A Dancer in Darkness (12 page)

She came to him from time to time after that, but always without warning, and always very late. He scarcely knew how he felt about it, but it was an immense physical relief for them both, and if we cannot rest, it is at least something if our bodies can.

For the rest, he could find out nothing. Had it not been for the strange uneasiness he sensed not only in Cariola, but also when watching the Duchess, he would have despaired of there being anything to find out. And after a while his suspicions passed from Antonio elsewhere. There was nothing between them, he was sure. The mischief, if it did exist, must exist with someone else. He was reduced to sending the Cardinal minute descriptions of petty court intrigue, the opinions of the Amalfitani, and the condition of the State. It made him tremble for his position.

But days and weeks, and then months, went by, and nothing happened. It became autumn. Frost ran up the orange trees and touched the oranges. The sea grew angry and the court wore warmer clothes. The mountains looked colder.

All summer Cariola had watched the Duchess try one
diversion
after another. She had seen her grave, gay, wise,
coquettish
, full of laughter, and a little sad, taking an interest in the proposed convent, talking with prelates at dinner, or riding alone in the mountains, with a hawk on her wrist. Yet no matter what the Duchess did, Cariola was not deceived. She still caught her mistress watching Antonio from time to time.
Outwardly
Antonio’s deportment left nothing to be desired, but something had gone out of him. He did not dance any more, and the court had grown sedate. His calves were going down. His legs were now wanly slim.

Winter was early that year. The first snow fell early in October, powdering the ground only lightly, as though with sugar. The year was almost gone.

Cariola hurried into her Mistress’s bedchamber, bringing heavy furs from the storage
cassone,
to find her mistress
kneeling
and in floods of tears. She dropped the furs to the floor and put her arms around the Duchess, kneeling beside her. She hated to see grief.

For the Duchess it was not precisely grief. It was strain. She had controlled herself too long, so at last she had given way. It was the first winter snow that had proved too much. She could not bear that this year in which she had met him should go away without her seeing him again.

And in her own mind she had settled something. She had watched Antonio covertly for months. She had blamed him with every base motive she could invent, and every infirmity of character she could think of. She had believed him cold. But sorrowing self-control had made her see at last that passion could have a passive as well as an active form. She was
convinced
now that he was suffering because of her, and tried to compensate herself for the gulf between them with that. But now it seemed that nothing could compensate her for that gulf. She clung to Cariola, and cried in her lap.

“I want him,” she sobbed. “I must see him.”

Cariola stiffened. “You should not say such things to me,” she warned.

“Why not? I must speak to someone or go mad.”

Cariola thought how skilfully Bosola talked with her at night, and felt a sudden pity. But also she was curious.

The Duchess had had no one to speak to for six months. Now she had to say everything. Fear of her brother and utter terror of her own loneliness had paralysed her for too long. Besides, she was wary. She did not want to be taken advantage of. She saw all the faults in Antonio. She even saw faults of her own invention. And yet he had no faults. Nor was she any longer afraid of Ferdinand, even when inwardly she was afraid of him. After all, she was the independent ruler of a state. Why should she not do as she pleased? And no one need ever know. No one need know anything. It was not right that Antonio should suffer so, or she either. She did not even think of the Cardinal.

“Madam could send him away.”

“I have sent him everywhere. If he wanted to go, he would go. Why then should he choose to stay?”

Cariola had no answer. But she did not want to listen any more. She saw a danger in hearing too much.

“You must be more circumspect,” she said. It was all she could say.

In the small, stubborn lines of her mistress’s wilful mouth, Cariola saw that the Duchess had decided on something that might be fatal to both of them. For an instant she thought of those maids whom Cleopatra had compelled to enter the pyramid with her, and then quelled the thought. It was
disloyal
. Whatever happened, she would tell Bosola nothing.

“We are going away tomorrow, to Ravello,” said the Duchess. “You will bring Antonio here tonight.”

“Oh no,” said Cariola. But she saw that the Duchess’s face had the rapt expression of someone who is afraid no longer, the expression of someone afraid of life, who has at last found something worth living for. Protest was useless.

She went in the evening to fetch Antonio.

When she came back, the Duchess was at the windows, gazing down at the patterns of the snow against the barren courtyard and its rocks. She was a little drunk with what she had decided to do. She felt exhilarated and giddy with joy. It never even entered her mind that he might not wish to comply with her requests. She grew arch.

Looking at her, Antonio saw something of what was going on inside her, and breathed deeply. It was perhaps better so. Self-restraint can cripple us, and no man would be a cripple if he had the choice. It was better to go on.

Cold air swept in from the window. It stimulated the Duchess and excited her. She dismissed Cariola. Then they were alone.

The Duchess had suddenly turned into comedy. She decided, even while her eye caught the slim shadow of his legs, to tease him.

She began to talk of rents and her estates. He clearly looked bewildered. For it was not easy for them. They had been separated for so long they did not know how first to touch each other again. He doubted the rippling undercurrent in her voice, and thought she was making fun of him. His chagrin showed so clearly in his face that with a glance towards the door, which Cariola had shut, she came over to him, walked past him, and
looked out the window again. The courtyard was deserted. She was aware of his standing behind her, and of his bewilderment. He shifted uneasily.

Then abruptly she turned, and he was looking at her with wide, sad eyes, slightly veiled, as though ready to be hurt. She smiled at him and stretched out her arms. Since he could not first approach her, it gave her pleasure to approach him. “Oh come,” she said. “Oh come!”

He hesitated.

She smiled more fully, extending her hands palms up, and wriggling her fingers, and then he was in front of her, kissing her hands. She could not raise him up. That would not have made them equals, as they should be. Instead, she sank down to the ground and they knelt on the floor, facing each other, with their arms about each other, while the cold air from the window blew around them.

For a long time, embracing, they did not say anything at all. She could feel his body tremble, and his face lit up with a curious, impish, boyish joy. They sat there, and each began to laugh, and then was solemn again, and a little abashed.

There were, after all, no explanations, and no words. It was natural between them, as though they had been together for a long, long while.

She lay extended, with her head in his lap. “Why could we not marry, as other people do?” she said. “In some countries, contract in a room, before a witness, is legal marriage. Why could we not marry like that?”

He stirred uneasily. Suddenly he looked frightened, like some saint surprised by the stigmata. She did not like that look. She did not care for that glimpse of reality. She pouted.

“Suppose we were ordinary people. Why should we not be equals and so marry? No one need ever know.”

“Your brothers would not allow it. You are Duchess of Amalfi. You have an heir and lands.”

The image of Ferdinand’s contorted face flared up in her mind.

“Privately,” she urged. “Privately, to satisfy ourselves, not the world. I do not want to be married to that hideous, rotten old man they married me to. I want to be married to you.”

He sat still for a long time. A little of her would always be wary. She had to know what he was thinking. She grew aware of Cariola in the next room, perhaps listening.

“There is a little town called Arosa,” he said at last. “Do you know it?”

She shook her head.

“It is back in the mountains, a few hours from Ravello. No one ever goes there. It is only a collection of huts, and a ruined house or two. We could go there.”

She misunderstood him. She did not care that they should hide out squalidly. “I am going to Ravello in the morning, with Cariola. I thought if I pretended to send you to Salerno, you could join me there.” She must meet him on her own ground, not his.

But that was not what he had meant. “There is a church there. The living is in the gift of the Piccolomini. Thirty years ago your husband gave it to the priest who is still there. He is dying. He would marry us, and no one would ever know. We could meet there, if you like.”

She was touched. She went to a chest in the corner. From it she withdrew a box, and from the box, a ring, massive, a baroque pearl set with enamel and small yellow diamonds. He watched her anxiously. She smiled at him.

“You shall give me this there,” she said. “We shall be married with this.” She handed him the ring slowly, looking into his eyes for the finer person she knew was there. She fumbled in the box again. “And I shall give you this. And——” She drew out a chain, and looked uncertainly around the room. If they were truly to be married, then they must not begin illicitly. He must go back to his own rooms, until tomorrow.

But this time he did not rush down the stair. He went reluctantly, as reluctant as she was to have him go.

Next day, in his report to the Cardinal, Bosola wrote that the Duchess and Cariola had gone to Ravello, finding Amalfi too cold; that the Duchess had graciously shown interest in the Cardinal’s proposal for a convent foundation, and had asked who Sor Juana was; that the revenues from the fish catch had fallen off; that the Count Carriocciolo had abandoned his suit to the Duchess, but was having an affair with a tavern girl; and
that Mestre Antonio had departed on a mission to Salerno, in which there was nothing unusual, since the Duchess sent him there from time to time, on business connected with her house.

Altogether the fates gave them three weeks of happiness. Since it was the only happiness they were to know, that was both kind and merciful. Not that the fates are either, but the fates are very busy. They cannot watch us all the time, and if we watch eagerly for the moment, when their attention is diverted, then it is possible to snatch a little joy.

The Duchess had not dared to take Cariola with her to their meeting. She rode along a faded track at the bottom of a steep gully, alone. Her thoughts were serious, and yet her face was merry. The weather was cold and dusty. Occasionally she passed a patch of pock-marked snow, and once she saw a ptarmigan.

She came out above Arosa at high noon. It was nestled in the groin of the valley, as though it had tumbled down the hills from all directions, and then come to rest in the stream-bed. It was dominated by a single tree, and by a little chapel. On the opposite hill a figure picked its way on horseback towards the same goal. She saw with excitement that it must be Antonio. It seemed to her symbolic that they should converge upon this ultimate meeting place simultaneously. It also seemed to her a good omen. She urged her horse on.

No woman tells a man how she feels about her actual
marriage
, for it has a symbolic meaning for her that it does not have for him. And then it only happens to a part of her. The rest of her is merely watching it. And so it will be with
everything
she does with him, even though she might want the matter otherwise.

When her brothers married her to the Piccolomini, that was no marriage, but only a deed of sale. This was her marriage, and she watched it bright-eyed and eager, determined to find it romantic. Well, it was.

The priest was truly ill, and a little dazed at the prospect of having something to do. If he knew who the Duchess was, he
said nothing. A small boy was busy in the interior with a broom. The priest refused to let them enter the church
immediately
, but went in alone, and then sent the boy out to them.

He had wanted to furbish up the church. The damp gloom was smelly with newly-lit candles, there was incense in the air, and from somewhere he had dug out his best altar cloth. It had been so long since the church had been used by anyone but himself. He stood at the altar, vague, and nodding his head happily, with the child to assist him to say a Mass. He was clearly enchanted by the candles and by the air of consequence. In a town as poor and remote as this, a donation of candles seemed a miracle. It occurred to the Duchess to send the
altar-piece
here. It seemed to belong here. And if we cannot please God, we can at least make easier the last moments of his ministers. She determined that that was what she would do. Antonio could bring it privately.

So they were married. It filled her with tenderness. She looked at Antonio kneeling beside her, and it seemed to her no accident that the only light entering the chapel fell full upon his face. The baroque pearl was already on her finger. The priest moved erratically through his Mass. The wall behind the altar was bare. The altar-piece would fit it almost exactly. She wished the priest well.

She wished the whole world well.

When it was time for them to leave, the priest said good-bye to them reluctantly. Because her life was so full, and she was so happy, the Duchess felt sorry for him, and wanted to do him a good turn. Besides, the Mass had so clearly tired him out. She bent down from her pillion and told him about the altar-piece. His face lit up happily, and she was content. All she had wanted was to see someone smile. She rode on.