Innocence. Julian Barnes

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СКАЧАТЬ or race, we must remember that, in Macchiavelli’s words, Nature has implanted in everything a hidden energy which gives its own resemblance to everything that springs from it, making it like itself. We can see the truth of this in the lemon tree, whose smallest twig, even if the tree is unfortunate enough to be barren, still has the fragrance which is the soul of the lemon.’ This letter was relevant, and it was civilized, but it was not helpful. With great difficulty and many enquiries the Ridolfi followed up reported instances of midget families, so that by the time she was six their only child had a retinue suitable to her position, a tiny governess, a tiny doctor, a tiny notary, and so forth, all to size. The child never went out, and was confident that the world consisted of people less than 1.3 metres high. To amuse her, a dwarf (not a midget) was sent for from Valmarana, but without success. She pitied him, because she thought how much he must suffer from knowing that, as a dwarf, he was different from anyone else at Ricordanza. Then, in trying harder and harder to make her laugh, he fell and cracked his head, which made the little girl cry so bitterly that he had to be sent away.

      The Ridolfi suffered from having to practise so many deceptions on their daughter. But deception, to a quite unexpected extent, grows easier with habit. The whole property had, of course, been extensively adapted, although only one of the special stairways through the gardens remains today, with its miniature steps of grass and marble. As to the statues, none of them were made by local sculptors, though so many stone-quarries were handy. The commission was given to someone completely unknown, thought by some authorities to have been a Turkish prisoner of war.

      At the same time Count Ridolfi heard of a little midget girl, illegitimate but of good family, who lived as far away as Terracina, and they arranged for her to come and live with them. Fortunately she was born dumb, or, at all events, when she arrived at the Ricordanza she was dumb. It was impossible, therefore, for her to describe the human beings she had seen while she lived outside the walls of the villa.

      All the care and attention of the little Ridolfi were now for Gemma da Terracina. Having failed to teach this new and beloved friend to talk, which was something even the cage birds could do, she asked to give up studying Latin and Greek herself, or, at least, never to have them read aloud. Music was an even more serious matter. The Ridolfi had a private organist, and nobody who has ever seen it will ever forget the toy-like instrument in the salotto, whose sounds are still as clear as a bird’s. It must have been a sacrifice to silence this organ, and probably quite a needless one, since there was no proof that Gemma was deaf.

      But less than twelve months later Gemma began to grow at a very noticeable rate, as though her body had set itself to make up for its eight stunted years. By the next spring she was a head taller than the family doctor, who lived with the chaplain and the notary in a suite of rooms built for them over the chapel. The doctor, consulted, had very little to suggest. He tried administering oil of juniper to stunt the growth, and then, when this failed, a remedy of Pliny’s, who says that Greek tradesmen used to rub a hyacinth bulb over young slaves to prevent the growth of pubic hair. The Ridolfi began to fear that their doctor was a fool. In anguish, they searched on all sides for better advice. Della Torre was, once again, of little comfort. Another letter of his, now in the Biblioteca Nazionale, points out the folly, in the last resort, of attempting to reverse Nature. ‘Don’t be so concerned,’ he adds, ‘with the matter of happiness.’ There is also an exchange between Ridolfi and his brother, the Cardinal Archbishop of Florence, who says nothing about Nature, but warns that human happiness must be left to Heaven. ‘Certainly,’ the Count replies, ‘as far as I myself am concerned, but surely I am right to exert myself on other people’s account, what better study could there be?’ And his daughter was not in the least concerned about herself, only about her friend. She knew, after all, that if Gemma were ever to have to go back to the outside world, where no-one was more than 1.3 metres in height, she would be treated as a monster — dumb, into the bargain, and unable to explain herself. The whole situation was cruelly embarrassing already. And the little girl took to walking a few steps ahead of Gemma, so that their shadows would be seen to be the same length.

      The Count reflected that neither Nature nor Heaven has allowed for anyone, certainly not for any child, with such a compassionate heart as this only daughter of his. Impossible and unthinkable to separate her now from Gemma, and he was driven to promise her that if she could think of any way to help Gemma in her desperate condition they would try it, no matter what the cost.

      She was now about eight years old, the age at which the mind works logically and without hesitation on what it has learned so far, because it is not troubled by the possibility of any other system. It was for this reason (for instance) that she had never questioned the fact that she herself was confined to Ricordanza. She knew, on the other hand, something about pain, and that it was worth suffering to a certain extent if it led to something more appropriate or more beautiful. Sometimes, for example, when it was a special occasion, she had her hair curled. That hurt a little. The lemon trees, too, on the terraces of the Ricordanza, were sometimes dipped by the gardeners in boiling water, so that they lost all their leaves but the new leaves grew back more strongly.

      Meanwhile, Gemma had taken to going up and down the wrong steps in the garden, the old flights of giant steps which had been left here and there and should have been used only for the occasional games. The little Ridolfi made a special intention, and prayed to be shown the way out of her difficulties. In a few weeks an answer suggested itself. Since Gemma must never know the increasing difference between herself and the rest of the world, she would be better off if she was blind — happier, that is, if her eyes were put out. And since there seemed no other way to stop her going up and down the wrong staircases, it would be better for her, surely, in the long run, if her legs were cut off at the knee.

2

      This story is not the one given out nowadays in the leaflet provided by the Azienda di Turismo or by the Committee for Visiting the Most Beautiful Villas of Florence — it starts in the same way, but ends differently. Nor, probably, is the Ricordanza, for all its high and airy position, for all its lemon terraces, really one of the most beautiful villas of Florence. Nor, in a sense, is the present Count Ridolfi really a Count, although the leaflet calls him that, because all titles were abolished in Italy after the Second World War. And, in the course of their descent, the Ridolfi family has taken so many turns and half-turns, so many doubtful passages, that the past generations can hardly be held responsible for those of the twentieth century. No more midgets among them now. Still a tendency towards rash decisions, perhaps, always intended to ensure other people’s happiness, once and for all. It seems an odd characteristic to survive for so many years. Perhaps it won’t do so for much longer.

3

      In 1955 Giancarlo Ridolfi, at the age of sixty-five, had made a serious decision to outface the last part of his life, and indeed of his character, by not minding about anything very much. But his resolution was shaken not only by his love for his daughter Chiara, but by concern for his elder sister, Maddalena. This was at the time when Chiara, having just turned eighteen, told them that she wanted to marry a doctor, Doctor Salvatore Rossi. He was young, not so very young, thirtyish, a specialist at the S. Agostino Hospital, clever, very hard-working. ‘Hard-working, I suppose that means he’s from the South,’ said Maddalena.

      Giancarlo had been born in 1890, by which time the Italian nobility had been put in their place, and no longer held important public office. His father had brought him up quietly on the small family farm of Valsassina, thirty kilometres to the east of Florence. All of them lived quietly, in reduced circumstances (the Ridolfi were never, at any time, successful with money). The old Count had his clothes made by a country tailor, and went down in the evening to drink wine, the wine from his own estate, at the village cantina, where jokes improved every time they were repeated. Until the 1900s the family had never been to the seaside and had no idea that it might be a place to go to, instead СКАЧАТЬ