A Dancer in Darkness (8 page)

Rabbits really do scream when talons sink into their flanks. And somehow the patterns they make as they shuttle back and forth in terror across a field remain in the mind when they are gone. The patterns are like cradles made of string.

And why is it that the gesture of the nape of a man’s neck, when he leans forward, is one of the most poignant and touching things in the world?

She did not know. But now when she laughed, she did it unconsciously, and did not hear herself do so, as usually she did. For she had discovered an intoxicating freedom. At first she did not believe it, and yet it was true. It was simply that
Antonio did not know. She had never known a naïve man before. For that matter she had never known a naïve woman, either. She found out suddenly that he had not one grain of self-interest. She had been taught that that was a form of folly. Now on the uplands she discovered that it could also be the source of a sense of well-being and of ease attainable in no other way. She relaxed. So long as she never met his eye, she might say and do anything she pleased. So long as she did not touch him, life could be innocent. For though he was older than she, he was still a boy. He was not yet awake.

Or so she thought, but she was quite wrong. He was boyish, but no boy. It was true he had no guile and very little wit, and that he laughed all the time, with that rapturous giggle that sits properly only upon Latin men. But he was a gentleman, and so he knew that the difference in their rank made it
impossible
for him to have her. And so he was very merry. He knew she saw nothing in him but a pleasant companion, and so it was safe for him to have at least this much, and to rejoice in having even that.

Yet sometimes, when we are holding an amiable
conversation
, suddenly that screen of words parts, and we know we are only talking against what we really want to do together. Then we become conscious of what we are saying, and hurry on, and cover the moment up, but the effort is useless. In that one little pause between words something has become evident, and we can neither take advantage of it nor even have the same ease with each other back again. That was the moment he inwardly dreaded, and he avoided it in every way he could. The trouble is that moment occurs at random and unexpectedly. We cannot prepare against it. So under the merriment he was very sad. He knew that they could not be innocent for long.

One day, coming over a rise, they came unexpectedly upon one of those saplings to which the farmers attach dead birds and voles, to frighten away the living from the fields, and
perhaps
as a warning to the curious. The bodies had mummified, and swayed in a stiff breeze, like frost-bitten pomegranates on a leafless tree. The Duchess pulled her reins and turned away. For some reason she was shocked. They came to a small stream, and dismounted while the horses drank.

Little by little, as the weeks had gone by, it had become established that the company with them should make camp under the cedars and wait for them. At first a page had been brought along for the sake of seemliness. But today he was ill. For the first time they were completely alone. It made them both uneasy, and the vole tree had upset them both, not so much because it was horrible, as because it had been
unexpected
. They had each been under greater pressure than they knew. They had said everything to each other already, without ever having uttered a word. And now, with the page absent, they found themselves where they had not meant to be. Each had guarded against making any beginning. But now, alone, they found it had already been made.

Nothing happened. The horses’ heads were at the stream, and the hair of their manes parted smoothly and silkily. Antonio looked up, and saw the Duchess staring at him. A cloud scurried across the sun, it was true, but that had little to do with it. Antonio took an involuntary step forward, the Duchess’s eyes widened, and then he pretended to be fussing with the saddle. That was all. But it frightened them both badly, and the trouble was now that each knew the other was scared. It had happened in the wrong place. They were within sight of the cedar trees. Both looked automatically that way.

But as they remounted and rode back to the camp, they talked as people do who have just had a serious quarrel, and are trying to overlook the fact, plodding through their words to the nearest exit.

It is by noticing such subtle changes that a court informer earns his keep. But there was no court informer there as yet, which was lucky for both of them. But Cariola was there, and though Cariola said nothing that night, when she helped the Duchess undress, her lips were tight.

“Madame should be more cautious.”

“What do you mean by that?”

“You know very well what I mean.”

“I don’t! I don’t! I don’t!” said the Duchess, and smashed the glass vial she was holding. She was so young.

Cariola sniffed. “You had better send him away.”

“No. I will go away myself.”

“He will still be here when you come back. Madam, send him away. You do not know who watches you here.”

Cariola was right. Nothing had happened, but she was right. But she did not send him away. It was too late for that. Instead she dismissed Cariola for the night.

The Duchess’s bedroom was lofty and square, its arcaded windows giving on a large terrace. The enormous bed stood in the centre of the room, on a dais with three steps. The Duchess lay there restlessly until she fell asleep at dawn. If she had her eyes open, she thought about him. If she closed her eyes, she could see him, and that was even worse. No one had the right to have such eyes. No one had the right to be unique. His eyes seared her night. She would not take a lover. She could not marry. Her brothers would permit no course but chastity.

The next few days she did not see Antonio. She saw her courtiers instead. It did not do. To her everyone was unique. You could find one trait here, another there, but never could you find the same person. You may love a body, and there are a thousand bodies, all charming. There is only one soul. Love that in anyone, and lose it, and you have lost yourself for good.

Antonio had not waited to be dismissed. He had gone on a tour of her establishments. She admired him for that. He had more tact than she. But what was he thinking? What was he doing? Where was he? Every day she turned to speak to him, and he was not there.

There remained her little court. She was an heiress. She was young. She passed for beautiful. She had powerful brothers. The Spanish would be back in power some day, and it was not impossible the Cardinal might one day be Pope. She did not lack for suitors. They were all diplomats.

No doubt they were worthy men. They were not Antonio. And the pages, flunkies, and attendants? She might have taken any one of them. It would have been diverting for an hour or two. One or two might have lasted a week. This one was saintly, that was reputed animal in bed, was proud of it, and showed it, and wanted only a little favour in return, a parcel of land, a farm, a percentage on the fishing tax, a suit of clothes. That one was lubricious and wanted nothing. He was perhaps the
better one. But we are not siege machines and she was not a town wall. She had no talent for the moment. What she wanted she wanted every day.

Yet every day she must be pert, well-favoured, fortunate, polite, tactful, and the ruler of the state. Every day people watched to see if she was this or that. It was their duty to amuse her, so she must pretend to be amused. Antonio was still on tour. He would be back soon. The burden was
intolerable
. She fled.

She went to Ravello. The town was very old, and was already falling into decay, but it was high on the cliffs, a thousand feet above and to the south of Amalfi. It had been built by the Normans, centuries ago. Now its noble houses were empty, and many of its churches were boarded up. The palace was at the end of the town. Its gardens stretched to the precipice. She took only Cariola and some domestics with her. The precipice fell sheer several thousand feet to the sea, and was backed by a
pineta.
One could look down and out to the small rock islets in the lonely sea, and Amalfi was hidden somewhere to the right. At the edge of the cliff there was a small gazebo, built by one of the dead Piccolomini. It was where she went when she wished to be alone, for it suited her thoughts. Here, with the gates closed, she could be safe.

She walked often by herself, over the hills, restlessly and thoughtfully, from one church to the next, from one empty house to the next, with only the peasants to speak to her.

The town was divided into two halves by a ravine. One evening at dusk she found herself on the far hill. There was an enormous church there, of unadorned brick, long boarded up. The evening was full of yellow light, as though it had been dusted with sulphur. Every time she turned a corner she expected to meet a stranger.

Instead she found herself in the piazza before the church, looking up at its twisted, eyeless façade. Attached to the church on one side was another structure. She thought she heard a horse somewhere, and, not wanting to be disturbed, tried the church door.

The interior was vast, shadowy, and naked of all ornament. The chairs were overturned, as no doubt they had been left long ago. There was no Host, and the altar had been stripped bare. The dust made patterns underneath her shoes. She picked up her robes, so they should not become soiled, and moved aimlessly down the aisle.

She came to an arch on her left, one step up from the nave. The opening was closed by a rusty iron grille. She peered
inside
. It was the ancient tombhouse of the Piccolomini, who had been little lords here, before they gained Amalfi. On an impulse she pushed against the grille, the lock gave, and the gate swung open. She hesitated and then went inside.

It was a very different affair from their baroque mausoleum at Castello del Mare. The room was long and square, with circular lights let in near the ceiling of the high roof, and a tall open arcade that looked down across the valley towards the sea. It seemed that the Piccolomini had crowded down to death in some haste, following one another pell mell, for the floor was a maze of statuary. She threaded her way to and fro, and let her skirts trail where they would.

She was young enough to find monuments of this kind full of a curious thrill, a certain charm. Here a woman life-size knelt beside a table tomb, thinking of nothing in particular, while her husband reclined on the lid, tapping with his fingers on a marble skull. There some knight rested with his feet up on an intelligent stone porcupine.

Farther along stood a marble countess in a farthingale, one hand on her breast, and with a stubborn, but gracious
expression
on her face. She stood among her children, of which there were seven, together with an eighth that lay in the cradle of her left arm. They were shown shrouded, with only their heads peeping out of their ruffs, and looked like ears of corn, stripped to show the cob.

It made her meditative. She had no children of her own. She had only the Piccolomini heir, and even he had been taken away from her. She wondered for a moment how ordinary people felt about their children. They must like them even when they were small.

She turned to leave, and thought she heard footsteps. She
hurried towards the grille and felt herself pulled backward. For a moment it startled her. The hem of her robe had caught a cherub carved low to the floor on one of the tombs.

Beyond the grille she saw the glow of a candle, and someone was definitely standing there. She gasped with exasperation and tugged once more at her skirt. But it would not come free. The grille creaked and the figure stepped forward. She looked at it wide-eyed. It was Antonio.

“What are you doing here?” she asked. She felt an
overwhelming
relief.

‘The building is in disrepair. Something might have
happened
to you.”

“Have you been here all the time?”

“I came to check the tombhouse, and the grille was open.”

“You knew I was here.”

He hesitated and then nodded reluctantly. He came no closer to her. That annoyed her. She tugged again at her dress.

“I’m caught,” she said. Her hands moved idly, as though they had a life of their own, and wanted to say something.

He came forward, set the thick candle on the top of the table-tomb, and bent to release her. He had to kneel to do so. The light flickered restlessly. She looked down and saw the small black hair curling round the nape of his neck, and
remembered
those early days when they had first gone hawking. The well-cherished gesture of that neck suddenly made visible was too much for her. She watched her hand reach down to touch him, as though it were not part of her. He shook it off, and then, kneeling as he was, put his arms around her legs, and buried his head in the thick, embroidered folds of her dress, with a little stifled moan, that seemed to run up through her. She felt her hands rest in his hair, and burst into floods of tears.

Tears bring release. They sometimes spring from joy. They are like rain. They renew everything. Tears are a promise. Tears are enjoyable.

Together they sank towards the floor. They had offered up six weeks to self-control, and now the sacrifice was over. It
made them solemn. It is curious how much more you can see of the world when you cry. When two people cry together, kneeling on a stone floor, face to face, they see even more.

He put his head on her shoulder. His fingers began to toy with her hair, and ran over the locket that hung at her throat, clutching it convulsively.

“Oh no,” she moaned.

He wrenched away from her, but still knelt there, his hands on his thighs, staring at her. “Why should I not?” he
demanded
, and his voice made him older. He was not the
harmless
boy she had imagined after all. “Why should I
not
?”

He put his head in her lap. She could feel various parts of herself waking up. Abruptly she gave in to him. What harm could it do? It need happen only once, and there was no one to see.