3

The room is warm, too warm. The red damask curtains let in the red light of sunset through a blanket of clouds that conceals the horizon. Sitting in an armchair, Maruzza is leaning her head on the palm of one hand and with the other hand holding open the pages of D'Annunzio's Maybe Yes, Maybe No , left by Franca at Villa Igiea years ago. The writer himself had given it to her with a dedication that read: To Donna Franca Florio in great devotion , and she'd had it bound in Morocco leather finished in gold.

Yes, all those years ago, when war was far in the future and nobody knew what was going to happen , Maruzza thinks with a sigh.

Franca comes less and less often to Palermo. When she isn't traveling, she spends long periods in Rome, usually at the Grand

Hotel, with her daughters and with Ama Tasca di Cutò, who has left her husband, Alessandro, and their children and is seen

about with a young cavalier servente .

At this thought, Maruzza closes the book abruptly. One should never judge , she reflects, but really, those Tasca di Cutòs don't know how to restrain themselves . And to think that, in all these years roaming about Europe in the company of the Florios, she's seen it all... She thinks

again nostalgically of those long stays in Montecatini, in Switzerland, or on the C?te d'Azur, and the money that Franca spent

on her, too.

Not anymore.

She raises her eyes to the ceiling, her face expressing a sorrow that's impossible to hide. The war has insinuated itself

into everyone's lives like a damp patch slowly peeling the plaster off a wall, leaving it chipped. Men are allowed to act,

to fight, in the hope—or is it the illusion?—of being able to change things, of returning to normalcy. Women, on the other

hand, can only wait for the storm to pass and, in the meantime, contemplate the devastation, wondering if life will ever be

able to resume its course.

And God knows what life will be like afterward.

"Maruzza... Maruzza..."

The voice comes from the heap of blankets in which Giovanna is wrapped. Frail, tired, pale, stiff with arthritis, she's resting in an armchair: she divides her days between that and bed. "Haven't my children come yet?" she asks in a plaintive whisper. "Don't they know I'm sick?"

Maruzza goes to her and strokes her face, wiping away a tear. "Donna Giovanna, they're at the war, you know that..."

"Yes, I know... but I'm their mother and I'm sick. They could have let them come for a couple of days... And what about

Franca? Where's Franca?"

"In Rome with the girls, Igiea and Giugiù."

"Ah... Rome... Maybe she could come for a while?"

Maruzza leans over, kisses her forehead, and talks to her, trying to calm her. Her breathing is labored again, she notes,

perhaps because she's getting agitated at the thought of her children being far away. After so many years, she feels closer

to this woman than to her own relatives. She has seen her grow older, becoming ever thinner, suffering because of the deaths

of her grandchildren, the financial difficulties of Casa Florio, and the lost dignity of a name that was once powerful and

respected.

She has seen pain and disappointment on her face when her sons asked her to guarantee their promissory notes or asked her

to pay the interest on debts they were unable to settle themselves.

And now she's alone and sick. Angina pectoris, say the doctors: that's how they've classified the pains that shoot from her

arms up to her chest and make every breath painful. The sufferings and anxieties—past, present, and future—have finally taken

their toll.

Maruzza moves through the room, fills a glass, and pours into it a few drops of a medication that should calm the beating of that sick heart. Giovanna drinks, resigned, then asks her to open the curtains because she wants to see the sky and the last rays of the sun. Maruzza obeys. The sunset is a bronze light that pours into the room, illuminating the Ducrot furniture and the photographs on the chest of drawers. Above them, the portrait of her husband, Ignazio. A new painting, done after the fire.

It's on this that Maruzza lingers. Is it really possible to love just one man your whole life? she wonders. Because it's obvious that Giovanna has always kept in her heart that husband she herself has known only through

the accounts of the other family members. A self-controlled man, sparing with his emotions: calm, kind, capable of great acts

of tenderness, but also cold and ruthless. Giovanna seems to catch these thoughts, because she calls her over, motioning her

to approach.

"Let me look at him," she says, her features softening. A vague smile appears on those lips made hollow by age. She raises

her hand and points at the chest of drawers. "Bring me the photograph of my son Vincenzo."

Maruzza is about to take the photograph of the Vincenzo she knows, but then she realizes. Her hand stops in midair and moves

toward another of the photographs, this one of a child with a gentle, serious face. She hands it to Giovanna, who kisses it

and places it over her heart.

"My flesh and blood," she murmurs, and tries to lift herself. "They told me I was lucky... I, who had nothing left to cry

for." She kisses and strokes the photograph. "If he were still here, things might not have ended up like this. You know what

scares me, Maruzza? That when I'm gone, my sons will fight each other for money. They're never at peace, those two, never

patient... Where are they, why don't they come back here to me? Ignazio, Vice'... unni siti —where are you?" she cries. She becomes agitated and makes an attempt to rise. Maruzza tucks in her blankets and tries to

calm her.

"I told you, they're at the front. Maybe they'll come back in the New Year. For now, don't think about it, Donna Giovanna, and above all don't get upset, because when you do your chest hurts."

"They'll find nothing but my bones," Giovanna says sullenly, still clutching the photograph. "Turn my chair to the window—I

want to look outside," she adds in a voice that briefly gains strength again. "At least I still have that. I don't have anything

else left, not even my house, not even my health. Nothing. Sulu l'occhi pi' chianciri —only eyes to weep with."

With some difficulty, Maruzza turns the chair in such a way that Giovanna can see the city, from which the color is draining;

very soon, when the curfew starts, it will lose every trace of light. Shrouded in darkness, Palermo will fall asleep, as frightened

as a little girl looking into the emptiness of night and finding only pain and anguish. And then it will withdraw into itself,

falling into a merciful, dreamless sleep.

Maruzza strokes Giovanna's hair, then says, "I'll go get your dinner. I asked them to make you chicken broth. I'll be right

back."

Villa Igiea has been partially requisitioned and turned into a hospital for officers. Along the corridors, nurses and men

in uniform or in pajamas move about, dragging crutches and sticks. Everything echoes with those faltering steps, rhythmic

thuds like a drum. Even the air in the villa has changed: where once there hung a fragrant mixture of cologne, cigars, flowers,

and face powder, there is now the heavy odor of sickness, mingling with that of the food prepared in the basement kitchens.

The carpet runners have been removed, the games room is occupied by rows of beds, and the clicking of the chips has been replaced

by moans. Even the sinuous moldings on the stairs are splintered and covered in a layer of dust.

Outside the kitchens, Maruzza waits for the dinner to be ready. Propped against the wall is a mirror in a solid gold frame, and she can't help looking at herself in it. The tired face, the deep lines, the gray hair gathered in an untidy bun... In Donna Giovanna's room, time seems to stand still, and yet here they are, the marks of its passing. They are all there, together with those caused by anxiety about the war and the family's financial hardships. No, fate has not been kind to her.

She raises her eyes to the ceiling.

Yes, she's very sick. I can't wait any longer , she tells herself. I have to find a way to bring at least her daughter Giulia here, so that she can comfort her. Though how can the poor woman

comfort her mother when she has two sons on the front line?

The door to the kitchens is flung open, interrupting these reflections of Maruzza's. She takes the tray the cook passes her

and heads back to the family apartments. On the stairs, she guesses she will have to force Donna Giovanna to eat—it's what

she's had to do most of the time these last few weeks. She enters the room. "Here it is: as promised, a light chicken broth,"

she says gaily. "And there's also some orange juice. You will eat, won't you, Donna Giovanna? At lunch you didn't eat a thing..."

No answer comes from Giovanna. The blankets have fallen to the floor, and her body seems to have tilted to the side, now slumped

over the arm of the chair. Her hand is still clutching the photograph of her son. The lips are turned down with the weight

of an infinite solitude.

Her gaze is distant, beyond Palermo, beyond the horizon. She has left just like that, in silence, without her children by

her side. Alone. And perhaps, Maruzza tells herself as she closes her eyes and a curtain of sorrow falls over her heart, perhaps,

in spite of everything, she is the luckiest of the Florios.

She has seen the sun rise, but she won't see it set.

***

The first days of January 1918 leave a metallic taste in one's mouth, the taste of mourning. Franca walks across rooms and

down corridors, her kid gloves in one hand, the other on the fur collar of her cape. Behind her, Maruzza, dressed all in black,

and a maid bundled up in a blue overcoat, worn at the elbows. She is one of the few who have remained at the Olivuzza: most

of the servants have been dismissed because of the restrictions imposed by Linch. The three women advance slowly, in silence,

leaving tracks in the dust on the floor. Around them, furniture covered in white sheets, rolled up carpets, a few objects—a

pen, a pair of glasses—left behind by someone or other.

They reach the green salon. Franca has always liked this cozy, light-filled room looking out on the garden. Now, though, it

is dark and cold, imbued with a moldy smell. Franca opens the French window, and a gust of wind brings in the topsoil and

dry leaves that have accumulated against the shutter. Then she turns and spots, among the furniture, a sewing loom covered

in dust and spiderwebs, like threads interlaced one last time by nature. It's her mother-in-law Giovanna's loom.

She was buried in the family chapel a few days into the New Year; they'd had to wait for Vincenzo and Ignazio to return from

the front and Franca to arrive from Rome. After so many years, Giovanna d'Ondes was finally reunited with her beloved husband

and with her son Vincenzo.

And today, Franca has come back to the Olivuzza to preside over another kind of memorial service.

Very soon the big house will be put up for sale; before then, it will have to be cleared of furniture. They will have to decide

what to keep and what to sell. That's what Carlo Linch has requested.

Ignazio and Vincenzo have had to leave again for the front, so the responsibility falls to her. Some of the furniture will go to the house on Via Catania, where Vincenzo will live when the war is over; other items will be moved to storehouses at the Arenella in expectation of better times or moved to their apartment in Villa Igiea. The rest will be sold to make a little money.

This is what Franca has come to do: to choose what to preserve of the life that is being torn away from her. As if she hasn't

already had to give up so many things! As if they haven't already taken away everything of value! She will have to say farewell

to the French furniture, the candelabras bought by Giovanna in Paris, the ebony-inlaid coin cabinet, the Aubussons, the great

collection of antique vases and majolica, the marble panel by Antonello Gagini in Ignazio's study... but also the paintings

by Antonino Leto, Francesco de Mura, Luca Giordano, Francesco Solimena, and Francesco Lojacono. Yes, even the Velázquez. Only

a few will go to Villa Igiea. Of the others, all that will remain at the Olivuzza will be empty space left on the bare walls.

Every now and again Maruzza comes up to Franca and points at something.

"That one," Franca replies with a nod, and Maruzza tells the maid what to write in the little notebook she holds in her hands.

Franca leaves the green salon, reaches the red marble staircase, crosses the gallery, and lingers for a few moments to look

out at what remains of the winter garden: only dry plants, bare trunks, and rottenness. Then she lowers her gaze and heads

for her room. She stops only for a moment in front of a little display case that houses a group of statuettes purchased over

the years in Saxony, France, and Capodimonte: groups of children playing alone or with puppies, varying in their styles, identical

in their smiles and in the playfulness captured by the whiteness of the porcelain.

Pure memories of a time when innocence seemed something of value.

"These," she says, her voice suddenly hard. "I don't want to see them again."

She opens the door to her bedroom. In truth, there is almost nothing left in it, but she was happy in this room, Giovanna,

Ignazio, Igiea, and Giulia were born in this bed, and perhaps the memories are still here, enclosed in the rose petals on

the floor, in the tiles in front of the French windows, in the stiff handle that closes the shutters, in the lopsided smiles

of the cherubs in the corners of the ceiling...

But what memories? she thinks angrily. This room has witnessed more moments of pain and jealousy than happy ones. It houses an emptiness of

the soul that Franca has long been unable to shake. There is only stuff here, pointless stuff. Dead stuff.

Maruzza, who is still in the doorway, says, "I'll have the servants take away part of the trousseau and send it to Rome."

Franca turns. "The used linen can be given to charity, or else they can keep it for themselves... if they haven't already."

Her tone is contemptuous. "Well, it's what happens. Do you think I don't know?"

Maruzza merely nods, a grimace curling her dry lips.

"Let's hurry up. I want to get back to my daughters."

She looks into Ignazio's room, with a curt gesture points to just one item of furniture, the sophisticated burr-mahogany shirt

case, closes the door, and walks back, passing the winter garden and entering the dining room. "Away with all of it," she

says, meaning even the coral and copper peacocks and the great fireguard. Passing the children's rooms, which still contain

games and books although the children are long gone, she merely nods, as if to say: Away with it.

She heads toward the oldest part of the Olivuzza, where the fire broke out ten years ago and which was subsequently rebuilt. There are still bills to pay for that work, and she can't help thinking: If everything had burned, at least I would have been spared this torture.

She takes a few steps, then, all at once, stops in front of a door. She seizes the handle, but her hand doesn't move.

At last she opens the door and goes in.

In the semi-darkness, she makes out the armchairs and divans heaped up against the walls, the empty consoles, devoid of crystal

vases, the silver centerpieces and gilded bronze clocks, the rolled-up carpets, the tables covered with dusty cloths. She

raises her eyes to the Murano lampshades, opaque with dirt, and the gilded moldings on the ceiling, imprisoned behind a veil

of spiderwebs.

But the thing that draws a heartfelt sigh out of her is the silence. There was never silence in this room.

It was the realm of music and laughter and chatter, of rustling dresses, the tinkling of glasses, the tapping of shoes.

It was the ballroom of the Olivuzza.

Franca advances and stops in the middle of the room.

She looks around.

And all at once she sees figures that have escaped the laws of time. Men and women who are no longer here but who have smiled,

danced, loved here. She can hear their voices and it's almost as if they brush against her. She herself is one of them, a

shadow among shadows: young, beautiful, with Ignazio's hand at her side, laughing and looking at her with desire. Not far

away are Giulia Trigona and Stefanina Pajno, and Maria Concetta and Giulia Lanza di Trabia. There's the smell of her perfume,

La Marescialla. There are satin and mother-of-pearl fans, champagne glasses, white gloves, diamond bracelets, dance cards

lined in silk, lace corsets. And there's the sound of mazurkas, polkas, waltzes...

But it lasts only a moment; it's only a mirage of the dust raised when the maid opened the shutters to let in a little light. That same maid now stands looking at her, waiting expectantly.

Another step. The shadows fade, the dust settles.

Franca retreats and leaves the room without answering Maruzza's questioning glance. Maruzza remains motionless for a moment

too long and then is forced to follow her.

"We also need to take the Saxony porcelain service and the silver kitchenware," Franca is saying.

Maruzza nods and turns to the maid. "Make a note. And we should add the silverware from the big cabinet and the crystals—isn't

that so, Donna Franca?"

But Franca has stopped listening. She's tired of this list, tired of fighting the memories that every object, even the most

insignificant, evokes in her. The chair on which D'Annunzio sat at dinner after the performance of La Gioconda at the Teatro Massimo. The piano on which Puccini sketched out Che gelida manina , and which her own children used for a brief period. The table on which she and Ignazio laid out large sheets of paper to

design the furniture for Villa Igiea. The camera that Vincenzo gave his eldest brother, and that which he used in the garden

of the H?tel Métropole before...

She looks at the objects, as if they're calling her, then quickens her pace and almost runs toward the exit, as if pursued

by them. It's the fate of men to be happy and not to realize it. It is their curse to waste times of joy without realizing they're

as rare as they're unrepeatable. That memory can't give you back what you have felt but will instead give you back the measure

of what you have lost, Franca thinks, while the other two women continue to chatter about linen tablecloths and silver forks. She looks at them,

and an infinite sorrow sweeps over her. She would like to weep, to cry out: You're thinking about things, and I'm thinking that soon these things will no longer belong to me, whereas once they spoke of me, of Ignazio, of our children, of this family. Now love has slipped away, leaving me with nothing but lines of bitterness. Do you know what it means to really feel loved? To hope to be loved? To feel infinitely alone?

Instead, she remains motionless and silent. Because, despite everything, she is still Donna Franca Florio and she can show

the world only one face, the face of pride.

At last, the three women get back in the car to return to Villa Igiea. Franca feels her heart grow lighter as they leave the

house behind, even though she was once happy there. In a few days, she and her daughters will go back to Rome. Palermo, with

its cold, opaque light will be far away, and she'll be able to stop remembering.

She doesn't yet know that in a few years' time even the memory of that house and those grounds will have faded. That everything

will end up in the hands of a real estate agency that will divide the garden into allotments, knocking down almost everything

and building apartment buildings where the aviary and the little neoclassical temple once were, where the avenues lined with

rosebushes and tropical plants once stretched into the distance and her children played and Vincenzo drove his cars.

She won't hear the noise of the saws cutting into the centuries-old trees, or the blows of the axe splitting the trunks of

the yuccas and the dracaenas. She won't see the hedges being pulled up or the creepers torn off the burning gazebo.

Of that luxuriant garden, very little will survive. Two palms, confined to a small patch of earth, on which the windows of

a clinic will look out. A flower bed, where the salon facing the garden once stood. The olive tree next to the entrance, the

one particularly dear to Senator Ignazio, repotted in a concrete tub inside a parking lot.

Around the little villa designed by Basile—where Vincenzo and Annina loved each other—a small green patch will remain. There will even be moves to tear down that fairy-tale house and replace it with yet another apartment block, yet another concrete monster. Fate will decide otherwise.

But that's another story.