Where Tigers Are at Home (55 page)

In the spring of 1650 the Fountain of the Four Rivers was unveiled by the Pamphili family. The greatest names of Rome all gathered in the Forum Agonale together with Kircher & Bernini, the sole creators of this magnificent work. After a long speech on the virtues of his predecessor, Alexander VII, the new Supreme Pontiff, blessed the fountain with great ceremony; the sluice gates were opened & the pure water of the Acqua Felice finally flowed into the immense basin.

“This fountain is absolutely worthy of praise,” the Pope said as he approached our little group, Kircher, Bernini and me, “& I salute you as men who deserve to be as greatly honored by our age as Michelangelo & Marsilio Ficino were in theirs.”

Bernini visibly swelled with pride, my master having, out of humility, emphasized the modest nature of his own contribution.

“Is it true what they say,” the Pope went on, turning to Bernini, “that this rock with the pipe through it, this lion & this horse only required a few weeks’ work?”

“A few months, your Holiness,” Bernini corrected, piqued by the insinuation. “The rest of the work presented no major difficulty & would have taken more time than I had at my disposal.”

“I know, I know,” the Pope replied in honeyed tones, looking demonstratively at the statue of the Nile, “but no one could maintain that this fountain would have been equally majestic if you had sculpted it entirely with your own hands …”

There was no mystery about the fact that Bernini himself had only worked on the three figures mentioned by the Pope & that for the other parts of the fountain he had been happy to supervise the best pupils in his studio. It was due, moreover, less to a decision on his part than to the time limits imposed by the late Innocent X. But even if the Supreme Pontiff’s irony was merely intended to tease Bernini in his too obvious vanity, it still seemed very unfair to me. Seeing the sculptor roll his mastiff eyes & aware of his impulsive nature, Kircher stepped in: ‘Doubtless it sometimes happens that pupils surpass their teachers—
Tristo è quel discepolo che non avanza il suo maestro
,
¹
is he not? Nevertheless, that is rare & in this case it is to the one who has taught them everything that the credit is due.”

“But tell me, Reverend,” the Pope asked without appearing to have noticed Kircher’s interjection, “is there not a contradiction in placing this stone idol at the center of a monument dedicated to our religion? I have not yet had time to look at your book, which I am told is fascinating, & I would be interested to know by what magic you manage to justify the unjustifiable …”

Athanasius threw me a quick glance in which I could see his surprise: the Pope was attacking him for having supported Bernini against his irony! The sculptor gave my master a little shrug as if to apologize for having landed him in such an awkward position.

“There is no need of magic,” Kircher replied, “to explain the presence of this obelisk at the very heart of the Eternal City. Your predecessor, the late Pope Innocent X, since it was his wish that his name & that of his ancestors should be forever associated with this monument, was quite right to place it here. Although the product of one of the most ancient of peoples, but also of the one most worthy to be compared with ours, this obelisk remains a pagan symbol; it is for that reason that it is surmounted by the dove of the Holy Ghost, indicating the superiority of our religion over paganism. Thus the divine light, victorious over all idolatrous religions & descending from the eternal heavens, spreads its blessings over the four continents of the Earth represented by the Nile, the Ganges, the Danube & the Plate, the four splendid rivers from which Africa, India, Europe and the Americas draw their sustenance. The Nile is masked because no one has yet found its sources; as for the others, they are each represented by emblems corresponding to their nature.”

“Very interesting …” Pope Alexander said. “From what you say, then, it is a monument to the propagation of the faith that we owe to the generosity of Innocent X & to your genius … I didn’t see it from that point of view. Especially after the dispute the Franciscans had with you not long ago …”

“I insist,” Kircher said, ignoring the dig at him, “that this fountain is a stone symbol of the glory of the Church & of all the missionaries who serve our holy cause. But it is more than that, & if I may—”

“That will be enough for today, Reverend Father, other duties call. But I will be happy to listen to your … ‘stories’ some other time.”

That was the first & last time I saw my master turn scarlet with indignation. I was afraid he would direct one of the quips he always had up is sleeve at the Pope, but he contained himself & bent humbly to kiss the ring Alexander held out to him. “
Tamen amabit semper
,”
²
he said between his teeth, as the rules of our Society commanded him. Bernini & I did the same, then the Pope turned his back on us without further ado.

As soon as he could do so without danger of being noticed, Bernini burst out into open, infectious laughter. “You see what it costs to take the side of a stonemason,” he said, placing his hand on Kircher’s shoulder. “Welcome to the brotherhood of actors, Father Athanasius, for you have just been promoted to the ranks of storytellers …”

“How dare he?!” Kircher exclaimed, still rather somber. “Years of work to decipher the hieroglyphs, the key sought by men for centuries & that all at once can give us the whole of the science & philosophy of the ancients! All that dismissed with a wave of the hand, like an irritating fly! Why is God punishing me like this? Do I still have too much pride?”

“No, no,” said Bernini in soothing tones, “only a few days ago that Pope was merely Cardinal Fabio Chigi, well known for … let’s say his lack of judgment & his patrician smugness. If it is true that the function creates the organ, it’ll take quite some time with that fellow.”

The thought drew a smile from Kircher, accompanied by a pseudoreproachful frown. I could have kissed Bernini for that! Especially since he now invited us, with all the warmth of an old friend, to accompany him to his house.

“
Carpe diem
, my friends. Let us forget that ass & go & empty a few bottles of French wine that I have been keeping for this occasion. For myself, I prefer to drink that to the water of the rivers, even if they were those of the Garden of Eden.”

His house was not far from where we were. There we met several of his pupils who had played a part in the erection of the fountain and had preceded us to their master’s house after the unveiling. There were also several ragged creatures who lived there to serve as models for Bernini & his pupils, but also to act as servants &, from what I thought I could tell from the liberties they allowed these gentlemen, as other things as well … Good girls, all the same, cheerful & in some cases even cultured, who behaved in a seemly manner while we were there.

We all sat around the common table in the studio surrounded by the clay models, blocks of stone and drawings cluttering up the room. Large white sheets hung underneath the glass roof allowed a soft light to filter through; the wine in the copper goblets was deliciously cool, we were in high spirits & Kircher quickly recovered his good humor.

Bernini went on & on about his set- to with the Pope & how my master had backed him up & suffered for it. He did a marvelous imitation of Alexander’s curt, arrogant voice, prompting general hilarity. It was nothing to make a fuss about & my master laughed as much as the others at the biting satire, though taking care not to join in it himself.

Once we had finished the second bottle of white wine from Ay, our host had several chickens killed and sent to be roasted at a neighboring eating-house. It was therefore with mouths full
of perfectly cooked meat that we started to discuss the fountain again. One of the young women sitting at the table asked if we had to believe that all the animals carved on the obelisk told a story.

“And what a story, my lovely!” Bernini exclaimed, tearing a chicken leg apart. “You can trust Father Kircher, he can read hieroglyphs as if he’d drawn them himself. Is that not true, Reverend Father?” he added with a wink.

“We mustn’t exaggerate,” said my master, “it’s a bit more complicated than that; our good Caspar, who helps me in my work, will confirm how much labor the translation of each line demands. The priests of ancient Egypt took their time making this secret language complicated in order to keep their knowledge inaccessible to the profane; the centuries have shown how successful they were in this.”

“And what is the story these figures tell?” the young woman asked.

“A beautiful story, one I’m sure you’ll enjoy,” Bernini said, taking over from Kircher, “the story of the love of Isis & Osiris. Listen, my girl, and don’t let me die of thirst: a certain Râ of Egypt, the sun god of his land, had the misfortune to have four children—two daughters: Isis & Nephtys, & two sons: Typhon & Osiris. These brothers & sisters married each other, as was the charming custom among the powerful. Isis became the wife of Osiris & Nephtys that of Typhon. Since their father was becoming a little decrepit, he put the administration of the kingdom into the hands of Osiris, the one who was more worthy to exercise that power. Under him Egypt thrived; aided by his wife, he taught the people how to cultivate wheat & the vine, introduced the religious cults & built large and beautiful cities, thus ensuring the happiness of the nation. But then Typhon, jealous of the power & fame of Osiris, decided to conspire against his brother. Drawing
him into a cleverly laid trap, he killed him, cut him up into tiny pieces and threw him into the Nile.

“Poor Isis, in despair but still in love, set about finding the pieces of her husband. Through her persistence, she managed to find almost all of them, for the fish of the Nile treated him with respect & spared them. There was just one missing, a dainty morsel the oxyrhynch had not been able to resist … & this piece, my little doll, the one that Isis, as a true woman, preferred above all, was his gherkin, his big bird, his engine, his tassel, his family organ, his Don Cypriano, his awl, his chitterling, his fiddle bow, his syringe, his ploughshare, his Polyphemus, his father confessor, his lance, his yard, his pintle, his drumstick, his coney-catcher &, in a word, his sweetmeat! Yes, my lovelies, his sweetmeat!”

This tirade drew laughter and chuckles from all sides & even Kircher congratulated him on the
richness
of his vocabulary.

“A tragedy, then,” the laughing sculptor went on, “for the widow Isis, but that would be to ignore her—very understandable—persistence, for the queen, aided by her sister & by Anubis, reconstructed her husband’s member with river silt and spittle, stuck it on him in the right place &, thanks to heaven & various practices, brought it back to life. And since, as it seems to me, this new instrument worked better than his previous one, Isis soon found she was pregnant. She gave birth to a boy, who was called Harpocrates and became king in his turn, while Osiris, the first mortal ever to be recovered from a definitive death, was enjoying a happy eternity in the Fields of Iaru, the Egyptian paradise …”

The company was fascinated by Bernini’s story & asked many questions, principally regarding its truth.

“The Egyptian priests,” my master said, “following the doctrine passed on by the patriarchs of antiquity, were
convinced that God was to be found everywhere & they aimed at finding His manifestations hidden in natural entities &, once they had been discovered, showing them in symbols derived from nature. The story of Osiris is a fable, of course, a discreet veil beneath which the sages were, according to the testimony of Iamblichus, endeavoring to express the most profound mysteries of the deity, the world, angels & demons.”

“Oh, come on, Reverend Father,” Bernini mocked. “Who do you take us for? Next you’ll be asking us to accept that your pharaohs believed in the one God & the Holy Trinity!”

“You don’t know how right you are …”

“How is it then that the entire world isn’t Christian?” Bernini asked in more serious tones than before.

“The malice of the Devil is infinite &, moreover, it was greatly aided by the confusion of languages following the fall of the Tower of Babel, by the nations moving farther & farther away & the perversion of rites to which that led. All idolatrous religions are nothing but more or less recognizable anamorphoses of Christianity. The Egyptians, who, thanks to Hermes, still retained the greatest secrets of universal knowledge, passed them on throughout the world as far as China & the Americas, where they were gradually transformed, growing paler like those foxes that lose their natural color & take on that of the ice or the desert where they live. But the Egyptians knew that truth as well, for what is the dismemberment of Osiris by Typhon & Isis’s patient search other than an image of idolatry itself, a misfortune that divine wisdom remedied by reuniting the scattered parts of the archetype in a single mystical body? Look around you: nothing stays the same, nothing lasts, no peace can be guaranteed by laws that are so strong they will not collapse. War is
everywhere! And it is up to us, the priests & missionaries, to seek, through suffering & martyrdom, that lost stability …”

On the third day of their journey on foot through the jungle it became clear to all that their progress would be much slower than expected. Yurupig, Mauro & Petersen took it in turns to carry Dietlev’s stretcher, but the most they could do in a straight line in the forest was about ten yards, so frequent were the tangles of branches and succulents, dark undergrowth and luxuriant, impenetrable foliage. Occasionally the person opening up a path managed to make a passage with the machete, but almost always they had to go round the obstacle, clamber over a fallen tree trunk, which would disintegrate into sawdust under their weight, thread their way as best they could through the rigging of the intertwined lianas or even crawl, when a way forward could be vaguely discerned behind an arching root. Constantly diverted from their ideal line, they concentrated on following natural gaps oriented toward the northeast quarter of the compass. This course, however, remained largely theoretical inasmuch as they were sometimes forced to turn back and try another route that was less obvious but better suited to their goal. They had the impression they were treading on an immense mass of decaying material that collapsed, liquefied under their feet, an elastic, aromatic humus from which the trampled vegetation immediately sprang up again, made stronger, denser by its own decomposition. Bromeliads and rubber plants suffering from gigantism with nothing in common with the plants Elaine knew by those names
from the florist’s, vegetable columns, smooth or ringed, recalling the impossible combinations of computer-generated images: root-stilts, strangler fig trees, all kinds of parasites, a Chinese box of jungles, one inside the other at the very heart of the jungle. An indefinable cacophony came down from above, filling the space all round them, a shrill, discordant hubbub in which Yurupig and Petersen alone were able to pick out the howl of a capuchin monkey, the castanets of a toucan’s beak, the sudden hysterical shriek of a great macaw … The mystery of life seemed to have concentrated in this primordial crucible teeming with mosquitos and insects.