While Maria’s flight with Marco had given him acute anguish, the moral figure of his wife appeared prouder and bolder in its act of liberation, and ifthe husband still carried with him all the pain of the offence, so as to feel the impression of a bleeding wound for three years, the man had admired in Maria her lofty contempt of every minor good to obtain the one supreme good. While Maria was far away, as if lost in the vast world, Emilio saw her again near him palpitating with beauty and life, and he began to love her in solitary silence, vainly and uselessly. He surprised himself into desiring and wanting her more than ever, and in his empty love and desire he ended by knowing that powerful and terrible instinct of love—jealousy.
He had always marvelled when he saw in others the interior torturing lashes of jealousy, and its external manifestations. Now he is a victim to this gloomy and fascinating force which comes from the lowest elements of the human system, but which dominates a man entirely. Sometimes he would give his blood to snatch his wife away from the arms of Marco Fiore, at other times he was seized by an exasperation which almost led him to a crime. Then he had to leave Rome and go far away where only memory could follow him. On his return, through the natural power of his equilibrium, he was always calm, patient, and sad.
At last, at the end of three years, so long to a heart which had never known how to love, which perhaps had still not learned to love better but was not inept to suffer, Emilio, with concealedcuriosity and anxiety, had learnt that the amorous folly of Marco and Maria had begun to languish, had become a folly’s shadow, and was lapsing into a pale usage. From this knowledge which reached him from reliable sources, from secret inquiries which he had made with extreme caution, knowing how every day that love shadow was vanishing more and more, a unique sentiment, derived from so many opposite sentiments at war with each other, had raised his heart almost to heroism. This was the sentiment of human and Christian pity for a miserable woman who had wanted and still wanted to give her life to her dream, who instead saw all her dream vanish before her in a time which seemed as short as a flash of lightning. Anger long repressed, sorrow long concealed, the offence which wounds without ever a wound appearing, love rendered more supreme and consuming in jealousy itself,—all in Emilio Guasco was sunk in this tender compassion for Maria. He felt within himself all the evangelical virtue of charity, perhaps stronger than any other sentimental impulse. He was the good Samaritan who rescues the dying man on the road-side, doctors his cruel wounds, and pours out the balsam that heals.
Thus the pardon had been offered by Emilio Guasco to the wife who had betrayed and left him. When he had sent her word he had thought nothing more of the past or the future; he hadthought only of healing the poor creature’s wounds, struck by passion’s cruel and implacable weapons; he felt within himself a new soul greater, more generous, and superior to sophisms and the world’s axioms. There seemed to be something heroic in his heart, which raised and exalted him as at no other time in his life. The immense tenderness he felt for her reacted on him; he pitied and admired himself like the heroic person in a romance whose story he sometimes read. The nearer the day of her return approached, the more his emotion increased, the more the noble and sublime thing, which is pardon, the law which Christ has given as the most supreme, seemed to find in him a pure interpreter. So on that April evening in the presence of the woman, pale and trembling as he had never seen her before and would never see her again, he had pronounced those Christian words which cancel, absolve, and redeem—
“I pardon you, Maria.”
But suddenly afterwards, in a flash, he felt this unique and noble sentiment, this Christian pity, destroyed within him, as if it could only give him one supreme moment of heroism. He felt all the old sentiments rise again in his mind, contending among themselves—anger, suffering, love and jealousy, and he was seized again in their power without guide or will.
Maria Guascowas proceeding minutely to the completion of her toilette. That morning she was wearing a cloth dress of maroon colour, cut in the English fashion, through the jacket of which a blouse of white Irish lace was to be seen; the full skirt in big pleats discovered the neat feet shod in black kid. A large straw hat, with a circlet of red roses and a thin veil, was placed over the chestnut hair, affording a glimpse of its waves over the forehead, temple and neck. In her simple dress without ornaments, and in its exact lines, she looked enchantingly young. She said to Chiara, who was hovering round offering her gloves, parasol, and purse—
“Let your master know that I am ready and waiting for him here.”
Meanwhile she buttoned her yellow deerskin gloves and verified the contents of her purse.
“The master begs Your Excellency to oblige him with your presence in the study,” said Chiara on returning in a low voice.
Maria frowned slightly, and for an instant the colour left her cheeks. Then, as if her will predominated immediately, she proceeded towards herhusband’s study, and not a shadow of her recent emotion appeared on her recomposed face.
Seated behind his desk Emilio was writing a letter and smoking a cigarette. He did not raise his head.
“Well, Emilio,” asked his wife in a soothing voice, standing in the middle of the room, “aren’t you dressed for the meet?”
“No,” he replied, raising his head from his letter absently, “I am not dressed.”
“Wasn’t this the hour?” she continued gently; “ten o’clock, I think.”
“Yes, ten o’clock,” and he lowered his head, resuming his writing.
Maria’s gloved hand nervously clutched the onyx knob of her parasol.
“Well, well,” she asked again, with a certain insistency. Emilio let his pen fall, throwing it on the table, pushed the letter aside, and leaning back in his chair regarded his wife for a long time earnestly without speaking.
“I have decided not to go to this last meet.”
“Ah!” said Maria only.
Then, as if it annoyed her to remain standing before her husband’s desk, her eyes sought a chair. She found one a little bit away and sat down, still holding her parasol and purse, in the attitude of a lady paying a visit.
Both were silent; though, as ever since her return, he fixed his eyes on his wife’s face andperson with a curiosity half thoughtful and half observant, with an attitude of acute investigation which sometimes embarrassed Maria.
“Still, Emilio,” she said in a low voice, to break the silence, “you are so fond of fox-hunting.”
“I like it very much, it is true,” he replied.
“And it will be a year before you can begin again.”
“That is true.”
“Didn’t you decide yesterday evening to go?”
“Certainly I did decide to go; but a night has passed on it.”
“You don’t sleep at night and think of the meet at Cecilia Metella?” she asked, trying to joke.
“Eh, one doesn’t always sleep,” he replied, with an irritable gesture of annoyance.
She was silent. Then she raised her head resolutely.
“Since I should have accompanied you, may I consider myself free?” she asked, with some impatience.
“You have other plans?” he murmured, looking at her again fixedly.
“I have had no others from the moment that it was arranged that we should go out together,” she replied quickly.
“I beg your pardon for having made you dress; you have lost atoilette.”
“It doesn’t matter,” she said, shrugging hershoulders, and she began to trace the arabesque designs of the carpet with her parasol.
“Emilio?” she said suddenly.
“Maria!”
“Why don’t you go alone to Cecilia Metella? Go and put on your pink; the victoria is ready, and will take you to where Francesco is waiting with the horses. Go now.”
Her tone was quiet, indifferent, and persuasive.
“No!” he exclaimed, with an angry gesture; “I don’t want to.”
“Emilio,” she continued, in a voice still more persuasive, “I know that it is on my account that you are not going to Cecilia Metella. I beg you not to renounce this pleasure.”
“Thank you; I shall not go,” he said drily.
Maria got up suddenly, as if she had nothing further to say.
“Where are you going?” he exclaimed, rising from his seat and following her for a few steps.
“To my room,” she replied, a little surprised; “then I shall go out.”
“To go where?” he asked again harshly.
“I don’t know; I shall go for a walk somewhere,” she said, still more surprised.
“Where?” and anger trembled in the demand.
“Emilio!” she exclaimed in sweet reproach; “Emilio!”
He changed colour.
“I beg your pardon, Maria, I beg your pardon.”
He threw himself on a large sofa, without taking the hand she offered him. The woman remained standing, and looked at him.
“Shall we go out together, Emilio?” she asked patiently.
“No.”
“Let us go outside the city where there is nobody.”
“No, no.”
“In the carriage to Villa Pamphily? It is such a beautiful morning, and the air is so soft. Come, do.”
“No, no, no!” he exclaimed, without looking at her.
“Well, then, what ought I to do?” she asked patiently.
“Nothing.”
“What do you wish to do?”
“Nothing.”
“Do you wish me to remain? Do you wish me to go?” and the tone was one of sublime patience.
He understood it and melted.
“Maria, you are treating me like a child. Do you think I am ill? I have white hair, but I am not infirm.”
She noticed all the signs of anger and suffering.
“At times we are ill without knowing it, and we mustn’t repulse an affectionate hand.”
“What charity!” he exclaimed, with irony.
“What are you irritated about, Emilio? Because of the sentiment or the person?” she asked.
“For the two things,” he replied, with asperity.
“Ah!” she said, and her hand, trembling a little, found the handle of her parasol. Again she made as if to go away without greeting him, without turning round.
“Are you offended?” he cried to her back; “you will end by hating me.”
“I am not offended,” she replied, stopping with lowered eyes and speaking slowly; “I have tamed my pride, Emilio, in the contact of life, and I am not offended. I can hate no one.”
He looked at her peculiarly and gloomily, with the strange insistence of a man who wished to extract a tremendous secret from a glance. But she did not see it. The question which was trembling on Emilio’s lips disappeared. He lapsed again into confusion and silence.
“Are you going to your bank?” she asked, to say something.
“Yes, for a moment,” he replied absently.
“Shall you come home to lunch?”
“Yes, at the usual hour.”
“What are you going to do afterwards?”
“I don’t know,” he replied.
“I am going to stay at home just now, and later——” she continued monotonously.
“Later?” he asked, with a start.
“I have a meeting.”
“Ah!” he replied, looking at her.
“With Flaminia Colonna; a work of charity,” she explained, somewhat coldly.
“Flaminia has always continued to love you.”
“She has continued to,” she answered bitterly, biting her lip, growing a little pale, “like any other friend.”
“Do you go out together?”
“Yes,” she replied, still paler; “are you surprised?” and the question was put harshly.
“No,” he said, speaking with difficulty, so great was his emotion; “Flaminia Colonna is a woman and a friend ... while I——”
“While you?” she asked.
“I am a man, a husband.”
There was a deep silence between them.
“Is that the reason why you didn’t go to Cecilia Metella with me?” she resumed.
“That is the reason,” he replied.
“What were you fearing?” in a voice still deeper.
“Ridicule. Every one would have laughed at me, seeing me with you.”
She fell back. Her eyes grew clouded, but she had the strength not to open her mouth, to walk away without turning, leaving the man who had told his secret stretched on the sofa like a miserable weakling.
Theices were being served and the dinner was drawing to a close. All of a sudden, in the midst of the slightly laboured and frivolous conversation which occasionally gave place to the species of pompous gravity, Francesco Serlupi, a young man celebrated for his blunders, which assumed either a grotesque or dramatic aspect, again committed one of them.
“Do you know that the Fiore couple have returned home from their honeymoon? It seems that things are not going too well.”
A glacial silence fell on all.
Maria Guasco, behind the huge mass of white lilies and red roses, which almost hid her, had not even moved an eyelid; Emilio, taciturn as ever, had lowered his eyes. The other guests, Flaminia Colonna, Gianni Provana, and the Senator, Fabio Guasco, seemed distracted.
“It seems that the Costanzi is to be closed for a week,” remarked Gianni Provana, in an attempt to change the conversation.
But Francesco Serlupi stuck to his gaucherie, and proclaimed obstinately—
“However, it is as I have said, Marco Fiorereturned to the club yesterday, the day following his return, and yesterday he was at the races without Vittoria.”
Again a heavy silence. Maria, with a fervid glance, invoked the aid of Flaminia. She promptly, with her penetrating voice, which was the complement of her dark and proud figure, and of her beauty full of grace and expression, said—
“I am not surprised at it. As a matter of fact Marco Fiore has always liked a club life; his mother, Donna Arduina, had always complained to me about it. Besides, Vittoria has such a reserved and timid character.” She emphasised her slow and tactful remark, fixing her sweet grey eyes on Francesco, to make him understand that he must say no more on the subject. He, as usual, understood too late the mischief he had done, and became silent, keeping his head bent over his plate, not daring to look at his hosts, anxious to escape, as he always did, when he discovered he had committed an enormous indiscretion.
“Are these delicious early peaches from Lama, Emilio?” asked Mario Colonna, to divert the conversation better, alluding to the great property of Casa Guasco near Terni.
“Yes,” replied his host immediately, glad to be able to open his mouth and speak of something else; “my gardens there work miracles, and also my gardeners. Every day new flowers and fruit arrive.”
“Oh, you must be very happy about it, Maria,” observed Flaminia, with a good-natured smile on her lips.
“Oh, most happy,” she murmured.
“You ought to love La Lama, Donna Maria,” remarked Francesco Serlupi, in an endeavour to mend matters; “it is some time since you were there?”
But the question was put in a low voice, besides, the dinner was finished, so his hostess rose suddenly without replying to this latest piece of stupidity, and leaning on the arm of Senator Fabio Guasco the other guests followed her, Flaminia Colonna on the arm of Emilio, Gianni Provana, Francesco Serlupi, and Mario Colonna in a group.
“However did it come into your head?” said Gianni Provana to Serlupi, keeping him back a little with Mario Colonna. “No one will ask you to dinner, my dear friend, if you start breaking the dishes in your host’s face at dessert.”
“You are right; I am a proper stupid,” Serlupi declared, as they crossed the two or three rooms before the drawing-room, “I shall go away at once; I can’t stop here.”
“Worse and worse,” observed Colonna; “stop a moment or two longer.”
“You are going away with Donna Flaminia, aren’t you?”
“Yes, we can’t possibly stay. We are going to Madame Takuhira’s last reception at the Japanese Legation.”
“Do me a charity and take me away with you,” begged Serlupi.
“Very well, very well,” said Colonna, laughing, “we will save you even to the last indiscretion.”
A circle was formed in the large drawing-room, all gathering in a corner of it where Maria had formed a little room from the larger with screens, large plants, and furniture, which cut off the space. However, the conversation proceeded languidly, the sort of coldness which had been there since the beginning of dinner had become accentuated after Francesco Serlupi’s escapade. It was the first dinner Emilio and Maria had given after her return home, thus resuming their old custom of giving, during the chief Roman season from December to the end of May, two dinners a week, one to intimates, another of ceremony, the traditional hospitality in Casa Guasco and high Roman society. It had been Flaminia Colonna who had urged her friend to resume the habits of life where they had been relaxed; it had been Flaminia, too, who had said affectionately to Emilio Guasco, with a sweet smile, “Give us a dinner like you used to.”
With a feeling of concealed timidity, Emilio had only dared to invite persons of whom he was sure; his uncle, Fabio Guasco, the Colonna couple, andfinally that silly Francesco Serlupi, who was a gracious youth incapable of an incivility, but more capable of committing a disaster with a remark, the importance of which he did not understand till later, much later. Maria, as hostess, had endeavoured to give an air of continuity to this resumption of worldly life, decorating her dining-room as formerly, receiving her friends as formerly in that bright and flowery corner of the drawing-room, adorning her person with that studied elegance which distinguished her, and with which she satisfied her æsthetic tendencies, producing that impression of sympathy and fascination on her surroundings which was so appreciated. That evening she was dressed in black voile, affording a glimpse of neck and bosom, white in their perfect lines. A cluster of fresh red roses was placed at the opening, nestling on the whiteness of the skin, and rendering it more intense. A tall, stiff collar of small pearls in ten rows, with a clasp in front of rubies and diamonds, surrounded her neck; the bodice of the dress had half-sleeves embroidered with black wavy tulle, which did not reach to the elbow, and showed her magnificent white round arms with their delicate wrists. Her hands were loaded with rings, all in the ancient style, and in her hair, amidst its waves and dark abundance, were two little bright red roses. A quite interior exaltation had rendered more splendid her bright eyes, so often closed and disturbed.That evening she had experienced a sudden pride of energy and beauty.
But in spite of this a subtle sense of embarrassment and pain weighed on the dinner, and all the ordered luxury of the table, the exquisiteness of the viands, the richness of the surroundings, the serenity of the hostess, and the solicitous courtesy of the host had not caused this impression to be removed from the mind of their guests. This impression after Francesco Serlupi’s imprudent words became stronger; every one felt oppressed, and sought a decent and amiable excuse for leaving. Donna Maria allowed smoking in her room after dinner; but the men discreetly retired to a far corner, so, as they said, not to fumigate the two ladies. For some minutes Maria and Flaminia Colonna remained alone.
“What a bad experiment, eh, Flaminia, this dinner?” said Maria, with a sneer and a bitter smile.
“One wants much patience, immense patience,” replied the friend, shaking her expressive and gracious Roman head.
“Oh, not for me,” added Maria; “for myself I am ready to endure any pain. It displeases me on Emilio’s account.”
“He suffers, doesn’t he?” asked Flaminia, in a subdued voice.
“He suffers too much,” Maria assented sadly. Then she got up suddenly to serve the coffee andliqueurs, which had been placed before her. Her tall, undulating person possessed a great charm, as she lightly crossed the room, carrying a cup in her hands, while she offered it with a smile on her beautiful mouth to the men. She could see the admiration in all their eyes, and she seemed to see it mixed with confusion in her husband’s. She looked at him rather long, and between them, in those glances exchanged, it seemed as if a whole world of thoughts and sentiments had passed. With her rhythmical step Maria returned to her friend.
“Is it true what has been said?” she asked, sitting down.
“What?”
“That ... Marco and Vittoria already make a couple of doubtful happiness.”
“What does it matter to you?” replied Flaminia, looking at her with suspicion.
“It matters to me,” replied the other seriously; “I wished for their happiness.”
“But what do you desire?” said Flaminia a little diffidently.
“I desire with all my soul that they may be happy,” said Maria.
The friend believed her, because she recognised her as a creature incapable of lies or falseness.
“I believe that your desire of good for them cannot be a reality.”
“Do you know it then?”
“I know it.”
Maria sighed.
“Later on, with time,” concluded Donna Flaminia, with her sense of justice and equilibrium.
“One wants such patience, immense patience,” rejoined Maria Guasco dreamily.
The company began to break up. Flaminia and Mario Colonna had to go to the Japanese Legation. Francesco Serlupi, silently occupied with his flight, followed them, almost holding on to their shoulders, as if to hide himself. When the Senator Fabio Guasco took his leave as well, accustomed to early hours, he kissed his niece’s hand, bowing with much gallantry as he begged her not to forget her old uncle in her invitations. Emilio Guasco, who had not said a single word since dinner, announced that he was going to accompany him. So only Gianni Provana remained, immovable, always tranquil, with his monocle fixed in its orbit. Quietly and tactfully Maria made her way to her husband, and asked him in a low voice—
“Are you going out?”
“Yes,” he replied quietly.
“Why are you going?”
“To accompany uncle.”
“Are you returning soon?”
“I don’t know.”
“Take away Gianni Provana too,” she suggested.
“But why?” he asked, with a little irony; “I don’t want you to remain alone.”
“Take him away; take him away,” she murmured, troubled and nervously.
“Are you afraid of him?” the husband asked mockingly.
“No,” she replied proudly, “I am not afraid of any one.”
She turned her back on him, greeting and kissing her friend, giving her hand to the men to kiss, and to her husband as well. Did not his lips seem to linger a little longer on her hand?
Gianni Provana remained as usual, the quiet and tenacious man, who allows nothing to disturb the plan he has formed for his existence. Without glancing at him, Maria threw herself into her favourite arm-chair, took a book with uncut leaves from a table, looked for a paper-knife, and, having found it, with the peculiar noise of cut paper, occupied her beautiful hands.
“I don’t bore you, Donna Maria?”
“No,” she replied, without raising her head.
“You would have preferred me to go with the others?”
“Perhaps,” she replied absently.
“You can’t bear me, isn’t it so?” he asked.
“You are mistaken, Provana.”
“Am I very antipathetic to you?”
“You are not antipathetic to me.”
“At any rate I am not sympathetic?”
“Certainly not,” she replied.
“Then indifferent,” and he bit his lip.
“Exactly; indifferent,” she concluded in a monotonous voice.
He got up quickly.
“Are you going?” she asked, rather surprised.
“For what am I to remain here? To hear this from you? The worst you could have told me you have told.”
The face of the worldling and pleasure-lover expressed at that moment true suffering.
She looked at him.
“Why are you obstinate, Provana,” she asked coldly and courteously, “in bothering about me, of what I think, of what I say, of what I do?”
“Because I am a fool,” he confessed, taking his monocle out of its orbit and looking at her, a familiar trick of his.
“You are not a fool,” she replied, with a little smile; “you are eagerly anxious to get something that seems necessary to you, which would instead be useless and dangerous to you, and which, through your good fortune, you will never obtain.”
“Everything has been said,” he murmured, offering her his hand, “good-night, Donna Maria.”
“Good-night, Provana.”
She offered her hand. He took it and kissed it, holding it a little in his own. In spite of hisworldly composure, in spite of his mask of good form, he showed that he was moved.
“Can’t you really manage, Donna Maria, to consider me a man worthy of some attention and curiosity?” he asked, with some anxiety.
“Oh, I know you well!” she replied, shaking her head.
“You could be wrong.”
“No, I can’t be wrong. For several years you have been attempting the conquest of my—attention—let us call it attention—a question of self-love. You have possessed other women more beautiful, more elegant than I. You are accustomed to succeed, so you are irritated and sad because you can’t with me. You have begun to suffer because you can’t succeed with me, and so you have got as far as believing that you are really in love.”
“Alas, it is no supposition!” he replied melancholily, but with an accent of truth.
“Let us not speak of love,” she declared; “I oughtn’t to listen any more to such talk. My greedy ears are satiated with it, they are tired of it, and have become deaf to it for ever and ever.”
“Nevertheless, some one loves you here, Donna Maria.”
“Whoever?”
“Emilio!”
“You are mistaken,” she said gravely; “Emilio no longer loves me.”
“Really?” he asked anxiously.
“Really.”
“Is he not an impassioned lover, an enamoured husband, and a tender friend?”
“None of these things, Provana.”
“What is he, then?”
“An enemy perhaps,” she replied softly.
“But hasn’t he pardoned you?”
“He has pardoned me, yes. He has pardoned me, but nothing more.”
“I never would have believed it,” he said thoughtfully.
“Nor I.”
“But perhaps,” he resumed, questioning her with his glance, “you have frightened him and kept him at a distance with your contempt.”
“I have done all that is possible; I am doing all that is possible,” she said vaguely, as if speaking to herself.
“You don’t love him; he will have understood.”
“I am humiliated and humiliate myself every day!” Maria exclaimed in a sorrowful voice; “and I break my pride every instant before him. But I can’t tell him to love me; neither does he ask it of me. He asks me nothing.”
“And if he were to ask it?” he said.
“He won’t; he won’t. He has understood I can’t lie.”
“Poor Emilio!” he exclaimed.
“Do you pity him? Even I pity him. He hashad pity on me, and I return it to him. But beyond this he can do nothing for me, and I can do nothing for him.”
The conversation had suddenly become austere. The worldling appeared preoccupied, the woman with her beautiful hands crossed on her knees was telling her tale as if in a dream. Gianni Provana looked two or three times at her. She was so young still, so flourishing in beauty, with every womanly grace, and he said to her—
“Is it possible that Emilio has no eyes, no heart, no feelings, that he doesn’t experience near you that invincible attraction which has made me ridiculous for years?”
“Who knows! Who knows!” she exclaimed wearily.
“What, in fact, do you think about your life?”
“I think nothing, Provana. I live my life as I do as a duty neither pleasant nor sad. I was hoping, and still hope, to give consolation for the undeserving sorrow I have sown. Now I don’t seem to be walking towards my goal. I don’t seem to be moving.”
“And how if your heart is elsewhere?” he said harshly; “you still love Marco Fiore.”
“If I loved him still I shouldn’t have returned,” she rejoined immediately, firmly. “I often think of him with tenderness and sweetness, but without love.”
“Have you heard? He isn’t happy,” he continued tartly.
“The fault isn’t mine, nor is it his. It is impossible that either he or I could ever be happy again. We knew it when we separated.”
“But Vittoria, it seems, is unhappy!” exclaimed Provana.
“Ah, that is very, very sad,” she said thoughtfully.
“Like your husband, for that matter,” added Provana.
“It is all immensely sad,” she concluded bitterly.
“The fault is neither yours nor Marco’s,” said Provana, with a sneer.
“You can only smile or laugh at all this,” and she glanced at him with disdain.
“Better to smile or laugh, Donna Maria. I am an optimist in my cynicism. Everything will gradually and slowly settle down.”
“How?” she asked, not without anxiety.
“Vittoria and Marco will end by adapting themselves to each other. He will have a son—perhaps two or three—and she will not bother any more about her husband. Marco will be older, and a monotonous frequenter of the club, the races, and other noble pursuits. Perhaps he will have a mistress or two whom he will not love, since he who has loved cannot love another woman with passion.”
“And here?” she asked, with a mocking laugh.
“Here, too, time will do its work. Emilio’s pardon will be, shall we say—active. He will love you tranquilly and faithfully as formerly, and you will again be an exemplary couple. Remorse will have ceased to bite yours and Marco’s heart; you may yet be two beautiful great souls. The years will be passed, and the four of you will even be able to see each other tranquilly.”
A strident and sardonic laugh punctuated the discourse, while he replaced his monocle in its orbit elegantly.
“And you, Provana?” asked the woman, laughing, too, ironically.
“Oh, I!” he exclaimed, with falsebonhommie; “I am the man who waits.Vice versâin waiting will come old age and death. So I shall pass to my ancestors with a beautiful and ridiculous epitaph: that of having loved Donna Maria Guasco uselessly.”
“It is even a big something to be able to love,” she remarked thoughtfully.
“That is what they say in novels and dramas; in life it is rather boring. Above everything the man who loves alone is the greatest bore of all. Good-night, Donna Maria.”
“Good-night,” she said, without detaining him.
An uncertain, melancholy, bitter dream settled on Maria’s soul.
* * * * * * * *
A voice awoke her from this dream.
“Good-evening, Maria.”
“Good-evening, Emilio.”
Her husband had entered without her noticing his step. He sat on the seat which Provana had left. It seemed to Maria that his face had become grave and thoughtful. She put down her book, and leaned her head, as if it were too heavy for her, on her beautiful hands. In the harmony of her movements, her womanly grace and fascination, in the silence of the moment, had something penetrating about it.
“Are you alone?” he asked.
“Provana went away a minute ago.”
“I met him near here, but he didn’t see me. What fine tales has he been telling you?” he resumed, with a disingenuous accent.
“Nothing very fine,” she replied.
“However, you must have listened to him with interest.”
“What makes you think that?” she said, trembling.
“I suppose it. The conversation has not been short, nor have you cut it short,” he added a little bitterly.
“Ah!” she exclaimed; “ought I to show the door to your Provana?”
“Mine? Mine? Isn’t he your friend?” he interrupted with agitation.
“No,” she replied precisely, “he is not my friend.”
“He makes love to you, however,” observed Emilio.
The tone was intended to appear indifferent, but if Maria had listened carefully and had regarded her husband’s face better, she would have understood that it was a question, and asked with anxiety. Instead, she shrugged her shoulders, and let it go without a reply. He repeated it.
“He makes love to you, doesn’t he?”
“Yes, perhaps; I believe so,” she murmured, letting her reply fall indifferently.
“He has always made love to you, hasn’t he?”
“Yes, he seems to have always done so,” she replied, with the same indifference and distraction.
“And you?” he said, in a sharp, hard voice which hurt her. Was he really Emilio who was questioning her so haughtily like a judge? Up to then the conversation had seemed to Maria one of those usual monotonous conversations in which every one speaks and thinks quite differently to what he says, and the lips pronounce empty words mechanically. Instead, she was suddenly aware that her husband wished imperiously to know the truth of her heart.
“I?” she replied, at once becoming sad and proud.
“You, you,” he replied, without changing his tone.
“What do you want to know from me?”
“If Gianni Provana’s suit pleases you, if it has ever pleased you, if it will ever please you?” he said coldly and cuttingly, drawing near to her, and looking at her with eyes full of anger.
She stepped back a little, certainly not in fright, but to measure this new sentiment of Emilio’s.
“What does it matter to you?” she asked slowly.
“It matters to me,” he replied, without changing either his accent or the expression of his face.
“Gianni Provana’s suit has never pleased me, does not please me, and never will please me.”
She pronounced the words slowly, letting them fall one by one, fixing her husband with her eyes. She saw his face change distinctly, the anger vanish which had transfigured him, and she heard his voice assume a lower tone, veiled with unfamiliar emotion.
“Why?” he asked; “why?”
“Because I despise him,” she concluded honestly, retiring again into a definite silence, as if she had nothing else to say, or wished to say, on that subject.
“I beg your pardon, Maria,” he whispered, drawing near her, his voice saddened and a little disturbed.
She glanced at him.
“It doesn’t matter,” she replied.
“I am certain I have offended you,” he insisted, still troubled.
“Yes, a little, but it doesn’t matter,” she added, with some pride.
“I must have seemed a little bit brutal to you, Maria,” he exclaimed remorsefully.
“A little,” she replied less proudly; “but it doesn’t matter.”
“Does nothing matter to you, then?” he asked, exasperated and sad.
She was silent and lowered her eyes, playing with her rings in a way that Emilio remembered.
“Will you give me your hand in token of peace?” he asked, with a false accent of easiness and frivolity.
“Yes,” she replied, giving him her hand.
“You bear me no rancour, Maria?” he continued with the same studied disingenuousness.
“No.”
“So be it,” he said, and he kissed the hand, and afterwards tried to keep it in his. She did not raise her eyes to his, and remained immobile and silent.
“Otherwise,” he resumed, as if continuing a discourse, “I find it quite reasonable that Gianni Provana should press his suit on you. Don’t get angry again,” he said, pressing the hand which she tried to withdraw, “his name annoys you; I won’t pronounce it again. I say finally that he is right to press his suit on you.”
She listened to him silently.
“Why are you so seducing?” he exclaimed weakly.
Was it the deception of the light, or did a slight flush diffuse itself over his face? But why did she say nothing to the man who was drawing his face nearer to hers and speaking so softly? What thought was restraining her? What sentiment was conquering her? The man was still bending, as if to snatch her from her silence, to snatch a word from her, which would not issue from the tightly closed lips.
“You are not yet thirty, Maria?” he asked, with a sigh.
“I am twenty-eight,” she replied softly.
“And I am old now,” he murmured melancholily, pressing her still hand, “I am so old for you. Youth is a beautiful thing.”
“Youth is a magnificent thing,” she replied, raising her voice with flashing eyes.
The incantation was broken. Violently Emilio let go of her hand. Getting up and withdrawing apart he strode through the room two or three times gloomily, almost blindly striking against the furniture. Sadly she looked at him, seeing him a prey to a sudden access of fury, and before this mystery her woman’s heart quailed anxiously.
“Emilio!” she called two or three times without his hearing.
“Maria,” he replied at last, in a kind of growl, without stopping.
“What is the matter?”
“Nothing,” he replied, between his teeth.
Very gradually his violent perambulations amongst the furniture grew calmer. He stopped near a table at a little distance away and sat there. Leaning his elbows on it, he hid his head in his hands, immersed in deep and terrible thoughts. Thus the time passed, while Maria herself seemed wrapped in thought. At last she seemed to make a decision. She rose, crossed the room, and bending over her husband, without touching him, called him again: “Emilio.”
He only started, but said nothing.
“Emilio, my friend, reply,” she said softly and insinuatingly.
“What do you want?” was the gloomy reply.
“I want to know what is disturbing you.”
“Nothing is disturbing me.”
“Why do you lie? You are very troubled; tell me what is the matter?”
“You would laugh at me.”
“I have never laughed at any one,” she replied patiently.
“Who knows?” he said, looking at her in mad anger, and with the open intention of offending her.
She stopped, and grew pale. But her moral energy was too great.
“He who laughs at the sufferings of another is a knave and a fool; you would not consider me perverse or stupid, Emilio?”
“I am not suffering,” he replied gloomily, rising.
“You are mistaken, my friend. You want to deceive me or yourself. You have some ill in your soul; tell me what it is.”
“I have nothing, and I am not suffering,” he replied gloomily.
She shook her head sadly.
“Perhaps I could give you some consolation, Emilio?”
“No.”
“Every human being who has a feeling heart, and soul, can give comfort.”
“No.”
“Am I not your friend, Emilio? Have you no faith in your friend?”
He sneered horribly.
“Friend? friend? You my friend? You, you? I should have faith in you?”
His laughter caused her to shudder.
“How you must be suffering, Emilio, to speak thus,” she said pityingly, pressing her hands to her breast. The man’s heart at such words, and at such a manifestation of pity, melted. He fell again into his seat and a sigh escaped him.
“Oh, how I suffer!”
An immense compassion transfigured the woman. She bent over him and lightly touched his shoulders with her fingers. He trembled and raised his face, and fixed her with eyes so full of immense,measureless sorrow that he seemed to Maria like the living image itself of anguish.
“Tell me why you suffer, Emilio?” she demanded, with such emotion that his spasms seemed to increase.
“I can’t!” he said desperately.
“Whatever it is you can tell me; I can bear it. Speak, speak, Emilio; don’t be afraid of offending me; don’t be afraid of saddening me. Speak,” she said to him affectionately, at the height of her pity.
“I can’t, I can’t,” he said, in cold desperation.
“My friend, don’t be severe with yourself. Don’t be so implacable with your wounded heart; don’t maltreat your wounded soul. Be more humane, more tender, more compassionate with yourself, my friend, or those bleeding wounds will never close, and you will never feel them heal. You will then sigh away all your best blood, Emilio.”
“It is true,” he murmured, as if to himself.
“Friend, conquer your pride and youramour propre. All of us, all of us, no one is excluded, have suffered, are suffering, and will suffer. It is not a shame or a reproach to suffer. Those who hide their pain proudly are not men, are not Christians, and do not feel the human comfort of weeping.”
“That is true,” he murmured.
“Friend, I know the words that caress sorrow,that rock it and finally send it to sleep. Later on, when it awakes in us, it is more tender and weaker; it is a much duller torment.”
Like a suffering child, he looked at her anxiously.
“My friend, why do you suffer?” she asked, leaning over him with a face transfigured with the grandeur of her loving charity, taking his hand and caressing it like that of a sick child in pain. “You oughtn’t to suffer. You have been an upright and just man. Your life has no remorses; it was guided by a moral conscience, tranquil and firm. You have not sinned—that I know; you have caused sorrow to none. Yours is a life without remorse, and so beautiful that suffering ought not to touch it.”
He looked at her ardently, almost drinking in her words like some divine liquor.
“You ought not to suffer. You are no longer alone in life; your friend is near you, near your heart, desiring one thing only, that you may not suffer, that you may no longer feel lonely, that you may possess a soul near you and for you——”
He looked at her passionately, and every one of her words seemed to intoxicate him. She, too, seemed exhilarated with compassion, tenderness, and devotion.
“Emilio, it is your Maria who is here,” she said solemnly.
Then like a madman he took her in his arms, pressed her madly to his breast in a frenziedembrace, and kissed her long, while she, trembling and lost, closed her eyes as before a mortal peril. But immediately, as if the contact of her person had scorched him, as if the lips which had not given him a kiss had scorched him, he pushed Maria brutally aside, crying out at her—
“You cause me horror!”
“Emilio!” she exclaimed, in complete amazement.
“Go away, go away. You cause me horror!” he yelled in her face like a madman.
She drew back, stupefied and terrified.
“You have pardoned me!” she exclaimed.
“It is true, it is true,” he yelled, “but I can’t forget. Go away, go away; I can’t forget.”
So she went, bent, defeated, and broken by the incomparable weight of the truth.
Inone of the large reception-rooms of Casa Nerola, near a bank formed of an enormous group of Hortense roses, two young girls stand talking and smiling discreetly, slowly moving their little white fans. The one, Theresa Santacroce, is dressed in light blue, with a silver belt, her hair arranged high with a circlet of silver ivy leaves. The other, Stefania Farnese, is dressed in ivory silk, and two large red roses in her chestnut hair give her a Spanish appearance, although her beauty is delicate.
“We thought we were going to be late with mamma.”
“Oh, we dined at seven on purpose.”
“That is why you haven’t been to the tea-room?”
“Of course. Here it is the same as at Court, one has to come before the sovereigns arrive.”
“The most beautiful spectacle is, naturally, the entry of the Emperor.”
“Is it true that all the women are in love with him?”
“So they say. As for me I don’t like Germans.”
“O Stefania, let us be grateful to him. Ifhe hadn’t come to Rome in December we shouldn’t have had the first ball now.”
“Long live the Kaiser, then! Since without him we should have had to wait till the end of February.”
“You are expecting Giovanni Altieri, aren’t you, Stefania?”
“Giovanni Altieri! I don’t want to hear him mentioned. No one is more voluble or frivolous.”
“Really!”
“Certainly. Just think, he has been in love this summer three or four times with foreigners—American, Russian, English. And now the wretch does nothing but speak badly of Italian girls.”
“How all our sweethearts take away these foreign women!”
“Let us give them an exchange. Let us go abroad with our mammas and marry Russian princes, English dukes and American millionaires.”
“A good idea; but our Italians are so sympathetic. Look at Marco Fiore over there; what a handsome youth! I would have married him very gladly.”
“And you would have done very badly.”
“Why?”
“Why ... do you know nothing? you are too simple.”
“Tell me why; tell me.”
“Another time. How late it is, and the ball can’t be opened till the Emperor comes!”
“Shall we see a state quadrille danced?”
“They say he dances beautifully.”
“Will he dance with the Principessa di Nerola?”
“Naturally. You know she is German, and a mediatised princess. That is why she is giving the ball and the Emperor is coming.”
“Are you engaged for the first waltz?”
“Yes, with De Goertz, of the Austrian Embassy.”
“Have you begun, then, with the foreigners?”
“Certainly; and you?”
“Oh, I am dancing with my cousin Roffredo.”
* * * * * * * *
Two old ladies are seated on a sofa of antique brocade in another of the rooms. Their age prohibits them from dancing. Their hair is white, their faces are furrowed with wrinkles, and their bodies bent with senility, so they seldom leave their patriarchal homes except on occasions of great state. They are the Princess of Anticoli and the Duchess of Sutri. Both are dressed in sumptuous dresses, trimmed with valuable lace; the most precious family jewels adorn their white hairs, giving them a certain majesty. Their necks, thin with age, wear scintillating diamond necklaces, and emeralds of old-fashioned style.
The Duchess of Sutri has magnificent eyes, black and vivid, which form a singular contrast tothe old age depicted in her face and person. Both their fans are closed in their hands, now so tired of moving them after so many years of balls and festivities. They are talking together slowly, watching with wandering eyes the elegant crowd which is coming and going.
“It wanted an Emperor, Lavinia, to make me leave my home at night.”
“Oh, in other times I wouldn’t have come here at any cost; isn’t he a Lutheran? But all that is changed. My Fabrizio has absolutely stated his wish to enter the Italian army. How was I, a widow, to contradict him? You understand me.”
“You have done well, my poor Lavinia. In fact, perhaps our sons and nephews are more right to accustom themselves to the new state of things than we are to protest. Now I am tired and sorry even of the discussion. I look and smile; sometimes I even laugh.”
“As for me, on the other hand, so many things happen and cause my pity, Livia. But to whom am I to say it? I should offend people by remarking on certain misfortunes and losses.”
“What magnificence, do you remember, in our times?”
“We were all much richer then, Livia.”
“What a lot of us have fallen into the most terrible poverty; it is a real shame.”
“Giovanna della Marsiliana.”
“Poor, poor thing! She lives on her little property near Perugia, just a small house and a garden, I think.”
“Does she stay there summer and winter?”
“Always now.”
“It is a real exile then.”
“But her daughter-in-law, Carolina della Marsiliana, is here. I see her over there.”
“Look, look, she is wearing the Marsiliana pearls!”
“Yes, she has rescued them from the moneylender, Labanchi, for a large sum.”
“Naturally, her father has so many millions.”
“A wholesale boot-manufacturer!”
“Yes, it seems he wants to repurchase the whole of the Marsiliana properties.”
“Carolina is speaking with Arduina Fiore.”
“Why isn’t Arduina wearing her diadem or necklace?”
“She has given them to her two daughters-in-law, Beatrice and Vittoria.”
“They are fortunate, those Casalta girls.”
“Do you think so? This evening they are wearing the jewels of Casa Fiore. Do you notice the two daughters-in-law are following their mother-in-law side by side?”
“Beatrice is very charming.”
“The other is insignificant.”
“A little pale and supercilious. She doesn’t like society, I suppose. How long are you staying, Lavinia?”
“Don’t you know we can’t go away till this Emperor leaves?”
“I knew his grandfather very well at Berlin.”
“And I his father in London, when he came to fetch his bride, Victoria.”
“It is useless to remind him of that.”
“Oh dear, yes.”
Two gentlemen have withdrawn from the flow of people to an embrasure of a window. One is Carlo Savelli, of the great house of Savelli, tall, strong and nervous, looking as if he had dismounted from one of the well-limbed horses of the Campagna, and had changed his large round cow-boy cloak for the evening dress of society. The other is Guglielmo Morici, pale and delicate, of the best Roman bourgeoisie, but allied by business and relationship to the nobility. In the conversation of each the Roman accent is very marked.
“When is the meeting fixed for?”
“For Saturday evening, Guglielmo. You are going to take part if you can get off?”
“Yes, I can get off for two or three days, for the Monday or even till Tuesday morning.”
“Good; we must pray Heaven that it doesn’t rain!”
“I don’t mind a little rain when one is out shooting, a little, but not too much.”
“You are right. We train to Velletri, thence we drive for three hours to Campiglione.”
“Do we get there at midnight?”
“Yes, and go to bed at once. At six o’clock we are off. Breakfast is at a place called L’Æqua Morta, and at night we sleep at Fattino.”
“How I love these shooting trips, dear Carlo! For three days through fields and woods, eating here and there, sleeping here and there. One could believe oneself far away in Africa or Asia.”
“I swear to you, Guglielmo, that everything else is indifferent to me; I rave about the chase. At first it was a hobby, but now it is a passion.”
“Oh, I have had it since a boy.”
“People who do not understand it laugh at us.”
“Let them laugh. Who is coming with us?”
“The usual lot; Mario Colonna, Giovanni Santacroce, and Emilio Guasco.”
“Splendid; have you fixed up everything?”
“This evening we must all meet here to arrange the time-table.”
“Is Emilio coming here too this evening?”
“I believe he is coming with his wife.”
“A beautiful woman!”
“I have always liked her.”
“You are not the only one who has liked her.”
“What are we to do? It is a misfortune for us husbands.”
“However, they are together again now—man and wife!”
“Oh, Emilio is a splendid fellow.”
“I wouldn’t have done it.”
“So one says. But then one has to find oneself in certain predicaments. Watch if you can see them arriving.”
“I see him; Mario Colonna is there.”
“Beckon to him to look for us after the Emperor has entered.”
“He has winked ‘yes.’ Now I see Emilio Guasco.”
“Is he with his wife?”
“Yes, yes. She is more beautiful than ever this evening. Do you know that even I think in looking at her that he was right to have pardoned her.”
“Have you nodded to him?”
“Yes; but I suppose he hasn’t seen me.”
“We will find him as soon as the Emperor has passed. At that moment every one will flock into the ball-room.”
“Is there to be much dancing afterwards?”
“Certainly, on account of the festivities the ladies have been enthusiastic about the Kaiser. My daughter, Maria, will stop late.”
“I think my wife must be very late. She was still dressing when I went out.”
“Oh, these ladies and theirtoilette!”
“Oh, I leave mine every liberty of being late by setting out first. Thus there is no quarrelling.”
A telephone message from the German Embassy has warned the Principe di Nerola that the Emperor of Germany with his suite has started for the Palazzo di Nerola. It is half-past ten. Court ceremonial ordains that the host honoured by a royal visit, receives His Majesty in the courtyard of his palace, at the foot of the grand staircase. The December evening is very cold. A slight frost covers the roads. The Prince of Nerola is already seventy, and the waiting in the cutting night air worries him secretly, in spite of the high honour which is coming to him from the Imperial visit.
The Roman patrician descends the stairs of his majestic palace wrapped in a fur coat, with his hat on his head. His three sons, Don Marcontonio, Don Camillo, and Don Clemente follow him at a little distance. On every step of the staircase, on right and left, are valets of Casa Nerola in grand livery. At the foot of the staircase footmen, with large lighted candelabra, form a circle round the group formed by the Prince and his sons.
The Nerola palace, in the via Santi Apostoli, is imposing and solemn in its exterior architecture. The courtyard is immense, with a fountain in the middle with a green tiled circle round it. A portico opens on the four sides of the courtyard. The internal architecture resembles the Palazzo Borghese.
Paolo, fifteenth Prince of Nerola, is tall and thin, with flowing white beard. His sons, between twenty-five and thirty-five years of age, all resemble him, but their appearance is less aristocratic and proud than his. Some minutes pass in silence, and suddenly the janitor of Casa Nerola, a Colossus clothed in a livery resplendent with gold, strikes the asphalt three times with his great gold-headed baton, while a dull noise of carriage-wheels reaches from the street.
At once, with youthful agility, Don Paolo frees himself from his cape, and remains in evening dress, his breast covered with decorations. The first imperial carriage enters, containing the aides-de-camp, and stops in front of the grand staircase. The imperial master of ceremonies and three officials in German uniform descend. Salutes are exchanged, and all four group themselves behind the Prince, in waiting. The second carriage enters more slowly, the Prince advances to the door. The Emperor alights, and uncovers at once before the Roman patrician, who bows profoundly and thanksHis Imperial Majesty for the honour he is doing to Casa Nerola. The Emperor smiles beneath his light moustaches, curled up proudly, and the procession is formed.
The footmen go slowly in front, holding the magnificent silver candelabra, lit with sweet-scented candles. Behind, at a certain distance, the Emperor. On his left the Prince walks a little apart, and a little behind him a group is formed by the Prince’s sons and the imperial suite. The procession mounts the stairs almost in silence, and with great solemnity. The sovereign is very calm, and talks to his host in German, looking around at the noble beauty of the house he is entering. Above, in the last ante-room, at the entrance to the suite of reception-rooms, the Princess of Nerola is waiting, born Princess Tekla di Salm-Salm. Dressed in white brocade, she wears the closed crown of a mediatised German princess; on her bodice is pinned a German order, which is only given to German ladies of high lineage. Her hair, which had been of the palest flaxen colour, is now quite white. She has that opaque whiteness of colouring, and the rosy cheeks of the descendants of Arminius. Though massive and big-boned, she looks quite the great lady. Immediately her Emperor appears at the door she goes towards him, and almost prostrates herself in profound reverence. Calmly, and almost jokingly,the Emperor takes her hand, kisses it gallantly, and gives her at once her title: “Your Serene Highness.”
The orchestra in the ante-room at once broke into the German National Anthem, in which all the ardent and mysterious power of the German soul is manifested. The procession is again formed, and William, King and Emperor, tall and erect in his uniform of a colonel of the Garde du Corps, gives his arm to the Princess to cross the rooms, glittering with light and magnificently decorated with plants and flowers, showing in all their refulgence the ancient beauty of their sculptural and pictorial decoration, in all the richness of their artistic furniture, an historic luxury, so calm and powerful. Behind the Emperor and the Princess come the Prince, his sons, and the suite. All walk slowly, regulating their step to his. He goes slowly, for he knows the secret of these appearances, and speaks smilingly to the Princess, looking around to right and left at the two lines of men and women who bow profoundly to him, and lower their eyes, if he fixes them with his clear, flashing eyes. It is a double hedge of women especially, in coloured and brilliant gowns, in white and soft gowns, with bare shoulders and arms. It is a double hedge of heads—blondes, brunettes, chestnuts, golden, white—on which feathers flap, on which jewelled stars and shining crescentstremble, on which strange flowers almost open: heads bowed beneath the weight of their thickly dressed hair, little heads almost childish beneath the wavy aureole of golden locks, heads which bow in a salute of reverence, of admiration, of mute feminine sympathy, for this Emperor of legend, of poesy, of ever-renewing self-will. He admires and greets the women with a slightly haughty smile, continuing his way. There is not a word or a whisper as he passes, nothing except the rustling of silk and velvet, or the jingling of the sabres of the suite. In this silence the passing of the Emperor-King acquires a more impressive and imposing character.
Crowded one against the other, dame and damsel had not spoken while he appeared and while he was passing, and indifferent to their surroundings had only thought of seeing him and being seen, of greeting him and receiving his greeting. Mixed among them are old men and young, also intent on bowing to the sovereign. In the famous tapestry-room of Casa Nerola, the room before the ball-room, in the great space cleared in the middle of it to allow the Emperor-King to pass, opposite but far off, divided by the big space and many people, a man and a woman have recognised each other with their eyes, and have remained immobile and silent to gaze at each other.
They are Maria Guasco Simonetti and Marco Fiore.
Since that sad autumn afternoon a year ago, when they had wept their last tears together without either being able to console the other, taking leave of each other for ever, and burying their dead dream of love, they had never seen each other. It is a year ago since, courageously and with broken hearts, they had separated, thinking in that terrible moment that they would never see each other again till death or old age; but so many singular circumstances had happened around them during this time, the change of events has been great, and their fate has changed all its course and aspect. Suddenly and unexpectedly on that December evening, amidst sumptuous and splendid surroundings, amidst flowers, women, jewels, music, and perfumes, the two who had lived their passion of love together, and had placed it desolately in its sepulchre, are face to face, divided by the crowd; but their glances, greedily and intensely attracted, seem as if they never could separate. For a long moment Maria Guasco and Marco Fiore gaze at each other. In their eyes there is only one beautiful, simple, strong expression, sadness free from every ardour, sadness free of every desire; sadness without remorse or hope; a sadness which neither invokes nor offers help. It is an incomparable and immeasurable sadness, which can only be supported by lofty human strength in its humility and innocence. Thus they look at each other and areonly sad for that which was and is no more, for that which can never return to them, since nothing which is dead in the soul rises again.
Proud and smiling the Emperor passes, and a flock of people crowd behind the suite and increases near the door, to get near him and surround him. Marco and Maria are separated by the great crowd. But they do not seek each other. Everything has been said in one long glance, in one long moment of intimate understanding.