By Lent of 1736, a letter arrived. The doctor called me into his study, handed it to me, and said nothing. My mother's handwriting was unmistakable.
She wished to see me before her departure for Saint Petersburg, and invited my tutor to accompany me for a few days in Venicia.
I watched his expression shift between pride and alarm.
He had never seen Venicia, never faced a drawing-room, and the prospect of both in one visit left him pale.
I said nothing. I knew already he would go.
We embarked the next morning. The burchiello carried us down the Brenta beneath a mild sun, and by the second evening the towers of my native city rose from the mist like a painted backdrop.
My mother received us with the grace that had undone stronger men.
She was dazzling—too dazzling for my poor doctor, who kept his gaze pinned to the carpet.
She addressed him warmly; he stammered back fragments of Latin disguised as compliments. She saw his torment at once and, being who she was, found it diverting.
As for me, I was now the miracle of the hour. The little idiot of two years before had returned a scholar, articulate and—by my own estimation—passably presentable.
Their astonishment amused me. I took care to meet it with studied modesty.
The doctor's face, meanwhile, shone with quiet triumph. They credited him with my transformation.
We sat together, my mother sparkling between questions. Her glance fell upon my pale wig—an unfortunate relic from Padua.
"Tell me," she said, "why does my son wear hair fit for a German doll? That color flatters neither his eyes nor his complexion."
The doctor, caught unprepared, replied honestly:
"With a wig, madam, it is easier for my sister to keep him clean."
Laughter circled the room. My mother, delighted by the simplicity of his answer, pressed on. "Your sister—is she married?"
I stepped gallantly into the breach. "Bettina, madam, is the prettiest girl in Padua and she is not married."
This time even my tutor smiled, though he tried to smother it.
My mother nodded, eyes glinting with mischief. "Then tell her," she said, "that if she permits Giacomo to wear his own hair, I shall send her a gift worthy of her beauty."
The doctor bowed. "Your wishes, madam, shall be obeyed."
A peruke-maker was summoned. By the next morning, I possessed a darker wig and, I thought, infinitely more becoming.
When the guests turned to cards, I excused myself to visit my brothers in our grandmother's room.
François was bent over a table scattered with papers.
"Look," he said proudly. "My plans for an opera house. What do you think?"
I examined them with solemn admiration. "Magnificent," I murmured whenever his eyes met mine.
He glowed under the praise.
The drawings were mediocre, but flattery seemed a gentle form of justice. It cost me less than the beating he once took in my place.
Jean showed me nothing at all. I judged him dull and left it at that. The younger ones were still very young.
At supper the doctor found himself seated beside my mother—a fate too brilliant for his peace of mind.
The poor man perspired like a penitent; his napkin twisted in his hands, and he stared fixedly at his wine as if it might supply the courage he lacked.
An elderly Englishman, grave and pink-cheeked, addressed him in Latin.
The doctor, confused by the accent, replied with all humility, "I beg your pardon, sir; I do not understand English."
Laughter passed round the table. Only half understood the cause.
Baffo leaned over to explain, smiling: "Englishmen pronounce Latin as they pronounce English."
"Then," I said, "they are no less mistaken than we should be if we tried to read English as though it were Latin."
The Englishman's eye brightened. From his pocket he drew a quill, scribbled two verses, and handed them across the table.
Dicite, grammatici, cur mascula nomina cunnus,
Et cur femineum mentula nomen habet.
(Tell me, grammarians, why the word cunnus (vulva) is masculine,
And why the word mentula (penis) is feminine.)
I read them aloud.
"This," I said, "is Latin indeed."
"We know that," said my mother, "but can you explain it?"
"To explain it is not enough," I answered; "it is a question which is worthy of an answer." And after considering for a moment, I wrote the following pentameter:
Disce quod a domino nomina servus habet.
(Learn that the servant takes its name from its master)
The Englishman read the line once, then again, then a third time.
"No boy of eleven has ever accomplished such a feat!" he declared, and in the warmth of his enthusiasm embraced me, drew from his pocket a gold watch, and pressed it into my hand.
This was my first literary exploit, and I may say that in that very instant the seed of my love for literary fame was sown in my breast, for the applause lavished upon me exalted me to the very pinnacle of happiness.
My mother—curious, as women are—asked the Abbé Grimani for the sense, but he was no wiser than she.
Baffo, obliging and discreet, translated in a whisper.
My mother rose, fetched a fine gold watch, and presented it to my tutor.
The poor doctor, not knowing how to signal gratitude, fell into the most comic embarrassment.
To spare him a speech, my mother offered her cheek for the two customary kisses—an easy, innocent civility.
He drew back, head down, and was suffered to sit in peace until we broke up for the night.
When we were alone, he regained speech. "It is a pity," he said, "that your couplet and the Englishman's cannot be printed in Padua."
"Why not?"
"Because both are obscene."
"But they are sublime," I said.
He groaned. "Go to sleep, Giacomo. Your answer was admirable only because you know nothing of the matter—or of verse."
He was mistaken. I knew more than he suspected.
Because of his prohibition I had read Meursius from cover to cover, and if my master, who had taught me prosody, could not write a single elegant line, that was no reason I should be equally barren.
In the realm of the mind, the rule nemo dat quod non habet (No one gives what he does not have) is happily false.
Four days later, as we prepared to leave, my mother entrusted me with a parcel for Bettina. Abbé Grimani gave me four sequins "for books," a purpose I took, for once, quite literally.
After our return to Padua, the good doctor spent three months talking of my mother with the sighs of a man who has discovered beauty too late in life.
Bettina, meanwhile, had found in her parcel five yards of black silk and twelve pairs of gloves.
From that day, her devotion to me redoubled.
She came to my bed each morning before I had time to rise.
"I cannot wait for you to dress," she would say, laughing, already combing my hair.
Her fingers moved through it with the precision of habit and the tenderness of curiosity. She washed my face, my neck, my chest.
At first, I thought her attentions innocent—then I realized innocence had nothing to do with it.
Her touch lingered. A kiss on the forehead became one on the cheek, and once—almost on the lips.
I felt a confusion I had no words for.
My blood ran quick, my breath shallow. I clenched my fists beneath the sheets, furious that her caresses excited me.
She laughed at my silence, pleased with her mischief.
"You're getting stouter," she said one morning, running her hands along my sides. "Shall I prove it?"
I dared not answer, fearing she would remark my sensitiveness.
She proved it all the same, and when she would go on saying that my skin was soft, the tickling sensation made me draw back, angry with myself that I did not dare to do the same to her, but delighted at her not guessing how I longed to do it.
When I was dressed, she often gave me the sweetest kisses, calling me her darling child, but whatever wish I had to follow her example, I was not yet bold enough.
After some time, however, Bettina laughing at my timidity, I became more daring and returned her kisses with interest.
But always, when instinct urged me further, I stopped.
Something—a ghost of upbringing or pride—pulled me back.
When she left the room, I would pace like a man cheated by his own restraint.
I was also astonished at the fact that Bettina could do to me all she was in the habit of doing without feeling any excitement from it, while I could hardly refrain from pushing my attacks further, I would every day determine to change my way of acting.
Autumn arrived, and with it, three new boarders.
One, a hulking country boy named Cordiani, full of himself, began exchanging glances and whispers with Bettina.
It took less than a month for me to despise him. I told myself it was contempt, not jealousy, that I felt.
Contempt for his clumsy speech, his hands still rough from the plough, his dull laughter. He was but the son of a simple farmer.
My young self-esteem whispered that I was above him.
My conduct towards Bettina changed.
I withdrew. My answers grew short, my tone cold, when she came to comb my hair while I was in bed; I would repulse her hands, and no longer return her kisses.
One day, she asked me about the reason of my change towards her.
I simply replied: "I had no cause for it"
She told me in a tone of commiseration: "You are jealous of Cordiani."
The words struck like an insult.
"Cordiani," I said, "is as worthy of you as you are of him."
She went away smiling, but, revolving in her mind the only way by which she could be revenged, she thought herself bound to render me jealous.
However, as she could not attain such an end without making me fall in love with her, this is the policy she adopted.