The Ghost in the Warehouse
Eager to make the sale, the carter of Casalino delivered the mare to Siena within the week. And while he went to a restaurant and ordered himself a heaping plate of veal scallopini in anticipation of the sixty thousand lire, Signor Busisi went to the bank to draw out the money.
On his way up the few stairs to the grilled portal, the Signore found himself side by side with a slight young man. He turned to see who it might be, and his face lighted. "Doctor Celli!" he exclaimed in pleased recognition. He hooked his arm through the young man's, swung him around, and led him back down the steps to the courtyard.
"Doctor Celli!" he beamed, unable to conceal his delight. "Think of my bumping into Fate twice in one week! May I delay you a moment? No?"
The gray eyes in the sun-browned face smiled. "Naturally, Signor Busisi. For you, my work can always wait."
"I had not thought to find you so soon."
"To find me?"
"Yes, you. This life is a big puzzle, Celli, jumbled with odd-shaped pieces. Then presto, the pieces, they fit!"
"Am I one of the odd pieces?" the doctor laughed.
"Let us say you were."
"And the other?"
"The other piece is...." the Signore ran his fingers through his shaggy white hair. Then he straightened to his full height and spoke in staccato excitement. "The other piece is an Arabian mare. She is called by the name Farfalla, and she moves as easily as an oiled machine. I found her in the Maremma. Quite by happenstance." The words now came more slowly. "Doctor Celli, you are the one to prescribe for her. She has the nervous tic."
The young man burst into fresh laughter. "Do you forget, Signore, I am a doctor of accounting, not of medicine?"
"I know, I know; but a doctor of this or that is smart enough to work magic in other fields. Besides, you are a horseman. You have a villa and hunting reserves, and as I recall, there is on your farm a good road, long and straight, fit for gallops. And," he paused a moment in his eagerness, "in less than three months, the Palio!"
The two men in the courtyard stood facing a statue, very tall, of Bandini, a celebrated economist, but neither one saw it. Nor were they conscious of the people going in and out of the bank. They were both seeing the same vision: Piazza del Campo in battle array—flags flying, lances gleaming, knights and nobles marching, horses dancing at the ropes, fantinos tense and ready. In their veins all of the ancient feelings boiled up again.
For a long moment the silence seemed unbreakable. Then at last Signor Busisi exploded. "You, Celli! You belong to the Contrada of the Unicorn. No?"
"Si, si."
"Your contrada is small and has won few Palios. No?"
Again the young man agreed.
"How sad for you, but...." the Signore waved his arms to heaven, "think how sweet your frenzy if a horse owned by you should win, even for another contrada!"
"A thousand times I thank you, Signor Busisi, but I never buy the cat in the bag."
"But, Celli! You do not have to buy the cat in the bag. This Farfalla by Sans Souci is here, right here in Siena! You have only to look!"
Respecting Signor Busisi as he did, Doctor Celli went early the next morning to see Farfalla. She was stabled temporarily in an old, dank warehouse used for storing ox hides. As he left the sunlight and crossed the doorsill, he stood blinking among the flies and the smells of dried blood and brine. A chill went through him. Out of the shadowy darkness the figure of the mare loomed like a gray ghost. Suddenly she scented the stranger and reared into the air, as if she would pitch him heels over head if he tried to mount. Then she retreated into a corner, her ears laid flat, her nostrils snorting, her lips drawn back.
It was several moments before Doctor Celli's eyes became accustomed to the dark. Then he took note of the fresh teeth marks on the wooden crib. "This cribbing is a thing she will not outgrow," he warned himself. "Yet nervous horses are like nervous people; they work in bursts of energy. For a race, this is good."
Back and forth he argued with himself. "She is too old to buy! Already she looks to be a six- or seven-year-old!"
And he answered himself. "But some horses come late to their full glory." He remembered the mighty Lipizzans of Vienna whose training did not begin until they were six. Perhaps she, too, would be a late bloomer. And if she was daughter to the noble Sans Souci, and if Signor Busisi liked her, that was enough.
He heard a cough behind him, and turned to find the Signore standing silently in the doorway.
"Restive, she is," the Signore said, "and pitifully underfed. But the Arabian blood is unmistakable; no?"
Already Doctor Celli had taken the hurdles in his mind. "Signor Busisi," he said, "from the fresh teeth marks it is plain that she is a nervous cribber. You already have told me this. Yet in spite of it, her possibilities intrigue me."
"Ah," the Signore replied, a wistful note in his voice, "is it not something beautiful to offer her the chance of fulfillment in this life?"
Within the span of the next ten minutes the walls of the warehouse echoed with excited voices. The haggling over the price began in a series of crescendos—up down, up down, up down.
The louder the talk, the quieter Farfalla became. The hub-bub seemed to be the very balm she needed, and Signor Busisi was quick to point it out. "Notice, Celli," he laughed, "the mare is now tranquil."
At last the two men were shaking hands to seal their agreement, both looking tremendously pleased.
The Signore took a deep breath, feeling his tired old heart skip a beat. "The pieces of the puzzle, they fit nice and precise," he sighed. "For sheer happiness my heart is bursting." And he smiled, as if he had given to the mare and the man their destiny.
As smoke lifts in an uprising wind, so ill fortune lifted for Farfalla. She began a new life. From the dingy, malodorous warehouse she was suddenly living on a wind-brushed hilltop beyond the city walls. It was from gloom to Paradise!
She had a nice box stall with sparrows for company, and outside her door she could hear pigs rooting and geese making friendly clacking noises. From her stable a grass-grown lane wound down and leveled off, straight as a string. The stretch of straightness began at a small bridge and flowed quietly through woods and farmland.
Each day was like the one before, and they were all good. Mornings when the mist lay wet and shining upon the land, she was saddled and bridled, and away she trotted without the nuisance of a cart joggling along behind. No rumbly noises at all. And no collar across her shoulders, nor leathers holding her back. Only a light hand on the reins and the light weight of Doctor Celli in the saddle. Occasionally a span of oxen would loom into sight and plod by, but to Farfalla they were placid old friends, remembered from the Maremma.
In this pleasant way the days and weeks of training for the Palio slipped by, one like the other. But along toward the end of June, with the selection of the horses only three days away, Doctor Celli was sent on a business errand to Rome. Scarcely had he left Siena when the sky clouded and the rain began. It pelted down in big drops, far apart at first, then closer and closer until they formed a thick curtain. Hour on hour the rain drummed ceaselessly against the small window of Farfalla's stable, until the noise and the eerie darkness threw her into a terror. She jerked her head up and down, more desperate with each moment, and she clamped her teeth on the uprights of her stall, biting them, peeling slivers of wood, and at the same time sucking in great mouthfuls of air.
Night and morning, the tenant farmer sloshed through the rain to look in on her. He saw to it that she had fresh water and grain and sweet meadow hay. But he cut his visits short, for she reared and snorted at the shadows made by his lantern, and her ghost-white color made his own flesh creep. He noticed her appetite was poor, but he attributed it to the foul weather and the lack of exercise. What he failed to notice was the swelling of her throat, and her belly becoming hard and distended.
When Doctor Celli returned, on the evening of the second day, he hurried at once to the stable. It was the very eve before the selection of the horses, and he wanted to be sure that Farfalla was as fit and happy as he had left her. With his hat dripping and his raincoat glossy wet, he entered her stall. To his horror he found her rolling from side to side, pawing the air in an agony of pain. He called in a veterinarian at once, but with all the aids of stomach pump and quieting medicines she still could not be readied in time for the trials.
