The Viceroys (77 page)

The Abbess, with a waxen face amid white veils, was well into her second childhood, and from behind the parlour gratings did nothing but repeat to her niece what had been impressed on her, saying, ‘You must carry out your father and mother's wishes. Our Lord orders it, Our Immaculate Virgin orders it, our protector St Joseph orders it …' Her voice had taken on the lilt of recitation of a Litany. And there among the convent walls, Teresa remembered her distant childhood, the old fear she had felt when they put her on the wheel to take her into the impenetrable convent. But she also remembered the nuns' praises when she helped to deck the altars with flowers and light the candles before the Crucifix. ‘A holy little nun! A holy little nun!…' And the instinct of sacrifice, the urge of
humility, the thirst for rewards which had preoccupied her as a child, awoke in her again. Her confessor suggested a further scruple: that of urging another soul to sin; for she did not now know it, but so it was—the younger Radalì had threatened to rebel openly against his mother.

This was untrue. Giovannino had no idea of rebellion at all; at the announcement of his brother's intended engagement he just lost his gaiety. Baldassarre, more determined than ever about arranging the second son's marriage, no longer understood what was happening. ‘Had Giovannino paid court to his cousin or not? Had the signorina shown she liked him or not? Was the duke Michele totally indifferent to his cousin as he was to all other girls or not? Was he very fond of his own brother or not? Then who was all this muddle due to? To the prince, stubborn like all the Uzeda …' Baldassarre at one point put a hand over his mouth so as not to repeat people's opinions about the family ‘and of the duchess, who was not part-Uzeda for nothing …'

The centenary of Blessed Ximena was celebrated with unusual pomp. For the triduum the church of the Capuchins, all red drapery, gold fringes and flowered carpets, was lit up like broad day. Bells rang festively; Masses said continuously on every altar drew huge crowds of faithful of all kinds. The Saint's descendants also came, but at different times, to avoid each other, so much did they love one another.

The princess and Teresa, the first day, lingered to beg their glorious relative to heal prince Giacomo, who for two weeks had been kept to his bed by mysterious ailments. But the greatest solemnity was reserved for the third day, when after Pontifical High Mass the people would be admitted to contemplate the relics.

Already the Father Guardian, helped by Father Camillo and Monsignor the Vicar-General, had produced a little volume entitled ‘
On the tercentenary of the canonisation of Blessed Uzeda
', printed with much display of margins and colours. All the relatives had received a copy, and Teresa, who had gone to Confession and was waiting to go to Holy Communion on the day of the great feast, meditated over her own copy. The legend of the Saint, which she had heard repeated piecemeal and in
differing versions, was narrated consecutively in that booklet.

‘Ximena, of the illustrious stock of Uzeda,' so began the first chapter, ‘was daughter of the Viceroy Consalvo and of the noble Caterina born Baroness of Marzanese. From her tenderest years she was an example of edification to her family, delighting in sacred images and the Divine Offices. Although her natural choice was to dedicate her life to her Celestial Spouse, yet her father was persuaded for political reasons to marry her to the Count of Motta-Reale, a mighty Spanish noble, but a man of cruel mind and with no fear of God.' There followed a narrative of Ximena's refusal, her long weeping, and the conflict between her filial and her celestial love. But one day when the girl was fifteen a singular miracle occurred; an angel appeared to Ximena and said to her, ‘The Lord has chosen you to redeem a soul; obey.' Then the girl accepted the match.

The second chapter described the count's castle, set on an eminence, ‘astride many trade routes', and narrated the wickednesses of her lord. ‘He attacked travellers, left them naked and tied to trees by the roadside, or took them prisoners, or murdered them amid cruel torments.' His life was an orgy; ‘he abused women, guzzled and drank from morn till night, cursed God and the Saints, and laughed at the Ministers of Heaven'. And the torments he inflicted on his bride were the subject of the third chapter. ‘Jeered at all day for her devout practices, forced to hear the coarse talk of that evil man and his henchmen, to observe their wickedness, to be present at their rascalities, Ximena made of her faith an ever-stronger shield, praying for the Almighty's forgiveness for these fallen souls. But that wretched husband of hers in his iniquity, exacerbated by such exemplary sanctity, maddened by the protection his wife gave to the poor creatures who had fallen into his clutches, put Ximena to such a proof that the very pen blushes to narrate it. One night, drunk from all the wine swilled, he let his friends penetrate into the nuptial chamber where Ximena was reposing after a day spent in prayer and good works. The wretched girl awoke all of a sudden, and, terrified by the drunken men's shifty eyes, leaped from the bed and fell at the feet of a sacred image of the Blessed Virgin of Perpetual Succour which she always kept with great devotion above the bed. Then a new miracle
occurred; the frenzied crew stopped as if some magic ring were preventing them getting any nearer to the woman, and coming suddenly to their senses, they made the Sign of the Cross before the image, then left the room.'

When one fine day the count set off for his estates in Spain and his wife remained in Sicily alone, all suddenly changed in the castle of Motta-Reale. ‘Where before there had echoed obscene songs and clash of swords and sounds of shot, savage cries and sad laments, now only the praises of the Most High rose to heaven. That place, once the terror of passers-by, became a hospice for the derelict and sick drawn there by the countess's great reputation for charity. She lodged pilgrims, adopted orphans, helped the needy, cured the sick, tended wounds and sores with her own hands and healed them most wonderfully. On the spots where so many wretches had fallen victims to the count were raised altars and crosses in expiation of old crimes and for the conversion of unbelievers. All Ximena's fortune was divided among churches; she herself lived a frugal life, saying “little is too much, a lot alarms me”. Not content that the poor should come to her, she would go to the poor herself, facing storms and perils, visibly protected by Heaven …'

There was no news meanwhile of the count. What was he doing? Where was he? ‘One stormy night, while lightning flashed and thunder crashed, the countess got up, woke her maid, and said to her, “Go and open the gate, someone is knocking.” The woman replied, “No one is knocking; 'tis the thunder.” And a second time the countess got up and said to the woman, “Go and open, someone is knocking.” And the woman replied, “No one is knocking, 'tis the wind.” And a third time the countess got up and said to the woman, “Go and open, someone is knocking,” and the woman replied, “No one is knocking, 'tis the rain.” But when she was ordered to waken the servants, the maid herself rose. When the castle gate was opened, a beggar was found, asking for the mistress of the house. This was an old man, ragged and barefoot, whose face was stamped with the stigma of vice; the terrible disease which is the just punishment of the dissolute had corroded away his features and his eyes were closed to the light of day. He was dying of hunger, could scarcely stand, and would have been at
the mercy of any small child. Who was this old man? It was the Count of Motta-Reale!

‘Having squandered all his riches in dissipation and gambling, lost his health, been abandoned by his former comrades in debauchery, rejected by all from horror of the disease destroying him, he had dragged himself from one place to another, blaspheming and cursing; till, having returned to Sicily, he heard of the great charity of a woman who greeted and tended all the sick, even those with leprosy. And as he climbed up to the castle and entered it, his dead eyes had been unable to recognise his old lair or his dulled ears to distinguish his consort's voice. But she had recognised him. And, after restoring him with food and drink, dressing his wounds and washing his feet, Ximena put him to rest in her own bed … And the wretch, who till a few hours before had cursed and despaired, felt for the first time a gentle sweetness in his veins and a fire of gratitude melt his stony heart … But now his hour had sounded, and God had arranged to give him not the ephemeral health of the body, but the true health of the soul … The old man, cared for by the Blessed Ximena, entered his death agony amid the gentle murmur of her prayers. But his end had nothing dreadful about it at all; in fact he seemed completely healed, and to hear ineffable music and breathe sweet perfumes when a short time before he had been rotting and suppurating all over … And a smile of contentment played about his mouth as his lips murmured, “Who art thou who dost not reject me and who grantest me back life?” … And the Blessed Ximena replied, “Look me in the face.”

‘Then came the greatest miracle. The blind man's eyes opened; he recognised his wife, the woman he had maltreated and offended and who alone was protecting him now in his wretchedness and infirmity; and at the instant when his soul, forgiven and redeemed, rose to heaven, from his lips came the words, “A Saint, O Lord! a Saint!…” '

Teresa's eyes were bathed in tears of emotion; but the little book was not finished. The last chapter narrated new, greater, clearer proofs of charity and sanctity given by the Blessed Ximena after her husband's death. At the end it told of her death and her miracles. ‘She had not yet expired when flights
of little birds came and settled on the roof of her house, perched on her balcony, entered her little room like celestial messengers come to meet her lovely soul. Sweet scents of roses and jasmine and hyacinths spread like incense from her body, and a great number of sick, brought to look at her for the last time on her death-bed, were miraculously healed on kissing the hem of her robe.

‘By divine prodigy the earthly remains of this chosen soul were preserved from corruption; after all the centuries the Blessed Ximena's flesh still keeps the freshness and colour which it had in life, so that she seems deep in some divine dream. During plagues and other private and public calamities Blessed Uzeda has operated innumerable miracles, proved before the Sacred Courts of Rome. And for this reason, we hereby publish for the first time the cause for her canonisation, which we have been able to procure thanks to the noble intercession of his Most Eminent Cardinal Lodovico Uzeda, the Blessed Ximena's distinguished descendant.'

The reading of this story, the solemnity of the centenary, the harangues by her confessor, her stepmother and her aunt the nun, her father's illness, even the raising of her uncle Lodovico to the supreme dignity of the Church in those same days, all united to bend Teresa's heart like wax.

After all, was she being forced to marry a monster as the Saint had been in her time? Michele was no monster; he was a good young man. And her parents were not forcing her, they were just trying to persuade her, showing her the virtue of obedience, speaking for her own good, for the peace of two families, for the health of her father, made ill—it was said—by all his rebuffs. They were warning her not to follow Consalvo's sad example, and promising her every reward, earthly and celestial.

Then that solemn ceremonial of the centenary, particularly on the third day, the adoration of the relics! She had gone to the altar steps for Holy Communion, had received the Sacred Host, while the smoke of incense and the scent of great masses of flowers were wafted in the air and bells rang festively and the organ played, grave and potent. How many brows had been bowed, how many prayers murmured before the Saint, to whom she had been compared herself! But for years and years she had
been terrified at the idea of actually seeing the dead woman's centuries-old corpse, as if by some new and ghastly miracle the lifeless body might raise itself in its coffin, break the glass and grasp the living amid the nauseating stench of rotten balsam … With the crowd opening respectfully to let them pass as she advanced towards the glittering chapel, her terror grew, turned her to ice, her legs felt as if they were giving way, cold shivers ran down her backbone. Ah, that coffin!

With eyes tight shut she fell on her knees, overwhelmed, trembling, beside herself with terror. A voice beside her murmured:

‘Pray to her for your father … promise her that you will be good like her …'

And from fear, to get away at once, to avoid seeing that horror, she replied, with tight-shut eyes:

‘Yes …'

More time passed. The prince's health improved and relapsed, the duchess came to the palace with her elder son, the network of advice, persuasion and inducement grew tighter round Teresa. Her stepmother told her that Giovannino, so as not to be an obstacle to his brother's happiness, had given an example of obedience and gone off to Augusta where he had settled to look after his properties. Teresa considered herself as bound by her vows to the Saint; and she consented. Only one condition did she make. To her stepmother she said:

‘I'll do what you wish on condition that father promises me one thing. That he'll make peace with
my
brother and agree at least to see him, even if he doesn't want him to live here again. That he'll end the quarrels with my uncle and aunt and come to an agreement. It won't be difficult to conclude if each gives way in something. With your permission, I will talk to my aunt and uncle myself.' Her voice was grave, her eyes lowered.

‘What a saint!' exclaimed Donna Graziella. ‘Your dear mother must be inspiring you! Thus shall we see peace return among us!… I'll talk to your father at once and we'll obtain what you wish.' Next day in fact she announced:

‘Your father agrees. Consalvo will come here on the day when your future husband does. We will go and invite your
uncle and aunt ourselves. And let's hope for a settlement of the quarrel.'