Imprimatur

September 1699

I am now closing this memoir. As I write, eleven years have passed since William of Orange's landing in England. The heretical sovereign still reigns there, and his reign is a successful one: the honour of religion and of the English Catholics was sold by Innocent XI for mere lucre.

Pope Innocent will not, however, be repeating that miserable business. He expired ten years ago, after a long and painful agony. The autopsy showed that his bowels had rotted and his kidneys were full of stones. Someone has already proposed that he should be held up as an exemplar and beatified.

Pompeo Dulcibeni has left us, too. He died this year, as a good Christian, after much prayer and sincerely repenting his sins, which were not few. It happened one day in April; we had perhaps eaten rather more than we should and he (who was always too red in the face and had, in his last years, tended to partake too much of the bottle) asked me to help him to bed, so that he might take a little rest. He never rose again.

What I am today, I believe that I owe in great part to him: he had, so to speak, become my new mentor, God only knows how different from Abbot Melani. Thanks to his long and sorrow-laden sojourn on this earth, Pompeo was able to reveal much to me of his life and sufferings, while always seeking to transmit all that he told me with the comforts of the Faith and in the fear of God. I have read all the volumes which he gave me: books of history, theology, poetry and even medicine, along with some containing the rudiments of the science of commerce and business ventures, in which Dulcibeni was so deeply versed and which, these days, one can no longer permit oneself to ignore. This makes me think that I may perhaps have penned these memoirs of former times with today's thoughts in my mind, often attributing to the poor, destitute prentice of the Donzello words and cogitations with which God has graced me only of late.

I have, moreover, found that my greatest discoveries came, not from the tomes of political or moral doctrine, but from those of medicine. I have burned much midnight oil to convince myself that I was, in reality, never immune to the plague, as Cristofano had assured me at the beginning of our quarantine; my unfortunate condition in no way protected me from infection. The doctor had lied, perhaps in order to avail himself of my services, and had invented everything: from the fable of the sodomising African homunculus to the classifications of Caspar Schott, Fortunius Licetus and Johannes Eusebius Nierember- gius, in none of whose works did I find any mention of my supposed immunity. Cristofano knew perfectly well that stature bears no relation to the pestilence. Against infection, it avails me nothing to be what I am, a poor dwarf: "a source of amusement for princes and of astonishment for fairground idlers", as Dulcibeni once put it so scornfully.

I shall, nevertheless, always be grateful to Cristofano: thanks to his venial lie, my pygmy breast was blown up with pride. That was never to recur. My cruelly diminutive stature resulted only in my being abandoned at an early age and the derision of the entire human race; and that, despite the fact that-as Cristofano once stressed-I was to be counted among the more fortunate of my kind, the mediocres in stature, and not the minores or, worst of all, the minimi.

When I look back to the adventure of the Donzello, the mocking laughter of the Bargello's men still rings in my ears, as they shoved me violently into the hostelry at the start of the quarantine: and then, there was Dulcibeni, who amused himself by ascribing to me the Latin tag of pumilio, or "little dwarf". I can still see, as though he were there, the obscene vice of Brenozzi, pinching the celery between his thighs, just at the height of my nose; and the corpisantari when they mistook me for one of the daemunculi subterranei, the minuscule demons which people their nightmares. And I can see myself, almost as though I had been created for that underworld, as I moved agilely before Atto through the narrow tunnels under the hostelry.

In those days at the Donzello, my unhappy condition weighed upon me not less than throughout the rest of my life. I have, however, preferred to leave that in the shadows in my evocation of the great theatre of those events; who would ever accord the slightest credence to the words of one whom only a few wrinkles differentiate from a small boy?

Dulcibeni's revelations have, in the time that has intervened, been confirmed by the facts. The nephew of Innocent XI, Livio Odescalchi, who was the Pope's sole heir, has for a derisory price purchased from the Emperor the Hungarian fief of Sirmio (acting, so it is whispered in Rome, against the advice of the officials of the Imperial Household). To add to the lustre of that most profitable transaction, the Emperor even made him a Prince of the Holy Roman Empire. Yet, every excessive gift always, it is said, hides the repayment of a favour. So it was true: the Emperor too was indebted to the Odescalchi. Now he has repaid that money with interest.

Livio Odescalchi himself seems to feel no shame for his odious and bare-faced trafficking. Upon the death of Innocent XI, it is said that his fortune amounted to more than a million and a half scudi, as well as the fief of Ceri. He at once laid his hands on the dukedom of Bracciano, the marquisate of Roncofreddo, the county of Montiano and the lordship of Palo, as well as on the Villa Montalto at Frascati. He was even on the point of buying the fief of Albano, but the Apostolic Chamber itself managed in extremis to snatch the transaction from him. Finally, after the death of King Jan Sobieski, the victor of Vienna, Livio attempted to succeed him on the throne of Poland with an offer of eight million florins.

There is no point in waxing indignant: money-that infamous scourge, without land and without pity-has never ceased to corrupt Europe and will ever more trample underfoot the honour of the Faith and of crowns.

I am no longer the innocent boy of those days at the Donzello. The things I then saw and heard, and which I shall never be able to reveal to anyone, have marked my life forever. The Faith has not abandoned me; yet, inevitably, the sentiments of devotion and fidelity which every good Christian should foster for his Church have been forever corrupted.

The act of confiding my memories to these pages has, if nothing else, helped me to overcome the moments of greatest discomfort in my life. The rest has been provided for by prayer, the companionship of Cloridia and the reading with which I have nourished my spirit over the years.

Three months ago, Cloridia and I were at last joined in matrimony: we seized upon the opportunity when a mendicant friar arrived in our wretched locality.

A few days ago, I sold a few bunches of grapes to a cantor from the Sistine Chapel. I asked him if he ever happened to sing arias by Luigi Rossi.

"Rossi?" he replied, furrowing his eyebrows. "Ah yes, I think I have heard that name, but it must be old stuff, from the days of the Barberini. No," he added, laughing, "nowadays no one remembers him: today in Rome, all glory goes to the great Corelli, did you not know that?"

Only now do I realise how I have let the years flow past beyond the threshold of my little house. No, I do not know that Corelli; but I do know that I shall never forget the name of the Le Seigneur Luigi or the sublime accents of his arias, which were already out of fashion when Abbot Melani evoked them for himself and for me.

From time to time, sometimes even in my dreams, I recollect the voice and sharp little eyes of Atto Melani, whom 1 imagine bent by age in his house in Paris, that spacious house in which he had once invited me to go and live.

Fortunately, the weariness of my labours banishes nostalgia: our farm has grown and there is always more work. Among other things, we sell fresh vegetables and good fruit to the nearby villa of the Spada family, where they often call upon me for some other services.

Whenever my work allows, however, I turn to my memories of Atto's words and repeat to myself that phrase of his about solitary eagles and flocks of crows, inwardly seeking to reproduce the tone, the intonations and the intentions, although I know them to be both audacious and ill-advised.

Oft have I returned in vain to the Via dell'Orso, to ask the new occupants of the house where the Donzello stood (now there are only apartments for rent) whether any letters have arrived for me from Paris, or whether anyone has ever asked after the one-time prentice. Every time, as I feared, my hopes have been dashed.

Time has helped me to understand. Only today have I understood that in reality Abbot Melani never intended to betray Fouquet. It is true that Atto gave the Sun King the letters which he had stolen from Colbert, from which the Superintendent was found to be hiding in Rome. However, before then, the King had already begun to show clemency for Fouquet; he had alleviated the conditions of his imprisonment and by now there was even hope that he might be freed. Everyone believed that his liberation was being delayed by Colbert as usual: so why should it not have been a good idea to bring the Coluber 's letters to the King? Melani could certainly not foresee that the King's mind would, as soon as he laid eyes on the letters stolen by Atto from Colbert's study, move as swiftly as lightning to a deadly conclusion: Fouquet was in Rome with the secretum pestis, and perhaps he would give it to the Pope, who was sustaining the defenders of Vienna…

Louis XIV could not permit his plans to fail at precisely that moment, when his pact with the Turks was on the point of yielding fruit. He will have coldly dismissed Atto. He will have accorded himself time for reflection. He will have recalled him a little later and told him who knows what deceitful tale. Whatever that may have been, I am sure of the conclusion of that meeting: Atto was sent to accomplish an extreme and tragic act of fidelity to the Crown.

Today, all this no longer seems horrible to me. I look back almost with tenderness at the stratagem of robbing those little pearls off me in order to involve me in his investigations. And I wish I could turn back to that last day when I saw Atto Melani: Signor Abbot, please stop, I should like to tell you…

The chance was lost and now that is impossible. We were separated, then and forever, by my boyish candour, my disappointed enthusiasm and my impatience. Now, I know that it was wrong to sacrifice friendship on the altar of purity, confidence on that of reason, sentiment on that of sincerity.

One cannot befriend a spy without bidding farewell to the truth.

All the prophecies came true. On the first days of the quarantine, I dreamed that Atto gave me a ring and that Devize played the trumpet. Well, in my Cloridia's book on the interpretation of dreams, I have read that the ring is a symbol of the good conjoined with difficulty, while the trumpet signifies occult knowledge, such as the secret of the pestilence.

In my dream, I had seen Pellegrino rise from the grave: a presage of travails and harm, which did indeed befall us all. In those dream fantasies I saw salt scattered, symbolising assassination (the death of Fouquet); and then, a guitar, indicative of melancholy and labour without reputation (I and Cloridia, unknown and neglected on our little plot). Only one symbol had been favourable, and Cloridia knew that well: the cat, which signals lust.

Stilone Priaso's astrological almanack had also predicted all that befell us: not only the collapse of the inn, but also the imprisonment of a group of gentlemen (the quarantine at the Donzello), a city besieged (Vienna), malignant fevers and venomous distempers (which struck more than one guest), the death of a sovereign (Maria Teresa), and the journeys of ambassadors (bringing news of the victory in Vienna). Only one vaticination had not come true; or rather, it had been overtaken by an even greater force: the "Barricades Mysterieuses" had prevented the death of "certain enclosed noblemen", as foreseen by the almanack.

All this has helped me to come to a decision, or rather, to free myself of an old and unhealthy desire.

No longer do I wish to become a gazetteer. Nor is this only because of the doubt (incompatible with the Faith) that our destinies may be governed by the caprices of the stars. It was something else that extinguished that old ardour in me.

In the gazettes which, since the adventure of the Donzello, I have had occasion to read in great numbers, I have found nothing of what Atto taught me. I am not speaking of facts: I already knew that the real secrets of sovereigns and states are never to be found in the broadsheets which are sold in our city squares. What is most lacking from the gazetteers' accounts is the courage to think matters through to their conclusion, a thirst for knowledge, and bold and honest testing of the intellect. It is not that newspapers are quite useless: they are simply not made for searchers after the truth.

I could certainly, even with the poor abilities at my disposal, have changed that state of affairs; but whoever dared divulge the mysteries of Fouquet and Kircher, Maria Teresa and Louis XIV William of Orange and Innocent XI, would at once be arrested, bound in chains and thrown forever into the prison for the insane.

What Atto said is true: knowing the truth is of no use to those who write gazettes. On the contrary, it is the greatest of obstacles.

Silence is the only known salvation.

What no one can restore to me and which I most sorely miss are not, however, words, but sounds. Of the "Barricades Mysterieuses" (alas, I could keep no copy) there remains to me only a faint and patchy memory, some sixteen years old.

I have made of it a sort of solitary divertissement, a joyous contest with my own memory. How was it, how did that passage sound, that chord, that bold modulation?

When the dog days of summer dry the head and the knees, I sit down under the oak that shades our modest cottage, in Pompeo Dulcibeni's favourite seat. Then I close my eyes and gently hum Devize's rondeau, once, twice, and then again, in the sure knowledge that my every attempt will be more faded, more uncertain, more distant from the truth.

A few months ago, I sent a letter to Atto. Not having his address in Paris, I sent it to Versailles, in the hope that someone would forward it to him. I am sure that everyone at court knows the famous castrato abbot, counsellor to the Most Christian King.

I confided to him my deep pain at having taken my leave without first expressing to him my gratitude and devotion. I offered him my services, begging him to do me the favour of accepting them and calling myself his most faithful servant. Last of all, I mentioned to him that I had written these memoirs, based upon my diary of those days, of which Atto will not even have suspected the existence.

Yet he has not so far replied to me. Thus, an atrocious suspicion has in recent times begun to disturb my mind.

What will Atto have reported to the Most Christian King on his return to Paris? Will he have succeeded in concealing all those royal secrets which he had discovered? Or will he have lowered his guard, browbeaten by so many questions, thus enabling the King to perceive that he was privy to too many infamies?

Thus, I sometimes imagine a nocturnal ambush in some obscure alleyway, a stifled cry, the footsteps of fleeing ruffians and Atto's body lying in blood and mire…

I shall not give up. Struggling with my fantasies, I continue to hope. And as I await the post from Paris, I sometimes quietly sing a verse or two of his old master, Le Seigneur Luigi:

Speranza, al tuo pallore so che non speripiu.

E pur non lasci tu di lusingarmi il core…

Hope, from your pallor

I know you hope no more.

And yet you do not cease

From flattering my heart…