I was on my way down to offer my last services to the Major-Domo when I remembered that I had left my gardener's apron and tools behind in Atto's lodgings. The Abbot would not, I thought, mind if I entered briefly to retrieve it. I obtained permission from one of the valets de chambre to take the keys to Melani's apartment. I had worked long enough among the villa's servants for them to trust me blindly.
Having entered and taken my apron, I was about to leave again when my attention was caught by what lay on Atto's bureau: a neat pile of absorbent powder and, nearby, two broken goose plumes. The Abbot must have written much, and in a great state of excitation, during our absence that afternoon. Only a fevered hand could have twice broken a pen. Might this have something to do with the letter which he had received and which had so perturbed him?
I glanced out of the window. Abbot Melani and Buvat were moving down one of the walks in the garden. They were on the point of disappearing from view when I remembered that a short while before I had, without being certain of recognising it, glimpsed a device in Atto's lodgings. I looked around me. Where could he have hidden it? On the dining chair, that was it. I was not mistaken. It was a telescope. Although I had never held one in my hands, I knew what these things looked like and how they functioned, for in Rome the celebrated Vanvitelli used similar devices to paint his famous and wonderful views of the city.
So I took the telescope and brought it to my eye, pointing it at the figures of Atto and his secretary now receding in the distance. I was surprised and delighted by the miraculous power of that machine, capable of rendering distant things near and minute things large. Thus, like wit, to cite Father Tesauro, it is able to render interesting that which is tedious, and gay, that which is sad. Flushing with emotion, with my eyelids still recoiling from the hard metal of the device, I aimed in error at the indigo of the sky and then at the green of the vegetation, at last succeeding in pointing its powerful regard in the right direction.
I saw Atto stop and bow deeply to a pair of cardinals, then to a noblewoman accompanied by two young ladies. Buvat, with a glass of his beloved wine already in one hand, tripped over a piece of wood and came close to falling against the noble lady. Melani went to great lengths to present his excuses to the three ladies, then upbraided Buvat discreetly but bitterly, while the latter, after setting down his glass, brushed the soil clumsily from his black stockings. It was not, however, easy to move along the drives; all around were the usual comings and goings of lackeys, servants and labourers, while the walks still had not been cleared of materials and refuse from the works for the construction of the theatre, the ephemeral architectural effects, the open-air tables, not to mention the gardening and irrigation works.
No sooner had I seen Atto and Buvat meet and talk to another pair of gentlemen than I decided. This was the opportune moment. If the French wolf had found his way into the sheepfold of the little Spanish lambkins, that gave me the chance now to spy out the wolf's lair.
To tell the truth, I was rather ashamed of my idea. The Abbot had taken me into his service, paying me handsomely. I was therefore beset by some hesitation. Yet, said I to myself at length, I may perhaps be more useful if I know better the requirements of my temporary master: including those which, for whatever reason, he had not yet revealed to me.
I therefore began to explore the apartment with some circumspection in search of the letters, or more probably one single letter which the Abbot had penned with such passion during our absence. I was certain that he had not yet had it sent; Buvat who, as the Abbot had already told me also copied his letters, had returned too late to produce a copy for Atto's archives, in accordance with the common practice among gentlemen. This was evident from the fact that I found no traces of sealing wax on the bureau, and the table candle (on which Atto would have had to heat the wax to seal his letter) was still uncut.
I searched fruitlessly. In Atto's trunk and among the things in the two wardrobes with which his apartment was furnished there was, on the face of it, no trace of the missives. Next to a geographical map and the manuscript of a number of cantatas, I came upon a little folder of commentaries on items of news. It was a set of notices and flyers from gazettes, heavily marked and annotated by the Abbot. They dealt for the most part with matters pertaining to the Holy College of Cardinals, and a number of Atto's notes referred to events far back in time. It was, in substance, a collection of gossip on the relations between the various eminences, on their rivalries, the tricks played on each other during conclaves, and so on and so forth. I found no little amusement in perusing them, however rapidly.
Spurred on by the scant time at my disposal, I soon took my search further. I opened a little medicine chest which, however, revealed only creams and ointments, a perfume for wigs and a bottle of the Queen of Hungary's Water; then, a second chest with a little mirror, a brooch, metal-tipped cords, a belt and two watch dials. I found nothing, nothing. My heart leapt suddenly when, lifting a woollen cloth, I discovered a pistol. Seventeen years earlier, he had got the better of our adversaries by disguising a pipe as a pistol, succeeding perfectly in deceiving the enemy. Now, however, he must truly fear for his own safety, said I to myself, if he has decided to travel armed.
After looking through shoes and purses, I began unwillingly to rummage through clothing; as usual, the Abbot had brought with him enough to last ten years. I diligently perused the long series of greatcoats, collars, short coats, hussar-style cloaks and cloaks in the Brandenburg style, capes and capouches, sashes and jabots in pleated Venetian lace, breeches, cuffs, mantles of pleated silk and long stockings. My rough hands smoothed the precious silks, the shining satins, the twills, the chamois leathers, the suedes, the damasks, the silk taffeta, the grograms, the striped and flowered linens, the ermines, with silks patterned or damasked, or in the Florentine style, the ferrandine silk and wool blends, the doublets, the brocaded cloth of gold and silver, the satins, shiny or quilted, the Milanese salia and the Genoese sateen. My eyes scanned the most recherche hues, from mouse-grey, pearl, fire, musk rose, dried roses, to speckled colours, scarlets, black cherry, dove-grey, jujube-red, berrettino grey, nacre, tawny, milky white, moire and gris castor, and the silver and gold foil and thread of fringes and braiding.
Among all that rich attire, the mauve-grey soutane in which Abbot Melani had appeared to me on that day, after so many years' silence, seemed distinctly out of place. With surprise, I saw that there were in fact no other outmoded items of apparel in that sumptuous wardrobe; on the contrary. I quickly realised that Atto had worn it deliberately for my sake, so that the sudden change in his manner of dress should not add to the gradual erosion which time effects upon faces and to ensure that his appearance today should correspond as far as possible to my memory. In other words, he knew how much I had missed him and wished to make a strong impression.
Still uncertain whether I should be grateful to him or resentful (it depended from which viewpoint one chose to consider the matter), I examined the soutane, which, I confess, was for me not without precious and distant memories of my youth. On its breast I felt something which I took initially for a jewel of some sort, but it turned out to be sewn onto the inside. Examining the lining of the soutane, I discovered not without extreme surprise a small scapular of the Madonna of the Carmel, the miraculous little scapular which the Most Holy Virgin had promised would, if worn on one's person, free the wearer from the torments of purgatory on the first Saturday after their death. What had, however, captured my attention were three little protuberances: in a tiny bag sewn onto the scapular, exactly at the level of the heart, were three little pearls.