"He must have heard. It can be no news to you that the works about to
be made upon the river Edera will necessitate the purchase of the
land known as the Terra Vergine."
Here the Syndic put on gold spectacles, drew towards him a black
portfolio filled by plans and papers, and began to move them about,
muttering, as he searched, little scraps of phrases out of each of
them. At last he turned over the sheets which concerned the land of
the Alba.
"Terra Vergine -- Commune of Ruscino -- owners Alba from 1620 --
family of good report -- regular taxpayers -- sixty hectares -- land
productive; value -- just so -- humph, humph, humph!"
Then he laid down the documents and looked at Don Silverio from over
his spectacles.
"I conclude, most reverend, that you come empowered by this young man
to treat with us?"
"I venture, sir," replied Don Silverio respectfully, "to remind you
again that it is impossible I should be so empowered, since Adone
Alba was ignorant of the reason for which he was summoned here."
Corradini shuffled his documents nervously with some irritation.
"This conference, then, is a mere waste of time? I hold council
to-day --"
"Pardon me, your Excellency," said Don Silverio blandly. "It will not
be a waste of time if you will allow me to lay before you certain
facts, and, first, to ask you one question: Who is, or are, the buyer
or buyers of this land?"
The question was evidently unwelcome to the Syndic; it was direct,
which every Italian considers ill-bred, and it was awkward to answer.
He was troubled for personal reasons, and the calm and searching gaze
of the priest's dark eyes embarrassed him. After all, he thought, it
would have been better to deal with the boor himself.
"Why do you ask that?" he said irritably. "You are aware that the
National Society for the Improvement of Land and the foreign company
of the Teramo-Tronto Electric Railway combine in these projected
works?"
"To which of these two societies, then, is Adone Alba, or am I, as
his _locum tenens_, to address ourselves?"
"To neither. This commune deals with you."
"Why?"
Count Corradini took off his glasses, put them on again, shifted the
papers and plans in his imposing portfolio.
"May I ask again -- why?" said Don Silverio in the gentlest tones of
his beautiful voice.
"Because, because," answered the Syndic irritably, "because the whole
affair is in treaty between our delegates and the companies. Public
societies do not deal with private individuals directly, but by
proxy."
"Pardon my ignorance," said Don Silverio, "but why does the commune
desire to substitute itself for the owner?"
"It is usual."
"Ah! It is usual."
Corradini did not like the repetition of his phrase, which would not
perhaps bear very close examination. He looked at his watch.
"Excuse me, Reverend Father, but time presses."
"Allow me to crave of your bounty a little more time, nevertheless. I
am not habituated to business, but I believe, if I understand your
worshipful self aright, the commune contemplates purchasing from the
individuals, with power and intent to sell to the companies."
What an unmannerly ecclesiastic! thought Corradini; for indeed, put
thus bluntly and crudely what the commune, as represented by himself,
was doing did not look as entirely correct as could be desired.
"I was in Rome, most illustrious," said Don Silverio, "in
connection with this matter some months ago?"
"In Rome?"
To hear this was unpleasant to the Syndic; it ha never occurred to
him that his rural, illiterate, and sparsely populated district would
have contained any person educated enough to think of inquiring in
Rome about this local matter.
"To Rome! Why did you go to Rome?"
"To acquire information concerning this scheme."
"You are an owner of land?"
"No, sir. I am a poor, very poor, priest."
"It cannot concern you, then."
"It concerns my people. Nothing which concerns them is alien to me."
"Humph, humph! Most proper, most praiseworthy. But we have no time
for generalities. You came to treat of the Terra Vergine?"
"Pardon me, sir; I came to hear why you summoned Adone Alba, one of
my flock."
"Could he not have come himself? It had been but his duty."
"He could not, sir; and, to say truth, he would not. He does not
intend to sell his land."
"What!"
Corradini half rose from his chair, leaning both hands on the table,
and staring though his glasses across the mass of portfolios and
papers at the priest.
"He will have no choice allowed him," he said with great anger. "To
the interests of the State all minor interests must bend. What! a
mere peasant stand in the way of a great enterprise?"
"You intend expropriation then?"
The voice of Don Silverio was very calm and sweet, but his
countenance was stern.
Corradini was irritated beyond measure. He did not desire to play
that great card so early in the game.
"I do not say that," he muttered. "There must be parliamentary
sanction for any forced sale. I spoke in general terms. Private
interest must cede to public"
"There is parliamentary sanction already given to the project for the
Valley of Edera," said Don Silverio, "expropriation included."
Count Corradini threw himself back in his chair with an action
expressive at once of wrath and of impotence. He had an irritating
sense that this priest was master of the position, and knew much more
than he said. In reality Don Silverio knew very little, but he had
skill and tact enough to give a contrary impression to his auditor.
He followed up his advantage.
"Expropriation is to be permitted to enforce sales on recalcitrant
landowners," he continued. "But that measure, even though conceded in
theory, will take time to translate into practice. I fear, sir, that
if it be ever put into execution we shall have trouble in your
commune. Your council has been over hasty in allying itself with
these speculators. You and they have not taken into account the
immense injury which will be done to the valley and to my own village
or town, call it as you will, of Ruscino. The people are quiet,
patient, meek, but they will not be so if they are robbed of the
water of the Edera. It is the source of all the little -- the very
little -- good which comes to them. So it is with Adone Alba. He has
been God-fearing, law-abiding, a good son, excellent in all
relations; but he will not recognise as law the seizure of his land.
Sir, you are the elected chief of this district; all these people
look to you for support in their emergency. What are these foreign
speculators to you that you should side with them? You say this
commune will purchase from its peasant proprietors in the interests
of these foreigners. Was it to do this that they elected you? Why
should the interests of the foreigners be upheld by you to the injury
of those of your own people? Speaking for my own parish, I can affirm
to you that, simple souls as they are, poor in the extreme, and
resigned to poverty, you will have trouble with them all if you take
it on you to enforce the usurpation of the Edera water."
Count Corradini, still leaning back in his large leathern chair,
listened as if he were hypnotised; he was astounded, offended,
enraged, but he was fascinated by the low, rich, harmonious
modulations of the voice which addressed him, and by the sense of
mastery which the priest conveyed without by a single word asserting
it.
"You would threaten me with public disorder?" he said feebly, and
with consciousness of feebleness.
"No sir; I would adjure you, in God's name, not to provoke it."
"It does not rest with me."
He raised himself in his chair: his slender aristocratic hands played
nervously with the strings of the portfolio, his eyelids flickered,
and his eyes avoided those of his visitor.
"I have no voice in this matter. You mistake."
"Surely your Excellency speaks with the voice of all you electors?"
"Of my administrative council, then? But they are all in favour of
the project; so is his Excellency the Prefect, so is the Deputy, so
is the Government. Can I take upon myself in my own slender
personality to oppose these?"
"Yes, sir, because you are the mouthpiece of those who cannot speak
for themselves."
"Euh! Euh! That may be true in a sense. But you mistake; my authority
is most limited. I have but two votes in Council. I am as wholly
convinced as you can be that some will suffer for the general good.
The individual is crushed by the crowd in these days. We are in a
period of immense and febrile development; of wholly unforeseen
expansion; we are surrounded by the miracles of science; we are
witnesses of an increase of intelligence which will lead to results
whereof no living man can dream; civilisation in its vast and
ineffable benevolence sometimes wounds, even as the light and heat of
the blessed sun --"
"Pardon me, sir," said Don Soverio, "at any other moment it would be
my dearest privilege to listen to your eloquence. But time passes. I
came here on a practical errand. I desire to take back some definite
answer to Adone and Clelia Alba. Am I to understand from you that the
municipality, on behalf of these foreign companies, desires to
purchase his land, and even insists upon its right to do so?"
The Syndic, accustomed to seek shelter from all plain speaking in the
cover of flowery periods such as those in which he had been arrested,
was driven from his usual refuge. He could not resume the noble and
enlightened discourse which had been thus recklessly cut in two. He
tied the strings of the portfolio into a bow, and undid them, and
tied them again.
"I have received you, sir, _ex officio_," he replied after a long
silence. "You address me as if I possessed some special individual
power. I have none. I am but the mouthpiece, the representative of my
administrative council. You, a learned ecclesiastic, cannot want to
be taught what are the functions of a Syndic."
"I am to understand then that I must address myself on behalf of my
people to the Prefect?"
Corradini was silent. The last thing he desired was for this
importunate priest to see the Prefect.
"I must go into council at once," he said, again looking at his
watch. "Could you return? Are you remaining here?"
"Some hours, sir."
"Will you dine with me at my house at three? You will give me much
pleasure, and the Countess Corradini will be charmed."
"I am grateful for so much offered honour, but I have promised to
make my noonday meal with an old friend, the superior of the
Cistercians."
"An excellent, a holy person," said Corradini, with a bend of his
head. "Be at my house, reverend sir, at five of the clock. I shall
then have spoken with the assessors of your errand, and it will be
dealt with probably in council."
Don Silverio made a low bow, and left him free to go to his awaiting
councillors, who were already gathered round a long table covered by
green cloth, in a vaulted and stately chamber, stories from Greek
mythology carved on its oaken doors and stone cornices.
"Pray excuse me, gentleman," said the courtly mayor to his assessors,
taking his seat on an old walnut-wood throne at the head of the
table. "I have been detained by this matter of the Valdedera. I fear
the people of that valley will show an ungrateful and refractory
temper. How hard it is to persuade the ignorant where their true
interests lie! But let us to business."
"It will be a hard matter," said the Prior to Don Silverio as they
walked together in the little burial-ground of the monastery between
its lines of rose-trees and its lines of crosses, after the frugal
noonday meal had been eaten in the refrectory. "It will be a hard
matter. You will fail, I fear. The municipalities here smell money.
That is enough to make them welcome the invasion. What can you do
against the force of gold?"
"Would it avail anything to see the Prefect?"
"Nothing. He is cousin to the Minister of Agriculture, whose brother
is chairman of the Teramo-Fermo Company. We are governed solely by
what the French call _tripotage_."
"What character does this Syndic bear?"
"A good one. He is blameless in his domestic relation, an indulgent
landlord, a gentleman, respectful of religion, assiduous in his
duties; but he is in debt; his large estates produce little; he has
no other means. I would not take upon me to say that he would be
above a bribe."
At five of the clock, as the Syndic had told him to do, Don Silverio
presented himself at the Palazzo Corradini. He was shown with much
deference by an old liveried servant into a fine apartment with
marble busts in niches in the walls, and antique bookcases of oak,
and doorhangings of Tuscan tapestry. The air of the place was cold,
and had the scent of a tomb. It was barely luminated by two bronze
lamps in which unshaded oil wicks burned. Corradini joined him there
in five minutes' time, and welcomed him to the house with grace and
warmth of courtesy.
"What does he want of me?" thought Don Silverio, who had not been
often met in life by such sweet phrases. "Does he want me to be
blind?"
"Dear and reverend sir," said the mayor, placing himself with his
back to the brass lamps, "tell me fully about this youth whom you
protect, who will not sell the Terra Vergine. Here we can speak at
our ease; yonder at the municipality, there may be always some
eavesdropper."
"Most worshipful, what I said is matter well known to the whole
countryside; all the valley can bear witness to its truth," replied
Don Silverio, and he proceeded to set forth all that he knew of Adone
and Clelia Alba, and of their great love for their lands; he only did
not mention what he believed to be Adone's descent, because he feared
that it might sound fantastical or presumptuous. Nearly three hundred
years of peasant ownership and residence were surely titles enough
for consideration.
"If land owned thus, and tilled thus by one family, can be taken away
from that family by Act of Parliament to please the greedy schemes of
strangers, why preserve the eighth commandment in the Decalogue? It
becomes absurd. There cannot be a more absolute ownership than this
of the Alba to the farm they live on and cultivate. So long as there
is any distinction at all between _meum et tuum_, how can its violent
seizure be by any possibility defended?"
"There will be no violent seizure," said Corradini. "The young man
will be offered a good price; even, since you are interested in him,
a high price."
"But he will take no price -- no price, if he were paid million; they
would not compensate for his loss."
"He must be a very singular young man."
"His character is singular, no doubt, in an age in which money is
esteemed the sole goal of existence, and discontent constitutes
philosophy. Adone Alba wants nothing but what he has; he only asks to
be left alone."
"It is difficult to be left alone in a world full of other people! If
your hero wants a Thebaid, he can go and buy one in La Plata, or the
Argentine, with the price we shall give for his land."
"We?" repeated Don Silverio with significant emphasis.
Corradini reddened a little. "I only use the word because I am
greatly interested in the success of this enterprise, being convinced
of its general utility to the province. Being cognisant as I am of
the neighbourhood, I hoped I could prevent some friction."
"The shares are, I believe, already on the market?"
It was a harmless remark, yet it was a disagreeable one to the Syndic
of San Beda.
"What would be the selling price of the Terra Vergine?" he said
abruptly. "It is valued at twelve thousand francs."
"It is useless to discuss its price," replied Don Silverio, "and the
question is much wider than the limits of the Terra Vergine. In one
word, is the whole of the Valdedera to be ruined because a Minister
has a relation who desires to create an unnecessary railway?"
"Ruined is a large word. These constructions appear to all, except
primitive and ignorant people, to be improvements, acquisitions,
benefits. In our province we are so aloof from all movement, so
remote in our seclusion, so moss-grown in our antiquity, so wedded to
the past, to old customs, old habits, old ways of act and thought,
that the modern world shocks us as impious, odious, and intolerable."
"Sir," said Don Silverio with his most caustic smile, "if you are
here to sing the praises of modernity, allow me to withdraw from the
duet. I venture to ask you, as I asked you this morning, one plain
question. To whom is Adone Alba, to whom are my people of Ruscino, to
appeal against the sequestration?"
"To no one. The Prefect approves; the Minister approves; the local
deputies approve; I and my municipal and provincial councils approve;
Parliament has approved and authorised. Who remain opposed? A few
small landowners and a mob of poor persons living in your village of
Ruscino and in similar places."
"Who can create grave disorders and will do so."
"Disorders, even insurrections, do not greatly alarm authority
nowadays; they are easily pressed since the invention of the
quick-firing guns. The army is always on the side of order."
Don Silverio rose.
"Most honourable Corradini! your views and mine are so far asunder
that no amount of discussion can assimilate them. Allow me to salute
you."
"Wait one instant, reverence," said the Syndic. "May I ask how it is
that an ecclesiastic of your appearance and your intellect can have
been buried so long in such an owls' nest as Ruscino?"
"Sir," replied Don Silverio very coldly, "ask my superiors: I am but
one of the least of the servants of the Church."
"You might be one of her greatest servants, if influence --"
"I abhor the word influence. It means a bribe too subtle to be
punished, too gilded to alarm."
"Nay, sometimes it is but a word in season, a pressure in the right
place."
"It means that which cannot serve the poor man without degrading
him."
"But -- but -- if as a reward for duty, advancement cane to you?"
"I fail to understand."
"Let me speak frankly. With your superiority to them you must easily
rule the embryo rioters of the Valdedera. If, to your efforts it
should be owing that the population remain quiet, and that this Adone
Alba and others in a similar position come to me in an orderly manner
and a pliant spirit, I will engage that this service to us on your
part shall not be forgotten."
He paused; but Don Silverio did not reply.
"It is lamentable and unjust," continued the mayor, "that any one of
your evident mental powers and capacity for higher place should be
wasting your years and wasting your mind in a miserable solitude like
Ruscino. If you will aid us to a pacific cession of the Valdedera I
will take upon myself to promise that your translation to a higher
office shall be favoured by the Government-"
He paused again, for he did not see upon Don Silverio's countenance
that flattered and rejoiced expression which he expected; there was
even upon it a look of scorn. He regretted that he had said so much.
"I thank your Excellency for so benevolent an interest in my poor
personality," said Don Silverio. "But with the King's government I
have nothing to do. I am content in the place whereto I have been
called, and have no disposition to assist the speculations of foreign
companies. I have the honour to bid your Excellency good evening."
He bowed low, and backed out of the apartment this time. Count
Corradini did not endeavour to detain him.
When he got out into the air the strong mountain wind was blowing
roughly down the steep and narrow street. He felt it with pleasure
smite his cheeks and brows.
"Truly only from nature can we find strength and health," he
murmured. "In the houses of men there are but fever and corruption,
and uncleanliness."