Читать книгу The Secret Price of History - Gayle Ridinger - Страница 19

James Freeman was doing his best to help Nicholas Brown to protect Americans in the city, encouraging them for example to fly flags off their balconies. Turning now into the labyrinth of narrow streets in the direction of the Consulate, which was none other than Brown's private apartment, he was thinking about his wife and if she was safe enough there in Florence, when he nearly collided with Eleonora Serlupi.

"But what are you doing here?" he exclaimed, giving her a fond hug. "Rome's too dangerous, Eleonora. Oudinot is committing atrocities."

"Even at the hospital, James. We've hidden the wounded we could, but his men won't leave the dying alone. And they've stopped paying the nurses. The women can't buy bread for their families anymore."

"New of Princess Belgioioso? Margaret Fuller says she's keeping away from the hospital."

"She's gone into hiding, although she spent last night at the bedside of a dying young writer whose wounds got infected, a certain Mameli. Up to now the French haven't dared touch her…touch her physically …on account of her being an old friend of the Buonapartes."

Freeman shook his head. "That won't save her in Rome."

"Oh she knows that. She's planning to head towards the Orient."

"You should ask her to take you with her."

"No, James. It's not the moment for me to go, not yet. Any news of Garibaldi?"

"The French are on his heels, but they're taking their time. They'd like to see him fall into the hands of the Austrians up north—you know, get their allies to do some of the dirty work." He took her arm. "Too dangerous stopping on the street like this. Have you got some time? Good, then come with me to see Nicholas Brown, our Consul, who's just resigned. His son tells me he's sick."

She remembered Anita mentioning him...and of course James himself. There'd been no mention of illness, however.

"He's not only a friend of Mazzini's but also a burning anti-slavery abolitionist. Comes from his Rhode Island background."

"Rhode Island?"

"A state in America."

She hurried behind him along the sidewalk of the narrow cobble-stoned street. "James, I get the feeling that the French are looking for me."

"Why?" Freeman's head jerked in surprise.

"Some soldiers, and a French civilian with an ugly mark on his face, came into the hospital this morning," Eleonora said, breathless from their fast pace. "The civilian seemed to be guiding the others. He wanted to see all the patients and then he asked them if they'd seen two volunteers. The description he gave of them fit my friends Sandor and Goffredo. Some traitor told them that those two often came round to see one of the nurses. That's when the soldiers set about questioning the other nurses and I ran away. I can't understand what they want from me."

"Neither do I, but I don't like the sound of it," Freeman replied darkly. "Here we are. That standing carriage and the mass of trunks piled in the wagon behind it are probably Brown's. Most of his family's left already. His son said to go straight up."

A burly young dark Italian opened the door. In the hall stood a much thinner and paler fellow who looked just as young. He held a filthy cap in both hands and his breeches were too short for him. Freeman guided Eleonora by the elbow into Brown's drawing room. The furniture was covered, and on the floor along one wall the silver candelabras were lined up in a row in front of a series of oil paintings. Over the closed door to the library, where Brown was signing his last official despatches, hung the American flag. The only thing in the room destined, from the look of things, to stay behind was the black polished baby grand piano, with a stack of papers and documents on its closed back. Since its piano stool afforded the best view out of the window with its view of the Spanish Steps, Eleonora sat there. She gazed at the white keys, her hands in her lap but in her fingers the knowledge of their feel and sound; she had played as a child.

"Brown's wife is the pianist," Freeman said behind her. "I know that her nerves are very fragile, however. Brown's present poor health doesn't make it any easier."

Suddenly the library door opened.

"Hello, James," said Brown, a gangly man about fifty, looking yellow and gaunt in his brown suit.

"I'm here to give you the hand I know you need, Nicholas. This is my friend Eleonora, who works with Margaret Fuller at the hospital."

In a thick American accent—much thicker than Freeman's—Brown told Eleonora in Italian how delightful it was to meet her.

Freeman meanwhile was shaking his head at the last canvas in the row of paintings.

"That's Villa Spada. Induno must have painted it shortly before the attack," he commented. "Powerful," he added.

"Different from your genre and style, isn't it?"

"Induno paints Garibaldi's war minute by minute. I wouldn't have the stamina or the courage."

"You under-estimate yourself, James."

As they spoke, Eleonora was going from picture to picture. All by the same hand, all by Induno. The war as Goffredo and Sandor lived it. Under a sky and with the lighting that the courageous deserved.

"Do you know where Induno's ended up?" Brown asked.

"He's being cared for. In hiding," Eleonora said.

Freeman mentioned to Brown the pale man waiting in the front hall, adding "You're writing him a safe-conduct pass, I take it."

"He's French."

"Looks it."

"I'm sending up to Paris—I was thinking of doing it with him—copies of the Constitution of the Roman Republic," Brown gestured at the papers on the piano. "My friends there tell me that the plan to present it to the French Assembly is still viable. But Oudinot doesn't obey the deputies. Oudinot heeds one man only. The future Napoleon III," Brown said bitterly.

"May I see a copy?" Eleonora asked suddenly. She'd been so curious to read it but there was no time at the hospital.

Freeman smiled, remembering the day he taught her the meaning of 'constitution.'

She stood at the piano with her back and crown of red-blond curls to them, as she read with feeling, "Article One. Sovereignty is the eternal right of the people…Two. A democratic state is based on the principles of equality, liberty, and fraternity. It does not recognize titles of nobility nor does it sanction privileges of birth or rank."

Freeman began to think of the sketch he made of Eleonora as she lay asleep on his sofa, the first day Augusta brought her to him. She was perfect, she was beautiful, she was Liberty herself.

She looked at him with a moved expression on her face. "It says that the death penalty is hereby abolished."

Before he could reply, there was an immense pounding in the hallway. The front door of Brown's apartment was being broken down by a patrol of yelling French soldiers. Four of them seized the two men in the hall, Brown's servant and the waiting pale youth, while the other ten or so stampeded towards them, backing them into the drawing room.

"This is the American Consulate!" shouted Brown, his yellow face trembling. "Consulat américain, consolato americano. Off limits! Interdit!"

His words had no effect, no matter how many times he uttered them. The soldiers knocked over the paintings and pulled the volumes and scrolls from the remaining trunks, one man even attempting to snatch the papers from Eleonora's hands. Brown disappeared into his library, but instead of bolting the door as Freeman expected, he came back brandishing a sword.

"Interdit!" he yelled again.

In response, the French patrol officer pulled out his own saber.

"Comment? Vous avez l'intention de me couper??" Brown cried, dumbfounded.

Desperate for an idea, Freeman reached up over the library door and yanked down the American flag. "This is diplomatic territory!" he ranted, waving it in the soldiers' faces.

The soldiers in the front hall called something to the ones in the drawing room, who—on the nod of their officer—stomped out of the room.

"Nicholas, this is outrageous," Freeman seethed. "We've got to lodge a formal protest immediately. Oudinot is going to hear about this!"

Another swarthy Italian, this one wearing a blacksmith's apron, barged into the room. "Signore, they've taken my brother with another man. They've taken Giuseppe," he told Brown, who nodded sadly.

"My servant. He likes to heckle them," Brown told Eleonora.

"We're putting on our diplomatic attire," Freeman insisted forcefully. "Oudinot is going to receive us and apologize or risk a major international incident. Nicholas!" Freeman made a fist in the air. This was in part for Eleonora's benefit, but Eleonora's eyes and ears were directed out the window at the street below and at the steps, where a vocal crowd was commenting the scene.

"I'm leaving, James, remember? I'm not even officially the consul anymore," replied Brown dejectedly. "The carriage is waiting downstairs."

"No, first we protest. I'm going to my house and getting dressed. Come with me, Eleonora. I'll be right back, Nicholas."

When Freeman and Eleonora reached his studio—oh, yes, she remembered its panoramic view and that couch which had been her first place of rest after running away from her family—the painter blustered about, pulling a tricolored sash and a tricolored hat from a wardrobe and talking agitatedly about how yet again he found himself having to lodge an official complaint with this rogue Oudinot, who, naturally, was only going to make his stiff, meaningless 'regrets,' then claim that his soldiers had been threatened and by consequence had only given chase to the author of these insults, 'regrettably' without noting the American flags.

"I'll show them, Eleonora, though. I'll write more safe-conduct passes than they've ever seen. I've got a good counterfeiter. Excellent typographer."

From the same wardrobe he lifted out a small iron safe, which he opened with a key from his waist pocket.

"Here. Do you recognize this?" he asked, still in an excited state, drawing out a pistol. "It was yours."

She nodded.

"I took it while you were sleeping."

"I never was sure."

"It's best for you to have it now, my dear. The Pope will be back and there will be full repression. If the French are already looking for you, there must be some reason."