February, 1795.
In a somewhat shabby carriage, Hagi Ion—a minor colonel from Prahova—and his daughter, whose name history has not bothered to record, arrive at the Metropolitan Church. Both are wrapped in furs and wear imposing headgear: the father a large, globular ișlic, the daughter a red cap wrapped in veils.
The father walks forward without a smile. The daughter looks ready for anything—perhaps even a small crime—an impression reinforced by her large, pale eyes.
What can one do with such characters?
There is always a conflict. Either an open one, when two characters encounter a third who opposes them, or a scattered one, revealed through small narratives about the days before the moment when the colonel and his daughter stepped down in front of the Metropolitan Church. Of course, no one really cares where they came from or what they were doing earlier. Not now. Naturally we want to know what happened next.
And yet today I intend to prove two things: first, that no matter how hard I try to tell what happened at the Metropolitan Church, I will inevitably end up in the past; and second, that nothing happening in the present is truly interesting. Despite all the praise given to the force of the present moment, whenever we begin to tell a story we always run back there—to the past, with its face like a dried plum.
So while our characters—the colonel and his daughter—are climbing the steps toward the building, a somewhat rumpled fellow is already waiting in the corridor, nervous and pale.
Grigore—Gore, Gorache, poor devil! Just over twenty, his hair neatly bound in a scarf, a gold-tipped cane in his hand, new boots on his feet. He owns no proper coat—or, as it was called in those days, a malotea—but only a coarse shepherd’s cloak, made respectable by a brand-new collar of kid leather.
It is this Gore whom the colonel has come to throw to the ground.
The story is simple.
The unfortunate Gore no longer wishes to marry Hagi Ion’s daughter. He admits that he made a promise. More than that: he admits they loved each other, breaking every canon. He even admits the affair lasted nearly a year.
The Metropolitan imagines the passing days; the princely inspector imagines lifted skirts. For 365 days the two of them rolled about in the outbuildings of the colonel’s houses, doing exactly as they pleased.
But now Gore refuses her. He is deeply offended, and he even has a serious reason.
The colonel’s daughter—decorated with a red cap, her eyes wet with tears because Gore refuses to marry her—has maintained another relationship just as steady, during the very same year swollen with promises.
And the rival?
A wretch from the neighborhood. A servant. More precisely, a farmhand employed by the colonel’s own brother-in-law.
The Metropolitan opens his eyes wide.
The girl turns pale. The colonel is outraged by such an indecent accusation. He refuses to imagine his daughter touched by a farmhand.
Gore insists he has proof.
The girl bursts into sobs.
The Metropolitan listens to the entire story without comment, without asking a single question. From the very first words the case seems clear to him: this is a difficult matter, one that requires the trial of the curse.
He therefore writes a document transferring the case to Prahova—more precisely to the parish where the three aggrieved parties live. Both the girl and Gorache seem equally convincing. In such cases testimony was sworn with a hand upon the cross, and sooner or later the verdict was delivered by Heaven itself.
Something always followed. Someone in the liar’s family would die, or a chicken would go lame. The exact form did not matter. What mattered was that the message arrived—from somewhere above.
Of course, in this particular case there is also the element of surprise: the character capable of overturning the entire story, of throwing fuel on the fire—the farmhand.
I said I would bring you back to the past, to the events of the previous year, yet I have not done so completely. This farmhand proves to be a character tied rather to the future—at least at first glance.
Because in the reality that truly matters, whatever he says will eventually lead us back to the same place: the year that has already passed. To clandestine meetings, reprehensible acts, or perhaps to alibis, wandering eyes, and imaginary witnesses.
But who listens to the story of a farmhand once a Metropolitan like Deli Zorzo has written in black ink that the case shall be decided by the trial of the curse?
