Nobody mourns her.
PERHAPS the Prince mourns her, in fact he surely does. Or perhaps he feels slightly relieved. Perhaps both.
Nobody knows, for he speaks to no one. He goes about pale and worn and is no longer himself. His forehead is furrowed beneath the black fringe and he is a little bent. His dark eyes gleam strangely and are full of unrest.
I caught a glimpse of him today and it was then I noticed it. I have seen him very seldom of late. I do not serve at his table.
I have not visited the Princess since that last time. I hear she is in a coma. Now that Fiammetta is dead, they say the Prince visits her frequently, sitting by her bed and watching over her.
Human beings are so strange, I can never understand their love for each other.
THE ENEMY raised the siege and went away as soon as the plague began to spread among them. Boccarossa’s mercenaries have no desire to fight such a foe.
And so, the plague has put an end to the war as nothing else could have done. Both countries are pillaged, particularly our own. The populations are probably too exhausted after two wars to be able to go on. Montanza has achieved nothing and maybe his troops will take the pest home with them.
More and more people are dying here in the palace. The black hangings in honor of Angelica are still up and match the somber atmosphere.
I am quite excluded from the service of the court. Nobody summons me any longer, nobody has any orders for me. Least of all the Prince; I never set eyes on him at all.
I can see on everybody’s faces that there is something in the wind, but I do not know what it can be.
Has somebody maligned me?
I have withdrawn altogether to the dwarfs’ apartment where I live quite alone. I do not even go down to eat, but keep myself alive on a little old bread which I have up here. It is quite sufficient, I have never wanted much.
I sit here alone under the low ceiling, deep in thought.
I like this utter solitude more and more.
IT IS a long time since last I wrote anything in this book of mine. That is because things have happened which strongly affected my life and made it impossible for me to continue with my notes. I could not even get hold of them, and only now have I had them brought to me here.
I am sitting chained to the wall in one of the castle dungeons. Until recently, my hands were also manacled, though that was quite superfluous. I could not possibly escape. But it was meant to aggravate my punishment. Now at last I have been freed from them. I do not know why. I have not asked for it, I have asked for nothing. Thus it is a little more bearable now, though my condition has not changed. I have persuaded Anselmo my jailer to fetch my writing materials and notes from the dwarfs’ apartment so that I may have some slight recreation by occupying myself with them. He may have risked something by getting them for me, for though my hands have been freed it is not at all certain that they do not grudge me this little pastime. As he said, he has no right to grant me anything, however much he may wish it. But he is an obliging and very simple fellow, so at last I managed to persuade him to do it.
I have read through my notes from the beginning, a little every day. It has been a certain satisfaction thus to relive my own and several others’ lives and once again meditate over everything in the silent hours. I shall now try to continue from where I left off and thus provide myself with a little variety in my somewhat monotonous existence.
I do not really know how long I have been here. My time in prison has been so utterly uneventful, each day precisely like all the others, that I have stopped reckoning them and take no further interest in the passage of time. But I clearly recall the circumstances which led me to this dungeon and chained me to its wall.
One morning I was sitting peacefully in my dwarfs’ chamber when one of the assistant torturers suddenly came in through the door and commanded me to follow him. He gave no explanation and I asked him no questions, considering that it was beneath my dignity to address him. He took me down to the torture chamber where stood the executioner, big and ruddy and stripped to the waist. There was a lawyer there too, and after I had been shown the instruments of torture he exhorted me to make a full confession of all that had happened during my visits to the Princess, which, they said, had been the cause of her present deplorable condition. Naturally I refused to do any such thing. Twice he exhorted me to confess, but in vain. Then the executioner seized me and laid me on the rack to torture me. But the rack proved to have been made for bodies of a size different from mine, so I had to scramble down again and stand and wait while they altered it so that it could be used for a dwarf. I had to listen to their obscenities and foolish jests and their assurances that they were going to make a fine tall fellow of me. Then I was put back on the rack and they began to torment me in the most horrible way. Despite the pain I did not utter a sound but gazed scornfully at them as they performed their despicable trade. The man of law bent over me, trying to extract my secret from me, but not a word passed my lips. I did not betray her. I did not want her debasement to be known.
Why did I behave thus? I do not know. But I preferred to endure the worst rather than reveal anything which might degrade her. I compressed my lips and let them plague me for the sake of that detestable woman. Why? Perhaps I liked suffering for her sake.
At last they had to give up. They loosened the ropes, swearing vilely all the while. I was taken to a dungeon and loaded with the chains which had been made that time when I gave communion to my oppressed people and which, therefore, now came in very useful. That was a less inhospitable prison than my present one. A couple of days later I was brought up again and went through the same treatment. But again it was all in vain. Nothing could make me speak. I still carry her secret in my heart.
After a time I was confronted by a kind of court of justice where I learned that I was accused of all manner of crimes, among others that of having caused the death of the Princess. I did not know that she was dead, but I am sure that on hearing it not a muscle of my face betrayed my emotion. She had died without ever awaking from her coma.
They asked me if I had anything to say in my defense. I did not deign to answer. Then came the verdict. For all my wicked deeds and as the cause of so many misfortunes, I was condemned to be welded to the wall in the darkest dungeon under the fortress and to remain there in chains for all eternity. I was a viper and the evil genius of his Most Princely Grace, and it was his expressed wish that I should be rendered harmless for all time.
I listened unmoved to the sentence. My ancient dwarf face showed only scorn and mockery and I noticed that the sight of it filled them with fear. I was taken away from the court and since then I have seen none of these despicable beings except Anselmo who is so puerile that he is beneath my contempt.
Viper!
It is true that I mixed the poison, but on whose orders? It is true that I was the death of Don Riccardo, but who was it wished his death? It is true that I scourged the Princess, but who begged and prayed me to do so?
Human beings are too feeble and exalted to shape their own destiny.
One might have thought that I should have been condemned to death for all these atrocious crimes, but only the heedless and those who do not know my noble lord can be surprised that this was not so. I knew him far too well ever to fear anything like that; nor has he really so much power over me.
Power over me! What does it matter if I sit here in the dungeon? What good does it do if they clap me in irons? I still belong to the castle just as much as before! To prove it they have even welded me to it! We are forged together, it and I! We cannot escape from each other, my master and I! If I am imprisoned, then he is imprisoned too! If I am linked to him, then he too is linked to me!