The Conversion. This chapter is filled with quotes from the New Testament, in line with its theme that salvation is possible for even the greatest sinner.
“Let us leave the ninety-nine sheep,” replied the Cardinal, “they are safe on the mountain. Now I wish to spend some time with the one that went astray.”
Unrepentant, by contrast, is our old friend, Don Abbondio:
“It was all Don Abbondio could do to hide how annoyed, irritated, and bitter this proposal—this order—had made him. With no time to compose his face or wipe away the frown that had already formed on it, he hid his feelings by bowing his head in a gesture of obedience.”
He is forced to perform an act of goodness without feeling it in his heart:
“‘What should I say to him?’ he thought. ‘Should I repeat, ‘I couldn’t be happier’? Happy about what? That, after a lifetime of doing the devil’s work, you’ve finally decided to become an honest man like everyone else? Some compliment! . . . No matter how I put it, that’s all my congratulations will end up meaning. And how do I know he really has suddenly turned into an honest man, out of the blue! Plenty of people put on an act in this world, and for plenty of reasons! How am I supposed to know what’s true?”
Don Abbondio's internal monologue on the way to the fortress was hilarious. While the theme of Divine Providence is not hard to see in this chapter, I loved how he talks trash about the saintly archbishop and the miraculous convert. He is a little like Agnese in the way he thinks about his social superiors, but she doesn't have the cowardliness and smallness of character that Manzoni mines for comic gold.
A key line for me is when Frederigo and the Nameless One are entering the room with the assembled clergy. Manzoni writes: "They were followed by Don Abbondio, whom no one even noticed. ( Dietro veniva don Abbondio, a cui nessuno badò.). A few moments earlier, the Cardinal seeing Don Abbondio looking unhappy says that the priest is always with him in the house of the Lord. but this man (the Nameless One), "He is lost and now he is found". I like Don Abbondio's response: " I couldn't be happier!" said Don Abbondio, bowing with equal reverence to both men.' The original has: Oh quanto me ne consolo!” disse don Abbondio, facendo una gran riverenza ad entrambi in comune. There seems to be a nice touch of irony in this response, as if to say, that's easy for you to say.
Don Abbondio seems to be a kind of Everyman, at the beck and call of the powerful, be they Cardinals or brigands. He is a small cog in a big machine, always under some kind of pressure from rich and poor. As the following few pages show, even when he is trying to pluck up courage to speak to the Nameless One, he is literally unable to find his own voice. I have great sympathy for him.