"I cannot imagine," replied Giannella simply. "I thought at first that perhaps he was sorry for mebecause I should soon be growing old and ugly and my shoes were going to pieces—and since dear Signora Dati of good memory died—and the Princess is too busy to remember, there is no one to get me any work. But now he speaks of—marriage. What man in his right senses could wish to marry me, nearly twenty-one and without a penny?" She looked up in perplexed good faith as she asked the question, and the lamplight fell on the calm, lovely face which had so enchanted one man that he dreamed of it all night and crept down to the church morning after morning to catch another glimpse of it.
"There might be plenty," growled Mariuccia, "if they could only see you. You will be beautiful till you are a hundred, core of my heart. Now don't smother me!" for Giannella suddenly ran round the table and hugged her friend. "But the padrone is not like other men. The time has come when I must tell you what I have discovered. You are young, you saw nothing, but I saw, I understood. This bewitchment had a beginning. It came with the first visit of that stout gentleman who asked you such strange questions. Do you remember? Ah, they could not deceive me. I wish I had thought of it when he was last here. If he comes again I will ask him some questions, I can tell you. What did he want here, putting folly into my poor boy's head and disturbing the tranquillity of a Christian family? I have lived twenty-three years with that poor afflicted angel in there, and never have we had a disagreement till thatfat demon, whoever he was, came to upset us all, and may his best dead suffer for it. There, it is late, go to bed, Giannella, I am going to sit up in here—the padrone may want something."
Bianchi judged it prudent to prolong his relapse in order to profit by the softening of heart it had induced in his attendants. He obeyed Mariuccia's commands with touching submission and kept her affectionately uneasy about him by well-timed sighs and complaints. She would not leave the house till he should be better, and she would not leave Giannella alone with him; in fact she bade her keep out of his sight altogether, hoping rather forlornly that his mad project would disappear with the other symptoms of his alarming indisposition.
So Giannella went alone to Mass and marketing, and came home each day with more pink in her cheeks, more light in her eyes. Her spirits seemed to have returned and she hummed little tunes over her work, just as she had done when she first came back from the convent. Some of the moist sweetness of the summer morning followed her in when Mariuccia opened the door to her and her parcels at seven o'clock; and through the long hot days of July she looked as fresh and bright as an opening rose in the first sunbeam.
The inhabitants of the Via Tresette knew all about it long before Giannella did. The dairyman's wife told her lord that the Signorino Goffi was as good as in love, "bello che innamorato," with the Biondina."Don't tell me," she declared, "that a young fellow like that would go to church every day at five o'clock—and bring down a clean handkerchief to kneel on every blessed morning—if he were not in love! He is rich. Has he not a splendid vigna outside Porta San Giovanni, from which he received fruit and wine but yesterday? The man who brought it told me all about him. He is disinterested, one can see that, for he did not bargain more than a day over the rooms, and he has never tried to beat me down on the eggs and ricotta—oh, he will marry Mariuccia's Biondina, and was I not the cleverest of women to insist on your building a good apartment that could accommodate a family, instead of just a studio and a cubbyhole of a kitchen as you wished to do?"
Sora Rosa opposite nodded her old head in approval of these sentiments, delivered in clarion tones on the dairyman's doorstep. She had seen it happening for a week now, had seen Giannella come down the street from Palazzo Santafede with the sun behind her and Rinaldo with the sun on his face emerge from his door at the same moment; had seen them meet at the low entrance to the San Severino courtyard, pause an instant, smile involuntarily, and then disappear as the heavy old portal swung to behind them.
Fra Tommaso too knew all about it. Divided between sympathy for the youth and romance, and jealousy for the respect due the sacred precincts, he had watched his old and his new parishioner closely, but had found nothing to criticise in their behavior. "Good children, good children," he said to himself ashe saw Giannella go out and Rinaldo follow her, with proper deliberation. Of course he had obtained the young man's history in full from the communicative lady of the dairy, and indulged in a little self-approval for having been the immediate instrument of obtaining for the Biondina the fine instruction which would fit her to be the sposa of that superior young gentleman, Signorina Goffi. Padre Anselmo might talk about the evils of human distractions, but there could not be anything very dangerous in them when they had such splendid results at this.
Things were nothing like so clear to the hero and heroine of the popular little romance. They had traveled no farther than the outer garden of love's fairy habitation, and Giannella at any rate did not dream that anything sweeter or more perfect could lie beyond. The thrilling excitement of seeing Rinaldo coming to meet her at the doorway, the silent passage to their places in the chapel, the kneeling so near each other for the blessed half hour—this had seemed enough at first to bring her happiness for the day. But when on the fourth morning Rinaldo had overtaken her in the court, and, with profound apologies, returned to her the purse and key which she had left lying on the chair—when, baring his head he looked in her face and she saw the glow on his and heard his voice for the first time—then Giannella's heart beat so wildly that she could find no words to say and her trembling fingers almost dropped the objects he held out to her.
Together they had left the courtyard, and Rinaldo,lifting his hat respectfully, had turned away fearing she might think he was going to have the presumption to accompany her. But when, on looking round, he saw her entering the dairy, he reached the threshold in two strides, for here was his opportunity. Sora Amalia, the proprietress, should introduce him properly. Then Giannella would know as much about him as he already knew about her. After that—leave it to him to make the most of the acquaintance.
As he entered the dark cool shop, Giannella was burying her face in a huge posy of carnations which stood on the marble counter midway between the butter and the fresh eggs. Sora Amalia gave him a cheery good-morning, and Giannella lifted her face, all rosy, and dewy from the flowers, and drew back a little as if to wait her turn until the new-comer should have been attended to. Rinaldo, with a quick movement of the head, manifested his wish to Sora Amalia, who, smiling broadly, said: "Signorina Giannella, this is Signor Goffi, the great painter, who has taken our apartment. Some day, if you like, I will take you upstairs and show you his pictures. For to me he is already like a son. Oh, signorino, that salad you gave me from your vigna—it was a cream, a flower of tenderness. That of Sora Rosa over there is material, tough, compared to it. And the wine—of a sincerity we had a treat last night, Pippo and I."
She chattered on, to give the young people time to look at each other, and also to impress Giannella with the importance of the new lodger. As soon as sheceased, Rinaldo caught at the proposal contained in her speech.
"My pictures are nothing to mount the stairs for, signorina," he said eagerly, "but the view—if you would condescend, and Sora Amalia could come up now?"
"Oh, not now, I am afraid I have not time," Giannella interposed, addressing Sora Amalia; "another day, perhaps, if you can come—and Signor Goffi permits?" she added, looking up at him and flushing divinely. "Now I have still to go to the apothecary with this prescription—and he is not very near—and does take so long to prepare the medicine—and you know, Sora Amalia, there is much to do at home."
"Is there illness in the family, signorina?" Rinaldo inquired with concern. "It grieves me to hear it."
Sora Amalia touched his hand as it lay on the counter and gave him a broad wink with the eye Giannella could not see. "Illness?" she exclaimed, "there is indeed. The Signor Professore has been in bed for a week. Now, signorino, if you wish to do him a good turn—and get a nice walk in the morning air for your health's sake—you will take this prescription and get it made up, and bring it yourself to Sora Mariuccia, who will thank you for sending Giannella home so quickly."
She had whisked the paper from the girl's hand and held it out to him, laughingly defending it from the rightful owner, who was trying to get it back.
"Oh, please, Sora Amalia," Giannella pleaded, "how can you imagine that I would let Signor Goffitake all that trouble for us? I will go for it myself, of course."
But Rinaldo was quick to seize the golden opportunity. The paper vanished into his pocket and he was making for the door when Giannella ran after him. "Please, please, since you are determined to be so charitable," she said, "here is the money to pay for it," and she tendered a silver coin. He took it gravely, and they both paled a little at the touch of hand and hand.
"I will bring the medicine to the palazzo," he said rather huskily.
"How could you, Sora Amalia?" Giannella remonstrated when he was gone; "what will he think of being asked to do such a thing for a stranger?"
"I will show you to-morrow what he thinks," replied the good woman, "and perhaps I will give you some of it. There will be a pile of fruit and vegetables a yard high, from his vigna, on this counter to-morrow morning. Run along and tell Sora Mariuccia all about it—and be sure to open the door to him yourself when he brings the medicine."
Giannella was rather reticent with Mariuccia, however, and gave her story of how Sora Amalia's lodger had run off with the prescription in as few words as possible. She expected to receive a good scolding for the indiscretion she must have committed—or permitted—before things reached such a pass, though she could not quite see where she had been in fault.
Mariuccia had no such doubts. "That blessed Sora Amalia!" she exclaimed, her eyebrows meetingin rhadamanthine severity across her low forehead. "What a want of education! Could she not perceive that she was taking the most indiscreet liberty—imposing on the gentleman's good nature, so that he must have been deeply displeased? I will apologize to him when he comes. I will tell him that we are shocked at that woman's imprudence. Four flights of stairs to climb, and his time wasted! I wonder you did not die of shame, Giannella, at being made the occasion of such inconvenience to him."
Giannella remembered Signor Goffi's ecstatic alacrity and ventured to say that he did not seem at all annoyed, on the contrary, very happy to be of service.
"Then," thundered Mariuccia, "you have spoken to him before. You have permitted him to make your acquaintance—in secret. Oh, this is terrible. How can I ever let you out of my sight again?"
"I never spoke to him till this morning," cried the girl. "I have seen him, yes, how could I help it? He comes to Mass every day. Is the church my private chapel? Is no one else to enter it while her Excellency, Giannella Brockmann, is saying her prayers there? How dare you say that I have made his acquaintance in secret? I will not hear such things. You speak as if you believed evil of me."
Was this Mariuccia's submissive Giannella, this outraged young woman with scarlet cheeks and flashing eyes standing up to her inquisitor with rebellion in every tone of her voice? Mariuccia drew back from her in surprise, and before she had recovered enough to reply, the doorbell tinkled hoarsely.
"There he is," said Giannella. "You must open to him yourself. I will not. He would see that you have been pouring shame over me." And she turned her back and sat down to her work, shaking with indignation.
Mariuccia went to the door, nothing loth. "I shall see what he is like at any rate," she told herself in the passage. "Some silly dandy who thinks he can make eyes at a poor girl because she has to go out alone. That's the kind. But I'll settle him." And she opened the door with a jerk and stood squarely on the threshold as if barring the way to impertinent intruders.
"With permission?" inquired a courteous voice, and one hand held out a small parcel while the other removed the hat from a handsome young head. "I took the liberty—Sora Mariuccia will pardon me, I trust. I have heard of her so much from Fra Tommaso—and I knew she was anxious to have this as soon as possible. How is the chiarissimo Professore this morning?"
If the young man felt any chagrin at the substitution of this janitress for a prettier one he effaced all signs of it from his address. He was so good-looking, so urbane, there was such honest kindness in his smile, that the hardest feminine heart must have softened to him. Mariuccia thawed at once. What if he were to prove—but she chased away the rosy dream, and answered his inquiry about the padrone's health, thanked him for his amiability and, remembering that the Professor was safe in bed, was actually going toask Rinaldo to enter. It went against all her traditions to keep anyone standing at the threshold.
But Rinaldo had his traditions too. One did not impose oneself as a visitor on the strength of a rendered service. "Levo l' incommodo" (I remove the inconvenience of my presence), he said, bowing and turning to depart. Then a thought struck him, and he came back to ask: "Can I be of any service in the way of commissions while the Professor is ill? it would be for me a pleasure. I live over the dairy in the Via Tresette, close by. A word to Sora Amalia, and I am at your disposal at any time, day or night. Arrivederci, Sora Mariuccia."
"A beautiful youth," she remarked to herself when she had thanked him and closed the door. "And well brought up. He would not even come in. I do not believe he is running after Giannella at all. Poor child—it might be a good thing for her if he did—if he has any money. San Giuseppe mio, send us a good husband for her, and restore my little padrone to his right mind. I will never complain of his faults any more if only he drops his crazy idea of marrying Giannella. Eccomi quá, here I come!" This in answer to a querulous call from the invalid's room.
When she returned to the kitchen Giannella's bad temper had disappeared. She was standing at the window amusing herself with feeding Fra Tommaso's pigeons, who looked upon her as their supplementary Providence, since she always had crumbs and corn in store for them. The wide window sill so near thedeep palace eaves was shady in the hot hours, and the pretty tame creatures often haunted it, strutting up and down, carrying on their little sham fights over tempting morsels or boldly hopping on Giannella's shoulder to ask for more. She was quite unconscious that she was ever watched from across the way at these moments, but, to tell the truth, Rinaldo trespassed unwarrantably on Fra Tommaso's premises and wasted a good deal of time in the occupation of feeding his eyes on the sight of his goddess and the preoccupation of preventing her or anyone else from finding it out.
Themistocles was bolder. He had taken to Fra Tommaso's loggia and his own kin there very kindly, and had wheeled towards Giannella's window more than once in the wake of the rest; but he had never settled there till this morning, when he at last permitted himself to be courted and captured.
"Fra Tommaso has got a new pigeon and a fine name for it too," said Giannella as Mariuccia entered. She had made up her mind to pardon her old friend and this seemed a good way of opening up a reconciliation. "See, is he not a beauty? And he has a silver band round his neck, with 'Themistocles' on it. What grandeur! Fra Tommaso grows extravagant in his old age. Ah, ungrateful one," she cried, as the bird slipped from her hand and soared away over the convent roof, "being full you depart, but you will return with great love when you are hungry again."
"That reminds me," Mariuccia replied, catchingat the flag of truce, "that gentleman who brought the medicine just now spoke of Fra Tommaso. He seems a nice quiet young man."
"Who? Fra Tommaso?" Giannella asked. "He seems to me a nice talkative old one." And she laughed, being too full of happiness to quarrel long with anyone to-day. Her troubles seemed to have vanished into air. The padrone was out of sight and mind, and the sun was rising on her horizon at last.
After this it was impossible to refuse to speak to Rinaldo when she met him in the mornings, and the little conversations in the back court of San Severino became very friendly and intimate. Rinaldo always began with eager inquiries after the health of the illustrious Professor, as if his peace of mind depended on the answer. Then he hoped that the most respectable Sora Mariuccia was well. After that, conventionalities were forgotten. In the most natural way in the world each came to know all about the other. Rinaldo had learned Giannella's limited life story from her own lips, had had to avow his admiration of Mariuccia's goodness—"She is an angel, that woman," Giannella declared one morning, her eyes suffused with emotion; "she seems cross and rough, but she has a heart of gold. Oh, you will love her when you know her better."
And Rinaldo, his heart quite full of another love, proclaimed that he already felt for the good woman the affection of a son. There was nothing he would not do to prove it. Let Giannella try him. Meanwhile, would she not persuade Sora Mariuccia tobring her to his studio some Sunday afternoon? They could have a little refreshment on the terrace, and he would get his friend, Peppino Sacchetti, who sang divinely, to come and bring his mandolin, and though indeed the pictures were not worth looking at, the signorina would be amused at the antics of the pigeon, Themistocles, who would dance about when Peppino played, and was altogether a most sagacious bird.
The first part of this speech opened up a dizzy vista of happiness not to be contemplated for a moment when one had only one old frock and one's shoes were going to pieces. So, with a determined gulp, Giannella ignored it and replied to the last words only.
"Oh, he is yours then, the one with the silver collar? I thought he belonged to Fra Tommaso. Why, he comes to see me every day."
"Beato lui, too happy bird!" cried Rinaldo, with sudden passion in eyes and voice. "My little sister sent him to me from Orbetello, saying he would bring me good fortune. It is he who is fortunate." Then, as the color flushed up in Giannella's cheek at his cry, he went on more quietly, "Signorina, I am coming to-morrow to bring Sora Mariuccia something from the vigna—poor stuff, but fresher than we get in the city. Then I shall myself invite her for next Sunday. What kind of ice-cream do you like best."
"Framboise," she replied, without a moment's hesitation. Then she remembered. Such pleasures were not for her. She turned away to hide the silly tears that would come into her eyes, and said chokingly,"Oh, please do not speak of it, Signor Goffi. It is quite impossible—there are good reasons. We never go anywhere—we could not come."
Rinaldo was silent, looking at the averted head where the gold gleamed royally through the carefully mended lace. His trained eye took in the poverty of the thin black dress with its neat little darns here and there; it clothed the delicate young form very kindly, but it was a thousand times unworthy of such honor. Being artist as well as lover, he understood, and his heart was so hot with love and pity that for the first time in his life words failed him. Giannella moved towards the outer gate of the court, and he followed dumbly, aching to find expression for what he felt. But there was nothing to say which would not have been an offense; he could not offer sympathy where he had no right to seem to understand. His Latin tact came to his aid, however, as he held the door open for her to pass out.
"We will put off our party a little, then, signorina," he said, gentle detaining her. "The weather is warm just now. Perhaps it would please you better to come to the vigna, some day when the grapes are ripe? It will be cooler then." And he added to himself, "And by that time, my beautiful heart, you will have a Sunday dress of splendid blue silk, and a gold chain to match your hair, and you will go to your own, for the vigna will belong to you. We will be married on the first Sunday in October, and what a sposina you will make!"
Giannella murmured something and hastened awaytowards the Piazza Santafede, and Rinaldo stood looking after her till she disappeared. Then he regained his studio in haste, and applied himself to the picture for the rich foreigner. He was to receive five hundred scudi for it, and that was just the sum he wanted to put the apartment in order and buy his wedding gifts for his bride. He had been tempted to commit the extravagance of having a living model this time, so as to get on faster; but he reflected that the hired peasant would not look much more like a real cardinal than the ever-obedient but rickety clay figure, and then—three pauls an hour! No, it was not to be thought of—when one had set one's mind on that other extravagance, that holy folly of marriage.
"Come along, your Eminence," he exclaimed as he knocked Themistocles off the ragged head and crowned it with a red skullcap. Then he got his old friend seated in the cherub-crowned chair, pinned the red tablecloth round him in dignified folds, and in half-an-hour had forgotten that he was not contemplating a live dignitary of the Church.
Towards evening the friend of whom he had spoken to Giannella, Peppino Sacchetti, came to tempt him away to the Tiber for a row and a swim before the sun went down.
"Capperi, Nalduccio," he cried as he looked from the model to the picture, "but you have a fine big imagination! I could not have drawn that from our old manikin. I see Themistocles has been trying to mend that bump on its nose. When are you going to have living models? You are a rich man, yourascal, and you can pay for them now. I wish I could."
"Peppino mio," replied Rinaldo, as he worked his palette off his thumb and prepared to wash his brushes, "I shall have a living model, and a very beautiful one, next October. Meanwhile I have an imagination which is neither fine nor big—but, thank Heaven, extremely obedient. It saves me much money. While I am painting, I see a cardinal, and I am most respectful to him. I address that person in the tablecloth as 'your Eminence' and push him into his place with reverence when he tumbles down. When the rich foreigner receives the picture, he also sees a cardinal, and he admires him, for he has probably never cast eyes on a real one. The picture goes with him to his nasty cold heretic country where there are no cardinals. Everybody admires it, and the naturally good of heart wish that they belonged to a Church governed by noble ecclesiastics with pink cheeks and Chinese white hair and beautiful taper fingers (I always draw the hands from those same old casts), and if God is good to them they come to Rome and save their souls. I obtain all these fine results and save many precious scudi—because I have an obedient imagination. Cultivate one, Peppino mio, it is as good as a savings bank."
The hereditary lawyer of the Santafede family caused great inconvenience about this time by leaving a world of woe and circumlocution, to reap the reward stored up for honest men of business elsewhere. Since that section of the heavenly mansions cannot be overcrowded it is to be hoped that he met with a warm welcome. His demise, lamentable though it appeared to his employers, brought solid satisfaction to his successor, a stout young gentleman with a turn for malicious humor, whom he had himself trained and designated as the disciple on whom his mantle of faded parchments was to fall when he himself should no longer have any use for it.
Guglielmo De Sanctis swelled with pride when Ferretti, the power behind the Santafede throne, sent for him to come to the cancelleria to make out a new lease for one of the apartments. He had acquired considerable knowledge of the Santafede affairs through having for some years passed attended to those of the Princess's brother, Cardinal Cestaldini, who had warmly endorsed his recommendation for the vacant post. As the young lawyer saw in the appointment another source of income and honor for the rest of his life, his heart was gay within him as he passed under the archway into the Santafede palaceto answer the maestro di casa's summons one fine morning late in July.
The Professor was better that day and Mariuccia intended to regale him with one of her "golden fries;" Giannella, running out in haste to buy whitebait and cucumbers, and counting her coppers in the corner of the red handkerchief which takes the place of the market basket in Rome, nearly bumped into the lawyer as he turned the angle of the colonnade. She pulled up with hurried excuses; he declared they should come from him; and then, recognizing the padrone's mysterious visitor of some weeks ago, she greeted him politely and asked after his respectable health. He did not reply at once, but stood looking at her with slightly knitted brow and a puzzled expression. Then, calling up a smile, he removed his hat and held it in his hand while he assured her that his health was fairly good, thank Heaven, hoped the scirocco was not too trying to that of the Signorina Brockmann; though indeed, if he might be permitted to say so in all sincerity, that was evident, since she looked so well (his eyes said: so pretty), and reminded her that he was always at her command should she require his services.
Giannella, unaccustomed to flowery speeches, was puzzled in her turn; she thanked him briefly, and passed on, unwilling to be seen conversing alone with any young man—except one. De Sanctis turned and gazed after her. "What a curious girl!" he said to himself; "she has bought no finery, she runs out marketing with a red handkerchief and a few baiocchi—I wonder what she is doing with her money? I suppose she has lived so long with Bianchi that she has caught some of his parsimonious tricks. Oh well, it is none of my business. Now for Ferretti," and he dived into the cool vaulted hall of the cancelleria.
The Professor was certainly much better. Indeed he intended to go out that afternoon to visit the Cardinal and have an exciting talk about a discovery made by his Eminence, a bit of an inscription unearthed in the Cestaldini cellars by the workmen who were repairing the drains. At this time of year these were always looked to, as heavy rains usually closed the long summer drought, and the Tiber, rising in his silt-choked bed, was apt to bubble up and make improvised fountains in unexpected places. On the discovery of the interesting fragment the Cardinal had suspended the repairs, feeling sure that the remainder of the inscription could be found, and had sent for his friend Carlo Bianchi, that light of dark learnings, to come and advise him as to further investigations.
Bianchi was keen to get on the scent, but there was one visit he proposed to pay before calling on the Cardinal. In all the dignity of clean clothes and returning health, he summoned Giannella to his study that morning and repeated his declaration of the generous intention to add to all his past kindness to her by shortly making her his wife. Seeing that he was perfectly well and otherwise in his right mind she did not laugh this time, but told him, with a quiet decision he had never yet seen her display, thatshe could not even pretend to consider his proposal an honor; it was degrading to himself and repulsive to her. What possible grounds for a union, she asked, could exist between them? He was old enough to be her father, rich and distinguished. She was a waif and a pauper, and ignorant in the extreme, having forgotten, as she mournfully declared, the little book learning that the nuns had taught her, and being now only fit to cook and clean and mend, services she was most willing to render him in return for his charity in allowing her to live under his roof. There she trusted she might still remain—if he would at once and forever abandon a project, the fulfillment of which would only make him ridiculous in the eyes of his friends, and to which she herself would never, never consent.
Exit Giannella, shaking with the anger of battle, so new to her calm, equable nature, and enter Mariuccia, who had frankly listened at the keyhole and heard every word. This time she would not let her feelings master her. She preserved a respectful attitude—with superhuman effort and many mental appeals to "Domine Dio" to keep His Hand on her head. After repeating all Giannella's arguments, she implored her beloved padroncino, whom she loved as a master and as a son, by all he held dearest in life, personal comfort, avoidance of expense, the respect of his many admiring friends, to put this caprice out of his clever head and restore peace to his unfortunate but ever devoted family.
Mariuccia's address was a triumph of good senseand good temper, but Bianchi was unmoved by it. A stony silence ensued when she ceased. Then Bianchi, glowering at her through those big spectacles, told her that an ignorant female could be no judge of an instructed man's motives or actions; that he thanked her for her expressions of affection, which he wished she would prove by either minding her own business or by using her influence to bring Giannella to a more reasonable frame of mind. He intended—here he glanced at a fly-blown calendar on the wall and appeared to be making a rapid mental calculation—yes, he intended to espouse Giannella in about three weeks; in any case before the end of August. Mariuccia might retire. He was going out.
Mariuccia, cold at heart, found her way back to the kitchen, sank into a chair and let her head fall forward on the table. Giannella, who had been working off her feelings by some violent sweeping in the inner room, came and knelt beside her and comforted her dumbly; both their hearts were heavy with the sense of disaster, but Giannella had something which Mariuccia had not—youth and love and hope, to strengthen her hard tried courage.
When he was left alone Bianchi locked the door and stuffed a bit of paper into the key hole. Then he took a rusty key from his vest pocket and opened the old secretary by the window. From one of the pigeon holes he drew forth a bundle of papers, laid them on the table, and read them through one by one. Had Giannella been able to look over his shoulder her eyes would have opened wide at therevelations they contained, and at the same time all surprise at the padrone's extraordinary infatuation would have died with the knowledge. But Giannella, Bianchi was resolved, never should see them, never should know that her unwillingly written signature was attached to the acknowledgment of certain respectable sums accruing to her while she should be still under the Professor's tutelage as a minor, and to be delivered into her own keeping on her twenty-first birthday. For the documents on Bianchi's table set forth that one Siegfried Brockmann, a merchant in Copenhagen, had died about a year earlier, leaving his modest fortune to the person who should prove to be his nearest relation. As he had had a brother who lived abroad, the conscientious authorities instituted a search, which resulted in the discovery that the brother had met his end in Rome, and that the person who should claim the benefit of Siegfried Brockmann's will was this brother's daughter, proved by the records of the Danish Consulate to have survived her father. Inquiries of the police (who in those days kept a strict registry of the families of all householders), and of the parish priests, revealed that the child had been taken in charge by one Mariuccia Botti, who had ever since that date been in the service of Professor Carlo Bianchi, the distinguished archæologist. As this gentleman, when referred to, claimed to be the responsible guardian of the girl, and furnished, from his hastily reconstructed memoirs, convincing proofs of her identity, the negotiations for the transfer of the money were carried on with himby Signor De Sanctis, the legal adviser of the Danish Consulate, and he was now in command of some two thousand scudi a year, to be handed over in due form to Giannella on her coming of age in the ensuing September. Since that date was so close when the business was finally wound up in July, it was agreed that the principal, together with the year's income which had accrued between the testator's death and the finding of his heir, should lie at interest in the Banco di Roma, barring the sum of one hundred scudi handed to Bianchi to pay him for Giannella's maintainance during the interval, and two hundred to be given to the girl herself to provide her with a proper wardrobe and a little pocket money.
It was for this sum that Giannella had signed a receipt. The Professor, on the first announcement of her inheritance, confided to De Sanctis that the girl was of a nervous, excitable temperament, and begged to be allowed to inform her of her good fortune himself. He would break the news quietly and gently. He added that she was shy with strangers, and, like so many young ladies, inclined to be hysterical on slight provocation. Giannella would not have recognized herself from the Professor's description. De Sanctis in his one short conversation with her, had satisfied himself that she was of sound mind; her answers to his questions as to her childhood at Castel Gandolfo, her education at the convent, her having no friends except Signor Bianchi and Mariuccia, were given with frankness and clearness. Bianchi, in a subsequent interview with the lawyer,told him that she had been much overcome by the revelation made to her, and suggested, in order to avoid any emotional scene, "so disturbing to a man of business," that he should give her the two hundred dollars himself and she should sign a receipt for it in De Sanctis' presence without any further discussion of the subject.
De Sanctis consented gladly. He had a horror of scenes, pleasant or unpleasant, and was anxious to save time and get the little business off his mind. The Professor's reputation for parsimony had rather heightened than diminished the general opinion of his probity. It seemed fortunate for the girl that she should have such an upright and careful adviser. Nevertheless the lawyer's bewilderment was great at meeting her quite a fortnight after the conclusion of the transaction in the same garb of decent poverty, the same attitude of humble domestic service in which he had first found her. But he reflected that there was no accounting for tastes—and dismissed the matter from his thoughts.
So Mariuccia's brave inventions about the Brockmann relations had materialized at last. No wonder that the Professor's attention was attracted to Giannella. Even Mariuccia would have appeared less forbidding in his eyes had she suddenly inherited money. As for Giannella, he honestly wondered that he had never noticed before that she was young and beautiful; now that he had time to think of it, he remembered with what good-natured readiness she had waited on him and worked for him; something like a realaffection stirred in his heart. It began to reach out for its rights in comradeship and sympathy, and he permitted himself to look forward to the more cheerful aspects of advancing years which he had seen others enjoy but had as yet not provided for himself. If self was the central motive of his actions at this juncture, at least his feelings towards the girl were as warm and kind as his strange nature would permit; and he contemplated, as he thought, no injury to her; her interests would be carefully safeguarded in case of his dying first, and in the meantime he was doing her a benefit by preventing her from squandering her money. So quickly does self-deception do its work that in a few days after he made up his mind to marry her he had persuaded himself that he would have done so long ago had not common prudence barred the way. No man with a sense of duty would take a portionless bride, of course. But since that reproach had fallen from her, dear, pretty sweet-tempered Giannella would make an excellent wife and do him credit, since, probably on account of the regard felt for himself, she had received a decent education. She had much to thank him for, he reflected, and he was glad that in the recent manifesto of his intentions, so rudely received by her, he had not permitted her to forget her obligations to him. Her unwillingness in no way affected his calm conviction that he would carry his point in the end, but there was no time to be lost. Giannella was within a few weeks of her twenty-first birthday, and Bianchi, who, though he had no particular impatience to enter heaven, wasmightily afraid of hell, knew that unless she and her money had been lawfully and irrevocably confined to his keeping before that date he must either become a common thief or hand over her fortune to her as soon as she came of age.
And then—good-bye pretty money, good-bye pretty Giannella. Mariuccia and the Curato, and the honest gossips of the neighborhood would find a pious, honest young man with a fortune more or less equal to hers; there would be a wedding, and confetti, and a drive round the Villa Borghese in a livery carriage; and the Professor would return to his defrauded home and have to watch Mariuccia court a painful death by devouring fifteen baiocchi's worth of food a day all to herself. No, these wrongs must not be. The foolish women should know nothing of defunct Scandinavian uncles until the unconscious heiress was safely ticketed as a prudent man's wife. Then how pleased they would be if he spent a few pauls of Giannella's money in taking them out of a Sunday afternoon to one of the osterias beyond the gates where wine and maccheroni were so good and cheap!
But he told himself again that there was no time to lose if all his pleasant dreams were to be realized. He had not counted on the girl's resistance; it had caused him a painful surprise to find that any young woman should be so devoid of proper feeling, should show such a complete lack of gratitude for past benefits and those which he now proposed to confer. Of course Mariuccia had much to do with it. Opposition from her he had expected; it was not to besupposed that she would relish the idea of having to look upon Giannella as her mistress. The "stultus vulgus" was always so jealous and suspicious. And unfortunately Mariuccia's was a strong character in a vulgar way. The kind-hearted Professor acknowledged to himself that it would cost him many struggles to break down the combined resistance of two obstinate women, and that discomfort would be added to conflict in the process, since the ordering of his daily life was in their hands. He must find an ally of their own sex, one sufficiently imposing to awe them into good behavior. Who so fitted to speak with authority as the Princess, to whom Giannella owed so much gratitude and respect? He would lay the facts—with a few insignificant reservations—before the great lady and beg her to intervene for the good of the orphan in whom she had taken such benevolent interest a few years ago.
Rather resenting the necessity of wasting time over these details when that thrilling discovery of the Cardinal's awaited his inspection, he presented himself at the Princess's door and sent in his card with the respectful request that her Excellency would grant him a short interview on a matter of great importance. He spent some trying moments in the visitor's waiting-room, in uncertainty as to the result of his application, and was greatly relieved when informed that the Princess would have the pleasure of seeing him.
Teresa Santafede was a good deal harassed at this time by domestic matters; she missed her faithful Elena Dati more every day; Onorato was distressingher deeply by still evading the charms and chains of matrimony; her health seemed breaking down, she began to feel old and to lose confidence in herself. A mistake had been made somewhere; life had proved unruly and would not fit into the frame she had made for it. Still she was alert to the call of duty, and never sent away any person who had a right to see her. This wearisome Professor evidently wanted something. She hoped it could be quickly and reasonably granted him—ask him to walk in.
All her sense of duty could not disarm her manner of a certain stiffness, the outcome of the nobles' deep-seated hereditary antagonism to the middle class, the class which once furnished hundreds of clients to every great patrician and is now independent of patronage yet still mean, obscure, envious yet critical, nameless but ubiquitous, carrying on its colorless existence entirely apart from their illuminated sphere. A chasm of separation from her visitor was disclosed in the Princess's slight, formal bow, and as Bianchi gingerly sat down on the edge of a chair opposite her sofa, and dropped his hat and gloves on the floor, his heart sank a little, not from any sense of inferiority—the Romans are not snobs—but simply because the atmosphere was not one of success. He was, however, conscious of the justice of his cause, and after an opening speech, in which he reminded his hearer of her former benevolence to a certain orphan girl, unfolded his case with a good deal of tact and plausibility. As he went on, the Princess became first interested, then sympathetic. The undoubted benefit of such amarriage for a friendless young woman was evident. Suppose, said Bianchi, that he or his old servant were to die? In what an impossible position would Giannella find herself! Could she remain in his home without a respectable female's companionship? Could she, in case of his own demise (here the Princess made a polite gesture of deprecation), be cast on the world, young and attractive as she was, with only an aged peasant to protect her from its snares and temptations? The Excellency must surely see that Giannella's only safety lay in a respectable marriage, and the speaker's good heart, yearning over the girl's future, had prompted him to throw himself into the breach.
The moment the word "temptation" sounded in her ears the Princess's conscience hurled itself to the rescue of a soul in danger, just as the nearest surgeon hastens to give first aid to the victim of a street accident. Likes or dislikes, youthful romance or aged prejudice, all must be swept aside to preserve the innocent and convert the sinful. Safety awaited Giannella (whose existence had for some time escaped the Princess's overburdened memory) as the wife of the good, disinterested man who seemed to have put his own feelings out of the question and to be pleading her cause alone with fine singleness of heart.
"I see. Yes, I agree with you," the hostess said, bowing slightly to show that the interview was ended. "Send the girl to me, and let the servant accompany her. I will speak to Giannella alone, and will then have a few words with the old woman, who can only be acting from jealous and unworthy motives in thusopposing a marriage which, in spite of a trifling difference of age, offers such advantages to that unfortunate orphan. I am not at all surprised at the servant's conduct. The common people are always ignorant and stubborn, but they can see reason when it is explained to them. I have generally found our contadini tractable. Excuse me for mentioning such a thing—but I suppose there is no secret attachment, no foolish love affair which is causing Giannella to behave so strangely? That is quite impossible, is it not?"
"Quite impossible, Excellency," the Professor declared. "We have brought her up most strictly, have never let her out of our sight. I can assure you that she has never spoken to a young man in her life!"
Had the Princess become more human with the passing years? A gleam of amused pity touched her eyes and mouth; but she replied gravely: "That is as it should be. I shall expect her to-morrow then at ten o'clock. I am leaving for Santafede at twelve and shall not return to Rome till October. It was fortunate, Signor Professore, that you came to-day." Bianchi bowed himself out with effusive thanks. As he went on his way to keep his interesting appointment with the Cardinal, his appearance was one of such elation that a student who belonged to his class at the university laughingly pointed him out to his two companions, Rinaldo Goffi and Peppino Sacchetti. "There goes old 'brontolone' (grumbler) Bianchi, boys," he said, "just look at him. I never saw him so happy before. He might have won a terno in thelottery! But I am sure it is nothing more than a copper picked up in the street—or another mouldy old statue discovered in a cabbage patch. What things some men do stick for stars in their sky!"
"Is that Professor Bianchi?" asked Rinaldo, looking after the receding figure with sudden interest. "Capperi! He is no beauty!"
"Who is, at that age?" laughed Peppino, and he began to hum, "La gioventu é un fiore, che presto se ne vá."
But Rinaldo did not laugh. A chance phrase of the sacristan of San Severino came back to his mind. "Now that she is big and pretty, they say he means to marry her." He had hardly thought of it again. Giannella's eyes, Giannella's smile, had told him that he had no rivals; but the insolence of the Professor's pretensions suddenly kindled him to a fury of resentment. That sallow, hook-nosed, round-shouldered old fellow would dare to approach her, was trying to wrap the cobwebs of his ugly age round her sweet freshness? For the first time in his life Rinaldo felt a passionate hatred fasten on his heart and pump the lust of murder through his veins. He was standing rooted to the spot, gazing at the entrance to Palazzo Cestaldini, through which the Professor had disappeared.
"Come on, Nalduccio," said Peppino, shaking him by the arm, "what on earth is the matter? You look as if you had seen the Lupo Manaro."
"I wish it would catch him," growled Rinaldo, turning to his friends with such an expression that they drew back from him in horror. "May he and all hisbest dead be the werewolf's food forever. No, I shall not come to the river. The sight of that antipatico Professor of yours has upset me. It will be more prudent to go home and take a dose of medicine than to go for a cold swim after such an emotion."
"Is it as bad as that?" inquired Peppino with affectionate concern. "Poveraccio, perhaps he has the evil eye?" and he fingered the coral horn on his watch chain as he pronounced the fatal word. "If so, why, I think I will come with you. This meeting might bring us bad luck on the river. It is a Friday, too. Yes, I will go back with you, Rinaldo."
"Stuff and nonsense!" exclaimed the third member of the party, the irreverent student who had drawn attention to Bianchi; "I and thirty others have been attending his lectures for the last year, and nothing has happened to us. He is as ugly as hungry, and as tiresome as the Latin in a sermon, but as for the other thing, I never heard that he was accused of it. What a couple of superstitious young donkeys you are!"
"That is all very well," retorted Peppino, "but when the mere sight of a man makes such an impression as that—are you feeling worse, Nalduccio?" he inquired hastily, seeing the artist's face screwing itself up into a frightful grimace—"it is folly, even impiety, to disregard it. Come along, Rinaldo, we will stop at the apothecary's and get him to prescribe for you, and I will come and sit with you till you feel better."
The Professor had a delightful hour with Cardinal Cestaldini, an hour during which personal preoccupations ceased to exist. The Cardinal, indeed, never seemed to have any of these; his bland, benevolent, well-ordered existence left no loophole for worry, the cipher word which expresses in five letters regrets for the past, irritation in the present, and anxiety concerning the future. Whatever the occupation of the moment might be, he came to it gladly and preparedly, knew that it was either obligatory or legitimate, and turned from it to the next without haste, without delay, without a jarring note in the harmonious modulations by which his spirit passed from key to key, from the inner sanctuaries of prayer and contemplation to the apostolic publicity of his sacredotal and hierarchical functions, the fulfillment of every duty as a priest and a prince of the Church; and again from these to the intellectual and artistic enjoyments which provided the recreation necessary to preserve the elasticity of his well-balanced mind.
He enjoyed few things, in a minor way, more than his occasional conversations with Carlo Bianchi. Those were the days when the new archæology was in its infancy, when the ground had been barely broken over the rich depths of the second Rome, although its more visible remains everywhere met the eye, builtinto palace and basilica or standing up in sun-stained beauty of colonnade and temple, amphitheater or triumphal arch. The first Rome lay still buried, still undreamed of, far beneath the second, in its cerement of soil, so closely spaded in by time that it served to bear the enormous weight of the Imperial city, which in its turn supported Roma Terza, the Rome of the middle ages and the popes. And every particle of that fine black soil had been soaked in blood whirled by tempest, fused by fire; had incorporated with itself uncounted thousands of human bodies, falling like living grain in the swathe of the invader, who dropped into it in his turn and was gathered to his enemy, hate to hate, Etruscan to Latin, Latin to Roman, Roman to Barbarian, as Fortune flung the numbers from her ever blood-bright wheel.
Perhaps some prophetic thrill of discovery was in the air already when Carlo Bianchi came to examine and discuss the Cardinal's fragment of inscription that sultry July afternoon. The strangely archaic lettering, the almost unintelligible elementariness of the few Latin words, threw the two interpreters of antiquity into a state of excitement most unusual to both of them. Their hearts warmed to this mutilated ancestor of history, separated from all catalogued relics by some great chasm of time; the Cardinal smiled like a boy and fingered the pitted stone as if it had been a flower; the Professor's hands trembled so that he had to take three rubbings before he could get a satisfactory impression of the treasure. Could they but find the rest! What might it not reveal! Ah, it might befar away, if not already ground to powder or built into the foundations of some ponderous mausoleum. Well, they could but search. The Professor, forgetful of all else, was for descending then and there to the vast vaults which lay beneath the palace; remains of huge nameless ruins which had been utilized as foundations for a fortress in mediæval times, a stronghold which had in its turn been shorn away and its materials built into the stately Renaissance dwelling erected by one of the Cardinal's ancestors to mark the accession of his family to power.
"Let me descend to this fortunate Avernus at once, Eminenza," Bianchi pleaded. "Who knows but that the workmen in their ignorance may destroy that which we so desire to find?"
"No, amico," replied the prelate, "there is no fear of that. All work was stopped at once when the foreman brought this to me, as he does every fragment of marble which is turned up by his men. They have gone away now. I would not have another spade struck into the earth until I should have consulted you. But you must not visit the place now; it is always damp, and especially unsafe at this hour, after the heat of the day. The chill would strike to the bone—would you invite an ague? No, if you will favor me by coming in the morning, having fortified yourself with a little quinine, and, speaking with respect, with a flannel vest, I will perhaps be so selfish as to accept your kind offer, though I shall appear to you as a coward, for I have caught a slight cold and dare not run the risk of accompanying you. It is likestepping into a cold bath. Indeed, much as I wish to discover more, my conscience tells me that you would do better to trust Michele, the foreman, who is most obedient and intelligent, to go carefully over the ground himself, to a permitted depth. Every atom of stone could be brought here for your inspection. We should lose nothing, I am sure."
The Cardinal spoke with all the emphasis he could muster, but there was a wistful entreaty in his eyes, in the very tones of his voice, as if he were unselfishly imploring some hero of romance not to lead a forlorn hope to the rescue of one dear to him.
The Professor, carried out of himself by true enthusiasm, was about to reply that nothing should deter him from personally continuing the search the following morning, when an old servant stole into the room and stood waiting beside his master's chair for permission to speak.
"What is it, Domenico?" the Cardinal inquired, looking up at him with a friendly smile.
"Eminenza," the man replied, "the avvocato De Sanctis is here. He says that he has brought the papers of the Ariccia property. If the Eminenza would condescend to sign them this evening he could go out and conclude the affair to-morrow. But if it is inconvenient—"
"Not at all!" replied the master. "Ask him to come in. A busy man like that must not be made to lose his time." Then, as the servant retired, he turned to Bianchi with gentle apology. "You will pardon the interruption, my friend? The business willoccupy but a few moments. De Sanctis—but what is the matter? Are you indisposed?"
The Professor had risen unsteadily to his feet, at the same time turning sickly pale. De Sanctis! The last person he wished to meet or to have reminded of his existence till after the little ceremony which was to take place in three weeks! Distractedly he looked towards the door. He must fly—but he would be flying into the lawyer's arms. Well, better do that, and rush past him, than risk any polite inquiry as to how the excitable Signorina Brockmann was enjoying spending her abundant pocket money. There would be explanations—why keep such a pretty story a secret? The Cardinal would see his sister before long and would rally her on the fine good luck of her old protégée; and if the Princess came to know of that, after his own high-sounding protestations of disinterestedness that very afternoon—heavens, what a feast for carrion crows would the corpse of Carlo Bianchi's reputation become! The mere thought made him feel cold and sick.
"I must beg your Eminence to excuse me," he found voice to stammer, "a slight indisposition—pray incommode no one," for the Cardinal's hand was on his bell; "it will pass in the open air. With permission of the Eminenza I remove the inconvenience of my presence."
Scarcely waiting to hear his host's expressions of regret, he hurried from the room just in time to brush past De Sanctis, with averted face, in the curtained shadow of the next deep doorway. How heprayed that the sharp-eyed young man might not recognize him, might not, remembering the facts, entertain the kindhearted Cardinal with the story of a poor orphan, once the beneficiary of his noble sister's charity, who had, in the twinkling of an eye, become quite a little heiress in a modest way.
De Sanctis, intent on accomplishing his business, paid small attention to the outgoing visitor. When he had kissed the Cardinal's ring, and was preparing to spread his documents on the table, he carelessly pushed aside the three-cornered fragment of marble which was so precious in the eyes of the prelate.
"Take care, Guglielmo," cried the latter, putting out both hands to save his treasure, "that stone is more valuable to me than all the Ariccia property."
"Pardon my blindness, Eminenza," said De Sanctis. "Is this a new gem to add to the great collection?" There was a touch of amusement in his tone which jarred on the Cardinal's ear.
"You could not be expected to appreciate its value," he replied with gentle dignity; "that is for specialists like myself and Professor Bianchi. He suspects that it antedates all existing inscriptions by at least three hundred years. An account of it will appear in next month'sArchæological Review." He wrapped the thing in a red silk handkerchief and signed to De Sanctis to deposit it on another table.
The lawyer obeyed in respectful silence; then he dipped the pen in the ink, handed it to his employer, shook the sand over the delicate pointed signatures on the three sheets and laid them together.
The Cardinal looked up at him with a little smile, saying, "You are very quiet to-day, my son. Did I reproach you too sharply for not sharing my little enthusiasms? You must forgive me. We old fellows are apt to grow querulous, you know."
"But, Eminenza, what an idea!" exclaimed De Sanctis in shocked protest. "No indeed. I fear my mind had wandered from the matter in hand. The mention of Professor Bianchi had set me thinking. I apologize for my bad manners."
"You know the Professor?" the Cardinal asked. "Ah, I have a great respect for him. Such deep learning and such simple modesty of character are rarely met with."
De Sanctis bowed in acquiescence. "I have only the honor of a slight acquaintance with him," he replied, "but doubtless your Eminence's discernment is not mistaken. Indeed I believe he hardly meets his due, in general, for public opinion accuses him of avarice—and I have caught him, red-handed, in a long-continued work of charity."
The Cardinal's eyes shone with the light of that lovely virtue and he leaned forward eagerly. "But this is delightful," he said, "tell me all about it. How consoling it is to hear of good deeds done in secret!"
"I will relate the facts with pleasure, Eminenza," the other answered. "Since they only redound to Professor Bianchi's credit, I think I shall not be guilty of any betrayal of confidence in doing so." And then he told the story of how a forsaken child had been cared for during her infancy by a kind-heartedgentleman; how when the burden became too heavy for him, the listener's most excellent sister had sent the child to school for nine years; how at the end of that time she had returned to the archæologist, who had received her as his own daughter (De Sanctis was convinced the Professor's daughter would have had to work quite as hard as Giannella, and he was merely repeating the facts as he had learned them from Bianchi himself); how Bianchi had kept her under his roof ever since, shielding her from all care and temptation; how the girl had unexpectedly inherited a competency which in her rank of life entitled her to make a good marriage—and how happy all this had made her benefactor. All that was wanting now was the appearance of a good, suitable young man to complete the family circle.
The Cardinal had completely forgotten his own intervention in the matter of Giannella's education and his defense of Bianchi from Fra Tommaso's reproaches at that time; he had received and attended to several scores of like applications in the last fourteen years, and never gave such things another thought when his part was done, so he beamed approbation at the lawyer's narrative. Many sad stories, he said, came to his ears, but few such encouraging ones. Did the Princess know of it? If not, he would give himself the pleasure of telling her; and as for the good young man—he laid his hand for a moment on that of De Sanctis—if the girl was sweet and virtuous, why should she not make the right wife for him? Itwas time he chose a partner for life. His own circumstances were prosperous, his future assured; and a good Christian wife would be a great comfort and assistance to him. The Cardinal believed in the wisdom of fairly early marriages, and De Sanctis, who had his own views on the subject, had to listen submissively to a discourse full of eloquence and sweetness on the benefits accruing to society and the individual from the experience and example of a Christian union.
"Your Eminence rates me too high," he said, when at last he could interrupt the persuasive periods. "I am a poor selfish devil, set on rising in my profession, and I have come to the conclusion that I can do that best as a bachelor. Indeed I am not sure that a lawyer has much more right to get married than a priest."
"And why not?" inquired the Cardinal, rather shocked at this unconventional proposition.
"Because," De Sanctis replied with his sardonic little smile, "he acts as a kind of father confessor to the public. And though the public is quite ready to confide its innocent little secrets to him, it does not care about having them shared with his pretty wife, who is sure to be as curious as Eve and as talkative as a parrot. No, Eminenza, I cannot afford to take on such a responsibility just yet. Eve was doubtless a great comfort and pleasure to Adam in Paradise—but she never rested till she got him turned out. She must have been more than woman if she did not reproach him for the catastrophe afterwards—and hemust have been more than man if he did not frequently wish that he had been allowed to enjoy a peaceful existence alone."
The Cardinal was laughing now, but his sermon was not ended. "You are incorrigible, my son," he said, "but your fine philosophy will go to pieces when you find yourself old and lonely and miserably rich—with no child to inherit your money, no one to care whether you are ill or well, alive or dead. Then you will have to follow Professor Bianchi's example and adopt an orphan on whom to expend your natural goodness of heart. However, I forgive your recalcitrancy this time, for the sake of the charming story you told me. Good-bye—take care of yourself when you go into the country to-morrow. The weather is 'bisbetico'—capricious just now. I fancy the rains are at hand. Arrivederci."
* * * * * * *
"It was a pretty story," De Sanctis said to himself as he walked home through the darkening streets where the few oil lamps were winking bravely under the onslaughts of the hot, moist wind, the scirocco that caresses at one moment and sears in the next. "It was certainly a pretty story and I told it to that saintly man just as it was told to me. But—oh, you are a sad liar, Guglielmo mio," and he tapped his own forehead reproachfully, "for you know that in your heart you don't believe a word of it—the Professor's part of it at least. When the wolf divides its food with the lamb, then we can begin to talk about such aphenomenon. Diamini, here is the rain—and I have forgotten my umbrella."
The Professor returned to his home less gaily than he had quitted it. He seemed to have little appetite for his supper; Mariuccia heard him go out for a short time afterwards, and when he returned soon after ten, he seemed more cheerful, but still looked pale and tired. "He has caught another chill," she mournfully told herself, "I let him go out too soon, stupid creature that I was. Oh, San Giuseppe mio, are these troubles never to finish?"
Bianchi had had a critical question to settle. Was it—or was it not—safe to send Giannella to the Princess? He had little doubt that the latter would gain his point for him with the girl; Giannella had till now been singularly amenable to authority. Now that it seemed necessary to analyze it, her temperament, he decided, was a cold one; all northerners were like that; difficult to rouse, too sluggish to fight long, though tiresomely obstinate when some prejudice was in question. This was the first time she had ever attempted to oppose her will to that of her elders; it was a whim; it would pass. The scirocco had been blowing for several days—that probably accounted for it. Yes, she had always been a docile little thing, giving no trouble at all; he had no fear of the upshot if the Princess spoke to her as, a few hours since, she had promised to speak. But there was that one small but hideous possibility that De Sanctis—an apoplexy to him—might have told the Cardinal of Giannella'sgood luck, and that the Cardinal, in some caprice of amused benevolence, might, before to-morrow morning, have related the same to his sister. He sometimes paid her a visit in "prima sera," the early evening, always reserved for intimates; and some demon might prompt him to come to-night to wish her a pleasant journey to the country. All these possibilities were of the slightest kind, yet the mere shadow of them was desperately disturbing. If none of them became facts, all would go smoothly. To-morrow the Princess would depart for her annual villeggiatura at Santafede, forty miles away to the north, and when she returned in October she and her brother would have forgotten all about Giannella Brockmann's unimportant destinies, and, if they should ever hear or think of her, would never raise the question of whether it was before or after the twenty-fifth of July that she had inherited the forty thousand scudi which would seem a trifle to personages like them, but the mere possession of which would bring joy unspeakable to poor unobtrusive Carlo Bianchi.
So he walked up and down his room in a fever of suspense, looking out of his window every moment to see if the Cardinal's carriage were coming up the street from the Ripetta; then he would turn and look at the clock. If once the hands touched ten and the Cardinal had not come, he knew that he was safe. It wanted twenty minutes yet of that magic hour. Ah, there was a rumble of wheels. Again he was at the window, peering down at something going by, a heavy carriage apparently. He cursed his short sight, andthe wretchedly dim light below, for he could not make out the details. As the vehicle turned the corner and disappeared into the piazza his heart stood still and a sudden rage possessed him. He must know if that carriage had entered the porte cochère, if it belonged to the Cardinal.
He snatched up his hat and cloak and went downstairs as rapidly as he dared, for the lights were few and the stone steps damp and slippery from the scirocco. At last he was safely out under the colonnade. Heaven be praised, the courtyard was empty. No hearse-like vehicle was standing at the far end waiting for its occupant. He walked the length of the colonnade and made sure that it was not under shelter at the entrance to the Princess's apartment. As he reached the spot, the clock in the porter's lodge struck ten, and the man came out, yawning, to close the great doors for the night. No music had ever sounded sweeter in the Professor's ears than those thin metallic strokes; the fat porter in his shirt sleeves running the bolts home in their stanchions was a bright, beneficent being shutting the demons of ill-luck out into the darkness. Glad at heart, at peace with all the world, Carlo Bianchi climbed the long stairs and regained his room. Now indeed he could go to sleep.