At the Curve of San Martino
In spite of his disappointment, Giorgio's spirits began to rise with each passing hour. Even if he could not ride Farfalla in the Palio, he was no longer an outcast. He was a participant! And for a week at least he would be free of the weasel of a groom with his sly grin and razor tongue.
That same day of the drawing, and for three successive days, the rehearsal races were held. They were called Provas, but Giorgio failed to see that they proved anything.
In the first one he was eager to make a good showing for the Shell, and he lifted Turbolento up over the starting rope before it actually touched the track. In fact, he was well in the lead when he noticed that none of the other fantinos were urging their mounts. They made a great to-do with flapping elbows and wild yelling, but anyone could see they were intent on concealing their mounts' true ability.
Giorgio followed their cue. Besides, after the first spurt, he sensed that he might have trouble with Turbolento. Although not new to racing, the horse was accustomed to the tracks in the provinces. The races there were run counterclockwise, while here in the Piazza del Campo the running went clockwise. It would take patient control of Turbolento's speed and of his leads to prevent his switching at the turns. Before Giorgio had gone once around the Piazza, he understood the real purpose of the Prova. Horses and riders had to get acquainted three ways—with each other, with the dangerous slopes and curves, and with the opposite way of running. No wonder the rehearsal races were neither battle nor competition!
During the days of the Provas, Giorgio felt as if he had the all-seeing eyes of a horse. Besides watching Turbolento's every move, he managed to see what was happening to Farfalla, whether she was ahead of him or behind. Her fantino, Ivan-the-Terrible, went around the curves flapping his wings like a bird. Twice he flew off into space. Luckily, Farfalla was not hurt by entangling reins or bumps from other horses. Giorgio remembered later that he had noticed Ivan was unhurt only after he had made sure about Farfalla!
"Which horse is it you ride?" an elderly man of the Forest whispered to Giorgio after the third Prova. "Is it your Turbolento, or is it our Farfalla?" And he winked and nudged him in the ribs as if he wished the boy could be their fantino.
Quickly Giorgio's bodyguards closed in, wondering if the man were making some secret offer. But they might have saved themselves the trouble, for neither Turbolento nor Giorgio was considered strong enough to win—or to help anyone else to win.
Despite his watchfulness, Giorgio failed to see the crippling accident that happened to Farfalla in the last Prova on the very morning of the Palio. Between the curves of San Martino and the Casato, the horses of the Panther and the Unicorn were having a private race of their own. As Farfalla tried to pass, a hoof lashed out and hit her a sharp blow, almost severing the cartilage of her left hind foot. Ivan-the-Terrible managed to stay on, and let her finish the race limping heavily.
Moments later Giorgio passed her in a narrow lane as she was being led back to her stable. He turned to look at her bleeding heel. "The devil pursues her!" he said to his guards. Then his eyes blazed with a sudden thought. "They won't race her; they can't race her this afternoon in the Palio!" he cried out.
"But they got to!" the young men answered in chorus, and they turned on him in a torrent of explanation.
"It is a law from year seventeen hundred," the Number One guard said. "If an animal is lamed or dies in a Prova, it is not permitted to replace him."
Another guard broke in excitedly. "Why, I myself saw one killed in a Prova, and the contrada remained horseless."
"I too saw it!" the first one said. "And in the parade before the race the long black tail and the severed hoof of the dead one were carried on a platter of silver."
Now thoroughly roused, the guards were irrepressible. "And the flags of that contrada were tightly furled in mourning and even the strongest men wept like small children and cried aloud."
Giorgio felt his stomach turn over. Almost pleading, he looked from face to face. "But Farfalla is crippled! There could be a stumble, a fatal...."
"Then it will be her time to die," the Number One bodyguard said flatly. "She too is only mortal." There was no coldness in his voice. He was merely repeating words said to him long ago.
Giorgio tried to shut out thoughts of Farfalla. He made his mind go forward. He began counting. Three hours until the blessing of the horses in the churches of their contradas. Then the long historical parade, and at last, at sundown, the Palio!
He went with Turbolento into the stable of the Shell and watched the barbaresco go to work, sponging him off, making him comfortable and cool with especial attention to his head, eyes, and nostrils. Giorgio stood by as long as he could. Then from sheer habit he fell to his knees and hand-rubbed Turbolento's legs. Unconsciously he worked for a long time on the left hind, as if in some remote way he were helping Farfalla.
Giorgio usually had the mind of a camera. Events registered sharply with him. But that afternoon, during the long parade in which he wore the martial costume of the Middle Ages and rode a heavy warhorse, he felt himself an actor in a play, an actor who did not know his part. He was bewildered by the vast sea of faces in the center of the Piazza, and the kaleidoscope of color in costumes and flags, and the drums beating out a somber rhythm. Through it all he rode woodenly, like a toy soldier.
But with the explosion of the bomb announcing the race, he became all awareness again. With every fiber he heard the starter call out the horses in order.
"Number one, Caterpillar!"
"Number two, Shell!"
"Number three, Forest!" That was Farfalla. Ignoring her injury, she walked briskly to the starting rope. Giorgio reminded himself that of course the doctors had deadened her pain.
As the horses moved to their positions, Giorgio felt his breath coming fast. Turbolento and Farfalla were side by side. "Is it some omen," he asked himself, "that brings us together?"
The starter's voice blared on: "Number four, Tower.... Number five, Snail.... Number six, Wave.... Number seven, Panther.... Number eight, Goose.... Number nine, Turtle!"
Now nine horses in line—pawing, dancing, heads pulling to go. And nine fantinos with faces taut, reins taut, waiting for the number ten horse. Not until he is called to the rope can the race begin.
"Number ten, Unicorn!" the strident voice of the starter fills the Piazza.
Head lowered like a bull charging, the number ten horse gallops up, almost touches the rope. The starter springs it. It snakes free. Ten horses, as one, leap over it!
Giorgio's fingers tighten hard around the nerbo. If he takes the lead, he will not need it. He arrows Turbolento out in front, sets the pace.
Forty thousand throats cry "Forza! Forza!" as the bunched leaders pass the Fonte Gaia, pass the Casino of the Nobles, pass the scaffold where the judges sit. Now they are thundering toward the death curve of San Martino.
Behind him Giorgio hears the nerbos strike hollow against horseflesh and sharp against steel helmets, but he is still in the lead, free of the bludgeoning.
Out of the tail of his eye he sees the Wave, the Goose, the Panther fighting it out, and behind them Ivan-the-Terrible trying to drive Farfalla through. In the split second of his looking, a fantino catapults into the air like a rag doll shot from a cannon. It must be Ivan! It is Ivan! Farfalla is staggering on by herself. All this Giorgio senses rather than sees. He is at the curve now. Turbolento is leaning at a crazy angle; he seems to be tiring, faltering.
From every balcony and window, from all over the Piazza, the people of the Shell are shouting to Giorgio: "The nerbo! The nerbo! Use the nerbo on him!"
Giorgio feels icy terror. Turbolento is trying to wheel, to run the wrong way of the track. His left foreleg crosses his right. It is rooted! The pack is passing him! From both sides nerbos are raining blows on him, on Giorgio, beating them out of the way.
Giorgio lifts the horse's head, tries to get the weight on his hocks, but it is too late! Turbolento freezes, then buckles. His scream joins the shrieks of the crowd as he somersaults and slides across the track. Giorgio is pitched into the air, and hits with a thud on his back.
Hoofs go thundering past while he lies writhing, gasping, the wind knocked out of his body. As in a trance he sees the white-coated veterinarian rush out on the track. He hears the crack of the bullet that ends Turbolento's life, and sees the limping form of Farfalla come within an arm's length of the smoking pistol.
His heart beats thickly. He is suddenly afraid. A soundless prayer escapes his lips.
"Not her, too! O Holy Mother, not her! Not her!"
