Indeed he cannot see the ass
That's grinning at him from the glass!
'Do you understand those verses now?' he asked. 'Albicastro made idiots of us, and took great pleasure in so doing. I really want to look him in the face, that insolent Dutchman, and demand an apology,' he added, with a warlike expression on his visage, as he motioned me to follow him downstairs.
Armed to the teeth, we had been defeated by a few mirrors and our imagination. Now Abbot Melani wanted to unload his anger and shame on the only other occupant of the Vessel. The only flesh and blood one, at any rate.
Of course, we could not find him. Albicastro belonged to that rare class of persons who appear by surprise ('to make a nuisance of themselves,' Atto added) and never when one looks for them.
Atto insisted on searching bath chambers, store rooms and the like, but it very soon became quite clear that there was no trace of the Dutchman in the whole of the Vessel.
'We fear what we cannot understand,' I recited, reminding the Abbot of his own philosophising two days previously when I had taken the little dog in Borromini's perspective gallery for a colossus.
'Shut up and let us return to Villa Spada,' he muttered, his face dark with anger.
We made the brief journey without exchanging a word. I was thinking. Every single one of the mysteries which we had encountered, and which had caused Abbot Melani or myself (or both) to tremble, had become clear in the end: the Dutchman had been walking on a cornice hidden from our view; the flowers from the mythical gardens of Adonis had turned out to be common plants like garlic and castor bean; the gallery of the Vessel which seemed to extend as far as the Vatican Hill was just a clever trick with mirrors; the infernal tongues of flame and the faces of dead souls which we had seen in Ugonio's den at the Baths of Agrippina, and which had succeeded in convincing me that I myself was dead, were the mere product of camphor vapours; the roaring monster which I feared was about to devour me at Palazzo Spada was in reality nothing but a lapdog, whose dimensions had been made to appear gigantic by the false perspective of the Borromini gallery; and, last of all, we had taken our own reflections in distorting mirrors for the Tetrachion. For one thing only we had found no explanation: the apparitions of Maria, Louis and Fouquet in the gardens of the Vessel. The Abbot had invoked his theory of corpuscles and hypothetical hallucinogenic exhalations, but nothing more; unlike all the other mysteries, we had found no concrete solution to this one.
While these thoughts were turning around in my mind, Abbot Melani continued to hold his peace. Who knows, perhaps he too was asking himself the same questions, I thought, glancing at him out of the corner of my eye.
Flere, my reflections were brought sharply to an end. I saw Abbot Melani grow pale, paler than the ceruse on his face. We had come by now to the gates of the Villa Spada and Atto was staring at something in the distance.
Amidst the perfume of the flower beds, there reigned a great confusion of valets, porters, secretaries, with trunks and travellers' baskets of provisions being hauled onto departing carriages, and a going and coming of eminences and gentlemen amiably taking their leave of the master of the house, making appointments to meet at a degree ceremony at the Sapienza University, at some consistory, or at a mass for the repose of somebody's soul.
I was just wondering what could have so altered the Abbot's humour, when I saw one of Sfasciamonti's catchpolls pointing out a stranger to us. The shock to my heart was tremendous. I could already see myself accused by the parish priest of Saint Peter's of breaking into the basilica, identified by the Bargello's men, tried and cast into a dungeon for twenty years. Terrified, I looked at Atto. I did not even attempt to flee. At Villa Spada, everyone knew where I lived. The stranger's face was tense, tired, quivering. Soon he confronted us.
'An urgent message for Abbot Melani.'
'He stands here before you, speak up,' said I, feeling greatly relieved, while the Abbot said nothing, his face drawn, staring fixedly before him, almost as though he already knew — and feared — the message which the man was about to deliver to him.
'Madama the Connestabilessa Colonna: her carriage is a short distance from here. She begs you not to leave; within an hour, you will meet.'
Rooted by my own legs, I expected some reaction from Atto, some free expression from his soul, some genuine impulse from the heart.
But the old Abbot did not open his mouth. He did not even quicken his footsteps; on the contrary, he seemed slower and more uncertain.
We reached his apartments without a word. Here, he took off his wig, slowly stroked his forehead and sat down, suddenly very tired, before the dressing table.
He began to whistle an unknown tune. His whistling was short of breath and uncertain, often breaking off in his throat as he looked sadly at his own naked, hoary and almost bald head reflected in the looking glass.
'This is a tune from the Ballet des Plaisirs of Maestro Lully,' said he, continuing to explore his face; then he stood up and donned his dressing gown.
I stood open-mouthed. That messenger had just announced the imminent arrival of the Connestabilessa, and Atto was not getting ready?
Did Melani no longer believe in her coming? He was not entirely to be blamed; too many times already, he had awaited her in vain. This time, however, there seemed to be no doubt about it: Maria was already almost at the gates of the Villa Spada, there were no more impediments. Of course, what she was coming for now that the festivities were over may have been somewhat less than clear. Perhaps she was coming to offer her tardy tribute, and her apologies, to Cardinal Spada.
'Everyone at court was astonished when, a few months ago, they suddenly heard His Majesty sing this same music from memory. An air which he and Maria had sung together for a whole season during their amorous promenades forty years ago. Everyone was surprised, except me.'
I understood. In fact, I knew perfectly well for what purpose Maria Mancini was coming: she was obeying the wish of the Most Christian King, as she herself had written to Atto; and she was prepared to listen to Atto's entreaties on the King's behalf and his offer that she should return to France. To assure himself of her attention, to move her, and lastly, to persuade, Atto must therefore call upon memory. He must be able to recall and report to the Connestabilessa, looks, moments, words pronounced by the King, of which she could not know but which the Abbot must at all costs be able to give life to in her eyes and in her heart.
'Since the time of the Affair of the Poisons, when he thought that the world was collapsing on his head, His Majesty has increasingly asked his ministers to request my services,' Melani explained, 'and ever more frequently in the missives which I received Madama the Connestabilessa Colonna was mentioned: How was she? What was she doing? And so on.'
Maria, he continued in a bitter tone of voice, had for some time taken refuge in Spain, persecuted by her husband, the Constable Colonna, whom she had abandoned when she fled Rome. The poor woman spent her time in and out of convents and prisons.
'During all those years, I did not fail in truth to bring her news to the attention of the Most Christian King.'
I held my breath. Melani was at last beginning to confess to being the King's go-between with the Connestabilessa. Perhaps he would soon tell me the whole truth, which secretly I already knew.
'Until one day,' Atto continued, 'when the King, after being compelled to suppress the Affair of the Poisons, began to show more vividly on his face that old secret trembling whenever he heard the name Colonna.'
Colonna: that name, the Abbot revealed, bore more of a sting for Louis XIV than the familiar 'Maria'. 'Colonna' carved into his regal flesh, always as though for the first time, the knowledge that their separation was forever: she belonged to another; and then there were the three sons by that prince, the Grand Constable Lorenzo Onofrio Colonna, whom Maria had conceived and given birth to.
'And above all, the cruellest torment was to know that she had never forgotten him, so much so that she fled from the yoke imposed upon her by that husband, despite the strong passion of the senses which, as I had not failed to inform the King, he aroused in her.' Thus Atto concluded, his mouth watering as one compelled ever to live such passions vicariously, with his nose glued to the monastic grate which separates his unfortunate kind from ordinary men and women.
'Signor Atto, you've told me nothing about Prince Colonna, Maria's only husband.'
'There is not much to be said,' said the Abbot, cutting me short, thoroughly irritated.
