The sword of wealth

by Henry Wilton Thomas

On an outer boulevard a large body of insurgents, after a company of Bersaglieri had given them a peppering from their muskets, advanced on the soldiers and showed them what could be done with stones flung by enthusiasts. They drove the soldiers into the moat that runs round the city wall, then returned to the barricades they were building of overturned carts and carriages of the gentry and an automobile they had captured.

Every one arrested was heard before a court martial; all prisoners were committed to cells. From behind their bars they launched curses against their captors and defiance of authority. Some of the newspapers hailed the uprising as the birth of a new and glorious Italy. These were seized promptly. Men with swords sat at the desks where men with pens had done their work. The Queen of Holland, who was expected, was advised by the Minister of the Interior not to proceed to Milan. Wherever workmen were found grouped an unceremonious shower of bullets dispersed them.

It had been all fun for the rebels the night before, when Tarsis and the Panther, in the gloom of Piazza dell’ Armi, arranged to square the account against Mario Forza. There were not enough soldiers about then to interfere with the mobs that took the ordering of pleasures into their own hands. They swept into the Dal Verme Theatre and occupied excellent seats. The manager, wise in his hour, accepted the situation and instructed his singers to do their best. It turned out as he expected. Listening to the arias of The Huguenots proved tame work for revolutionists, and before the act was over they rushed into the street, following a leader who had shouted, in a voice heard above the music, “On to the bakeries, comrades! On to the meat-shops!”

The same cry had begun to ring in every part of the town where the revolt was in progress. It was an epitome of the new movement. After all, the reform chiefly desired was a full stomach instead of an empty one. Bakery windows were broken, haunches of meat were lifted from their hooks, slaughter-houses were sacked of dripping carcasses. Bread! It was piled up at the street corners! A new type of butcher presided over the meat. He gave it for the asking and used no scales.

All this was pleasing and satisfactory to the Panther, who witnessed such scenes of the drama as were enacted in the neighbourhood of the Café of the Ancient Colonnade. It seemed to him that affairs had taken a distinctly lucky turn, in view of the service Tarsis had engaged him to perform. As he sipped his coffee or puffed his “Cavour” he reflected that the minds of the officials, press, and public were preoccupied by doings of great moment. Therefore, they would have scant attention to spare on the result of the small commission intrusted to his skill. In this carnival of bloodshed and pillage who would care whether the Honourable Mario Forza were alive or dead? He had no misgiving, but it was pleasant to feel that in case his work were done awkwardly the police would be too busy to meddle with his business of escape.

“Easy money, and more to come,” he told himself, complacently, and the hand in his pocket touched the thousand-lira note that had been transferred from the wallet of Tarsis.

In other cities there had been similar risings, and the rulers, appalled by the power of the people to help themselves, decided suddenly to give them the measures of relief that Mario Forza and his Parliamentary group had been asking for months. The General Government issued a decree suspending the entire duty on wheat; the municipal authorities of Milan put forth a proclamation saying that the price of bread would be reduced at the public expense. But the concessions were too late. Not by bread alone was the madness to be appeased. The fire of insurrection had entered the blood, and the masses went on with their object lesson in the science of bettering social conditions. Refused the reasonable, they demanded the unreasonable.

Emblems of refinement and luxury enraged them. A blind fury which none could foresee attacked the statues in the public squares, the ornaments on the fountains, the treasure houses of painting, sculpture, and letters. A few who loved and revered such things risked their lives to save them.

Ulrich the Austrian, on his way to Palazzo Barbiondi to learn how it fared with his master, saw and heard things that took the high colour from his cheeks and made him continue his journey with the cab-shade drawn. He had seen women place their children on the top of barricades, bare their breasts to musket fire, and invite death. Once above the wave of the mob’s rage he had heard the tremulous cry of a child; a mother, in the front rank of the rebels, was holding it at arms’ length while the cavalry dashed upon her. And he had seen women, when struck, bandage their wounds and return to the battle.

Wherever the mob fought most savagely there was La Ferita, the long scar on her face dulled now by the grime of the struggle. Often it was her hand that applied the torch. With the women that followed her she urged on the men, or dashed alone in front of the soldiers, calling them cowards, assassins, “slaves of Tarsis, who killed little children.” Now and then the soldiers charged their tormentors. Although some of them stood their ground or were carried away wounded, La Ferita was never among the number.