The Silent Duchess (29 page)

devil, some who make it with the wounded body of our Lord Jesus, some who make it with themselves, some who make it with little boys--but without abusing them, without seizing them or tearing them or violating them in any way ... pleasure is an art that knows its own limits ... the greatest pleasure lies in respecting these limits and making out of them a framework for one's own harmony. Excesses are not a part of how he is ... excesses would cast him straight into a cauldron of strains and swindles, scandals and lies, and he loves books too much to believe in the searing temptations of the flesh. The eye knows how to caress better than the hand, and his eyes have had their fill, but with such gentleness, such unspoken tenderness. ...

That's enough, says Marianna to herself, now I must write to him to stop showing me his thoughts. But her hand stays resting quietly on her lap, her eyes half-shut in the shadow of the pomegranate leaves that send out a delicate bitter perfume.

"I have a girl for you, she is called Peppinedda. She is a good girl, she is sixteen and she is very poor but so long as you encourage her ..."

Marianna nods. It seems pointless to begin another sheet of paper. Her mind is exhausted by the thoughts that have travelled up and down her head like a gang of mice having a party. Now she only wants to rest. She already knows all about Peppina and it does not worry her that her brother has chosen her for his own eccentric reasons; one reason is as good as another. If she had asked her daughters they would have been all at sixes and sevens, and no help at all. Carlo, with his epicurean philosophy, his intelligent piggy eyes, is capable of resolving other people's difficulties delicately, combining their interests with what lies close to his heart. His motive is not to do good, and that is the very reason why he sometimes does it. His truffle-hound nose can find the treasure and flush it out for her as he has done now, with generosity. It only remains for her to thank him and leave. But something holds her back, a question that prods her hand; she takes up the pen, nibbles the point and then writes as quickly as usual: "Carlo, do you remember whether I have ever talked?"

"No, Marianna." No hesitation. A "no" that closes the discussion. An exclamation

mark, a flourish.

"Yet I can remember hearing sounds that I've since lost."

"I know nothing of it, sister." And with that the conversation is ended. He prepares to get up and say goodbye, but his sister shows no sign of moving. Her fingers still twist round the pen, becoming stained with ink. "Is there anything else?" he writes, bending over his sister's notebook.

"Our lady mother once told me that I had not always been deaf and dumb."

Now what's got into her head? Isn't it enough for her to come and disturb him about one of her household, someone she is perhaps in love with ... of course, why did he not think of that before ... are they not both of the same flesh? Lecherous and indulgent towards their own desires, ready to snatch, to withhold, to pay, because everything is allowed them by right of birth. ... Lord forgive me! ... Perhaps it is only an evil thought ... the Ucr@ias have been good hunters, insatiable profiteers ... even if they then stopped half-way, because they did not have the stamina for excesses like the Scebarr@as. ... Look at her ladyship his sister, with that milky pallor, that soft mouth ... something tells him that everything is yet to be revealed in her ... a fine game, sister, at your age ... madness! And no one has taught her the rudiments of love ... it's easy to see she will lose all her feathers ... he could teach her something but they are not experiences that can be exchanged between brothers and sisters. ... What a leveret she was when she was little ... both happy and fearful ... but it's true, she talked when she was four years old, maybe five ... he remembers that very well and he recollects all the whisperings in the family, the closing up of terrified lips ... but why? What was the awful thing that took place in the labyrinths of the Via Alloro? One evening they heard screams to make the flesh creep and Marianna with her legs all bloodstained being dragged away between their father and Raffaele Cuffa. Strange the absence of the women ... the fact is that, yes, now he remembers, Uncle

Pietro, that damned old billy-goat, had assaulted her and left her half-dead ... yes, Uncle Pietro, now it comes back to him, how could he have forgotten? "Out of love," Uncle Pietro had said, "out of a most sacred love." He just adored that little girl and "if

only he hadn't gone crazy. ..."

How could he have lost the memory of that tragedy? And then, afterwards, yes afterwards, when Marianna was healed it was realised that she could no longer speak as if zap, he had cut out her tongue. ... Our father the Duke, with his superstitious ideas, his obsessive love for his daughter ... seeking to make her better, made her worse ... a little girl at an execution, how could a half-witted action like that have come into his head? Then when she was thirteen to give her to the same uncle who had violated her when she was five. ... What a fool their father Duke Signoretto was ... seeing that the wrong done was his brother-in-law's, he thought he might just as well give her to him in marriage. ... Her little head has erased everything ... no one knows ... perhaps it's better like that, let's leave her in ignorance, poor dumb thing ... she would be better taking a glass of laudanum and putting herself to sleep ... he has no patience with deaf people nor with those who tie themselves in knots with their own hands, nor with those who give themselves to God with so much gullibility. ... But it will not be him who awakens her crippled memory ... after all, it is a family secret ... a secret that not even our mother knew ... an affair between men, a crime perhaps but by now expiated, buried ... what is served by getting in a rage about it?

The Abbot Carlo, still pursuing his secret thoughts, has forgotten his sister, who by now has left and has almost reached the garden gate. From behind it looks as if she is weeping. But why should she be weeping? Has he perhaps written something? Suppose she had heard his thoughts, the little darling? Who knows if behind that deafness there might not be some more subtle hearing, a diabolical ear capable of unveiling the secrets of the mind? Quick, I'll catch her up, he says to himself. I'll take her by the shoulders, I'll clasp her to my breast, I'll kiss her cheek ... I'll do it, even if the heavens should fall.

"Marianna," he shouts, on the point of following her.

But she cannot hear him. And while he is getting out of the chair into which he has sunk she has already opened the gate, jumped into the hired litter and started to descend the slope that leads down to Palermo.

XXXV

"Oh Lord, I long for what I cannot will. ..." The books emit a good smell of tanned leather, pressed paper, dried ink. This little book of poetry is as heavy in her hand as a small block of crystal. The words of Michelangelo compose themselves in her mind with the precision, the purity of a drawing in Chinese ink. A perfect little geometry of words:

Sweet is my sleep, but sweeter to be stone; So long as pain and ill-repute endure Neither to see nor feel is my cure.

Then do not wake me; speak in an undertone.

Marianna looks up at the window. Darkness has already fallen and it is scarcely half-past four. It is cold in the library in spite of the coal burning in the brazier. She lifts her hand to pull the bell-rope but at that very moment she sees the door slide open by itself, preceded by a halo of light. In the doorway a candlestick appears followed by Fila holding the candlestick in her hands. Her face is almost entirely obscured by a bonnet of coarse cloth that covers up her ears, comes down all askew over her cheeks and fastens beneath her chin with a little cord that inhibits her breathing. She is white as a sheet and her eyes are red as if she has been crying.

Marianna signals her to come close, but Fila pretends not to understand, makes a quick curtsy, puts the candlestick on the table and goes towards the door. Marianna gets up out of the chair into which she has sunk, and goes after her, takes her by the arm and feels it tremble. Her skin is ice-cold, covered with a veil of sweat. "What's the matter?" she asks with her eyes. She feels her forehead, and sniffs her. From beneath her bonnet emerges an acid smell, greasy and nauseating. Then she notices a black liquid running down from her ears to her neck. What is it? Marianna shakes her and questions her with gestures, but the girl bends her head obstinately and does not reply.

Marianna pulls the bell to summon Innocenza and meanwhile continues to sniff at the girl. Innocenza cannot write but when she wants she knows how to make herself understood better than Fila. As soon as the cook comes into the room

Marianna shows her Fila's head, the cloth bonnet spotted with dark stains, the black liquid that runs stinking and glistening down her neck. Innocenza bursts out laughing and slowly forms the syllables of the word "ringworm" so that the Duchess can read it on her lips.

Marianna remembers having read in a pamphlet by the skin specialists of the School of Salerno that ringworm is sometimes cured amongst the common people by a folk remedy that uses burning pitch. But it is a dangerous and drastic method of cure; it involves burning the scalp and stripping it bare. If the unfortunate victim manages to hold out they will be cured, if they do not die ravaged by the burns. Marianna pulls the bonnet from Fila's head, but she sees that the damage has already been done. Her poor head, completely without hair, is torn open by large patches of burnt and bleeding skin.

Apparently this all took place at the home of some relations at Ficarazzi when she last visited them. She had stayed for ten days in one of those dark caves surrounded by donkeys, fowls and black beetles; and now, without saying a word to her, she is trying to get rid of the parasites by burning her head to death.

Fila had started to behave strangely after Saro's marriage to Peppinedda. She had taken to sleepwalking, wandering about in the middle of the night in her night-gown. One morning she was discovered half-drowned, having fainted and fallen into the lily pond. And now this business of the ringworm. A month ago she had asked permission to go and visit distant cousins at Ficarazzi. An enormous man with goatskin leggings had come to fetch her in a cart painted with the most beautiful pictures of paladins, trees and horses.

Fila got in between a dog and a sack of grain. She went off swinging her legs and looking happy. Marianna remembers waving to her from the window, following with her eyes the minute figure on the cart with its gaudy colours, going off towards Bagheria.

For Saro's wedding Marianna had given a big party with wine from her cellars and many different kinds of fish: from mackerel and amberjack roasted over the embers to small boiled squid, from stuffed sardines to baked sole. Peppina had eaten so much that she felt quite ill. Saro seemed satisfied: the wife the Duchess had chosen for

him was to his liking--small as a child, olive-skinned, her arms covered with hair, a fresh mouth with strong white teeth, large dark eyes melting like two coffee ices.

She has soon shown herself to be an intelligent and strong-willed girl, even though she is as wild as a goat. Used to suffering hunger and to working like a slave at home, mending other people's nets beneath the sun, making do with a piece of bread spread with garlic, she demonstrates her contentment by eating anything and everything, running everywhere and singing at the top of her voice. She laughs a lot and is as stubborn as a mule, but she obeys her husband because she knows it is her duty. However, she has a way of obeying him that has nothing servile about it: as if each time it is she who has made the decision about what has to be done, according to her own wishes, like a powerful queen. Saro treats her like a pet animal that belongs to him. Sometimes he plays with her on the carpet in the yellow room, throwing her to the ground, tickling her, laughing until they cry. At other times he forgets about her for days on end.

If uncle husband were alive he would chase both of them out, Marianna tells herself, but instead she tolerates them, even taking pleasure in watching them as they play. Since Saro has been married she feels much calmer. She does not walk on tiptoe any more to avoid the snares set for her throughout the day. She is no longer in terror of being left alone with him, she does not wait to see him pass beneath her window in the morning, with his freshly laundered shirt open at his delicate throat, a lock of hair sliding over his temple. She has given Peppinedda the task of helping Innocenza in the kitchen and the girl has shown herself to be very good at gutting fish, at scraping off the scales without splattering them around, and at preparing a sauce of garlic and oil, marjoram and rosemary for grilling them.

Like Fila, Peppinedda refused to wear shoes at first. Although she has been given two pairs, one of leather and one of embroidered silk, she has always gone around barefoot, leaving small damp footprints on the polished floors of the rooms. Now she is five months pregnant, she has stopped playing with Sarino and carries her belly around like a trophy. She ties her black hair lightly behind her neck with a

brilliant red bow. She walks with her legs apart as if she might ladle the child out then and there in the middle of the kitchen or the yellow room, but she has not lost any of her skills. She wields the kitchen knife like a hefty soldier, she talks little or not at all, and having at first stuffed herself with food, she now pecks at it like a young sparrow.

On the other hand, she steals. Not money or precious objects, but sugar and biscuits and coffee and lard. She hides the food under the roof and then, as soon as she can, makes her way to Palermo and gives everything to her sisters. Another of her obsessions is buttons. At the beginning she only used to take ones that had fallen off. But then she started to pull them off by twisting them in her fingers with a dreamy look. Recently she has got into the habit of cutting them with her teeth and if someone surprises her doing this she keeps the buttons in her mouth until she can put them in a safe place in her room, where she piles them up in an old box.