"This director," I said, "calls himself a patriot. What has he told us?
That while at Orvinio he knew a foreigner who climbed a high mountain to
make calculations with instruments. What does this admirable citizen do
with regard to such a suspicious character? He does nothing. Is there
not a barrack-full of carbineers at the entrance of the place ready to
arrest such people? But our patriotic gentleman allows the spy to walk
away, to climb fifty other mountains and take five thousand other
measurements, all of which have by this time safely reached Berlin and
Vienna. That, Signor Commissario, is not our English notion of
patriotism. I shall certainly make it my business to write and
congratulate the Banca d'Italia on possessing such a good Italian as
director. I shall also suggest that his talents would be more worthily
employed at the Banca - "(naming a notoriously pro-German establishment).
A poor speech; but it gave me the satisfaction of seeing the fellow grow
purple with fury and so picturesquely indignant that he soon reached the
spluttering stage. In fact, there was nothing to be done with him. The
delegato suggested that inasmuch as he had said his say and deposited
his address, he was at liberty to depart, whenever so disposed.
They went - he and his friends.
The other was looking serious - as serious as such a face could be made
to look. He must not be allowed to think, I decided, for once an
official begins to think he is liable to grow conscientious and
then - why, any disaster might happen, the least of them being that I
should remain in custody pending investigations. In how many more
countries was I going to be arrested for one crime or another? This joke
had lost its novelty a good many years ago.
"A pernicious person," I began, " - you have but to look at him. And now
he has invited me here in order to make a patriotic impression on his
friends, those poor little devils in uniform (a safe remark, since no
love is lost hereabouts between police and military). Such silly talk
about measurements! It should be nipped in the bud. Here you have an
intelligent young subordinate, if I mistake not. Let him drive home with
me at my expense; we will go through all papers and search for
instruments and bring everything that savours of suspicion back to this
office, together with my passport which I never carry on my person.
This, meanwhile, is my carta di soggiorno."
The document was in order. Still he hesitated. I thought of those
miserable three days' grace which were all that the French consulate had
accorded me. If the man grew conscientious, I might remain stranded in
Rome, and all that passport trouble must begin again. And to tell him of
this dilemma would make him more distrustful than ever.
I went on hastily to admit that my request might not be regular, but how
natural!
