alluring for it, and most impressive in the fine clothes that Tonio’s purse supplied.
Yet Guido’s face softened somewhat with authority; he was less angry all the time. And he had about him a more casual air of command which caused Tonio to feel a secret and debilitating pleasure at the mere brush of Guido’s hand.
Maestro Cavalla cautioned Guido not to push Tonio. Yet it was through performance that Guido’s real work with Tonio had begun.
Before the lights, he could better examine Tonio’s weaknesses and strength. And though he drilled Tonio relentlessly with his exercises, and wrote for him a variety of arias, Guido could see it was with the aria cantabile—the aria of sadness and tender feeling—that Tonio excelled. Benedetto was good at tricks; he could do acrobatics with his high notes, only to plunge into the contralto range with disturbing ease. It had the audience gasping, but it didn’t make them weep.
And that Tonio could do, without fail, every time he sang.
Meanwhile the Bourbon King Charles III, who had been ruling Naples for two years now, decided to build his Teatro San Carlos, and within a matter of months it was completed and the old San Bartolommeo was pulled down.
But though everyone marveled at the speed with which the house had been erected, on opening night it was the interior which drew the gasps of admiration and awe.
The San Bartolommeo had been an old rectangular house. This was a horseshoe with six tiers. But the marvel was not its impressive size so much as the way it was so lavishly lighted, each box being fixed with a mirror on the front and a candle on either side. When the candles were lighted, the minors amplified the tiny flames a thousandfold in all directions; it was an unbelievable spectacle dimmed only by the talent of the prima donna Anna Peruzzi, and her rival, the contralto Vittoria Tesi, who was renowned for her skill in male roles. The opera, Achille en Sciro, was from the recent libretto by Metastasio, with music by Domenico Sarri, whom the Neapolitans had loved for many years.
One of the greatest scene designers of the time, Pietro Righini, had been employed for the stage, and the whole was a magnificent production indeed.
Guido and Tonio had places in the front of the parterre, enormous seats with arm rests, which could be locked by the season subscriber when not in use. No one could take your place, then. It was there for you no matter how late you might come; and the rows were so broadly spaced, a man might walk to his seat without disturbing anyone else.
Of course everyone knew the monarch didn’t care for opera; they laughed that he built such a spacious theater so he might place himself as far as possible from the stage.
But the eyes of Europe were more than ever turned to Naples. Her singers, her composers, her music had fully superseded those of Venice. And they had long ago eclipsed those of Rome.
Rome however was still the place for a castrato’s debut, as far as Guido was concerned. Rome might not be producing singers and composers, but Rome was Rome. And Guido reminded Tonio of this all the time.
Tonio’s progress amazed everyone. And though he had sung four arias in the fall opera at the conservatorio and spent his evenings out with Guido, he still took some meals with his fellow students, spent his afternoon recreation with them, and worked with them at all the menial tasks assigned to him backstage.
But some time after his second Christmas in Naples, Tonio had a clash with another fencing student which proved as dangerous as his struggle with Lorenzo the year before.
It happened on a day when Tonio’s mind was heavy, and he moved through the world with an unusual sluggishness and indifference to all he heard and saw.
That morning one of Catrina Lisani’s letters had informed him his mother had given birth to a healthy son. Five months ago, the baby had been delivered; he had been in this world almost half a year.
A debilitating languor came over Tonio, and he had found himself lost in an inaudible little prayer. May you be sound of limb and quick of wit, he was almost whispering. May you receive every blessing from God and from men. Were I at your christening, I would kiss your tender little forehead myself.
And an image drifted into his mind, of itself, it seemed, so that he saw his figure, tall