Free That Summer in Sicily by Marlena de Blasi Page B

there were his wife and his daughters, another kind of devil. His wife. The princess Simona. Neither kind nor cruel, neither beautiful nor ugly, she was a fluttering presence who interested me far less than did the young princesses, Yolande and Charlotte. They, too, were unlike anyone I’d ever known or seen. They had names I’d never heard. They wore white stockings embroidered with butterflies and white leather shoes tied with satin ribbons and, though they were seven and eight while I’d just turned nine, they seemed to be ages older as they scurried about the grand place with such purpose, curtsying to the tall yellow-haired devil with the soft voice who was their father. As though this family had come from another corner of the earth than mine rather than from across two hills and over a few kilometers of narrow white road; yes, that’s how I felt. As though they had come from another corner of the earth. We were geographical neighbors in the way Sicilians are neighbors, and yet one of their more modest drawing rooms was larger than my church, and the house where I’d lived would have been lost in the space of their pantry. And there were so many people. Not just the mother, the father, and the children but cousins, aunts, a governess who spoke even more strangely than the family, a music professor, a Latin professor, an art professor. A priest. Others whom I can’t remember now. Everywhere there were servants. And guests in arrival and departure, and so it was like living in the puppet theater I’d once seen at the market in Enna. The constant entrances and exits of splendidly dressed people reciting their lines so perfectly. I watched. I watched them all and, little by little, the savage motherless green-eyed child from the horse farm grew calm. Calm enough to become curious. And then calm enough to dare join in the show myself.
    “With bells and gongs and Ave Marias to mark the hours, the household regime was rigorous, compulsory. We three girls were awakened, scrubbed, combed, braided, dressed by a thirteen-year-old maid called Agata. Our Agata. Yes, it was she. The same. You’ll get to know far more about Agata.
    “The household gathered in the chapel for prayers and benediction at 7:45, breakfasted together in one of the smaller dining rooms at eight. We walked in the garden until nine when lessons began in the schoolroom. At one o’clock the household and guests assembled at table in another of the smaller dining rooms for lunch—a procession of tureens and platters and trays carried ’round by servants amidst the dull chink cut crystal makes as it collides in endless wishes of
salute, salute.
Never risking the bad fortune that comes with crossing arms, each one walked about the table until he or she was certain to have touched everyone’s glass at least once. Twice was better. Only the yellow-haired devil stood, unmoving, at his place while all of us went to him. Even the princess Simona seemed
allegra
in her stroll about the table, wishing good health, sometimes patting a face or an arm almost affectionately. I don’t recall her ever touching my face back then. I remember a gray dress of hers, though, one sewn with shiny beads at the top, and how her bobbed hair was set in tight waves and how the points of her cheeks went red and how she was almost pretty at that time of day.
    “There was a mandatory
riposo
until 4:30, when tea was served in the garden or, in winter, in the schoolroom. Though lessons resumed at five, on some afternoons we girls were allowed to close our books and sit by the fire with our sewing until seven, when Agata came to rescue us, to help us dress for dinner.
Aperitivi
were served in the room where we breakfasted and then we walked, en masse—often more than twenty strong—down the long, dark corridors to the main dining hall.
    “In light of the
grande bouffe
that was lunch, dinner seemed penitential—broth, cheese, glaceéd fruits, biscuits. Wine. A common, catching