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Updated: June 16, 2025
Caesar considered that so red a nose in that livid, ghastly face resembled a lantern in a melancholy landscape lighted by the evening twilight. This livid person was the house librarian. "His Eminence is very busy," said Preciozi, after bowing to the callers. He spoke with a different voice from the one he used outside. "I will go in, in a moment, and see if you can see him."
"You are giving a proof of irreligion which is in bad taste," said Laura. "Only janitors talk like that." "On such questions I am an honourary janitor." "That's all right, but you ought to realize that there are religious people here, like the abbe...." "Preciozi? Why, he's a Voltairean." "Oh! Oh! My friend...." exclaimed Preciozi, emptying a glass of wine. "Voltaireanism," continued Caesar.
"Yes, but that will not impede my Spaniard's heart, my Cardinal's nephew's heart from bleeding grievously.... Shall we go to the cafe, Abbe?" "Yes, let us go." They left the hotel and entered a cafe in the Piazza Esedra. Preciozi made a vague move to pay, but Caesar would not permit him to. "What do you wish to do?" said the abbe. "Whatever you like."
Caesar and Preciozi went on encircling the walls and reading the various marble tablets set into them, and ascended to the Janiculum, to the terrace where Garibaldi's statue stands. "But, are you anti-Catholic, seriously?" asked Preciozi. "But do you believe any one can be a Catholic seriously?" said Caesar. "I can, yes; otherwise I shouldn't be a priest."
Peter's had the colour of a cloud, the shrubberies on the Pincio were reddened by the sun, and the Alban Hills disclosed the little white towns and the smiling villas on their declivities. Preciozi pointed out domes and towers; Caesar did not hear him, and he was thinking, with a certain terror: "We shall die, and these stones will continue to shine in the sunlight of other winter evenings."
"What a wonderful bird you keep in this beautiful cage!" said Caesar. "What bird?" asked Preciozi. "The Pope, friend Preciozi, the Pope. Not the popinjay, but the Pope in white. What a very marvellous bird!
He is a man of great influence, of great talent." "Influence, I believe; talent, I doubt," said Caesar. "Oh, no, no! He is an intelligent man." "But I have heard that his Theological Commentaries is absolutely absurd." "No, no." "A crude, banal book, full of stupidities...." "Macche!" exclaimed the indignant Preciozi, neglecting the culinary conflict he was engaged in. "All right.
After a brief audience, which could not have lasted over five minutes, the Cardinal said, addressing Laura: "Pardon me, my daughter, but I must go on with my work"; and immediately, without a look at his nephew or his niece, he called the secretary, who brought him a portfolio of papers. Caesar opened the glass door for Laura to pass. "Would you like to see the palace?" Preciozi asked them.
"Yes, my dear abbe," retorted Caesar, "and I even believe that you added confidentially that sometimes the Pope in the Vatican gardens, imitating Francis I after the battle of Pavia, is wont to say sadly to the Secretary of State: 'All is lost, save faith and... good cooking." "What a bufone! What a bufone!" exclaimed Preciozi, with his mouth full.
Preciozi was beginning to believe that his friend was a man with a future. Some explanations that Caesar gave him about the mechanism of the stock-exchange convinced the abbe that he was in the presence of a great financier.
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