Hunting Season: A Novel Page 8

  “How many blessings do you want to extract? You’re already taken care of by the priest. What do you want?”

  “Father Macaluso says you should drop in at the church, at m’lord’s convenience, of course.”

  “And why should I drop in at the church? Tell Father Macaluso he should drop in to see me.”

  After the sacristan had raced back and forth three or four times, the two parties reached an agreement. They would meet at six o’clock sharp in the square, between the church and the Circolo.

  Naturally, they did not greet each other.

  “I want to talk about your daughter,” said Father Macaluso, getting right to the point.

  “And why should I talk about her with you?”

  “Because I’m a priest and I’m supposed to look after the souls of my parishioners.”

  “You’re asking me to discuss ’Ntontò’s soul?”

  “For the love of God, Marchese, don’t make me lose my temper. You know how easily I get upset, and I might piss outside the urinal.”

  “Well, you should know that if you piss outside the urinal, I’m liable to shit outside it.”

  “I know. That’s why I’m suggesting that we set off, both of us, on the right foot. All right?”

  “All right.”

  “Would you please explain to me what sort of life your daughter leads? The poor thing! Shut up indoors all the time, in deep mourning! She only goes out on Saturdays to confess and on Sunday mornings to take Communion, and then at Christmas and Easter, on the feast of the patron saint, and on All Souls’ Day to go to the cemetery.”

  “It seems to me she’s got all the entertainment she needs, and then some. What more do you want, a marching band?”

  Father Macaluso had difficulty restraining himself.

  “You, moreover, are clearly not a good father.”

  “Here we go again! What the hell have I got to do with it?”

  “Oh, you’ve got plenty to do with it, damn it all!” said the priest, beginning to get worked up. “You are never at home, but we all know where you are, and I even learned this morning that your sin will soon bear fruit. Are you not ashamed?”

  “No, I’m not. I have no sense of shame. I follow nature.”

  “Well, then, you should let your daughter follow nature, too, and in a more respectable manner.”

  “And what would that be?”

  “Marry her off.”

  The marchese suddenly calmed down. The idea of being rid of ’Ntontò and clearing the way to bringing Trisina home with him could only appeal to him.

  “She’s never wanted to get married. And to think that she’s had so many attractive offers.”

  “But now it would be easy to persuade her. She’s been left almost completely alone.”

  “Have you got someone in mind?”

  “Yes,” said the priest, but then he hesitated.

  “Come on, out with it. What’s his name?”

  “Fofò La Matina. He’s an honorable man, has no vices, doesn’t drink, smoke, or gamble.”

  “And every now and then he pops.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Nothing,” said the marchese. Then, after a pause, he continued: “Whose brilliant idea was this? Yours,’Ntontò’s, or the pharmacist’s? Or all of you put together?”

  “Your daughter and the pharmacist know nothing about this. It’s something I and my dear friend, Signora Colajanni, have been thinking about.”

  “May I say something?”

  “Of course.”

  “You and your dear friend can go and take it you-know-where.”

  Father Macaluso had made a vow, at the main altar, not to have it out with the marchese.

  “Would you at least tell me what you have against the pharmacist?”

  “I have nothing against the pharmacist. Actually, I rather admire the man. But he’s got no social standing whatsoever. His father worked the land for my father. And you want me to give my daughter to the son of a clodhopper? Look, I’ve already forgotten what you said to me. Bring me someone of my daughter’s station, and then we can talk.”

  “Why, are you asking me to play matchmaker now?”

  “Why not? After all, you’re already wearing a dress.”

  It turned into a shouting match.

  Fifteen days before Trisina gave birth, Don Filippo grew very restless. He could not sit still for a minute, paced about the house lengthwise and widthwise, and didn’t sleep a wink at night. He answered everyone rudely when addressed, and nothing worked the way he thought it should. One morning, as he was looking out the window at his property, he started shouting that the rows of grapevines were all crooked and needed to be set straight; another time he cursed the whole day long because the rooster did not crow at a specific time of the morning, but whenever it suited him. The rooster problem was serious.

  “I have to go and talk to that shit of a rooster,” he said to Natale. “He wakes me up when he shouldn’t, and when he should, he doesn’t give a damn.”

  “So, go and talk to him, then,” replied Natale, resigned.

  The discussion between the marchese and the rooster took place without the others’ knowing about it. They realized, however, that the rooster had not budged from his intention to do things his way, since they found him with his neck broken.

  One week before the expected date, the marchese went into town and returned in the carriage with Mimì, followed by a farmhand with a caleche and the midwife, who had been paid her weight in gold. All the newborns of Vigàta who came into the world during her absence would have to make it on their own.

  Fofò La Matina solemnly promised that he would come to Le Zubbie in three days. The little house was turned into a sort of campsite. The marchese slept in his own bedroom, the pharmacist in the room built for Natale, Maddalena—brought back just in case—in the shed, Mimì and the farmhand in the stable, Trisina and the midwife in the master bedroom, and Natale in a straw hut in the vineyard within earshot.

  When Trisina started yelling that her water had broken, the multitude ran to her bedside. Only Natale and the marchese ran out of the house, sitting down on the stone wall of the well. They were teetering back and forth, like trees buffeted by the wind. And it wasn’t clear whether it was a gesture of affection or precaution when the marchese put his arm around Natale. There was a stampede of people coming and going with pots of boiling water and clean rags as Trisina screamed that she was breaking in two. Then a mysterious silence ensued, so complete that the two embracing men did not take a breath. It lasted an eternity. Pirrotta was staring at an ant climbing the stone wall, Don Filippo at a cricket that was cleaning itself. They were roused from their stupor by the voice of the midwife, who was holding in one hand a sort of slaughtered, upside-down rabbit and shouting for joy:

  “Come! It’s a boy! It’s a boy!”

  Each supporting the other, the two men, gimpy-legged, stood up.

  The day after the birth, the marchese wanted to give Fofò La Matina a lift into town with the caleche. After they had been traveling a while, the pharmacist was the first to break the silence.

  “Please forgive me, Marchese, but I feel obliged to tell you something.”

  “Fire away,” said Don Filippo, who was in a good mood.

  “You’re no longer a young man. And you eat a lot. Your face is too ruddy. You should give it some thought.”

  “What should I do?”

  “I could apply some leeches, for preventive purposes.”

  “Fofò, I prefer to have my blood sucked in other ways.”

  “But, sometimes, when you’ve eaten a great deal, don’t you feel a burning in the pit of your stomach?”

  “Burning? I feel fire! Some nights Trisina spends hours making me gallons and gallons of water and laurel.”

  “Water and laure
l is only a palliative. With your permission, I will make you ten or so tablets. If you come by the pharmacy this afternoon, I’ll have them ready for you. You should take one after each meal, if you’ve eaten a lot.”

  After dropping off Fofò in Vigàta, the marchese continued on to the provincial capital and appeared at the home of Scimè the notary.

  “Have you decided to make a will?” asked the notary, who was an old friend of his.

  The marchese touched his balls dramatically.

  “You know how it is, Scimè. I’m convinced that if I draw up a will, two days later I’ll be in the graveyard. No, I came because I want to make a bequest straightaway: all of Le Zubbie to a baby boy who was born yesterday. And then I want to adopt him.”

  “As far as the bequest is concerned, there’s no problem. Adoption, however, is a complicated matter. I’ll begin the paperwork tomorrow. But tell me something: Who is this baby boy?”

  “The son of my field watcher’s wife.”

  “All right, but where do you come in?”

  “Oh, I come in, Scimè, believe me. I come in the same way the Holy Spirit came in.”

  Returning to Vigàta, he went to see ragioniere Papìa, took him to eat at an inn, and talked about business. He did not go home to see ’Ntontò.

  At a certain point he dropped in at the pharmacy, picked up a little box of pills, and returned to Le Zubbie.

  Pasta al ragù with chunks of sausage, suckling goat with potatoes, and a strange wine that Mimì had brought back and Trisina and Natale had never seen before. When the cork came out it made a pop so loud it sounded like a rifle shot. And it was treacherous: it went down as easy as water, but before long one’s head was spinning. Such was the luncheon with which the marchese had wanted to celebrate the baby’s first month of life.

  When he had finished eating, Don Filippo said the meal was sitting a bit heavily on his stomach.

  “Want me to go get the pills, m’lord?” asked Trisina.

  “No, Trisì. I think I’ll go lie down in bed. If I fall asleep, wake me up at four.”

  He brought a glass of water with him into his bedroom, took a pill from the little cardboard box he kept on his bedside table, swallowed it, and lay down in bed.

  When Trisina went to wake him at four, he was dead.

  It was still dark outside when Mimì opened his eyes suddenly, hearing somebody pounding and kicking the great door and calling out wildly. He rolled out of bed, ran to open the door, and found Natale Pirrotta before him, pale and trembling as if he had malaria.

  “What’s going on?”

  “The marchese . . . yesterday afternoon, after eating . . . he went out for a little walk . . . and we haven’t seen him since . . . I’ve looked everywhere . . . but I can’t find him.”

  Mimì made a snap decision. He sent Natale off to inform Inspector Portera while he himself, dressed as he was, went to shake the pharmacist out of bed.

  Around midday one of Inspector Portera’s men, who had ventured all the way to Vaso di Failla, a deep, desolate, funnel-shaped gorge strewn with jagged rocks and crumbly, treacherous clay, with a few rare clumps of sorghum here and there, fired a shot in the air to alert the others who had spread out in several directions. The marchese’s body lay at the bottom of the gorge. When he arrived at the spot, Portera made everyone take a few steps back and started reading what the ground had to tell him. Then he called the others.

  “The marchese slipped from here. See that streak right at the edge? The ground is naturally slippery there, so you can imagine what it would be like after the three days of rain we’ve had. Poor Don Filippo tried to stop his fall. See how that shrub of sorghum over there is stripped away? But it wasn’t enough, and he kept on slipping. Then he must have gathered speed, probably broke his neck, and at the end of his fall even hit his head on a rock.”

  “Why do you think he was already dead when he hit his head?” asked Fofò La Matina.

  “Because there’s very little blood on the rock. In any case, we’ll know more after we bring in the body. But my question is: Why did he venture so far from home, and to such a dangerous place?”

  “The marchese, poor guy, wasn’t all there in the head anymore,” said Pirrotta.

  “Oh, no?”

  “It’s true,” interjected the pharmacist. “A few days ago Pirrotta told me the marchese broke a rooster’s neck because the animal didn’t crow at the right time of day.”

  Then he turned and addressed Pirrotta directly:

  “Did the marchese eat a lot yesterday?”

  “I’d told him not to; I’d warned him about eating so much. He must’ve fainted, or felt dizzy, and then he fell.”

  “Well, let’s be patient,” Portera concluded, “and take him away from here.”

  “May I ask a question?” inquired Fofò.

  “Go right ahead.”

  “Who should inform the daughter?”

  There was silence. Nobody had the courage to volunteer.

  “Well, if that’s the way it is, I’ll take care of it myself,” said the pharmacist. “I’ll go at once, so she’ll be prepared when her father comes home dead.”

  Portera was a born cop. He sensed that something didn’t add up in this affair, but couldn’t figure out what.

  When the body was recovered from the gorge, he sent it on to Vigàta with Mimì and dismissed his men as well. He brought his horse up alongside Pirrotta’s mule.

  “I want to see the room the marchese slept in.”

  The first thing he noticed, upon entering the room, were the items on the bedside table: wallet, leather pouch, and a small cardboard box. Don Filippo’s gold watch had been found in the pocket of his vest, still running, though the chain had been broken. The wallet was full of money, and the pouch filled with coins. Inside the little box he found four white pills.

  “Do you know what these are?” he asked Trisina, who was nursing her baby.

  “Yessir. Pills the pharmacist gave to m’lord. They helped the burning in his stomach.”

  “I’m taking the wallet, pouch, and box with me.”

  “As you wish, sir,” said Pirrotta.

  The inspector sat down, poured himself a glass of wine without asking permission, and began questioning.

  “Whose kid is that?”

  “What do you mean, whose kid? He’s mine,” said Pirrotta.

  “Why was the marchese living here instead of at home?”

  “We’re not the ones you should be asking that. Maybe it’s ’cause after his son died, he felt more comfortable living with us.”

  “Why, didn’t he feel comfortable at home?”

  “Seems not. An’ he felt so comfortable here, in fact, that he left all the land in Le Zubbie in our son’s name.”

  The revelation hit the inspector like a punch in the stomach. The motive for a possible homicide had just fallen away. Pirrotta felt no pity for him.

  “And he wanted to adopt him. And me an’ Trisina were in favor of it. And if you don’t believe me, you can go ask Scimè the notary.”

  “So, now that the marchese’s dead, there’s not going to be any adoption.”

  “No, sir, no more adoption.”

  “If it was up to us, the poor marchese, bless his soul, should’ve lived to be a hundred!” Trisina said, bursting into tears.

  They waited for the sound of Portera’s galloping horse to recede before beginning to talk. The baby had been set down to sleep, and they had a great many things to say.

  “You were right,” said Trisina.

  “Of course,” said Pirrotta. “If they found ’im dead in the house, they would’ve sent us straight to San Vito prison. The law is always on the side of the nobles. As the proverb says: Sauta un torzolu e va in culu all’ortolano—‘When a plant goes missing, it ends up in the gardener’s ass.’”

  Without
warning, Trisina felt a flash of warmth down below, a pang of desire that anticipated her first postpartum menstruation by a good ten days.

  “Oh, Natale, my sweet Natale, love of my life!”

  She jumped on his lap and started kissing his neck. And this time Pirrotta held her close.

  “What are these pills in here?” the inspector asked, setting the little box on the counter in front of the pharmacist.

  “Where did you find them?”

  “On the marchese’s bedside table at Le Zubbie.”

  Fofò La Matina opened the box and looked inside. There were four pills left.

  “I made these for the marchese, to alleviate his heartburn.”

  “How many were there?”

  “Ten.”

  “Are you sure you didn’t make a mistake?”

  “As to the number?”

  “No, not as to the number. As to what you prepared for him.”

  The pharmacist’s face hardened.

  “I have never made a mistake in my life. And if you have any doubts, send those pills wherever you like and have them tested.”

  “It hadn’t even crossed my mind!” said the inspector, pocketing the little box.

  (But of course it had crossed his mind, and he sent the pills to Palermo only to receive a negative response one month later. They consisted only of bicarbonate of soda and extracts of digestive herbs.)

  The wake proceeded according to a specific ritual, which was, moreover, a timeworn tradition, since Palazzo Peluso had seen more than its share of deaths.

  The marchese lay on the bed, a white band over his forehead to hide the wound. He looked as if he was dreaming, and his dream must have been beautiful, to judge by the smile on his face. Father Macaluso had arranged to have a rosary wrapped around the deceased’s hands, but, for no apparent reason, every so often the rosary slipped out and onto the bed.

  The women sat along the walls and prayed. The men, on the other hand, paid their last respects to Don Filippo, then withdrew to the salon to talk and smoke.