Lucia - Andrea Di Robilant [95]
Roberston hoped to demonstrate that aerial navigation was safer than sea navigation but the government in Vienna was not persuaded, and though it showered him with accolades and gifts, it passed on his offer and politely suggested he go fly his balloons elsewhere.
Alvise planned to join Lucia and Alvisetto in the autumn of 1804. His recent letters to his wife had been affectionate and warmer than usual. He sounded genuinely interested in Alvisetto’s health, in the progress of his education, in how he was adapting to his new life in Vienna. So much attention, after all that had passed between them, touched Lucia, and encouraged her to consider Alvise in a fresh light—not as the cold husband interested only in securing an heir, as some people thought of him, but as a deeply scarred man who yearned for the joys of fatherhood. Perhaps Lucia even hoped for a small miracle—that the fruit of her love for another man might rekindle her husband’s love for her. For the truth is that she missed Alvise and wanted him by her side. “I so much want to see him,” she confessed to Paolina. “It really is ridiculous the way I rush to the window every minute, and ask over and over if someone has heard the postilion blow his hunting horn.”22
Alvise and Lucia had not seen each other in nearly six months when he finally arrived in early November, and he seemed a changed man. He was no longer irritable as in the past. He did not brood or complain or raise his voice. He showed little inclination to go out in the evening, preferring to stay at home with the family. He was full of attentions for Lucia, and took Alvisetto for a walk every day, often stopping at the sherbet kiosk by the Court Theatre. He took his new role as father seriously, and showed appreciation for Lucia’s efforts in educating their son. Alvise being Alvise, his demeanour with the little boy was usually tempered by a certain rigidity. He was constantly putting Alvisetto to the test, not so much to verify his knowledge in this or that field as to gauge his moral fibre. One day, he promised to take him out for an ice cream. It started to rain, and Alvise said that since he had made his promise but did not want Alvisetto to get wet, he would send a servant to fetch the ice cream for him. “But you should bear in mind that he will get soaked on the way,” Alvise reminded him. “So it’s up to you. Do you still want him to go?” Not surprisingly, Alvisetto meekly answered, “No.”
Teresa stepped in to lighten the atmosphere. “You’ll see, his heart will be more content than if he had eaten his sherbet.”23
Another evening Alvisetto was getting ready to go to a children’s play. Alvise needled him: why didn’t he give up the play and stay home to keep him company? “Alvisetto did all he could to persuade his father to go with him to the theatre,” Lucia told Paolina, wondering whether Alvise was not pushing their son a little too hard. “But it was useless, so in the end he said he’d stay at home with his father. He added touchingly: ‘nothing makes me happier than seeing my father and my mother with a smile on their face.’”24
Despite the rigidities in Alvise’s character, he was warming to Alvisetto and enjoyed being with him. In fact it was hard to tell who was happier, father or son, when the weather was good and they could walk hand in hand to the kiosk for their sherbet. Alvise had looked forward to taking him to the sled races, but the winter was very cold, it seldom snowed and very few races were held. On the other hand, it was a great winter for ice-skating, and there was nothing Alvisetto enjoyed more than going with his father to watch the older kids speed by and bump into each other at the rink in the Prater. He also made his formal entrance in society—children’s society, that is—by attending