Caesar or Nothing Part 11

Caesar took refuge in the entrance to a bazaar. The rain began to a.s.sume the proportions of a downpour. An old friar, with a big beard, a white habit, and a hood, armed with an untamable umbrella, attempted to cross the square. The umbrella turned inside out in the gusts of wind, and his beard seemed to be trying to get away from his face.

"Pavero frate!" said one of the crowd, smiling.

A priest pa.s.sed hidden under an umbrella. A tough among the refugees in the bazaar-doorway said that you couldn't tell if it was a woman or a priest, and the cleric, who no doubt heard the remark, threw a severe and threatening look at the group.

It stopped raining, and Caesar continued his walk along the Corso. He went a bit out of his way to throw a glance at the Piazza di Spagna.

The great stairway in that square was s.h.i.+ning, wet with the rain; a few seminarians in groups were going up the steps toward the Pincio.

Caesar arrived at the Piazza del Popolo and stopped near some ragam.u.f.fins who were playing a game, throwing coins in the air. A tattered urchin had written with charcoal on a wall: "Viva Musolino!"

and below that he was drawing a heart pierced by two daggers.

"Very good," murmured Caesar. "This youngster is like me: an advocate of action."

It began to rain again; Caesar decided to turn back. He took the same route and entered a cafe on the Corso for lunch. The afternoon turned out magnificent and Caesar went wandering about at random.

_THE CICERONE_

At twilight he returned to his inn, changed, and went to the salon.

Laura was conversing with a young abbe. "The Abbe Preciozi.... My brother Caesar."

The Abbe Preciozi was one of the household of Cardinal Fort, who had sent him to the hotel to act as cicerone to his nephew.

"Uncle has sent the abbe so that he can show you Rome." "Oh, many thanks!" answered Caesar. "I will make use of his knowledge; but I don't want him to neglect his occupations or to put himself out on my account." "No, no. I am at your disposition," replied the abbe, "His Eminence has given me orders to wait on you, and it will not put me out in the least."

"You will have dinner with us, Preciozi?" said Laura.

"Oh, Marchesa! Thank you so much!"

And the abbe bowed ceremoniously.

The three dined together, and afterwards went to the salon to chat.

One of the San Martino young ladies played the viola and the other the piano, and people urged them to exhibit their skill.

The talkative Neapolitan turned over the pieces of music in the music-stand, and after discussing with the two _contessinas_, he placed on the rack the "Intermezzo" from _Cavalleria Rusticana_.

The two sisters played, and the listeners made great eulogies about their ability.

Laura presented Caesar and the Abbe Preciozi to the Countess Brenda and to a lady who had just arrived from Malta.

"Did you know Rome before?" the Countess asked Caesar in French.

"No."

"And how does it strike you?"

"My opinion is of no value," said Caesar. "I am not an artist. Imagine; my specialty is financial questions. Up to the present what has given me the greatest shock is to find that Rome has walls."

"You didn't know it?" asked Laura.

"No."

"Dear child, I find that you are very ignorant."

"What do you wish?" replied Caesar in Spanish. "I am inclined to be ignorant of everything I don't get anything out of."

Caesar spoke jokingly of a square like a hole in the ground, out of which rises a white column similar to the one in Paris in the Place Vendome.

"What does he mean? Trajan's column?" asked Preciozi. "It must be," said Laura. "I have a brother who's a barbarian. Weren't you in the Forum, too?"

"Which is the Forum? An open s.p.a.ce where there are a lot of stones?"

"Yes."

"I pa.s.sed by there; there were a good many tourists, crowds of young ladies peering intently into corners and a gentleman with a bag over his shoulder who was pointing out some columns with an umbrella. Afterwards I saw a ticket-window. 'That doubtless means that one pays to get in,' I said, and as the ground was covered with mud and I didn't care to wet my feet, I asked a young rascal who was selling post-cards what that place was. I didn't quite understand his explanation, which I am sure was very amusing. He confused Emperors with the Madonna and the saints. I gave the lad a lira and had some trouble in escaping from there, because he followed me around everywhere calling me Excellency."

"I think Don Caesar is making fun of us," said Preciozi.

"No, no."

"But really, how did Rome strike you, on the whole?" asked the abbe.

"Well, I find it like a mixture of a monumental great city and a provincial capital."

"That is possible," responded the abbe. "Undoubtedly the provincial city is more of a city than the big modern capitals, where there is nothing to see but fine hotels on one hand and horrible hovels on the other. If you came from America, like me, you would see how agreeable you would find the impression of a city that one gets here. To forget all the geometry, the streets laid out with a compa.s.s, the right angles...."

"Probably so."

The abbe seemed to have an interest in gaining Caesar's friends.h.i.+p.

Caesar said to him that, if he wished, they could go to his room to chat and smoke. The abbe accepted with gusto, and Caesar, being a suspicious person, wondered if the Cardinal might have sent the abbe to find out what sort of man he was. Then he considered that his ideas must be of no importance whatsoever to his uncle; but on the chance, he set himself to throwing the abbe off the scent, talking volubly and emitting contradictory opinions about everything.

After chattering a long while and devoting himself to free paradox, Caesar thought that for the first session he had not done altogether badly. Preciozi took leave, promising to come back the next day.

"If he reports our conversation to my uncle, the man won't know what to think of me," reflected Caesar, on going to bed. "It would not be too much to expect, if His Eminence became interested and sent to fetch me.

But I don't believe he will; my uncle cannot be intelligent enough to have the curiosity to know a man like me."

VI. THE LITTLE INTERESTS OF THE PEOPLE IN A ROMAN HOTEL. _INTIMACIES_

During some days the main interest of the people in the hotel was the growing intimacy established between the Marchesa Sciacca, who was the lady from Malta, and the Neapolitan with the Pulcinella air, Signor Carminatti.

The Maltese must have been haughty and exclusive, to judge from the queenly air she a.s.sumed. Only with the handsome Neapolitan did she behave amiably.

In the dining-room the Maltese sat with her two children, a boy and a girl, at the other end from where Caesar and Laura were accustomed to sit. At her side, at a table close by, chattered and jested the diplomatic Carminatti.