With Spadolini. But in the end it was the lusterless farmer, not the illustrious prince of the Church, who was her strength and stay. Mother would sometimes lean on Father and say she was aware of what she had in him and grateful to him for forgiving her everything. Father just let her talk. He had already left the stage on which Spadolini was performed, this ludicrous comedy, as he called it. It had long been a piece for only two players. I have retained my preference for darkened rooms to this day, I thought, but there was also a practical reason for not switching on the light at this time of year; this had to do with the mosquitoes, which are attracted by light and immediately turn every room at Wolfsegg into a hell. After breakfast Father would go across to the Farm and look around, then usually get on a tractor and disappear into the woods. Nobody knows why he went there, probably just to find peace and quiet, away from his wife and family, I thought. In the late morning the tractor would be seen somewhere unattended, while he walked for miles across his land. This was what he loved best. He only ever wanted to be a farmer. He never entertained what are called higher ambitions. When the question of the succession became acute and he needed an heir, he married the small-town girl, the daughter of a vegetable wholesaler who jarred and canned the whole countryside around Wels, as it were, and sold the jars and cans in Vienna. After marrying my mother he still preferred the pigsty to the green drawing room,which she rechristened the large sitting room. His favorite company was to be found mainly at the Farm and the Huntsmen’s Lodge, I thought. But of course this farmer always had the bearing of a gentleman. The first child, Johannes, was the offspring he desired, who would in due course inherit the estate. As I have said, he took cognizance of me as the reserve heir. He could have done without my sisters; they were latecomers and never had a chance with him, and so naturally they were immediately tied to their mother’s apron strings. Both Caecilia and Amalia were what are called beautiful children, who subsequently became uglier and uglier; this is popularly supposed to be the destiny of beautiful children. Unprepossessing. At least in my view. But of all the children, I was always in the most difficult position, I now reflected. I had no place in my parents’ hearts, and in time I gave up trying to force myself into them, as it became clear that there was no room for me. But from the beginning I was closer to my father than to my mother, of whom I was afraid even as a very small child, whereas I trusted my father, first as a child, then as a teenager, and finally as an adult, right to the last. All my life I acknowledged his paternal authority, whatever that is, but I could not help regarding my mother as harmful to me. All my life I felt I was there only to be used as a last resort. They were not wrong, as the accident has shown, I thought, sitting in the chair, but they didn’t reckon with their own deaths. If Johannes had been alone in the car, I told myself, they could have used me as the fallback, and their foresight would have been justified. But they themselves died along with the heir apparent and so did not benefit from the existence of a second heir. I am the second heir, I thought to myself as I sat in the chair, the sole surviving heir. This was how I now saw myself. In my capacity as the second heir I sensed my big chance. But how was I to exploit it? I was glad that Spadolini was coming. Spadolini’s a person I can talk to about everything, I thought. Spadolini has a clear head, clearer than mine, which has been confused by the present calamity. In the next few days, possibly in the next few hours, I’ll be able to talk to Spadolini. He owes it to me to show me the way out that I’m unable to see for myself. I had some ideas about the immediate future but did not know how to weld them in a meaningful plan. Spadolini is the one person I can trust to tell me what I should do, I thought. On the other hand, I don’t know what kind of Spadolini is coming; I don’t know whether it’s a useful or a harmful Spadolini that’s about to arrive at Wolfsegg, for there was no doubt that Spadolini could now be harmful to me, and the possibility scared me. But if that’s the case I must be completely mistaken about him, I thought. It may be, I thought, sitting in the chair, that while he’s been on his way here, Spadolini’s thoughts have been running in the opposite direction, that he’s having his own thoughts about the future of Wolfsegg and how it can get over the present calamity. But do I need Spadolini? I asked myself. Haven’t I a mind of my own? I don’t need Spadolini at all, I told myself. Getting up, I went to the window and looked down at the company in the park; the party of funeral guests had thinned out, as most had gone to find their lodgings. I could see that it was breaking up. Spadolini’s still not here, I thought. He’s making a point of arriving late so that he won’t have to meet all these people, so that he can avoid all the embarrassment, or most of it. In the midst of the guests, who thought nothing of trampling the lawn, stood the wine cork manufacturer, holding a tray. All by himself. Caecilia called out his name, probably from the doorway, and he went across. Here, at this window, Father had often stood for half the night when he was unable to sleep. All his life he suffered from insomnia, which Mother never did. To tire himself he would stand by the window, but even when tired, after standing here for two or three hours, he still could not sleep. And so he took to going out at three o’clock in the morning, especially in March and April, and walking in the woods. I’m a woodsman, he often said. I’d rather be in the woods than anywhere else. I recalled that he had once said, I’d like to die in the woods, but this wish was not to be fulfilled: he died an everyday death, quite the opposite of the one he had hoped for, like millions of others who die on the roads today after a momentary lapse of concentration. Spadolini made me aware of Gambetti’s character; he explained Gambetti to me, as it were, telling me how to approach him and win his trust, for according to Spadolini it was extremely hard to get along with Gambetti. Gambetti had expressed a wish to have an Austrian to instruct him in German literature, not a German. I had arrived in Rome at just the right moment, said Spadolini. I was the ideal person. Gambetti regarded Spadolini as his mentor and concurred with him in everything. Their fathers were lifelong friends, I thought, again sitting in the chair but now with my eyes closed, enjoying the quiet of my father’s room. From the sounds coming in through the open window I gathered that most of the guests had dispersed, leaving only a few in conversation with my sisters. I could not follow the conversation, as I heard only isolated words. I clearly remember hearing the words breeze, angina pectoris, anarchy, disgusting, and wet weather. Their audibility depended on the wind conditions; some were clear and distinct, others indistinct and barely comprehensible, but they were all spoken in restrained tones. From the start Spadolini was destined for a very high position, as he once said. His father had entertained ambitions for his son and sent him to college, so that he could get on rapidly in the Vatican and rise in the hierarchy, whereas his mother is said to have had no interest in this single-minded pursuit of a Vatican career. According to my mother, Spadolini immediately rose in the hierarchy and went on rising — a