Speak! Speak!
Immediately after Giorgio's talk with General Barbarulli, four
bodyguards were assigned to him. They were tall, strapping
fellows--Carlo, Pinotto, Enzio, and Nello. Their eyes followed him
wherever he went. They never let him alone. Even at night he could feel
them peering at him, boring right through him in the dark.
"Am I a dog on a leash?" he asked, trying to make a joke of it.
The young men only laughed at the trapped-animal look of him. "We
attach ourselves to you," Carlo said kindly, "to prevent rival
contradas from coming with secret offers."
"But no one will! Even the Chief-of-the-Guards tells me that. He says I
have not yet seen enough Palios."
The boys agreed. "But we must also protect you from street fights,"
Enzio explained. "We must save your hands. They are small as...."
"I know." Giorgio bit his lips, then supplied the missing words. "Small
as girl's hands!"
It was scarcely any relief to swing up on Gaudenzia and ride twice a
day in the Provas. For even then he was not free. He knew that he was
being carefully observed, his every action noticed and weighed.
Why, he asked himself, did it take two Palios to teach him all the
rules and regulations leading up to the big race? He answered himself
honestly. Turbolento and Lirio, the horses he had ridden last year, had
been little more than names to him--no, they had almost been nameless.
But Gaudenzia was a part of his very life.
So now, for the first time, he was terrified by a rule that had not
really concerned him before. According to a proclamation of the Grand
Duke in 1719, the choice of the fantinos is not made final and official
until the day of the Palio. If through Giorgio's carelessness Gaudenzia
were kicked and lamed as in last year's Prova, he could be dismissed
abruptly. He had been hired, yes, but he could still be replaced, even
on the very morning of the Palio!
Thus, tortured by uncertainty, he took great care to keep Gaudenzia
clear of the other horses, and to bring her in slowly at the finish of
each Prova.
At night, however, he and Gaudenzia knew no restraints. When the moon
rode high, he took secret delight in waking his bodyguards, who slept
on mattresses in his room.
"Wake up, or I go alone!" he told the sleepy young giants.
Grumbling, they dressed and went out with him into the night. They
pounded heavily on the locked door of the stable of Onda. It was easier
to wake Gaudenzia than the sleeping barbaresco.
"Open!" shouted Giorgio, and it was the mare's stomping and pawing that
finally woke the groom. She remembered well the routine of galloping in
the dark, and the time clock in her mind said, "Now."
The city lay asleep. In the twisty streets, small yellow flames
flickered here and there before shrines to the Virgin Mary. But in the
shell of Il Campo the moon shone clear and bold.
_This_ was the real Prova! The four young men and the barbaresco,
watching in the deep moon shadow, nearly forgot themselves in awed
excitement. They were fully awake now. They wanted to shout and cheer
at the smooth-flying gallop. Around the treacherous curves Gaudenzia
went flying as if she were suspended on pulleys. Only an occasional
spark from her hoofs showed she was earthbound.
In less than an hour they were all back in bed again. For Giorgio and
Gaudenzia, sleep was sweet after the moonlight gallop.
* * * * *
July first, the day before the Palio, turned hot, with a brassy sun.
The morning Prova took place at the hour of nine. General Barbarulli
was on hand to observe, and afterward he stopped Giorgio on the way to
the stable. He looked at Gaudenzia, but not at her head. He seemed to
see only the heel that had been hurt last year.
"She goes sound?" He clipped out the questions. "She goes true? Her
legs, are they cool after the running?"
"Si, si, General."
"The Provas are nearly over, son. Already there have been four. If all
goes well in the last two, you will be fantino for the Contrada of
the Wave, and tomorrow your name will be inscribed in the archives,
officially."
Giorgio managed an anxious nod. He waited for the General's next words.
"Thus far she has not won a single Prova." Something in the man's voice
told Giorgio that he was in no way displeased.
"Tonight," he went on, "is the banquet before the Palio. As you know,
it is the great meeting of our people. You must come and you will be
seated between Captain Tortorelli and myself. Your bodyguards will
bring you at the hour of eight. From you only a short speech will be
expected."
"A speech! Me? A speech!" Giorgio grabbed a handful of Gaudenzia's mane
as if he might topple off. The bodyguards came up then to accompany him
to the stable. His lips moved drily. "A speech I must make," he mumbled
in deep misery.
* * * * *
All that afternoon Giorgio struggled with pencil and paper. As the
result of his labors he produced only three small sentences. These he
copied neatly on a clean sheet and folded it into the breast pocket of
his good suit.
Promptly at the stated hour Pinotto, Carlo, Enzio, and Nello led him
toward the church of the Wave. He felt like a prisoner on his way to
execution, as they wound in single file through the narrow streets,
through the arch of San Guiseppe, then through the doors of the church
itself, and down the wide, winding staircase into another world deep
under the sanctuary.
Giorgio stood gaping at the splendor. The banquet hall was high-vaulted
and vast. Already many people were seated in their places at the
rows of tables, but some were still standing in clusters, deep in
conversation. With the entrance of the burly guards towering over the
slight figure of Giorgio, all faces turned in his direction.
"Look! Our fantino! He comes!"
General Barbarulli signaled the bodyguards to come to the speakers'
platform. For one frozen moment Giorgio saw the scene and remembered.
Yes! There was the long table on the raised flooring, and the snow-pure
cloth spread over it, and the serious-faced men seated on one side
only. It was like the painting of the Last Supper, the one hanging
above his mother's and father's bed. Overawed, he wanted to bolt,
wanted to hide behind his bodyguards, but they were gone! They had
stepped down from the platform and melted into the crowd.
The General and Captain Tortorelli welcomed Giorgio with cordial
handshakes. Nervously, he felt for his speech in the place where his
pocket should be, but his hand felt cotton, not wool, and he looked
down and saw he had no pocket! He remembered now he was wearing the
uniform of the Wave, the white-and-blue fantino uniform which the
contrada had sent over. His speech was still in his room, in the pocket
of his good suit hanging on the peg!
The Captain shook his hand a second time. "Do not worry," he said
encouragingly. "All good fantinos are nervous. Those who joke have a
gross heart." Then he introduced Giorgio to the vicar, the chancellor,
the captain's assistant, the steward, and all the councilors.
When the food was served, Giorgio ate, though he hardly knew what he
ate. His ears heard the stirring battle songs of defiance, of threats,
but all the while his mind was trying to recall those three little
sentences he had painstakingly written down. They were gone from him.
Gone as completely as if some other hand had formed them.
"We are all united in the warm atmosphere of this dinner. In joy and
friendship...."
"Oh, Mamma mia!" breathed Giorgio, dropping his fork with a clatter.
"The speeches, they begin!"
"We of the Wave," the General was intoning, "regard this, our
banquet hall, as our other home, our other hearth-place of Love and
Brotherhood. Many of our families have separated for the Palio, each
member having gone back to the contrada where he was born. In their
place, many of us are hosts to some kinsman or friend. So first we
greet and welcome those who are our guests."
Of one accord the _contradaioli_ applauded.
The General smiled affably. "The Palio lifts us out of the everyday
life," he continued. "We are caught up in the golden net of hope, of
ambition, of glory. In four hundred years the magnificent colors of the
Wave--blue for the billows and white for the foam--have won thirty-nine
victories! Will Gaudenzia and Giorgio make it forty?"
"Si! Si! Si!" Wild cries bounced from wall to wall.
Giorgio listened in an agony of suspense. He could feel his chest going
in and out against the place where his pocket and his speech should
have been. "Please, O Mother of Perpetual Help, let him talk on and on!
Let him forget I am here. Or maybe you could make an earthquake ... or
an eruption like Vesuvius...."
But the only eruption was a burst of applause as the General sat down
and Captain Tortorelli arose.
Giorgio closed his eyes.
Captain Tortorelli half-closed his eyes, too, but _he_ was in ecstasy.
"How beautiful is the Piazza of Siena with ten fantinos in battle!" His
voice resounded through the great hall. "Some call them ten assassins.
Yes, the eyes of an assassin are dangerous, but in the danger they are
fiercely beautiful."
Giorgio began to shake all over. The Captain was making a half turn
toward him, was facing him now, speaking to him, and the force of
his breath caused the hairs on Giorgio's head to quiver. "_Fate_ is
Queen of the Palio!" the voice rolled on. "We can prepare for victory,
morally and materially, but never certainly. Only Fate and the fantino
can decide between victory and defeat.
"Some tasks," he concluded, "need a big man. Others, a small one. Some
fantinos are big and strong, but some are bird-light and think more of
their mount than of their own safety. Giorgio Terni, you are such a
one." He raised his glass in a toast to the boy at his side. "Our fate
is in your hands."
"Bravo! Bravissimo!" the councilmen and contradaioli cheered. Then all
about there was a great gaping silence--full of eyes, full of question
marks. What would the boy say? What promises would he make?
"Speak! Speak!" the people shouted in encouragement.
Giorgio rose to his feet. In the dead silence he nodded to the Captain,
and then to the audience. He opened his mouth, but no sound came. He
glanced imploringly into the sea of faces, but no one could prompt
him. His eyes swept the room, took in the marble angels on either
side of the stage. Their cornucopias were sending forth pink and red
carnations, but not help. And no help came from the painted dolphin
on the wall, its mouth dripping red beads of blood as if it had been
caught by some fisherman's hook. And as he stood helpless the silence
grew deeper, until it was a roaring in his ears. In desperation he
looked upward to the vaulted ceiling, and followed the arches that came
together in a central point. It was like the chalice of an Easter lily;
no, it was more like the inside of an umbrella.
An _umbrella!_ Suddenly the face of the Umbrella Man loomed in front of
him, and in spite of his terror he felt strength welling up in him. Now
he _wanted_ to talk.
"Signori of the Wave!" he began in a voice that had an odd kind of
dignity in it. "Gaudenzia and I, we were both reared in the Maremma,
and we fit well to each other. Tomorrow we go into battle together.
Fear does not choke our courage. For us it is not victory or defeat. We
think only the one thought--"
"_Vic-to-ry! Vic-to-ry! Viva Giorgio!_"
The crowd had finished his speech for him.