I guessed, or at least I thought I could understand intuitively, what must have been going through his mind at that moment: the feasting was over, by now the cerretani belonged to the past, he was returning to reality. After seeing the Connestabilessa, he would resume his personal battle, the desire to impose his own stamp on human affairs at the forthcoming conclave. At the same time, he must have been painfully aware of the inexorable passing of time, feeling how hard the springs of the carriage were on his loins, far, far harder than when, as a young castrato decades before, armed only with his own talent and the protection of the Grand Duke of Tuscany, he had looked out over the same city from another carriage, with grasping eyes and an ardent heart, as he came to play his part in the great banquet of music, politics, intrigue and, perhaps, one day, glory.
Within a few months, with the new conclave, he would know whether a lifetime was sufficient to achieve those ambitions. In a few minutes, however, he would know whether a lifetime had been able to cancel out a great love.
When the horses passed in front of the Vessel, Atto leaned out instinctively, looking upwards. I knew what he was thinking of: the Tetrachion.
It was time to talk.
"Why, when Capitor said 'two in one', did she also point to Neptune's sceptre, in other words, the trident?" I asked without warning.
The Abbot turned towards me, surprised.
"What are you getting at?" he asked me, frowning.
"Perhaps she meant that those two figures were united with the sceptre, truly 'two in one'."
"But what sense would that make?" asked Atto, betraying his impatience at not, for once, thinking as fast as I. He could not know that I had turned that thought over a thousand times in my bed a few hours before.
"Do you recall what the chambermaid at the Spanish Embassy said to Cloridia? That the Tetrachion was the heir to the Spanish throne. And, as you yourself told me, what was the meaning of that trident in Neptune's hand? The crown of Spain, mistress of the ocean and of two continents. There, perhaps that is what Capitor meant."
"I still don't grasp your meaning."
"In other words," I resumed, while my thoughts galloped ahead and words found it hard to keep up, "in my opinion, the madwoman meant that twins like those of the Tetrachion were the legitimate heirs to the Spanish throne, and she issued a warning to Mazarin."
"To Mazarin?" exclaimed Melani, incredulous and impatient. "But what's come over you, my boy? Are you losing your senses?"
I continued without paying any attention to this.
"Capitor also said that punishment would be meted out to the sons of whoever deprives the crown of Spain of its sons. Perhaps…" Here I hesitated. "Perhaps those sons are the Tetrachion and, as we might have seen them at the Vessel, perhaps Cardinal Mazarin may have had them abducted from Spain…"
The Abbot burst out laughing.
"His Eminence ordering the abduction of that sort of octopus we thought we saw up there in the penthouse above the Vessel… Why, that's not such a bad idea, good for a picaresque novel. Are you quite insane? And why, for heaven's sake, should he have done that? To boil it and serve it up with carrots and olives? Perhaps with a sprinkling of fresh oregano, since Mazarin was Sicilian…"
"He did it because the Tetrachion is the heir to the Spanish throne."
"Might you be suffering from sunstroke, by any chance? Or could last night's trip to Albano have caused you to part with your senses?" the Abbot insisted; but he had grown serious.
"Signor Atto, don't think that I have not reflected long and hard on the matter. You yourself said to me that, before Capitor's prophecies, Mazarin seemed to have very different plans for making Philip IV sign a peace favourable to French interests, and those plans were not matrimonial. But can you explain to me why? You also said that Mazarin had no intention of marrying the Most Christian King with the Infanta; indeed he was blissfully allowing the relationship between His Majesty and Maria to continue and develop undisturbed."
Now Atto was listening without moving a muscle.
"Perhaps Mazarin had a trump card in his hand, a horrible secret, born of the rotten blood of the Spanish Habsburgs: the
Tetrachion. All Philip IV's legitimate heirs died but those twins survived against all expectations."
"Do you mean that, before Charles II was born, Philip IV may also have sired twins like the Tetrachion?" he asked in a toneless voice.
"Perhaps this was one of the less serious cases, as Cloridia mentioned: those joined only by a leg," I continued. "They could not be separated when small, but if they reached adulthood, then the thing could be done. There was an heir, indeed, there were heirs to the Spanish throne. Mazarin had them abducted to use them as assets to be horse-traded in the peace negotiations. Then along came Capitor with her prophecy of the virgin and the crown, the Cardinal became scared and wanted at all costs to separate his niece from the young King. As for the Tetrachion, he did not know what to do with it, so he sent it to Elpidio Benedetti, who…"
"Halt. There's a serious logical flaw in all this," said the Abbot, stopping me with his hand. "If, as you assert, Capitor meant to warn Mazarin that he would be punished for having removed the Tetrachion from Spain, the Cardinal should have been beside himself with fear and therefore have returned the twins to Philip IV as quickly as possible. Instead, he sends them straight to Benedetti in Rome. Now, why?"
"Because he did not understand?"
"What do you mean?"
"You told me yourself. Mazarin was quite flattered by the gift of the charger with Neptune and Amphitrite. In the two deities who rule over the seas, he saw himself and Queen Anne, and in the trident sceptre of Neptune, the crown of France, held tightly in his hand; or perhaps that of Spain, mistress of the ocean and the two continents, exhausted by wars and by now in Mazarin's hands. This last possibility had sent him literally into raptures. Also, as you told me, the Cardinal had understood the mad seer's warning to whoever deprived the crown of Spain of its sons as being directed against Philip IV In other words, he did not realise that Capitor's words concealed a threat aimed at him."
"My compliments for the fantasy, even if it is somewhat convoluted," said Abbot Melani scornfully.
"If Mazarin had not had those twins abducted," I continued, quite unshaken, "France today would not have any claim to the Spanish throne. With one deformed leg each, they would certainly have been crippled, but, unlike Charles II, they might have been able to procreate. Is there not in Spain the legend of King Gerion, who had three heads? And what are we to say of the two-headed eagle on the arms of the Habsburgs? Cloridia herself said this might be a memento of some defective birth which took place who knows when among the ancestors of Charles II. In other words, it does not seem that the Tetrachion is the first such case among the kings of Spain."
"And obviously, according to your theory, Elpidio Benedetti would have sheltered those two unfortunate children somewhere, then here in the Vessel, once the building had been completed," the Abbot concluded rapidly.
"It is not by chance that Mazarin then entrusted the three gifts to him as well as the picture depicting them," said I grave ly "So, in that villa, as well as the apparitions of Maria, the King and Fouquet, and the picture with Capitor's three gifts, not to mention your parrot — what's he called? Caesar Augustus — we may also have seen the Tetrachion. Well, it all goes to make a fine stew, that Vessel, and there's no gainsaying that! It should have been called the Stewpot, ha!" he sniggered.
Atto went on laughing a long while. I looked at him without taking it badly. I knew that what I was saying was not at all as absurd as it seemed, and I was proud that for once it was I who was master, and he the disciple.