Beautiful Antonio (13 page)

The girls on the balconies across the way were all of a flutter. The one who succeeded most thoroughly in not seeing the bride, the crowd, the steps and façade of the church with the sun hanging plumb above it, the one who best managed to conjure up a picture of herself and Antonio framed in that intimacy and us-two-togetherness which perfectly matched his expression at that moment, more in a flutter even than the others, shrank back against the wall as if afraid of toppling over the rail.

At long last the vehicles stationed in the side-streets of Via Etnea drew up at the foot of the church steps, and the newly-weds, relatives and guests disappeared within, to become visible a moment later through the car windows. The procession got under way, and having proceeded a few yards, stopped: for it had already arrived at the Puglisi residence in Piazza Stesicoro. A number of girls took the short stretch of Via Etnea between church and residence at a run, and succeeded in catching a second glimpse of Antonio and bride in the act of climbing back out of the car hampered by an enormous bunch of carnations.

It was just then that the Marchese San Lorenzo, halted in the middle of the piazza, fist on hip, straight-backed, wasp-waisted
as a riding master, had a notion to denounce all those relatives of his whom he found to be wearing morning coats despite the Secretary-General's orders to the contrary. And it was at just that moment that one of the girls exclaimed, “I'm sure we'll never again see Antonio promenading in Via Etnea until two in the afternoon. It's really true – our youth is over!”

Nor was the girl mistaken. After the wedding Antonio and Barbara lived a retired life; and seldom indeed were they seen in the streets of Catania. The whole town knew they spent their days either at the house on La Piana or in the one at Paternò, immersed up to the eyebrows in happiness. Principe Di Bronte, who lived in an old, dilapidated country house two kilometres from the Magnano farm, declared that he had been investigating the curtains of the newly–weds with his powerful spy–glass, and caught them in each other's arms every time. This information led to a lot of daydreaming, and when the March wind rattled the shutters, not a few women's thoughts flew to the lovely rustle of the corn on La Piana, and the pleasure of watching through the window the swaying ears of wheat while in the arms of such a man as Antonio.

In this way passed two years, during which, at the end of every month, Edoardo Lentini sent his friend some books. Freud, Einstein, Croce, Bergson, Mann, Ortega, Gide: they all took the road to La Piana or to Paternò, though it was never known whether Antonio read them.

“What are you sending him? Books?” exclaimed Signor Alfio one day, when he met Edoardo in Via Etnea. “I rather fancy that chap spends day and night with his pestle in the mortar!”

“And children? Any in the offing?” enquired Edoardo.

“Not a one,” snorted the old man.

“It's a bit of an enigma,” pondered Edoardo, “but when one overdoes it, children are not forthcoming. It has occurred to me that only methodical husbands, the ones who lose a night's sleep once a week, succeed in producing children one after the other.”

“Come to think of it I only had Antonio after four years of marriage. I waited for him like the Messiah, that ugly little imp!”

“Come off it, I really can't believe he was ugly!”

“Hairy as a monkey!… Though I have to admit, he turned out all right in the end.”

“Too darned much so, if you ask me!”

The old fellow put his chin in the air, as was his wont when he wished to conceal his gratification, grasped his stick in both hands behind his back, and went off without further ado. Of a sudden he turned, shaking his stick in Edoardo's direction.

“You there!” he shouted at the top of his voice. “Are you never going to get yourself made our mayor?”

Edoardo blushed to the roots of his hair and hurried home thoroughly put out.

“That old nitwit will throw a spanner in the works,” he stumped about the house muttering to himself. “If a statement like that comes to Calderara's ears, which isn't at all unlikely with all the spies hanging around in Via Etnea, not even Christ himself returned to earth could get me the job of mayor!”

But he was not destined to suffer any such disappointment. A week later Calderara was appointed Deputy Secretary–General of the Party and moved to Rome, relinquishing his place in Catania to one Pietro Capàno, a coarse-grained twenty-five-year-old with eyes like marbles that bulged from a close–cropped head. One who dreamt of nothing else but striding – as a feared and respected figure – into the classroom at the
liceo
where his father, his uncle and his brother had all studied before him, and where over and over again he had heard, “Ah, so you're
all
cretins in your family are you!”

No sooner in Rome than Calderara went to pay his respects to Count K. who, to show how well up he was in Catanian affairs, mentioned Edoardo Lentini, a name fresh in his memory because he had rediscovered it in Antonio's letter of 1935, which his son had been using to conceal a diamond he had stolen from his mother. Calderara got the impression that
Count K really was a friend of Lentini's, and before taking leave he casually suggested that the latter should be appointed mayor of Catania. The count raised no objection, and five days later Edoardo, returning home, found two workmen up on the balcony with hammers and wire in their hands.

“The Town Hall is installing a telephone for us at its own expense,” explained his wife.

Edoardo dared not believe his ears, and in a fit of feverish shivers wrapped himself in a shawl to await the completion of the installation.

No sooner had the workmen said “Well, that's that job done!” than the instrument started to shrill and a hundred voices came in a steady stream over the line, from humble office and noble mansion, showering congratulations on the be-shawled young man for his appointment as mayor of Catania.

It was the 2nd of January, 1938.

Three months later Antonio and Barbara returned to Catania and set up house in a wing of Palazzo Puglisi. That same evening Edoardo invited the couple to the mayoral box to see a performance of
Norma
. Not a pair of opera glasses but was trained in their direction.

During the intervals, in the corridors, Antonio was greeted by his friends. “How do you do it?” they demanded of him. “You get younger and younger and slimmer and slimmer, while we were no sooner married than we got pot–bellies like bran–sacks!”

“It means that for
him,
” said Luigi d'Agata slyly, “marriage is no rest-cure!”

“Poor cousin Barbara,” murmured Edoardo Lentini between his teeth. “She never sees the light of day, with that immovable object always on top of her.”

The following day invitations to lunch poured in, as did also the relatives.

Signor Alfio, walking along Via Etnea between his son and daughter-in-law, would stop every few steps before the café
windows, ostensibly to study the sugar lambs transfixed by their little red flags, but actually to observe the reflections of Antonio, himself, and Barbara all lined up as if for a family portrait.

“They're in love,” he would say of an evening to the relatives who had come to call. “They're in love, and that's all there is to it!”

“It doesn't take much to fall in love with Antonio,” commented one black–clad aunt.

“Well it doesn't, but it does,” retorted Magnano senior, fishing for further compliments. “You have to rub my son up the right way, or else he scratches like a cat.”

“Now listen to me,” said his wife one evening, after their visitors had left. “All this upheaval in the house makes my cheeks burn as if I had the fever on me. We'll be the target of all tongues if we go on in this way about our Antonio. A little bird tells me that people are laughing at us behind our backs.”

“Are you dreaming?” burst out Signor Alfio. “The man who can make a fool of me has yet to be born! In any case, all these people swarming about the house, scratching the floors with their hobnailed boots like the clodhoppers they are, I tell you I don't like it either!”

For some time thereafter the two old people received nobody. But around the beginning of May they were obliged to offer a cup of coffee to Cousin Giuseppina, a person in her fifties and practically deaf, who talked for a couple of hours without pausing to draw breath, the feathers of her headgear nodding like a trotting horse's, and who as she was finally taking leave enquired of Signor Alfio: “Is it true that Barbara Puglisi is marrying the Duca Di Bronte?”

“
Now
what are you cooking up?” yelled Signor Alfio, his nose not an inch from her hair. “Barbara Puglisi is my daughter-in-law!…”

The elderly cousin's answer was to rock her head from side to side, wooden–faced, mouth sagging, saying nothing.

“Antonio's wife!… My son's wife!” he added, bawling louder than ever.

“Exactly,” was the reply.

“What d'you mean,
exactly
? Did you grasp what I said?”

“I perfectly grasped what you said, and my answer was: ‘Exactly'.”

“So it
is
true that you've lost your wits?”

“Believe me, Cousin Alfio, I'm the only one in the family with a decent head on their shoulders.

“Sara,” said old Magnano to his wife in an undertone, struggling to overcome his wrath, “kindly see her out, because if I escort her to the door, I swear to God I'll throw her down the stairs like the dirty-minded old bag she is! And tell her to get to work on herself with a curry-comb before visiting human beings again!”

Signora Rosaria saw their relative to the door, gave her a perfunctory kiss and went back to her husband.

“Well, what d'you think of this, ladies and gentlemen?” the old fellow was grumbling on. “I explain how things stand, and tell her that Barbara can't go off and marry anyone at all, because she's already married, because she's my daughter-in-law, because she's Antonio's wife, and what does she say? ‘Exactly', she says. And she then goes on to make
me
out the old dotard!”

“But Alfio,” said the wife, “you really
are
going a bit soft in the head.”

“And why, pray, am I going a bit soft in the head?”

“What on earth were you thinking of, sitting there arguing with a half-wit who'd just told you something with neither rhyme nor reason?”

“Maybe she meant to insult me.”

“What sort of an insult is it, to say something that makes not a scrap of sense this way or that.”

“I don't know, but she may have meant to insult me.”

“Keep your hair on, Alfio. Let's swallow the bitter pill and get to bed.”

The pair of them sat opposite each other in the dining-room, and chewed their boiled greens in silence.

“D'you know what she was implying?” burst out Signor Alfio when he had lit his pipe. “That… when it comes to… well, er… that kind of thing… Barbara and Antonio don't get on.”

“Well, just look what you're fabricating now! Those two are inseparable all day long… They can't bear to leave each other's side. Why on earth shouldn't they get on?”

“How do I know? But here in Catania nobody keeps their trap shut – their tongues are itching to wag. D'you know what they're saying? That your son is overtaxing his wife!”

“What do you mean, overtaxing her?”

“God in heaven, do I have to spell everything out? Your son is randier than a ram, and if he has a woman to hand he never gives her a moment's peace.”

“Antonio is a husband like any other husband!”

“You know very well that's not true. Antonio has a face like an icing-sugar angel, but when it really comes down to it he's a randy ram! In Rome he had three or four mistresses at the same time, and if now he's putting all his eggs in the one basket, may the Lord have mercy on his wife!… She has a right to be fed up… In any case, tomorrow I want to have a word with Notary Puglisi.”

“Very good, tomorrow have a word with whoever you please, but now let's get to bed. You never think straight when you're sleepy. And don't waste time peering under the beds! Thieves don't pay visits on paupers like us… They know well enough where the money is.”

“Y
OU SEE, YOU SEE
!… I was right!… It's just as I said!…” yelled Signor Alfio, resting the receiver on the desk he was sitting at and twisting his head, snail-like, towards the passage. “Come and listen to this! Sara! Rosaria!…. Hullo? Hullo? – He's rung off!”

Signora Rosaria appeared in the study doorway, red-faced and panting with the effort of having removed from the wall a large picture of Sant' Agata, which she still had in her hands.

“Can't you ever stop carrying saints around? Leave 'em in peace! Even they have… ahem!… their little troubles… So did you hear that? I was right! Puglisi rang me up this very moment, in a voice like a mother superior's, and told me he wants a word with me, that things aren't going well, that we must meet at once!”

“Lord save us! And what did you say?”

“I told him I'd expect him here, and asked him to pick me up two cigars on his way past the tobacconist's, since my wife,” he added in a severe and meaning tone of voice, “forgot to remind me to buy them this morning.”

“What a thing to bring up at such a moment!”

“Hang on there! Am I supposed to go around in mourning because
your
son plays the turkey-cock? Has the penny dropped? He likes to scratch and I pick up his fleas… And on top of it all, that whatsit… that Mr Notary, with his prissy little voice and his long, long face… What's he expect? Does he want Antonio to carry abroad the very thing that ought to stay at home? Does he want him to keep a mistress, or father children on chambermaids? If my son has such a yen for his
daughter, Mr Notary shouldn't poke his nose in! Every man should be master of his own house. Does he think their marriage was blessed in dirty dishwater?”