of his brother-in-law Malvica, had the Prince asked him, and Malvica was always the chosen spokesman of most of their friends. "For the King, who stands for order, continuity, decency, honor, right; for the King, who is sole defender of the Church, sole bulwark against the dispersal of property, 'The Sect's' ultimate aim." ("The Sect" refers to liberals and Freemasons0. Fine words, these, pointing to all that lay dearest and deepest in the Prince's heart. But there was something that didn't quite ring true, even so. The King, all right. He knew the King well, or rather the one who had just died; the present one was only a seminarian dressed up as a General. And the old King had really not been worth much. "But you're not reasoning, my dear Fabrizio," MUvica would reply; "one particular sovereign may not be up to it, yet the idea of monarchy is still the same.))

That was true too; but kings who personify an idea should not, cannot, fall below a certain level for generations; if they do, my dear brother-in-law, the idea suffers too.

He was sitting on a bench, inertly watching the devastation wrought by Bendic6 in the flower beds; every now and again the dog would turn innocent eyes toward him as if asking for praise at labor done: fourteen carnations broken off, half a hedge torn apart, an irrigation canal blocked. How human! "Good! Bendico" come here." And the animal hurried up and put its earthy nostrils into his hand, anxious to show that it had forgiven this silly interruption of a fine job of work. Those audiences! All those audiences granted him by King Ferdinand at Caserta, at Capodimonte, at Portici, Naples, anywhere at all.

Walking beside the chamberlain on duty, chatting as he guided with a cocked hat under an arm and the latest Neapolitan slang on his lips, they would move through innumerable rooms of superb architecture and revolting decor (just like the Bourbon monarchy itself), plunge into dirty passages and up ill-kept stairs, and finally emerge into an antechamber filled with waiting people: closed faces of police spies, avid faces of petitioners. The chamberlain apologized, pushed through this mob, and led him toward another antechamber reserved for members of the Courti a little blue and silver room of the period of Charles III. After a short wait a lackey tapped at the door and they were admitted into the August Presence.

The private study was small and consciously simple; on the white-painted walls hung a portrait of King Francis I and one with an acid, ill-tempered expression of the reigning Queen; above the mantelpiece was a Madonna by Andrea del Sarto looking astounded at finding herself in the company of colored lithographs representing obscure Neapolitan saints and sanctuaries; on a side table stood a wax statuette of the Child Jesus with a votive light before it; and the modest desk was heaped with papers white, yellow, and blue; the whole administration of the Kingdom here attained its final phase, that of signature by His Majesty (D. G.). Behind this paper barricade was the King. He was already standing so as not to be seen getting up; the King with his pallid, heavy face between fairish side whiskers, with his rough cloth military jacket under which burst a purple cataract of falling trousers. He gave a step forward with his right hand out and bent for the hand-kiss which he would then refuse.

"Well, Salina, blessings on you!" His Neapolitan accent was far stronger than the chamberlain's. "I must beg Your Majesty to excuse me for not wearing Court dress; I am only just passing through Naples; but I did not wish to forgo paying my respects to Your Revered Person."

"Nonsense, Salina, nonsense; you know that you're always at home here at Caserta."

"At home, of course," he repeated, sitting down behind the desk and waiting a second before motioning to his guest to sit down too.

"And how are the little girls?"

The Prince realized that now was the moment to produce a play on words both salacious and edifying. "The little girls, Your Majesty? At my age and under the sacred bonds of matrimony?"

The King's mouth laughed as his hands primly settled the papers before him. "Those I'd never let myself refer to, Salina. I was asking about your little daughters, your little Princesses. Concetta, now, that dear godchild of ours, she must be getting quite big, isn't she, almost grown up?"

From family he passed to science. "Salina, you're an honor not only to yourself but to the whole Kingdom! A fine thing, science, unless it takes to attacking religion!" After this, however, the mask of the Friend was put aside and its place assumed by that of the Severe Sovereign. "Tell me, Salina, what do they think of Castelcicala down in Sicily? " Salina had never heard a good word for the Viceroy of Sicily from either Royalists or liberals, but not wanting to let a friend down he parried and kept to generalities. "A great gentleman, a true hero, maybe a little old for the fatigues of viceroyalty. . . ." The King's face darkened: Salina was refusing to act the spy. So Salina was no use to him. Leaning both hands on his desk, he prepared the dismissal: "I've so much work! The whole Kingdom rests on these shoulders of mine." Now for a bit of sweetening: out of the drawer came the friendly mask again. "When you pass through Naples next, Salina, come and show your Concetta to the Queen. She's too young to be presented, I know, but there's nothing against our arranging a little dinner for her, is there?

Sweets to the sweet, as they say. Well, Salina, 'bye, and be good! "

On one occasion, though, the dismissal had not been so amiable. The Prince had made his second bow while backing out when the King called after him, "Hey, Salina, listen. They tell me you've some old friends in Palermo. That nephew of yours, Falconeri

. . . Why don't you knock some sense into him?"

"But, Your Majesty, Tancredi thinks of nothing but women and cards."

The King lost patience: "Take care, Salina, take care. You're responsible, remember, you're his guardian. Tell him to look after that neck of his. You may withdraw."

Repassing now through the sumptuously second-rate rooms on his way to sign the Queen's book, he felt suddenly discouraged. That plebeian cordiality had depressed him as much as the police sneers. Lucky those who could interpret such familiarity as friendship, such threats as royal might. He could not. And as he exchanged gossip with the impeccable chamberlain, he was asking himself what was destined to succeed this monarchy which bore the marks of death upon its face. The Piedmontese, the socalled
Galantuomo
* (*Victor Emmanuel 11, of Piedmont, northern Italian province with Turin as its capital. In 1861 he became the first King of the United Kingdom of Italy.) who was getting himself so talked of from that little out-of-the-way capital of his?

Wouldn't things be just the same? just Torinese instead of Neapolitan dialect, that's all. He had reached the book. He signed: Fabrizio Corbera, Prince of Salina.

Or maybe the Republic of Don Peppino Mazzini? "No, thanks. I'd just be plain Signor Corbera." And the long jog back to Naples did not calm him. Nor even the thought of an appointment with Cora Danolo. This being the case, then, what should he do? just cling to the status quo and avoid leaps in the dark? That would mean more shooting, like that which had resounded a short time before through a squalid square in Palermo; and what use was shooting anyway? "One never achieves anything by going bang! bang! Does one, Bendico? "

"Ding! Ding! Ding! " rang the bell for dinner. Bendico' rushed ahead with mouth watering in anticipation. "Just like a Piedmontese! " thought Salina as he moved back up the steps.

Dinner at Villa Salina was served with the slightly shabby grandeur then customary in the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies. The number of those taking part (fourteen in all, with the master and mistress of the house, children, governesses, and tutors) was itself enough to give the dining table an imposing air. Covered with a fine but mended lace cloth, it glittered beneath a powerful oil lamp hung precariously under the Murano chandelier. Daylight was still streaming through the windows, but the white figures in painted bas-relief against the dark backgrounds of the door mantels were already lost in shadow. The silver was massive and the glass splendid, bearing on smooth medallions amid cut Bohemian ware the initials F. D.
(Ferdinandus dedit)
in memory of royal munificence; but the plates, each signed by an illustrious artist, were mere survivors of many a scullion's massacre and originated from different services. The biggest, from Capodimonte, with a wide almond-green border, engraved with little gilt anchors, were reserved for the Prince, who liked everything around him, except his wife, to be on his own scale. When he entered the dining room the whole party was already assembled, only the Princess sitting, the rest standing behind their chairs. Opposite his own chair, flanked by a pile of plates, swelled the silver flanks of the enormous soup tureen with its cover surmounted by a prancing Leopard. The Prince ladled out the minestra himself, a pleasant chore, symbol of his proud duties as paterfamilias. That evening, though, there came a sound that had not been heard for some time, a threatening tinkle of the ladle against a side of the tureen: a sign of great though still controlled anger, one of the most terrifying sounds in the world, as one of his sons used to call it even forty years later. The Prince had noticed that the sixteen-year-old Francesco Paolo was not in his place. The lad entered at once ("Excuse me, Papa") and sat down. He was not reproved, but Father Pirrone, whose duties were more or less those of sheep dog, bent his head and muttered a prayer. The bomb did not explode, but the gust from its passage had swept the table and ruined the dinner all the same. As they ate in silence the Prince's blue eyes, narrowed behind half-closed lids, stared at his children one by one and numbed them with fear.

But, "A fine family," he was thinking. The girls plump, glowing, with gay little dimples, and between forehead and nose that frown which was the hereditary mark of the Salinas; the males slim but wiry, wearing an expression of fashionable melancholy as they wielded knives and forks with subdued violence. One of these had been away for two years: Giovanni, the second son, the most loved, the most difficult. One fine day he had vanished from home and there had been no news of him for two months. Then a cold but respectful letter arrived from London with apologies for any anxiety he had caused, reassurances about his health, and the strange statement that he preferred a modest life as clerk in a coal depot to a pampered (read: "fettered") existence in the ease of Palermo. Often a twinge of anxiety for the errant youth in that foggy and heretical city would prick the Prince's heart and torture him. His face grew darker than ever.