Another Small Kingdom (29 page)

Chapter Sixty-two

T
he following afternoon Macleod left Marie at the convent door and again began his patrol of the street, his mind far away in planning the forthcoming meeting with the Cardinal. Busy with his thoughts he did not see the man hurrying towards him. The man, also not looking where he was going, blundered into Macleod and a sheaf of folio papers he had been carrying spilled from his arms. Indeed it was reading one of these pages while hurrying that had caused the collision.

The man launched into an unintelligible flood of what Macleod assumed were apologies but as Macleod spoke no Italian he could not adequately respond.

‘Pray, sir, don't apologise …'

The flow of meaningless words stopped and the man resumed in English.

‘Ah, an Englishman.'

‘No, sir,
not
English.'

‘Not English?'

‘American.'

A slight breeze caught one of the pages at their feet and the man moved quickly, bent down and caught it, then started to gather and collect his papers into some sort of order. Macleod noticed one sheet gambolling away on the little breeze and, following it, picked it up and brought it back to its owner who was now standing up.

‘Signore, I thank you both for your help and your tolerance.'

‘Please, think no more of it, a mere accident.'

‘How kind, how thoroughly American. An Englishman would have huffed and puffed and damned and blasted and God knows what. They offend too easily, the English. It is their climate I think, it sours their natures. But you Americans are …' he paused looking for the right word, ‘here in Italy or in Spain we would say, simpático. I fear you have no true equivalent in the Anglo-Saxon tongue.'

‘Thank you, sir, I will not detain you further. Good day.'

But the stranger caught at his arm.

‘No, please, you are offended. I am too familiar, a stranger whom you do not know. I apologise.'

Macleod felt a little embarrassed. He had not intended to be short with the man but apparently he had been.

‘No, sir, upon my honour I never for a moment thought …'

‘But that also is so American, so quick to be accommodating, to be friendliness itself. Tell me, is this your first visit to Rome?'

‘It is.'

‘And do you make it on business or for pleasure?'

‘Neither, I am here with my wife. We wanted to see Rome. We are newly married.'

‘But my deepest congratulations, dear sir. May I be so bold as to suggest that, if you know no one in Rome, then please let me assist you, you and your wife of course. I would be pleased to be the one who …'

‘Thank you, no. We have no wish to move in society, we are very ordinary, quiet people.'

The man laughed.

‘Good heavens, Signore, you do not think that I move in what you call society? Look at me. Do I look like a person of any consequence, someone with position or power? I am a scribbler, sir, a mere scribbler. I write pamphlets, political pamphlets, and not of the sort that would get me invited into the palazzi of the rich or influential. This is my latest effort I carry. I have just returned from the printer having discussed the cost of publication. Prices, I fear, go ever upwards. I have used him before but even he now charges … But, excuse me, once I begin to talk about my work, time and everything else fly out of my head. I detain you. You are on your way somewhere?'

‘No, merely taking a walk. My wife is occupied so I walk to pass the time.'

‘Then let me make so bold as to invite you to drink a glass of wine with me. In Rome there has been, unfortunately, ample opportunity to improve one's French but less chance to improve one's English and little chance at all to note the subtle differences of American English to the native variety. Please, sir, do not hesitate, join me in a glass of wine and tell me about America.'

The last element of this appeal swayed Macleod, that and the fact that Marie had indicated that her confession, to be thorough and complete, would not be short. She had also said that the Mother Superior had indicated that, afterwards, she would welcome talking with someone who had experience of the New World and, as she was providing the vital letter of introduction, Marie would have to be at her service for as long as she wished. A drink with a pleasant companion would help pass the time.

‘Very well, sir, I would be pleased to take wine with you.'

The man stood back a pace and gave a small bow.

‘Allow me to introduce myself, Count Silviano Brutti.' He saw Macleod's surprise and hesitation and gave a small laugh. ‘Please, do not be fooled by the title. The Bruttis have been Counts for several hundred years but the last one to see any real money or to own a Palazzo here in Rome was my great-great-grandfather who gambled and debauched away one half of the family fortune and gave the other half to Holy Mother Church in old age to try and save his immortal soul from hell. A waste of both time and money, in my opinion. If you stay one month or more in Rome you will find that grand-sounding titles are almost more common than churches.' Count Brutti stepped forward and linked his free arm into Macleod's and carried on his chatter as they moved off along the street. ‘If no one has yet offered their services, you must let me offer my poor knowledge of my city to you and be your guide, Signor …?'

Count Brutti waited for a name.

‘Macleod, Jean Marie Macleod.'

‘But what unusual given names for an American.'

‘My mother was French, from Paris.'

‘Ah, Paris, I knew it well as a much younger man. I took part in the Revolution, not the storming of the Bastille or anything on such a grand scale, but I was there.'

Macleod was warming to this man. He was talking in the easy manner of an old friend and Macleod welcomed some sort of human contact in this strange city.

‘But your title, didn't that hamper you among the revolutionaries?'

‘Not at all, they welcomed me all the more because of it. Ah, here we are, a simple taverna, I'm afraid, but clean and the wine is drinkable. It comes from Frascati, not far from Rome. Do you know Frascati at all? Have you visited there?'

‘No, my wife and I have not yet been out of Rome.'

It was indeed a clean and respectable-looking place with a scattering of men around the tables all decently dressed and talking quietly, drinking wine or coffee, some smoking small cigars or pipes. The man behind the bar saw them arrive and hurried out to greet them.

He rattled off something rapidly in Italian and then shepherded them to a private booth where they sat down. Macleod's new friend directed a few words to the man who went back behind the bar where he busied himself getting glasses and a carafe of white wine.

Count Brutti nodded across in his direction.

‘His family once served my family in the days of my grandfather. Technically I suppose I still owe him the wages which my grandfather never paid his grandfather, but instead of that making him angry with me, he makes a fuss of me. It is the way things are here in Rome.'

The man returned and put the glasses and carafe on the table between them, bowed to the Count and then left. The Count took the carafe and poured them each a glass of wine. They lifted their glasses and drank. Macleod found the wine light, delicious and wonderfully fresh.

‘You like it, Signor Macleod, our Frascati?'

‘I do, sir.'

‘They say that the people of Frascati keep all their best wine for themselves and what they sell in Rome is only the inferior stuff. But my friend here is from Frascati and has family there so he makes sure there is always some of their best wine kept here for me. So, my friend … I hope I may call you that?'

‘If you think it appropriate on so small an acquaintance.'

Count Brutti laughed.

‘But I do, I think so. You must remember you are in Rome now, the Eternal City. For thousands of years we Romans have watched people come and go, conquering Emperors, barbarian hordes, armies, people seeking wealth, people seeking the past, people seeking God and people who have no idea what they are seeking. We make friends quickly and enemies too.'

‘Well, if it's a choice between one or the other I'll choose to be a friend.'

‘Bravo, bravissimo, to my new friend Jean Marie Macleod and his beautiful wife.'

‘Thank you for the compliment on my wife's behalf, but as you haven't seen her yet I'll accept it more as a courtesy than a considered judgement.'

‘Not at all, Jean Marie, I am sure that a man of your undoubted taste will prove to have a most beautiful wife.'

‘I fear you know as much about my taste as about my wife's looks.'

‘Ah, now there you are wrong.'

‘Wrong?'

‘But of course. Of all the people in Rome whom you might have chosen as your friend, did you not choose me? That being so, how could I consider you other than a man of the most accomplished taste?'

And he sat and smiled at Macleod.

It suddenly dawned on Macleod that this meeting, so casual and yet so pleasant, had been entirely engineered by his new friend. He had no reason to feel suspicious of the man but neither had he any reason to trust him. He took another small drink from his glass and then stood up.

‘I fear I must now leave you, Count.'

The Count stood up somewhat surprised.

‘Silviano, please.'

‘If you wish. Good-day, Silviano, and thank you for the wine.'

‘But we have not talked. Must you leave so soon?'

‘I must return to wait upon my wife. I do not wish her to walk alone through the streets.'

‘But of course, I understand. A new wife does not like to be left alone, especially if you tell her that, rather than wait for her return, you chose to drink wine in a taverna with a rapscallion who scrapes a humble living as a political agitator. Go, my friend, and give my kindest regards to your wife.'

Macleod put on his hat and held out his hand.

‘Thank you again for the wine.'

The Count took his hand and shook it.

‘Remember, if you need a guide, I assure you I know all the sights and I come at a very modest price.'

As if from nowhere, like a conjuror, the Count produced a dog-eared piece of card. Macleod took it.

‘Thank you. If we need a guide we will certainly call on you.'

Macleod left the table and walked out of the taverna into the afternoon sunshine. The Count sat down and watched him go.

The man came from behind the bar and stood at the table. The Count waved away the glasses and carafe which the man gathered up and took away. The Count waited a few minutes and then stood up. He gathered his papers from the table and walked across to the bar where he dropped them in front of the man who had served them.

‘Dispose of these. I have no further use for them.'

He turned and left. The barman watched him go. And there was indeed a look in his eyes, but it was one of fear, not any ancient family loyalty. He gathered up the papers, looked at them, then took them into a room behind the bar and dumped them in a basket. Later he would burn them. He would not get anyone to look at them, even though he knew at least one man who could read. The less he knew about Count Brutti's business the safer he felt. He returned to the bar. Several of the men sitting at the tables were looking at him. He gave the shrug universal in Italy which said, I know nothing and want to know nothing and neither do any of you. The eyes turned away and conversations resumed. Obviously no one in the taverna envied Macleod his newly found friend.

Macleod walked away from the taverna. It had been a pleasant meeting, a pleasant, chance meeting. But then an uneasy feeling came upon him and he stopped, turned and looked behind him. He saw nothing. No, it had been nothing but a chance meeting. He put the matter of Count Brutti from his mind. He had been careful. He had told him nothing that might put them in any danger. He had not told him where their apartment was nor that they were looking for Cardinal Henry Stuart. He had exercised all reasonable caution. But that wine, that Frascati, had been good. He would remember the name. And he continued his walking.

Marie, looking thoroughly happy, finally came out of the convent, linked her arm through his and showed him the envelope she was carrying.

‘Look, I found out where the Cardinal lives and we have a letter of introduction. Is that not marvellous, Jean? He is Bishop of Frascati and he lives there. It is a place …'

‘I know, not far from Rome. They say the wine is very good.'

Marie looked surprised.

‘How clever of you to know. But how did you find out?'

‘Somebody told me.'

Chapter Sixty-three

W
hen walking one evening in the streets away from the Piazza di Spagna, they had suddenly come upon a waterless fountain where dirty, semi-clothed children climbed and played. They stood for a moment admiring the fountain's beauty which was half-hidden by dirt, neglect and ill-use. Macleod remarked that the sight epitomised the decaying grandeur they had found so much in Rome, even in the short time they had been there.

Frascati, when they arrived there and took comfortable rooms above a clean and respectable taverna, came as a pleasant change. The taverna occupied a corner position of a piazza dominated on one side by the façade of Frascati's Cathedral of San Pietro Apostolo, an elaborate edifice in the Greek style but with the later addition of two monumental bell-towers. In the centre of the piazza stood a substantial and ornate fountain, also dedicated to the Apostle Peter.

They spent a day becoming familiar with their immediate surroundings. They admired the clean, well-ordered streets, peopled by quiet busy locals. They lunched in the taverna and were fêted as a newly married couple on honeymoon tour by the proprietor himself. He was an incurable romantic, although married thirty years, and although they learned many things about him, his attention to them was, in truth, rather more than they cared for.

In the early evening of their first day they hired a carriage and were driven out to the Villa Piccolomini where they were made welcome by the impressive major-domo who instructed a footman to show them the magnificent gardens. They stood together to admire the wonderful Teatro d'Acqua, the Water Theatre, which was a model of the nearby Villa Mondragone.

The following day, however, they set about the business that had brought them to Frascati. Although their destination was no great distance, they hired a carriage to call at the Cardinal's Palazzo which proved to be a very different affair from the Villa Piccolomini. The Cardinal's Palazzo seemed to them more of a fortress than a palace which, indeed was not due to their imagination, but rather because it had once been one. The old “Rocca” or castle was massive and provided with one rounded and two great square towers. Undeterred by appearances, they made their way to the great main doorway and presented their letter to the suitably ornate footman, who unfortunately spoke no English. The footman looked at the name on the letter, studied the seal, then took them into the Palazzo and promptly disappeared.

Macleod and Marie stood in a hallway about the size of a small ballroom. The floor was inlaid marble and on the ceiling was an idealised pastoral scene. From various niches busts of past bishops and other men of overwhelming dignity gazed at them with sightless eyes. Between these busts were paintings, mostly on religious themes and all in heavy, gilded frames. Macleod looked around at the splendour in which they waited and felt a vague unease. All they hoped to achieve rested on this visit.

After a short wait an elderly man wearing the black soutane edged with purple came into the hall where they waited. He spoke to them in Italian. Macleod answered in French.

‘I regret, Father, that neither I nor my wife speak Italian.'

The cleric responded in French.

‘I am Monsignore Cesarini, Secretary to His Eminence the Cardinal. I have read your letter from the Mother Superior. You are recently married?'

‘That is so, Monsignore.'

The priest looked again at the letter.

‘And you wish the Cardinal's blessing?'

The question was delivered in a tone which, clearly as words might have done, said “ … but surely, as people of no importance, you know you are asking for something fantastical”.

Macleod sensed that this formidable Secretary's attitude did not bode well for their hopes, and his reply was anything but assured.

‘We do.'

But Marie was not hampered by any sense of unease nor any feelings of diffidence.

‘My husband wishes to pay his respects not only to the Cardinal but also to the rightful King of England and Scotland. His father fought in the army of his brother, Prince Charles, and his uncles died for the Prince's cause.'

‘Indeed! The Cardinal, you understand, is always very busy. Many people of consequence call upon his attentions and he is much in demand both as a Prince of the Church and a man of affairs. But, for so charming a couple and for one whose family has suffered much in the glorious cause of his family, I will see if he will find a brief moment to receive you.'

‘We have taken rooms at the taverna on the Piazza San Pietro. Perhaps you would be so good as to send us a message there.'

Monsignore Cesarini's look was meant to quell Marie's awful presumption but she met it and returned it with a smile.

The Monsignore coldly promised to send word to their lodging as soon as he had spoken to His Eminence and motioned to a nearby footman who approached them. The prelate, without offering any farewell, turned and walked away, and the footman held out a hand indicating the way to the door and showed them out.

Once outside the Palazzo and in their carriage, Macleod asked Marie what she had thought about their reception by the Cardinal's Secretary.

She answered that she thought it both polite and gracious.

‘You didn't get the impression that we were expected?'

‘Expected? How could we be expected?'

‘How indeed? We arrive without warning, with nothing but a letter.'

‘From the Mother Superior, a friend of royalty, a woman of consequence.'

Macleod persisted.

‘With only a letter. We are seen at once by the Cardinal's Secretary. He listens politely to our request and agrees to try and arrange an audience. Wasn't it all a bit too simple?'

‘Oh, Jean, you see plots everywhere. The Monsignor accepted what we told him, he is a man of God, a priest, he only wishes to help us. What have we asked for? A blessing and a chance to pay our respects, nothing more. Why should he refuse such a request?'

‘And my request to acknowledge the Cardinal as the rightful King of England?'

‘Well, why not? You told me yourself that is how he thinks of himself. Your family gave his brother the Prince great service, did they not? Why should the Cardinal not wish to acknowledge such service?'

‘Perhaps you're right. Perhaps I see too many conspiracies.'

‘No, you are right to take care. But with the Cardinal I am sure we are safe.'

Macleod helped Marie back into their carriage. He wished he could have agreed with her, but somehow he felt that safety was still proving elusive.