Earthquake Echoes
Chapter XVII Totò Carbonaro
One morning, in the autumn of 1908, I was sitting in front of one of the windows of the albergo looking out across the harbour at the mountains of Calabria, waiting for coffee and thinking of Omertà. I had been spending a week in Messina with Giovanni Grasso and his company of Sicilian Players, and Omertà was the play they had performed the preceding evening. I remembered how at the end Giovanni had staggered in mortally wounded and refused to give the name of his murderer—though the audience guessed who it must have been—and then how he had given his knife to Pasqualino, his young brother, and with his last breath had spoken these words; “Per Don Totò, quando avrai diciotto anni”; and I had left the theatre wishing I could see Giovanni as Pasqualino grown up and executing the vendetta. Giovanni now uses a revolver as being a nobler weapon, but when I was with him in Messina it was a knife.
The big waiter brought the coffee and stood on my left, the little waiter followed him, and stood on my right. During the week I had often seen this boy who was not yet a real waiter, he was learning his business by waiting on the waiters, and hitherto I had respected the convention by which I was supposed to be unaware of his existence, except that when he had made way for me on the stairs we had exchanged greetings. I said to the big waiter:
“How old is this little fellow?”
“Thirteen.”
I glanced at him and saw by his smile of expansive friendliness that he was pleased to be the subject of our conversation.
“What do you call him?”
“Totò.”
I took my knife off the breakfast table and imitating Giovanni, as well as I could, handed it to the big waiter saying:
“For Don Totò when he shall be eighteen years old.”
This was perhaps wrong, it was certainly risky to play with edged tools in this way in a country where one ought not to give a handkerchief as a ricordo lest one should be supposed to be intending to pass the tears it contains. But I assumed he had seen the play and, although the quotation was not exact, expected him to recognise it, instead of which he was furious with me:
“You are not to do that. Totò is a very good boy and I shall not accept the knife.”
He said this so sternly that I made up my mind he could know nothing about the theatre—he must be a foreigner who had yet to learn that a Sicilian child’s confidence is not destroyed by a mere threat to stick a knife into him, the idea that anyone is going to hurt him is too preposterous to be taken seriously. Or perhaps he had invested all his imagination in superstitious securities. Or perhaps I had acted better than I knew and had seriously alarmed him. But I had not imitated Giovanni’s realism so closely as to deceive Totò. I looked at him. He was beaming all over his face as he shook his head and said:
“I am not afraid.”
The big waiter scowled and went away, abandoning the reckless child to his fate. Totò put his hand on my arm to attract my attention and emphasise what he was going to say:
“When you are at home, please will you send me a postcard with a picture of London?”
“Certainly, my boy; I’ll send you as many as you like.”
This is all the conversation I had with Totò before I left Messina, which I did that day, but we have corresponded. On returning to London I sent him a card with a view of Oxford Circus full of traffic and, not knowing his full name, addressed it:
A Don Totò,
Piccolo Cameriere all’ Albergo Trinacria,
Messina.
He replied at once, thanking me profusely for the beautiful view of what he called I Quattro Canti di Londra and promising to send me some prickly pears as soon as they were at their best, having heard that they do not mature in London. Presently I sent him another post-card secretly hoping he would show them both to the stupid big waiter. He replied at once and, among other things, asked if I should like him to come to London.
I never like them to come to London unless they are sure of some settled employment, and even then I would rather see them in their native surroundings; so I replied:
No, Totò. Here we already have too many Italians, Austrians, Swiss and Germans. They come because they believe that the streets of London are paved with gold, but too many of them find our streets guttered by the tears of foreign waiters who have failed to find work. You had much better stay where you are like a good boy, and I will come to Messina and see you next autumn.
Then a basket arrived containing the prickly pears in a state of pulp, exuding juice from every pore because he had not attempted to pack them, and accompanied by a card wishing me a Merry Christmas.
Early in the morning of the 28th December, 1908, Messina was destroyed by an earthquake. The newspapers particularly mentioned that the Albergo Trinacria had fallen, killing everyone who was sleeping there that night. I chanced a card to Totò asking whether he had escaped. On the 6th January I received a letter from him; he had evidently not received my card, which was returned to me about eight months later. This is a translation of Totò’s letter:
Catania,
1 Jan., 1909.
Egregious Signor Enrico,
You must have already heard of the destruction of Messina. By a miracle I am saved, also my family, except that I do not yet know the fate of two of my sisters, my father, three nephews and one brother-in-law. My father was at Reggio Calabria, which was also destroyed. The Albergo Trinacria was not merely shaken down, it was also burnt. It was my good fortune not to be on guard that night in the hotel, otherwise I too should have died. The few who have escaped have been brought to Catania naked, without a soldo. We are sleeping in the Municipio, on the floor, with a rug, a piece of bread and cheese and a glass of wine which the Municipio gives us. They have made me a present of a shirt because, as the earthquake was at five in the morning, everyone was asleep and they escaped just as they were. You may imagine in what a condition I find myself, in what misery, it is such that you will excuse my posting this letter without a stamp, but I have not a centesimo to send you the news of the disaster of Messina. On the post-card which you sent me you speak of coming in the autumn, but there will be no more coming to Messina.
Enough! I could tell you in detail of many misfortunes that have overtaken me, but I have not the courage to write more.
I send you my respects. You will pardon me for being obliged to post this without a stamp.
Totò.
He gave me an address in Catania to which I wrote, and he replied 24th January from Naples, where he and his family had been taken.
Then he left off writing and I thought I had heard the last of him. In the spring of 1910 I went to Sicily again, and within an hour of arriving at my hotel in Catania one of the waiters came up to me and said in a friendly way:
“Good day, sir.”
“Good day,” I replied, “but I do not recognise you.”
He said, “Totò. Messina.”
“It is not possible! You were only thirteen at Messina, and how old are you now?”
“Eighteen.”
“How have you managed to become five years older in eighteen months? Is it an effect of the earthquake?”
“I was sixteen at Messina.”
“Then why did that stupid big waiter say you were only thirteen?”
“Ah! well, he is dead now.”
I thought of the fate of Ananias and said: “Poor fellow! Do you remember how angry he was when I wanted to give him my knife and said those words from Omertà?”
“Yes, but he was not really angry with you, he was only pretending.”
“No, Totò! Not really? Do you mean he was acting?”
“Yes. I thought you understood. He was always like that, full of fun, not stupid at all. He was a good man and very kind to me.” And poor Totò’s eyes filled with tears.
So it was someone else who had been stupid, and I left off thinking of Ananias and began to think of those eighteen upon whom the Tower of Siloam fell.
Totò told me that he was sleeping at home when the earthquake woke him up, and that he and the others in his house ran out naked as they were into the street and saw the house fall; they were only just in time. His father, who was in Reggio, was saved, but one of his sisters was killed with her husband and three children.
This is all the conversation I had with Totò in Catania; next day on my inquiring for him they told me he had caught cold and had not come to the Albergo. I left without seeing him again and next time I was in Catania they told me he had gone away and they did not know his address. Possibly he has disappeared for ever, but it is more probable that, like other meteoric bodies, he will cross my path again some day.