The Witch of Napoli (6 page)

Rossi looked at me. “He died filled with hatred for humanity – our sins, our weaknesses, our disbelief. Now he’s back.”

“But what can he do to us?” I protested. “He’s just a spirit.”

“For Christ’s sake, Tommaso!” Rossi glared at me. “Have you forgotten what you saw the other night? If a spirit can lift a table off the floor, it can also hurl a vase across the room at your head. If a spirit can touch or pinch you in a séance, it can also slap or punch you. I don’t like Alessandra calling on him. ”

“Does she call on him often?”

Rossi scowled. “Whenever no other spirits respond. I’ve warned her to stop. She’s never seen her twisted face with Savonarola’s fiendish eyes staring out of her own sockets, or heard the venom spewing out of her own mouth. She’s in a trance when he’s possessing her, and when she recovers she remembers nothing. All she knows is that she produces her most spectacular feats when she allows him to take over her body.”

He pulled his watch out of his vest pocket and shot a quick glance. “I’m late. I have a class to prepare for this afternoon and I need to get going. Can you read the final paragraph?”

I turned back to the letter. Rossi had wrapped it up nicely before finally baiting the hook with a few shekels.

Rossi held out his hand. “My apologies for taking so much of your time. Can I leave this to you to handle?”

“Sure,” I promised. “Count on me.”

He reached under the table for his bag. “Even if Lombardi comes, Alessandra may perform poorly. But I’ve spent enough of my time and money on this.” He put on his hat.

“If she fails, I’m done with her.”

L
ombardi’s answer arrived a week later.

Venzano called Rossi and Alessandra to the newspaper and his secretary, Julieta, who everyone knew was his mistress, ushered us into his elegant, private office on the fourth floor of the
Mattino
.

I idolized Venzano. He had style. He always dressed smartly, a white walrus moustache accenting his tailored dark suits and polished black shoes. He collected the
macchiaioli
long before the Paris art world discovered them, and he cultivated exotic orchids from South America. A long-stemmed, purple cattleya from Costa Rica graced his desk. I learned a lot from him.

After we were seated, he leaned across the desk and handed Rossi a telegram he had received that morning from the
Mattino
’s correspondent in Torino. Alessandra and I waited nervously as Rossi silently read it. When he finished, he turned to Alessandra.

“I’m sorry, Alessandra” he said.

I watched the color drain from her face as he read the telegram to her.

Alessandra snatched the telegram from Rossi’s hand.

“No!” she shouted. “He must come. He must!” She crumpled up the telegram and flung it to the floor.

I jumped up. “Don’t worry, Alessandra, we’ll think of something.”

Rossi bent down and retrieved the telegram, then passed it back to Venzano.

“Alessandra, it’s over. He’s not coming.”

Venzano folded up the telegram. “Professor, do you have a comment we can run with the telegram?”

“Perhaps later,” he replied, reaching for his hat. You could hear the resignation in his voice. Alessandra and I followed him out to the street where she refused to let him go.

“Professor, if we can just get him to come…” she pleaded. “Once he’s here, I can convince him. I know I can! I know it! We can’t give up. We’ll talk about it after the service this week, yes?”

That’s when Rossi dropped his bombshell.

“Alessandra, we’re discontinuing the weekly séances.”

“No!” she cried. “But why?”

“Some members object to the cost.”

“But you can’t! Oh, you can’t! It’s such a small amount.”

Rossi stared at her for a second, then clasped her hands in his. “I’m so sorry about Lombardi, Alessandra. The failure is mine. I do believe you would have convinced him.”

Rossi bowed then disappeared into the chattering lunch crowd thronging the street. I steered Alessandra over to a bench and helped her sit down.

She was silent for several minutes, staring at the ground. Then she looked up, tears in her eyes.

“Pigotti found the money,” she whispered.

“What money?” I said.

“The money I was saving for Rome. He noticed the slit in the mattress.”

“Oh God, Alessandra! What did you say?”

“I told him I was saving it for his birthday, to buy him something special. That I stole it from Rossi’s wallet during a sitting.”

“Did he believe you?”

“I don’t know. He slapped me hard, then he took the money. It’s all gone, Tommaso.”

I tried to think of something to say, but I couldn’t. I mean, what
could
you say? Her dream was over. At least Pigotti hadn’t discovered the whole truth. She would have been dead.

A beggar woman cradling a dirty-faced child approached us with her hand out, and I tried to shoo her away. The city was filled with them, and you can’t help them all. But Alessandra called her back, dug into her purse, found a few
soldi
, and handed them to her. Then she stood up, and extended her hand.

“Thank you for everything you have done for me, Tommaso. You’ve been a true friend.”

“What will you do now?” I said.

“I don’t know,” she replied wearily. “Maybe Dr. Cappelli can help. His family has money. And I know he likes me.”

“Will I see you again?” I asked.

She looked at me for a long time, then a soft smile appeared on her face. “You’re a sweet boy, Tommaso. You’re going to make some woman very happy someday.”

Then she was gone.

I
hid in the darkroom all afternoon, my head in my hands, thinking of Alessandra.

Try as I might, I couldn’t come up with anything. Sick to my stomach, I was reaching for my hat to go home when Doffo stopped by to find out what had happened at the meeting.

Venzano had hired him a month before I joined, hoping his drawings would put more bite in our editorial pages, especially the war we were running against the mayor and his cronies. People were dying from eating rotten meat because the Camorra ran the slaughterhouses and owned the inspectors. At the time Venzano offered him a job, Doffo was working up in Rome as a cartoonist for a small Socialist weekly that couldn’t always pay him.

He was skinny, near-sighted, and a
ricchione
with a boyfriend in the Vatican, but he was fearless. He studied Daumier in art school and had an acid pen. He worked hard at his craft. The Dreyfus affair was big news that year, and he followed
La Libre Parole
closely – studying how their cartoonist exaggerated the Captain’s big nose, gave him a slouch, put him in ridiculous situations.

A light suddenly went on in my head.

“Doffo! Follow me,” I said.

“Where?”

“To Venzano’s office.”

“Why?”

“I’ll tell you on the way. Let’s go.”

I knew Venzano desperately wanted to keep the Alessandra story alive. He had a great business sense, and he understood what sells papers. He also had a soft spot for me – he saw a little of himself in me – and so when we arrived he waved us into his office. I wasted no time pitching my idea.

“We’ll shame Lombardi into coming,” I explained excitedly. “Let Doffo do a cartoon suggesting he’s afraid to test Alessandra.”

Venzano gave us an amused look, then nodded at Doffo. “Alright, what can you do with it?”

Doffo thought for a moment, then took the pencil from behind his ear and started drawing. I watched in fascination as he sketched out a woman in long flowing robes, which he labeled “Science,” holding the torch of “Knowledge.” She was scowling down at Lombardi, who’s hiding under her skirts. The caption read “Lombardi Investigates the Spirit World”

I wanted to humiliate Lombardi. “No, make Lombardi a cat, hiding from a little mouse – Alessandra.” Doffo grinned and quickly redid the sketch. Venzano stroked his moustache as he studied the drawing, then smiled. “Finish it up, and we’ll run it next to Lombardi’s telegram.”

“Front page?” I suggested.

Venzano laughed. “Get out of here, both of you.”

L
ombardi’s visit to Naples started off poorly.

He was still smarting from the
Mattino
cartoon when he stepped off the train at the Napoli Centrale station. Before leaving Torino, he had announced to a reporter from
La Stampa
that he would be attending one séance only, and he expected to be disappointed.

Rossi had booked him into the Palazzo, a short walk from the Main Post Office, a decent hotel but hardly
de luxe
. He should have known better. Lombardi wasn’t some ghetto Jew. He came from a wealthy family, and besides, Northerners always look down on the South.

When I showed up at the hotel at eight the night of the séance, I found Lombardi in the lobby giving Rossi an earful – his room was too hot, mosquitoes buzzed him all night, the service was embarrassing, the hotel food both atrocious and suspicious. Rossi used my arrival to extricate himself and went off to find a bellman to call a carriage. When it finally swung by to pick us up, I hopped up in the front seat next to the driver and Rossi followed Lombardi into the back seat. Rossi leaned forward and tapped the driver’s shoulder.

“Do you know your way to Corso Vanucci?”

The man hesitated. “
Si,
Signore
, I do. Is that where you want to go?”

I looked back in surprise at Rossi. I had presumed the séance that evening would be held at his home near the university. Instead, we were headed for the Basso-Porto, a seedy part of Naples, down by the docks. I started to say something but he shot me a look and I kept my mouth shut.

“Yes,” he repeated. “Corso Vanucci. Number 48.”

“As you wish,
Signore
.”

He snapped his whip and the horse trotted off. Lombardi and Rossi chatted away as I racked my brain, trying to think why we would be headed for that disreputable gehenna, then it hit me. The night I took the photo at Rossi’s house, Alessandra told me she lived down by the docks.

We were headed for Alessandra’s place.

We made our way across town, down the Corso Garibaldi past the railway station till we came to the Reclusorio, the city poorhouse, where we turned left onto Strada Marinella which runs southeast out of town, following the curve of the bay. Rain had swept the city that afternoon but by evening it had stopped and the heat and humidity had soared. The stink of rotten garbage soon mixed with the smell of stale fish, tar and salt air. The city sewer, built after the terrible cholera epidemic of ’84 which killed 12,000 people and turned Naples into a mortuary, empties into the mud flats there. Lombardi pulled out a handkerchief and pressed it to his nose.

“I say, Professor, isn’t there a more pleasant route to our destination?” he demanded.

The streets got progressively narrower and dirtier, and Lombardi fell silent. We finally arrived at Corso Vanucci. Dingy, flat-roofed, three-story tenements hung with laundry lined the narrow street down to the quay and the warehouses. The gaslights had already been lit, and we made our way down the rain-dampened cobblestones, the carriage forcing grumbling vendors to move their stands and press against the wall as we passed by. In the shadow of a doorway, a whore solicited a drunk, and a mangy dog nosed through a pile of garbage, hunting scraps to eat.

When the driver halted his carriage in front of Number 48, the astonished Lombardi turned to Rossi.

“Certainly you don’t live here?”

But Rossi had already jumped out of the carriage. He shoved some money in the cabman’s hand and started walking briskly towards the apartment. Lombardi hopped out and hurried after Rossi. He caught up with him at the curb, and grabbed his arm.

“I was told the séance would be held in your home. I demand an explanation!”

Rossi looked at him evenly. “This is where Alessandra lives, Professor.”

“This is ridiculous!”

“You offer her one opportunity to perform. Fair enough. She feels most comfortable in familiar surroundings, and she chooses to demonstrate her powers here.”

“That’s outrageous! This is no place for a gentleman. I insist you take me back to my hotel.”

Rossi shrugged his shoulder. “You can come with me or remain here on the street.”

A pack of ragged, dirty-faced boys came running up to Lombardi and started yanking on his sleeve, begging for money. Lombardi raised his walking stick and they scattered, laughing and flinging rude gestures at him. Lombardi stood there for a moment, looking around. The carriage was gone. He had no choice. He muttered an oath, grimly gripped his cane like a club, and followed us up a dark, narrow staircase smelling of piss and garlic to Alessandra’s third floor dump.

Give Rossi credit. It was a spectacular gamble, but he had gotten Lombardi there.

But could Alessandra deliver?

P
igotti was waiting for us at the door.

He nodded at Rossi, who had been there before, but he eyed Lombardi suspiciously.

The apartment was small and cramped – a parlor-kitchen with a small, high window open to the stink of the public latrine in the courtyard below, and off the parlor a bedroom. For Lower Town, it was a palace – most poor bastards in that part of town rent eight, ten to a room with no windows, sleeping on dirt floors with their chickens and pigs. But Pigotti ran the lottery and the gambling in the neighborhood for the Camorra, and could afford better.