Owing to the complaints of innumerable citizens the C.N.I. had nominated
a Commission to inquire into the pillage of the former Austrian stores
at Rieka--this town, as we have mentioned, had been the base for the
Albanian army--and the findings of that Commission displayed the
culpability of the most prominent members of the C.N.I. This document
was for a long time unknown to the general public, but was afterwards
published in Italy by Signor Riccardo Zanella, himself an Italian and an
ex-deputy and ex-mayor of Rieka. There was, by the way, an article in
the Triest paper, _Il Lavoratore_, at the beginning of September 1920,
wherein one Tercilio Borghese, a former member of d'Annunzio's army,
confesses that on June 21, he was ordered by d'Annunzio, as also by
Colonel Sani and Captain Baldassari, to get Signor Zanella in some way
out of the world. Hinko Camero and Angelo Marzi['c], his fellow-workers,
had likewise to be removed; and for this purpose Borghese says that the
Colonel provided him with a revolver. He was also to try to seize any
compromising documents. But he was forced by his conscience to reveal
everything to Zanella.... Now this confession may be true or false, but
the Triest "fascisti" (Nationalists) believed in it, for they issued a
placard on which they called Borghese a traitor and threatened him with
death. "He who after November 1918 returns to the martyred town," writes
Signor Zanella, "is simply stupefied in beholding that those personages
who now strut on the political scene, burning with the most ardent
Italian patriotism, are the same who until the eve of Vittorio Veneto
were the most unbending, the most eloquent and the most devoted
partisans and servants of the reactionary Magyar regime." And around
them a number of more or less questionable persons were assembled, whose
conduct with regard to the disposal of the Austrian stores has now been
so severely censured. That organization which, dependent on the C.N.I.,
was supposed to administer the stores, was known as the Adriatic
Commission. "We all knew," said the Commission of inquiry, "that the
eyes of the whole world were gazing at our little town." It was,
therefore, very desirable that nothing irregular should be done; whereas
the judges give a most unfavourable verdict. Nobody, they say, would
rejoice more than themselves if their conclusions should be shown to be
completely or partly erroneous, for they are all of them penetrated with
love for the fatherland Italy. But they relate, with chapter and verse,
a large number of peculiar transactions which show that the goods were
very improperly and very hastily auctioned, and that those who reaped
the benefit were nearly always the same people. To give one instance,
some of the wine, said to have been damaged, was sold at 260 crowns the
thousand litres, while undamaged wine brought 320 crowns, and the firm
of Riboli, the only one which appeared at the so-called auction, was
only asked to pay 30 crowns. Thus a considerable number of people in
Rieka were anxious that the town should not come under any Government
which might punish the culprits or make them disgorge. And Nitti and
d'Annunzio agreed with these interested parties in opposing a solution
other than the overlordship of Italy. "The Yugoslavs should understand,"
said the amiable Premier, "that Italy has no intention of acting in a
manner distasteful to them, but is struggling for a national ideal." And
meantime what of the conditions in the poor distracted town?
"D'Annunzio," says an Italian paper, "is no longer the master of Rieka.
He has become the prisoner of his own troops.... While he amuses himself
and organizes the worst orgies, his troops quarrel in the streets and
discharge their weapons.... A great many of them have their mistresses
in the hospital, where they make themselves at home. When the doctors,
after some time, protested, the arditi, with bombs in their hands,
threatened to blow up the hospital if they were not allowed to enter
it." On the other hand the pale, weary-looking poet succeeded in
impressing on a special correspondent of the _Morning Post_ that he was
"master of his job." He told this gentleman--and was apparently
believed--that with the consent and approval of the C.N.I. he had had
the whole place mined, city and harbour, and was prepared to blow it up
at a moment's notice. The means by which d'Annunzio, according to his
interviewer, worked on those who were depressed with gazing at the empty
shops, the silent warehouses, the grass-grown wharves, so that the
overwhelming majority of the town supported him, was by simply making to
them an eloquent speech. D'Annunzio would indeed be the master of his
job if with some rounded periods in Italian he could cause the very
numerous hostile business men to forget so blissfully that they were
men of business. Under his dispensation the town is said to have been
turned into a place of debauchery. Accusations were brought against his
sexual code, and with regard to men of commerce: "those who are not
partisans of d'Annunzio are expelled, and their establishments handed
over to friends of the ruling power.... Woe to him who dares to condemn
the transactions of the poet's adherents. There and then he is
pronounced to be a Yugoslav, is placed under surveillance and is
persecuted." These Italian critics of the poet do not in the least
exaggerate. One instance of his conduct towards a British firm will be
sufficient. The "Anglo-Near East Trading Company" shipped sixty-seven
cases (5292 pairs) of boots to private traders in Belgrade, and on the
way they reached Rieka just before d'Annunzio. In March 1920 they were
still detained there, and on the 13th of that month a certain Alcesde di
Ambris, who described himself as the Chief of the Cabinet, wrote a
letter saying that the boots were requisitioned, and that they would be
paid for within thirty days at a price fixed on March 5 by experts of
the local Chamber of Commerce. The company was offered forty lire a
pair, but they declined to accept so inadequate a sum. Senor Meynia, the
Spanish Consul, who was also representing Great Britain, attempted in
various ways to help the firm; he was finally told by an officer that
the "exceptional situation of Rieka compels the Authority to suspend the
exportation or transport of such goods as are thoroughly needed here."
And the Consul could do no more than protest. One might presume, from
this officer's reply, that d'Annunzio required the boots for his army.
As a matter of fact, they were simply sold to a couple of dealers, one
Levy of Triest and Mailaender of Rieka. It is alleged that the prices
paid by these receivers of stolen property was a good deal higher than
forty lire. When Signor di Ambris travelled to Rome in the merry month
of June and enjoyed a consultation with the Prime Minister, who by this
time was Signor Giolitti, it was not in order to explain any such
transactions as that one of the boots, but for the purpose, we are told,
of offering the services of d'Annunzio and his legionaries in Albania.
The regular Italian army was just then being roughly handled by the
natives.... It may be that Signor di Ambris wanted guarantees that if
the d'Annunzian troops were to come to the rescue, they would not suffer
the fate of the Yugoslavs who in the Great War had managed to desert to
Italy, had valiantly fought and won many decorations and--after the
War--been ignominiously interned. And they had given no grounds for
charges of financial frailty.