Lucrezia Floriani, page 15
“Dear angel,” she said to him, “I would never have dared conquer the repugnance you felt on entering here. Although you had never spoken to me about it, I had more than guessed that the peculiarities of my old father could not seem attractive to you. But since fate, or some instinct of the heart, has brought you to the cottage of my birth and we are alone, I would like to show it you in detail Come!”
She took him by the hand and led him to the back of the room in which they now stood and which, together with the one they were about to enter and a kind of store-room cluttered with old furniture, broken and unserviceable (of which Menapace did not wish to lose the pieces), made up the whole of this rustic building.
The room which Lucrezia opened to the prince was the one which she had inhabited during her childhood. It was a kind of garret, lighted by a single narrow skylight, its walls mantled on the outside with wild vine and clematis. A ramshackle bed with a reed mattress covered by a calico sheet patched again and again, crudely coloured plaster figurines of saints, some drawings stuck on the wall and so blackened by time and damp that they were totally unrecognisable, a stone floor, rough and uneven, a chair, a chest and a small deal table – such was the wretched place in which the fisherman’s daughter had spent her first years and felt the gifts of energy and genius smoulder within her.
“This is where my childhood was spent,” said she to the prince, “and whether it was through a spirit of preservation or a remnant of affection ill-stifled under his stern resentment, my father did not change or disturb anything in it during my long hard peregrinations through the world That is the bed I had when I was a little girl I remember sleeping in it with my legs bent and aching as I grew too big for it Look, at the head of the bed, a branch of hazel catkin which is crumbling into dust and which I put there on Palm Sunday, on the day before my departure, my flight with Ranieri. That crude plaster statuette is the portrait of Joachim Murat, but a pedlar sold it me as the effigy of my patron saint, Saint Anthony, and I said my prayers before it for a long time in all faith. And over there you can still see a spool, some pins and needles which I used when making fishing-nets. The number of times I dropped or broke the mesh when my thoughts carried me far away from this monotonous work, the only kind which my father allowed me to do outside the household tasks! How I suffered from cold, heat, gnats, scorpions, from loneliness and boredom in this dear little prison! How happy I was to leave it and without even dreaming of bidding it farewell on the day when my beloved godmother said to me, ‘You will become ill or deformed if you remain in that room and that bed Come and live with me. You will not be as comfortable as I would like or as you could be, because my husband, although richer than your father, is no less careful with money than he is. But I will look after your needs secretly, I will teach you everything that you are thirsting to know, you will look after me when I am ill and you will keep me company. You will pass for my servant, for Signor Ranieri would not allow me to take you as my friend But we shall be no less friends in this exchange of services.’ What an admirable and excellent woman she was! She sensed my abilities and revealed them to myself Alas! It was she too who made me pluck the fruit of good and evil from the tree of knowledge…
“And later when her son fell in love with me and old Ranieri drove me from his house, I returned once more to my wretched little room. I was fifteen then. My father wished to force me to marry a loutish friend of his, too old for me, grim, obstinate, greedy, violent and well nick-named Mangiafoco. I was afraid of him. I used to hide in the bushes near the lakeside so as to avoid him, and whem my father went fishing at night by torchlight, I barricaded myself in this poor garret, in dread of Mangiafoco whom I could see prowling around the house. My young lover wished to kill him. I lived in constant terror, because Mangiafoco was capable of killing him first.
“This existence was intolerable. When I implored my father to protect me from this ruffian, he would say: ‘He doesn’t mean you any harm. He is madly in love with you Marry him, he is rich, he will make you happy.’ And when I tried to rebel he reproached me for my insane love for the son of my employers and threatened to deliver me to the brutal passions of Mangiafoco who would thus be able to force me to become his wife. I knew quite well that my father would never have done so, for I had heard him tell the fellow that he would kill him if he as much as tried to frighten me. But if my father was capable of avenging his family honour in this, he had not sufficient delicacy not to attempt to do violence to my inclinations by frightening me. Moreover, I was consumed with boredom. When I was with my benefactress I had acquired the gentle art of intelligent occupation. The tedious work on the nets left too much freedom to my imagination. I was obsessed by the desire for an existence utterly different from the one which was being imposed on me. I therefore accepted the offer of Ranieri which I had so long rejected. Our love was still pure. He swore to me that it would always be so and that when his father saw him run away, he would consent to our marriage. He carried me off and it was through this little window and over a plank thrown across the stream below the cottage that I ran away in the middle of the night.
“This time, however, I was not happy to leave my cottage. Besides fear and remorse for the error that I was committing, as I parted from this room and its old furniture, the calm and silent witnesses of my games of childhood and the restlessness of puberty, I experienced an incredible regret, as if I had had a sudden revelation of all the sorrows and misfortunes which lay before me, or perhaps it was the result of the attachment which we develop for the very places where we suffer most”
Lucrezia was wrong to relate part of her life thus to Karol. It gave her pleasure to open her heart to him, and as he was obviously moved as he listened to her, she thought she was fulfilling a duty towards him and that he was grateful to her for it But at that moment he had not sufficient strength to receive confidences of this nature, nor to hear the mere mention of the name of a former lover. He was too oppressed to interrupt her with even the slightest remark, but a cold sweat appeared on his brow, and his mind, seizing upon the pictures which she set out before him, was harrassed by them in the most agonising manner conceivable.
However, this account was a truthful vindication of Lucrezia and her first error – the fatal source of all the others. Karol felt that he had not the right to refuse to listen to it and that the place and the moment held a certain solemnity which he could not flee.
“I had no need to hear all that,” he finally said with an effort, “to know that you have never obeyed evil instincts. I told you once: what would be wrong in others is right in you. A daughter who abandons her old father is guilty, but you, Lucrezia, were perhaps authorised to escape from his brutal and impious law. Heavens! How right I was when I could not bear to look at that old man without the utmost dislike!”
“Do not hasten to condemn him in order to diminish my wrongs,” she retorted “You misjudge him and do not know him. After accusing him to you, let me now show you the fine side of his character. It is a duty I must perform, isn’t it?”
Karol sighed and nodded agreement His principles commanded him to respect her filial piety, but his instinct could not accept the avarice and narrow despotism of such a father. What he did not realise was that he himself was much more tyrannical towards Lucrezia in his jealousy than Menapace had ever been with his paternal authority and his money.
16.
“Men are never logical or consistent in their best or their worst qualities,” said Lucrezia, “and in order to avoid passing from one extreme to the other, from an excess of esteem to an excess of blame, in order to preserve affection and trust for those whom duty tells us to love, we must form a fair picture of them, see the good and the bad with some degree of calmness and, above all, remember that in most men a vice is sometimes a virtue carried to extremes.
“My fathers vice is parsimony. I must mention this without delay for otherwise we would not recognise that his virtue is a spirit of equity and a fanatical respect for established rule. Loving money passionately – like all peasants – he is distinguished from them in that the theft of a blade of grass appears as a crime to him. His meanness lies in his eternal fear of waste which leads to destitution. His greatness is this same instinct of avarice put to the service of those whom he loves to the detriment of his own well-being, his health, and almost his life.
“Thus he has amassed – admittedly in a mean and ugly way – a miserable sum, buried no doubt in some recess in the cottage. From time to time he buys small plots of land in the belief that this will ensure the honour and future dignity of his grandchildren. To attempt to persuade him that a good education and talents are a better investment would be utterly futile. Having remained a peasant both in body and soul, he only understands what he sees. He knows how grass grows and seed germinates and without suspecting that that is a greater miracle than all human achievement, he calmly says that it is a natural fact Speak to him of things which can be proved and explained, of a steamship, for example, or a railway, and he will smile and say nothing. He does not believe in the existence of what he has not seen and if he were told to go to the other side of the lake to convince himself of it with his own eyes he would not go for fear it was a hoax.
“My life has taught him nothing of society, the arts, the power of intellectual gifts or the exchange of ideas. He never asks questions about such matters nor does it please him to hear conversations on subjects which are utterly unfamiliar to him. He believes that if I have made a fortune in my artistic career it is due to fortuitous circumstances which he would advise me not to risk again. Then he advances the following argument which is both very plausible and very ingenuous: ‘You artists earn a lot of money, but you need to spend even more. You acquire this taste from associating with one another and from gadding about So that you work to excess to enable you to have a little pleasure. I who spend nothing and have no taste for pleasure earn less, but what I have acquired I keep. Therefore my work is more pleasant and more lucrative than yours. You are poor and I am rich; you are slaves and I am free.’
“This explains his lack of esteem and admiration for the fame I have acquired. He is not flattered by it and, if you ask my opinion, I regard this kind of scorn for my futile triumphs as one of the most interesting aspects of his character and most worthy of respect The career which I pursued has conflicted too much with his ideas of elementary order for him to have retained much affection for me; in any case he has never felt real affection for anyone. With him everything is transferred to principles of cold, rigid equity. When my mother died on giving birth to me he made an oath never to remarry if I survived, in the conviction that a stepmother could never love the children of a previous marriage. And he kept his word, not out of love for the memory of his wife, but through a sense of his duty towards me. He brought me up with every possible care and watched over me in a way of which few men are capable when dealing with a small child; but I don’t think that he ever gave me a single kiss. He never thought about it. He never felt the urge to clasp me to his heart and he thinks that I spoil my own children because I caress them. He asks what good it does them and what advantages they derive from it. When, after an absence of fifteen years, I came here and flung myself at his feet, begging his forgiveness and trying to justify my behaviour, he said: ‘None of that concerns me, I know nothing about what is permitted or forbidden in the world you speak of. You refused the husband I meant for you, you disobeyed me – that is what I blame you for. You loved your master’s son and you turned him away from the obedience he owed his father, which was a bad thing and could have done me harm. None of those people are left now; you have come back and you have given me a lot of presents. I know how I am to behave towards you. Let us never speak of the past, there is an end to everything and I forgive you on condition that you bring up your children with a sense of order and good behaviour.’ Thereupon he shook my hand and that was all.
“Well, my dearest, in the course of my life on the stage I have seen something of the private lives of many artists and I am going to tell you what happens in nine cases out of ten. The artist and in particular the dramatic artist always comes from the poorest and humblest ranks of society. Whether his parents have intended him to be the bread-winner or chance and outside influence have revealed and utilised his talents, even if he is still only a child, he immediately finds himself burdened with maintaining, carrying, clothing, feeding and even amusing his family. It will be he who will pay his brothers’ debts, it will be he who will find suitable husbands for his sisters, it will be he who will invest all the fruits of his labour in safe funds to ensure a handsome pension for his father and mother against the day when he will wish to buy his freedom from them.
“It is women above all who suffer most in the world of art. This would be reasonable if it did not take shameful advantage of their strength, their health, and what is worst, alas! their honour, in order to make quicker profits, and by means of prostitution protect them from failure before their audiences. In this case the theatre also serves as a showcase, and more than one stupid and beautiful young woman pays for the privilege of showing herself – if only for a moment – on the boards, wearing provocative clothes, so as to make herself known and find clients.
“When this gullible young woman, this poor victim happens to have character and pride, whether she has managed to preserve her innocence or has yielded to infamous suggestions and justifiably resents it, as soon as she threatens to break with her family they collapse, tremble, flatter and crawl. I have seen these shameless fathers and odious mothers waiting in the wings, holding their daughter’s shawl, almost kissing the feet which have danced at a thousand francs per evening, performing the office of lackeys at home, making a downy nest for the goose that lays the golden eggs, in short, stooping to unparalleled servility, despicable complaisance and the vilest of flattery – all to retain the glory and profit which are to be gained by belonging to the great coquette, the prima donna or merely the courtesan of the moment.
“That kind of family would have made me weep with shame, and whenever I thought of my old father, the peasant, who had not wished to leave his nets so as to come and share my luxury, who refused to answer my letters, accepted my remittances of money solely to build up a dowry for my daughters, yet insisted on rising before the dawn, living in a thatched cottage and existing on two penn’ orth of rice daily, it seemed to me that I was of illustrious birth, and I felt proud of the plebeian blood that flowed in my veins.
“It is quite true that as in all things human all this has its occasional touches of pettiness and absurdity. It is true that my father refused to accept my letters if I ever forgot to stamp them; it is true that to-day he deplores what he calls my prodigality and that when he has sold his fish he shows a silver coin to Celio with a look of triumph and says: ‘At your age I was already earning this amount and at my present age I am still earning it. I will give it you to help you when you go out into the world and wish to earn some money too.’ It is also true that if he saw me give a hundred francs to an unfortunate penniless friend he would almost heap curses upon my head. I am often obliged to tolerate his oddities, but I am also always compelled to respect his pride and his homespun stubbornness. If he is harsh to others, he is even more so to himself. He works with the zeal of a young man, he is never indiscreet or importunate, he lives in his stoicism without ever verifying what he does not understand. Many another parent would have filled my existence with annoyances, drunk himself into a stupor at my table or made me blush for his coarseness. The situation of my father in relation to me was very delicate, and without any attempt to reason or calculate, he has kept it dignified, independent, and from his point of view, generous. Although showered with gifts from me he can still regard himself as the head and protector of the family, since he works and amasses money for the sake of my children’s happiness. I smile at his manner of doing things, but not at his intentions. And now, Karol, do you understand why I love and still bless my old father? Haven’t you noticed that I look like him and don’t you think that I have something of his character?”
“You?” cried Karol. “Good Heavens! Nothing at all”
“Oh yes, I have,” Lucrezia insisted “I owe something to the pride of the blood which he has transmitted to me. I have found myself in difficult situations; I have been loved by rich men; I had friends from whom I could have accepted help without dishonour. But the idea of imposing privations or an excess of work on others when I felt young, strong and industrious would have been intolerable to me. I have been accused of many faults and those which I have committed have been cruelly exaggerated; but not even the people worst disposed towards me have ever harboured the slightest shadow of a doubt concerning my independence and my integrity. I have been the manager of a theatre, I have handled practical matters, I have done what is called business – even complicated, difficult, delicate business. When I dealt with so many pretentious, vain or unreasonable people, my principle, in doubtful cases, was always to pay double my debt rather than argue; without being thrifty I have always been orderly, and although I have been charitable I have not jeopardised my fortune. The fact is I have never been extravagant for reasons of self-satisfaction. The woman who gives what she has to the less fortunate is more sober and sensible than the woman who mortgages what she does not have in order to procure jewels and carriages for herself.
“I myself have never had a taste for empty luxury. The possession of a small, valueless object which reveals the intelligence and taste of its maker is much more precious to me than that of a diamond necklace. I prefer what is good and true to what is showy and the object of envy. Without disciplining myself to a life as frugal as my father’s, I have trained myself to habits of moderation. Affection is the only instinct which I do not rule with temperance of the mind, and that is the only thing in which I differ from him. But if I have not been a kept woman, if the bribes of corruption did not tempt me when at sixteen I found myself at grips with the difficulties of existence, if I can still command respect from those who criticise me, you may be sure it is because I am the daughter of old Menapace. Admit then, that appearances are deceptive and that nature establishes strong ties and profound relations between beings who at a first glance seem utterly different.”
