Beautiful Antonio by Vitaliano Brancati Page B

the custodian a ticking-off about the messy state of the cemetery: “The paths are awash with tangerine-peel and wrapping paper. I’ll have you know, friend, that every month we pay a king’s ransom, and have a right to insist that our dead are properly cared for!”
    This said, he looked around as if hoping for a nod of approval from those faded faces gazing forth from the head-stones on every side, pictured on porcelain, set in marble.
    â€œLet’s get on home,” he added, addressing himself to Antonio. “Barbara will be on the lookout at the window for you!”
    And they climbed back into the carriage.
    Reaching Piazza Stesicoro, Antonio immediately raised his eyes to the windows of the Puglisi residence, but saw no face there; indeed, all was shuttered tight.
    â€œWhat a scatterbrain I am!” said the notary. “I clean forgot that we’re in mourning.”
    The street door was ajar, heavy with black ribbons and notices bordered with dense black, still damp, with blackcrosses in the middle and inscriptions such as: TO MY FATHER, TO MY FATHER-IN-LAW, TO MY BELOVED GRANDFATHER.
    Black-clad was the porter, and even the visitors hovering in the dim carriage-entrance were deep in mourning.
    â€œLooks like I’m going to have to wear black along with the rest,” Antonio ruminated as he climbed the stairs.
    â€œI regret,” said the notary, climbing at his side, “that your joy has been impaired by this misfortune. But they say it brings good luck. I can scarcely wait to throw open the windows again and let in some fresh air… This afternoon we must write that letter to the minister.”
    Antonio got down to it and wrote the much solicited letter. The notary had it typed out in duplicate and read it over a hundred times, each time disgruntled by the fact that Antonio did not address the minister familiarly as
tu
. The letter, express registered, was duly posted at the station.
    â€œWill I get an answer?” muttered the notary again and again until Barbara got huffy and came out with a simple, yet stern, “Daddy!”
    A week later the minister replied, announcing that the mayor, “for this and for other far more serious reasons”, would be sacked and replaced.
    Our good notary was beside himself with joy and, conquering his natural caution, took his good tidings off to the Law-courts.
    â€œVery strange,” scowled the Prefect, “I have not been informed of this. Am I to believe that the minister communicates his decisions to private citizens?… In saying this I do not wish to cast aspersions on your son-in-law, whom I know to have excellent connections in the Capital. But after all
I
am the person who represents His Excellency and enjoys the honour of carrying out his orders… No, my dear sir, I doubt very much that the decree to dismiss the mayor has as yet been signed… It may, perhaps, be something the minister has in mind, that might be put into effect in the more or lessforeseeable future… but as things stand today… To put it mildly, I have my doubts.”
    Our notary blushed.
    â€œWhat if this were the case?” he thought to himself. “How utterly imprudent of me to count my chickens before they’re hatched. I’ve never done anything so silly before in my life! If he’s right, I’ll shut up shop and move to another town. It’s my own fault for getting into cahoots with young people. Go to bed with a babe and you wake up in wet sheets!”
    However, it came about that three days later the Prefect received a telephone call from the minister, and after the following aside (“What’s up in Catania? What are the police
doing
at night? I have been informed that in a urinal in Via Pacini someone has written a rhymed couplet about me that’s now going the rounds of the whole of Italy, and those nitwitted egg-heads in the Caffè Aragno are already bandying it back and