Free The American by Martin Booth Page A

God gives him one. ‘Chicken broth, of bones.’
    I help myself to vegetables and we eat. The meat is sweet yet gamey, the salsify soft and delicious. The wine is dry but bland and the bottle bears no label. He must have purchased it locally, from an acquaintance with a few hectares of vines on the sides of the valley.
    ‘This is sinful,’ I declare, indicating the food with my fork. ‘Decadent. Hedonistic. We should be living a thousand years ago to eat so.’
    He nods but makes no answer.
    ‘At least,’ I continue, ‘we have the table for it. Laden with a repast fit for a pope.’
    ‘The Holy Father eats better than this,’ Father Benedetto declares, swilling the wine around his mouth. ‘And this is the correct table. It is said it was once the property of Aldebert.’
    He rightly interprets my silence as ignorance and goes on, laying down his knife and fork.
    ‘Aldebert was an Antichrist. French.’ He shrugs as if to imply this was an inevitability. ‘He was a Frankish bishop who abandoned his see and preached to peasants near Soissons. San Bonifacio – the English one – had much trouble with him. Aldebert practised apostolic poverty, was able to cure the sick and claimed he was born of a virgin. He was born by the Caesarean method. At a synod in the year of Our Lord 744, he was excommunicated. Yet he continued to preach and was never arrested.’
    ‘What happened to him?’
    ‘He died,’ Father Benedetto says with finality. ‘Who knows how?’ He picks up his knife and fork again. ‘The French have never been good Catholics. Consider this recent schism, this . . .’ again he looks up for divine translation but this time without receiving assistance ‘. . . buffone who wants to keep to the old ways. He is French. He causes much trouble for the Holy Father.’
    ‘But do you not adore history, my friend?’ I interject. ‘Is not such tradition the stuff of life, the blood of the continuity of the Church? Did you not say a Latin grace before we ate?’
    He sticks his fork into the breast of his pheasant as if it was a French priest of dubious piety and does not reply. He just grins.
    After a few more mouthfuls, I ask, ‘How can you dine at the table of the Antichrist? And was he not a Frenchman . . . ?’
    He smiles and excuses himself. ‘He was a bishop when he owned the table. Also, he was not Antichrist. I think this. He was a man of God. He cured the sick. Even today, there is the charismatic Catholic Church. I do not . . .’ He lifts his fork, burdened with flesh. ‘But it exists. Often Jesuits.’
    I cannot tell if he is in favour of the Society or against it.
    We finish the meat and I help him clear the plates away. He produces nuts and cognac. We sit again at the table.
    ‘Did you never want to be other than a priest?’ I ask.
    ‘No.’
    He splits an almond with the pair of silver-plated nutcrackers.
    ‘Not a doctor or teacher or something else you could do within the Church?’
    ‘No. And how about you, Signor Farfalla?’
    He almost smirks. He must know I receive mail in the name of Clarke, Clark, Leclerc and Giddings. He is certain to have asked Signora Prasca and she, a good and God-fearing woman, will have told him, for he is her priest and she an elderly lady with a devout faith in such men. I do not share this unquestioning trust.
    ‘Have you never wanted to be other than an artist?’ he enquires.
    ‘I have not considered it.’
    ‘You should do so. I am sure you have other talents. Other than with the brush and the paper, the aquatints and the pencil. Perhaps you should do something else also. You have the hands of a craftsman, not an artist.’
    I do not show my unease. He is treading too close to my path.
    ‘Perhaps you should also make other things. Things of beauty . . . Things to bring you greater wealth than little pictures of insects. This cannot make you a rich man.’
    ‘No, it cannot.’
    ‘Perhaps you are rich already?’ he suggests.
    ‘As rich as you are,