One morning after breakfast I found the whole family assembled in the yellow drawing-room in a state of unusual excitement. Even the bloodless little Marchesa had a red spot on either shrivelled cheek, and her handsome old husband had thrown off for once his mask of impenetrable and impassive dignity in favour of an air of distinct and lively pleasure.
Bianca was chattering, Romeo was smiling, and Annunziata, of course, was smiling too. Beckoning me confidentially towards her, and showing her gums even more freely than usual, she said: "There is great news. The Marchesino Andrea is coming home. We have had a letter this morning, and we are to expect him within a fortnight."
I received with genuine interest this piece of information. From the first I had decided that the rebelwas probably the most interesting member of his family, and had even gone so far as to "derive" him from his father, in accordance with the latter-day scientific fashion which has infected the most unscientific among us.
Bianca was quite unmanageable that morning, and I had finally to abandon all attempts at discipline and let her chat away, in English, to her heart's content.
"I cried all day when Andrea went away," she rattled on; "I was quite a little thing, and I did nothing but cry. Even mamma cried, too. When he was home she was often very, very angry with Andrea. Every one was always being angry with him," she added presently, "but every one liked him best. There was often loud talking with papa and Romeo. I used to peep from the door of my nursery and see Andrea stride past with a white face and a great frown." She knitted her own pale brows together in illustration of her own words, and looked so ridiculous that I could not help laughing.
I judged it best, moreover, to cut short these confidences, and we adjourned, with some reluctance on her part, to the piano.
Lunch was a very cheerful meal that day, andafterwards Bianca thrust her arm in mine and dragged me gaily up to the sitting-room.
"Only think," she said, "mamma is writing to Costanza Marchetti at Florence to ask her to stay with us the week after next."
"Is the signorina a great friend of yours?"
Bianca looked exceedingly sly. "Oh yes, she is a great friend of mine. I stayed with her once at Florence. They have a beautiful, beautiful house on the Lung' Arno, and Costanza has more dresses than she can wear."
She spoke with such an air of naïve and important self-consciousness that I could scarcely refrain from smiling.
It was impossible not to see through her meaning. The beloved truant was to be permanently trapped; the trap to be baited with a rich, perhaps a beautiful bride.
The situation was truly interesting; I foresaw the playing out of a little comedy under my very eyes. Life quickened perceptibly in the palazzo after the receipt of the letter from America.
Plans for picnics, balls, and other gaieties were freely discussed. There was a constant dragging about of heavy furniture along the corridors, fromwhich I gathered that rooms were being suitably prepared both for Andrea and his possible bride.
At the gossip parliaments, nothing else was talked of but the coming event; the misdemeanours of servants, the rudeness of tradesmen, and the latest Pisan scandal being relegated for the time being to complete obscurity.
In about ten days Costanza Marchetti appeared on the scene.
We were sitting in the yellow drawing-room after lunch when the carriage drove up, followed by a fly heavily laden with luggage.
Bianca had rushed to the window at the sound of wheels, and had hastily described the cavalcade.
A few minutes later in came Romeo with a young, or youngish, lady, dressed in the height of fashion, on his arm.
She advanced towards the Marchesa with a sort of sliding curtsy, and shook hands from the elbow in a manner worthy of Bond Street. But the meeting between her and Bianca was even more striking.
Retreating a little, to allow free play for their operations, the young ladies tilted forward on their high heels, precipitating themselves into one another's arms, where they kissed one another violently oneither cheek. Retreating again, they returned once more to the charge, and the performance was gone through for a second time.
Then they sat down close together on the sofa, stroking one another's hands.
"Costanza powders so thickly with violet powder, it makes me quite ill," Bianca confided to me later in the day; "and she thinks there is nobody like herself in all the world."
When the Contessima, for that I discovered was her style and title, had detached her fashionable bird-cage veil from the brim of her large hat, I fell to observing her with some curiosity from my modest corner. She was no longer in her first youth—about twenty-eight, I should say—but she was distinctly handsome, in a rather hard-featured fashion.
When she was introduced to me, she bowed very stiffly, and said, "How do you do, Miss?" in the funniest English I had ever heard.
"It is so good of you to come to us," said the Marchesa, with her usual stateliness; "to leave your gay Florence before the end of the Carnival for our quiet Pisa. We cannot promise you many parties and balls, Costanza."
Perhaps Costanza had seen too many balls in hertime—had discovered them, perhaps (who knows?), to be merely dust and ashes.
At any rate, she eagerly and gushingly disclaimed her hostess's insinuation, and there was voluble exchange of compliments between the ladies.
"Will you give Bianca a holiday for this week, Miss Meredith?" said the Marchesa, presently.
"Certainly, if you will allow it," I answered, saying what I knew I was intended to say.
Costanza looked across at me coldly, taking in the modest details of my costume.
"And when does the Marchesino arrive?" she asked, turning to his mother.
"Not till late on Thursday night."
Bianca counted upon her fingers.
"Three whole days and a half," she cried.
"On Friday," said the Marchesa, "we have arranged a little dance. It is so near the end of Carnival we could not put it off till long after his arrival."
"Ah, dearest Marchesa," cried Costanza, clasping her hands in a rather mechanical rapture, "it will be too delightful! Do we dance in the ball-room below, or in here?"
"In the ball-room," said the Marchesa, while Annunziata nodded across at me, saying—
"Do you dance, Miss Meredith?"
"Yes; I am very fond of it," I answered, but it must be owned that I looked forward with but scant interest to the festivity. My insular mind was unable to rise to the idea of Italian partners.
Costanza raised her eyeglass, with its long tortoiseshell handle, to her heavy-lidded eyes, and surveyed me scrutinizingly. It had been evident from the first that she had but a poor opinion of me.
"I hope you will join us on Friday, Miss Meredith," said the Marchesa, with much ceremony.
I could not help feeling snubbed. I had taken it for granted that I was to appear; this formal invitation was inexpressibly chilling.
I did not enjoy my holiday of the next few days. I had always been exceedingly grateful for my few hours of daily solitude, and these were mine no more.
The fact that the ladies of the household never seemed to need either solitude or silence had impressed me from the first as a curious phenomenon. Now, for the time being, I was dragged into the current of their lives, and throughout the day was forced to share in the ceaseless chatter, without which, it seemed, a guest could not be entertained, a ballgiven, or even a son received into the bosom of his family.
Here, there, and everywhere was the unfortunate Miss Meredith—at everybody's beck and call, "upstairs, downstairs, and in my lady's chamber."
"It is fortunate that it is only me," I reflected. "I don't know what Jenny or Rosalind would do. They would just pack up and go." For, at home, the liberty of the individual had always been greatly respected, which was, perhaps, the reason why we managed to live together in such complete harmony.
As for Bianca and her friend, they clattered about all day long together on their high heels, their arms intertwined, exchanging confidences, comparing possessions, and eatingtorinotill their teeth ached. In the intervals of this absorption in friendship my pupil would come up to me, throw her arms round me, and pour out a flood of the frankest criticisms on the fair Costanza. To these I refused to listen.
"How can I tell, Bianca, that you do not rush off to the Contessima and complain of me to her?"
"Dearest little signorina, there could be nothing to complain of."
"Of course," I said, "we know that. I am perfect. But, seriously, Bianca, I do not understand thiskissing and hugging of a person one moment, and saying evil things of her the next."
Bianca was getting on for nineteen, but it was necessary to treat her like a child. She hung her head, and took the rebuke very meekly.
"But, signorina, say what you will, Costanza does put wadding in her stays because she is so thin, and then pretends to have a fine figure. And she has a bad temper, as every one knows...."
"Bianca, you are incorrigible!" I put my hand across her mouth, and ran down the corridor to my own room.
The covered gallery which ran along the back of the house was flooded in the afternoon with sunshine. Here, as the day declined, I loved to pace, basking in the warmth and rejoicing in the brightness, for mild and clear as the day might be out of doors, within the thick-walled palace it was always mirk and chill.
The long, high wall of the gallery was covered with pictures—chiefly paintings of dead and gone Brogi—most of them worthless, taken singly; taken collectively, interesting as a study of the varieties of family types.
Here was Bianca, to the life, painted two centuries ago; the old Marchese looked out from a dingy canvass 300 years old at least, and a curious mixture of Romeo and his sister disported itself in powder amid a florid eighteenth century family group. Conspicuous among so much indifferent workmanship hung agenuine Bronzino of considerable beauty, representing a young man, whose charming aspect was scarcely marred by his stiff and elaborate fifteenth century costume. The dark eyes of this picture had a way of following one up and down the gallery in a rather disconcerting manner; already I had woven a series of little legends about him, and had decided that he left his frame at night, like the creatures in "Ruddygore," to roam the house as a ghost where once he had lived as a man.
Opposite the pictures, on which they shed their light, was a row of windows, set close together deep in the thick wall, and rising almost to the ceiling. They were not made open, but through their numerous and dingy panes I could see across the roofs of the town to the hills, or down below to where a neglected bit of territory, enclosed between high walls, did duty as a garden.
In one corner of this latter stood a great ilex tree, its massive grey trunk old and gnarled, its blue-green foliage casting a wide shadow. Two or three cypresses, with their broom-like stems, sprang from the overgrown turf, which, at this season of the year, was beginning to be yellow with daffodils, and a thick growth of laurel bushes ran along under the walls. An emptymarble basin, approached by broken pavement, marked the site of a forgotten fountain, the stone-crop running riot about its borders; the house-leek thrusting itself every now and then through the interstices of shattered stone. Forlorn, uncared for as was this square of ground, it had for me a mysterious attraction; it seemed to me that there clung to it through all change of times and weathers, something of the beauty in desolation which makes the charm of Italy.
It was about four o'clock on Thursday afternoon, and I was wandering up and down the gallery in the sunshine.
I was alone for the first time during the last three days, and was making the best of this brief respite from the gregarious life to which I saw myself doomed for some time to come. The ladies were out driving, paying calls and making a few last purchases for the coming festivities. In the evening Andrea was expected, and an atmosphere of excitement pervaded the whole household.
"They are really fond of him, it seems," I mused; "these people who, as far as I can make out, are so cold."
Then I leaned my forehead disconsolately against the window, and had a little burst of sadness all by myself.
The constant strain of the last few days had tired me. I longed intensely for peace, for rest, for affection, for the sweet and simple kindliness of home.
I had even lost my interest in the coming event which seemed to accentuate my forlornness.
What were other people's brothers to me? Let mother or one of the girls come out to me, and I would not be behindhand in rejoicing. "No one wants me, no one cares for me, and I don't care for any one either," I said to myself gloomily, brushing away a stray tear with the back of my hand. Then I moved from the window and my contemplation of the ilex tree, and began slowly pacing down the gallery, which was getting fuller every minute of the thick golden sunlight.
But suddenly my heart seemed to stop beating, my blood froze, loud pulses fell to throbbing in my ears. I remained rooted to the spot with horror, while my eyes fixed themselves on a figure, which, as yet on the further side of a shaft of moted sunlight, was slowly advancing towards me from the distant end of the gallery.
"Is it the Bronzino come to life?" whispered a voice in the back recess of my consciousness. The next moment I was laughing at my own fears, and wascontemplating with interest and astonishment the very flesh-and-blood presentiment of a modern gentleman which stood bowing before me.
"I fear I have startled you," said a decidedly human voice, speaking in English, with a peculiar accent, while the speaker looked straight at me with a pair of dark eyes that were certainly like those of the Bronzino.
"Oh, no; it was my own fault for being so stupid," I answered rather breathlessly, shaken out of my self-possession.
"I am Andrea Brogi," he said, with a little bow; "and I believe I have the pleasure of addressing Miss Clarke?"
"I am Miss Meredith, your sister's governess," I answered, feeling perhaps a little hurt that the substitution of one English teacher for another had not been thought a matter of sufficient importance for mention in the frequent letters which the family had been in the habit of sending to America. Andrea, with great simplicity, went on to explain his presence in the gallery.
"I am some hours before my time, you see. I had miscalculated the trains between this and Livorno. Now don't you think this a nice reception, MissMeredith?" he went on, with a smile and a sadder change of tone. "No one to meet me at the depôt, no one to meet me at home! Father and brother at the club, mother and sister amusing themselves in the town."
His remark scarcely seemed to admit of a reply; it was not my place to assure him of his welcome, and I got out of the situation with a smile.
He looked at me again, this time more attentively. "But I fear you were really frightened just now. You are pale still and trembling. Did you think I was a ghost?"
"I thought—I thought you were the Bronzino come down from its frame," I answered, astonished at my own daring. The complete absence of self-consciousness in my companion, the delight, moreover, of being addressed in fluent English, gave me courage.
As I spoke, I moved over half-unconsciously to the picture in question. Andrea, smiling gently, followed me, and planting himself before the canvas contemplated it with a genuine naïve interest that was irresistible.
I stood by, uncertain whether to go or stay, furtively regarding him.
"Was there ever such a creature," I thought;"with your handsome serious face, your gentle dignified air for all the world like Romeo's; with your sweet Italian voice and your ridiculous American accent—and the general suggestion about you of an old bottle with new wine poured in—only in this case by no means to the detriment of the bottle?"
At this point the unconscious object of my meditation broke in upon it.
"Why, yes," said Andrea, calmly, "I had never noticed it before, but I really am uncommonly like the fellow."
As he spoke, he fixed his eyes, frank as a child's, upon my face.
As for me, I could not forbear smiling; whereupon Andrea, struck with the humour of the thing, broke into a radiant and responsive smile. I thought I had never seen any one so funny or so charming.
At this point a bell rang through the house. "That must be my mother," he said, growing suddenly alert. "Miss Meredith, you will excuse me."
I lingered in the gallery after he had left, but my forlorn and pensive mood of ten minutes ago had vanished.
Rather wistfully, but with a certain excitement, I listened to the confused sound of voices which echoed up from below.
Then I heard the whole party pass upstairs behind me, the heels of the ladies clattering in a somewhat frenzied manner on the stones.
Annunziata was laughing and crying, the Marchesa was talking earnestly, the young ladies scattered ejaculations as they went. Every now and then I caught the clear tones of Andrea's voice.
At dinner that night there was high festival. Every one talked incessantly, even Romeo and his father. We had a turkey stuffed with chestnuts, and the Marchese brought forth his choicest wines. At the beginning of the meal I had been introduced to the new arrival, and, for no earthly reason, neither had made mention of the less formal fashion in which we had become acquainted. Some friends dropped in after dinner, and Andrea was again the hero of the hour—a rather trying position, which he bore with astonishing grace. As for me, I sat sewing in a distant corner of the room, content with my spectator's place, growing more and more interested in the spectacle.
"That Costanza!" I thought, rather crossly, as I observed the handsome Contessima smiling archly at Andrea above her fan. "I wonder how long the little comedy will be a-playing? As for the end, that,I suppose, is a foregone conclusion." Then I bent my head over my crewelwork again. I was beginning to feel annoyed with Andrea for having passed over our first meeting in silence; I was beginning also to wish I had furred slippers like Bianca's, as a protection against the cold floor.
"Miss Meredith," said a voice at my elbow, "you are cold; your teeth will soon begin to chatter in your head."
Then, before I knew what was happening, I was led from my corner, and installed close to the kindling logs. And it was Andrea, the hero of the day, who had done this thing; but had done it so quietly, so much as a matter of course, as scarcely to attract attention, though the Marchesa's eye fell on me coldly as I took up my new position.
"It really does make the place more alive," I reflected, as I laid my head on my pillow that night. "I am quite glad the Marchesino is here. And I wonder what he thinks of Costanza?"
The next day was exquisitely bright and warm—we seemed to have leapt at a bound into the very heart of spring—and when I came out of my room I was greeted with the news that Andrea and the ladies had gone to drive in the Cascine. Annunziata was my informant. She had stayed at home, and, freed from the rigid eye of her mother-in-law, was sitting very much at her ease, ready to gossip with the first comer.
The Marchesina could rise to an occasion as well as any one else; could, when duty called, confine her stout form in the stiffest of stays, and build up her hair into the neatest of bandolined pyramids. But I think she was never so happy as when, the bow unbent, she could expand into a loose morning-jacket and twist up her hair into a vague, unbecoming knot behind.
"Dear little signorina," she cried, beckoning me to a seat with her embroidery scissors, "have you heard the good news? Andrea returns no more to America."
"He has arranged matters with Costanza pretty quickly," was my reflection; and at the thought of that easy capitulation, he fell distinctly in my esteem.
"He has accepted a post in England," went on Annunziata. "We shall see him every year, if not oftener. Every one is overjoyed. It is a step in the right direction. Who knows but one day he may settle in Italy?" And she smiled meaningly, nodding her head as she spoke.
The ladies came back at lunch-time without their cavalier, who had stayed tocollazionewith some relatives in the town.
The afternoon was spent upstairs talking over the dance which was to take place that evening, discussing every detail of costume and every expected guest. Costanza was as cross as two sticks, and hadn't a good word for anybody. We dined an hour earlier than usual, but none of the gentlemen put in an appearance at the meal. With a sigh of inexpressible relief I rose from the table, and escaped to the welcome shelter of my room.
"I thought I was glad that Andrea had come," wasmy reflection; "but to-day has been worse than any other day."
Then, rather discontentedly, I began the preparations for my toilet.
The little black net dress, with the half-low bodice, the tan gloves, the black satin shoes, were already lying on the bed.
It is all very well to be Cinderella, if you happen to have a fairy-godmother. Without this convenient relative the situation is far less pleasant, and so common as to be not even picturesque. There are lots of Cinderellas who never went to the ball, or, if they did go, were taken no notice of by the prince, and were completely cut out by the proud sisters. Musing thus, with a pessimism which, to do me justice, was new to me, I proceeded to make myself as fine as the circumstances of the case permitted.
"At least my hair is nice," I thought, as I stood before the glass and fastened a knot of daffodils into my bodice; "Jenny always admired it, and the shape of my head as well. I've been pale and ugly, too, for the last few weeks, but my cheeks are red enough to-night. They are only red from crossness, and the same cause has made my eyes so bright, but how is any one to know that?"
"Why, Elsie Meredith," said a voice suddenly from some inner region of my being, "what on earth is the matter with you? You, who could never be persuaded to take enough interest in your personal appearance! Surely you have caught the infection from that middle-aged Costanza."
With which rather spiteful reflection I blew out the candles, threw a shawl over my shoulders, and ran downstairs into the ball-room.
I was the first arrival. The room stood empty, and I halted a moment on the threshold, struck by the beauty of the scene.
The walls of the vast chamber were hung from top to bottom with faded tapestry, of good design and soft dim colour. From the painted, vaulted ceiling, which rose to mysterious height, hung a chandelier in antique silver, ablaze with innumerable wax lights. Other lights in silver sconces were placed at intervals along the walls, and narrow sofas in faded gilt and damask bordered the wide space of the floor.
At one end of the room was a musician's gallery, whence sounds of tuning were already to be heard.
Two other rooms led out from the main apartment, both of smaller size, indeed, but large withal, andcharacterized by the same severe beauty. There was no attempt at decoration, nor was any needed.
Having made a general survey of the premises, I advanced to the middle of the ball-room, and began to feel the floor, across which a faded drugget had been stretched, critically with my foot.
Then I circled round on the tips of my toes under the chandelier, humming the air of "Dream Faces" very softly to myself.
So absorbed was I in this occupation that I did not notice the entrance of another person, till suddenly a voice sounded quite close to my ear, "Well, is it a good floor?"
I stopped, blushing deeply. There before me stood Andrea, looking very nice in his evening clothes.
"Not very good, but quite fair," I answered, recovering my self-possession before his complete coolness.
He smiled quietly.
"I guess you are a person of experience in such matters, Miss Meredith."
"I haven't been to many balls, but we are fond of dancing at home."
"We?" said Andrea, interrogatively.
"My sisters——"
"And brothers?"
"I haven't any brothers."
"And friends?"
"Yes, and friends." I could not help laughing; then thinking that he looked rather offended, I added by way of general conversation—
"How beautiful this room looks. It seems quite desecration to dance in it."
He looked round, and up and down.
"Yes, I suppose it is elegant. I think it very gloomy."
Again I found myself smiling. There was something so absurd in this mixture of the soft, sweet Italian tones and the very pronounced American accent, not to speak of the occasional flowers of American idiom.
This time, however, Andrea did not appear offended, but smiled back at me most charmingly, then turned to greet his mother, who, the two girls in her wake, came sweeping across the room in violet velvet and diamonds.
"You are down early, Miss Meredith," she said to me without moving a muscle of her face, but making me feel that I had committed a breach of propriety in venturing alone downstairs.
"You look so nice," cried Bianca, who, in blue-striped silk and a high tortoiseshell comb, had made the very worst of herself.
Costanza, shrugging her shoulders, turned and rustled across the room.
I was surprised to see how handsome she looked. With her gown of richest brocade, made with a long train and Elizabethan collar, with the rubies gleaming in her dark hair and in the folds of her bodice, she seemed a figure well in harmony with the stately beauty of her surroundings. As though conscious of her effect, she moved over to the entrance of the inner room, and stood there framed in the arched doorway with its hangings of faded damask. Andrea went at once to her side.
"It's a long time since we have had a dance together, Contessima."
"A long, long time, Marchesino."
Then their voices fell, and there was nothing to be heard but a twittering exchange of whispers.
Bianca put her arm about my waist and whirled me round and round.
"We don't dance the same way," she said, releasing me after a brief but breathless interval.
Annunziata in apple-green brocade and a pearlstomacher was the next arrival, laughing heartily, and flourishing her lace handkerchief as she came. Behind her strolled her husband, handsome, indolent, and grave as a judge. The old Marchese brought up the rear.
The guests began now to arrive; smart, dignified, voluble matrons; smart, expectant girls; slight, serious young civilians, dandling their hats as they came; pretty little officers in uniform, with an air of being very much at home in a ball-room. Romeo brought me a programme, and wrote his name down for the lancers.
Then I stood there rather forlornly while the musicians struck up the first waltz.
At the first notes of the music Andrea left Costanza's side and came towards me.
"He is going to ask me to dance," was my involuntary reflection; "how nice! I am sure he dances well."
"Let me introduce il signor capitano," said Romeo's voice in my ear; and there stood a trim little person in uniform before me, bowing and requesting the honour of the first dance.
"One moment," said Andrea, quietly, as, rather disappointed, I began to move away with my partner; "Miss Meredith, may I see your card?"
I handed him the little bit of gilt pasteboard, virgin, save for his brother's name.
"Will you give me six and ten?"
"Yes."
He returned to Costanza, his partner for the dance, and I and my officer plunged into the throng.
It was not a success. There were no points of agreement in our practice of waltzing, and after a few turns we subsided on to one of the damask sofas, exchanging commonplaces and watching the dancers, whose rapid twists and bounding action filled my heart with despair.
"I shall never be able to dance like that," I reflected. It was by no means an ungraceful performance. They leapt high, it is true, but in no vulgar fashion of mere jumping; rather they rose into the air with something of the ease and elasticity of an indiarubber ball, maintaining throughout an appearance of great seriousness and dignity.
At the end of the dance, my partner bowed himself away, and I withdrew rather forlornly to a corner, hoping to escape unnoticed. Here, however, Romeo again espied me, and led up to me a rather despondent young gentleman—a student at the University of Pisa, I afterwards learned—whom I had observed nursinghis tall silk hat in solitude throughout the previous dance.
I explained earnestly that I could not dance Italian fashion; that I preferred, indeed, to be a spectator, and settled down into my corner with some philosophy.
"I dare say Andrea can waltz my way," I thought, looking down at my programme, where the initials A.B. stood out clearly on two of the gilt lines. "It is rather disappointing to have to sit still and look on while other people dance to this delightful music, but it is amusing enough, in its way, and I must keep my eyes open and remember things to tell the girls."
It annoyed me, I confess, a little to meet Costanza's glance of contemptuous pity as she whirled by with a tall officer, and a mean-spirited desire came over me to explain to her that I was sitting out from choice, and not from necessity. The flood of dancers rushed on—those many-coloured ephemera, on which the old, dim walls looked down so gravely—and still I sat there patiently enough, though my eyes were beginning to ache and my brain to whirl.
Annunziata's apple-green skirts, Bianca's blue and white stripes, the Contessima's brocade and rubies, were growing familiar to weariness, so often did they flash before my sight. It was with genuine relief thatI welcomed Romeo, who came up to claim the fifth dance, the lancers, for which he had engaged me at the beginning of the evening.
But alas! the word "lancers" printed in French on the programme proved a mere will-o'-the-wisp, and I found myself drawn into the intricacies of a quite unknown and elaborate dance.
Romeo, gravely piloting me through the confusing maze, was all courtesy and patience; but Andrea, who with Costanza was ourvis-à-vis, seemed entirely absorbed in observing my stupidity.
"And I am really getting through with it very well," was my reflection; "it is all that Costanza who makes him notice the mistakes."
The next dance-was Andrea's—a waltz.
"Have you been having a good time, Miss Meredith?" he asked, as we stood awaiting the music. "I lost sight of you till the lancers, just now."
"I have been sitting in a corner, looking on," I answered dismally, but with a smile.
"What!" he drew his brows together.
"It is no one's fault but my own. I can't waltz Italian fashion. Perhaps we had better not attempt it."
For answer Andrea put his arm scientifically roundmy waist, piloting me into the middle of the room, where a few couples were already revolving.
"I have yet to find the young lady with whom I could not waltz," he observed, quietly, as we glided smoothly and rapidly across the floor.
Oh, the delights of that waltz! It was one of the intensely good things of life which cannot happen often even in the happiest careers; one of the little bits of perfection which start up now and then to astonish us, plants of such delicate growth that only by an unforeseen succession of accidents are they ever brought to birth. With what ease my partner skimmed about that crowded hall! How skilfully he steered among the bounding complex! Was ever such music heard out of heaven; and was ever such a kind, comfortable, reassuring presence as that of Andrea?
A moment ago I had been bored, wistful, tired; now I had nothing left to wish for.
"Well," he said, as, the music coming to an end, we paused for the first time; "that was not so bad for an Italian, was it?"
I was so happy that I could only smile, and my partner, apparently not disconcerted by my stupidity, led me into the inner room, installed me in a chair, and seated himself in another opposite.
At the same moment Romeo came sauntering up to us, throwing a remark in rapid Italian to his brother.
The latter, with a slight frown, rose reluctantly, and the two men went over to the doorway, where they stood talking.
I fell to observing them with considerable interest, these handsome, dark-eyed gentlemen, with their grace and air of breeding, who were at the same time so curiously alike and so curiously different.
In both the same simplicity and ease was felt to cover a certain inscrutability, the frankness a considerable depth of reserve; and in neither was seen a person to be thwarted with impunity. But whereas in Romeo's case the quiet manner was the unmistakable mark of a genuine indolence and indifference, in Andrea's it only served to bring out more clearly the keen vitality, the alertness, the purpose with which his whole personality was instinct.
I had not much time for my observations. In the course of a few minutes Annunziata rustled smilingly past them, and threw herself and her green skirts into the chair just vacated by her brother-in-law.
The latter shot a quick glance at her, shrugged his shoulders slightly, resumed his conversation with Romeo, and made no attempt to rejoin me.
As for me, my little cup of pleasure was dashed to the ground.
Annunziata, fanning herself and talking volubly, made but a poor substitute for Andrea, and I began to be dimly aware of a certain hostility towards myself in the atmosphere.
The next dance was played, and the next, and still Annunziata sat there smiling. The two gentlemen had long disappeared into the ball-room, and we had the smaller apartment to ourselves.
"I can't stand it any longer," I thought, "even with another waltz with Andrea in prospect." And making an apology to the Marchesina, I stole through a side door upstairs to bed.
Sounds of revelry reached me faint through the thick walls for many succeeding hours; and I lay awake on my great bed till the dawn crept in through the shutters.
"I have been a wallflower," I reflected, "a wallflower, to do me justice, for the first time in my life. And I'm not so sure that, in some respects, it wasn't the nicest dance I ever was at."
"Costanza is so cross," said Bianca, drawing me aside, in her childish fashion; "she talks of going back at once to Florence, and I don't know who would be sorry if she did."
"Oh, for shame, Bianca; she is your guest," I said, really shocked.
It was the morning after the ball, and all the ladies were assembled in the sitting-room, displaying every one of them unmistakable signs of what is sometimes called "hot coppers."
I had been greeted coldly on my entrance, a fact which had dashed my own cheerful mood, and had set me seriously considering plans of departure. "If they are going to dislike me, there's an end of the matter," I thought; but I hated the idea of retiring beaten from the field.
I did not succeed in making my escape for a singlehour throughout the day. Every one wanted Miss Meredith's services; now she must hold a skein of wool, now accompany Costanza's song on the piano, now shout her uncertain Italian down the trumpet of a deaf old visitor. I was quite worn out by dinner-time; and afterwards the whole party drove off to a reception, leaving me behind.
"Does not the signorina accompany us?" said Andrea to his mother, as they stood awaiting the carriage.
"Miss Meredith is tired and goes to bed," answered the Marchesa in her dry, impenetrable way. I had not been invited, but I made no remark. Andrea opened his eyes wide, and came over deliberately to the sofa where I sat.
There was such a determined look about the lines of his mouth, about his whole presence, that I found myself unconsciously thinking: "You are a very, very obstinate person, Marchesino, and I for one should be sorry to defy you. You looked just like that five years ago, when they were trying to tie you to the ancestral apron-strings, and I don't know that Costanza is to be envied, when all is said."
"Miss Meredith," said his lowered voice in my ear, "this is the first opportunity you have given me to-dayof telling you what I think of your conduct. I do not wonder that you are afraid of me."
"Marchesino!"
"To make engagements and to break them is not thought good behaviour either in Italy or in America. Perhaps in England it is different."
I looked up, and meeting his eyes forgot everything else in the world. Forgot the Marchesa hovering near, only prevented by a certain awe of her son from swooping down on us; forgot Costanza champing the bit, as it were, in the doorway; forgot the cold, unfriendly glances which had made life dark for me throughout the day.
"I had no partner for number ten," went on Andrea, "though a lady had promised to dance it with me. Now what do you think of that lady's behaviour?"
His gravity was too much for my own, and I smiled.
"You suffer from too keen a sense of humour, Miss Meredith," he said, and I scarcely knew whether to take him seriously or not. I only knew that my heart was beating, that my pulses were throbbing as they had never done before.
"The carriage is at the door, Andrea," criedBianca, bouncing up to us, and looking inquisitive and excited.
He rose at once, holding out his hand.
"Good-night, Miss Meredith," he said, aloud; "I am sorry that you do not accompany us."
Costanza flounced across the passage noisily; the Marchesa looked me full in the face, then turned away in silence; and even Annunziata was grave. I felt suddenly that I had been brought up before a court of justice, tried, and found guilty of some heinous but unknown offence.
Light still lingered in the gallery, and when the carriage had rolled off I sought shelter there, pacing to and fro with rapid, unequal tread. What had happened to me? What curious change had wrought itself not only in myself, but in my surroundings, during these last two days? Was it only two days since Andrea had come towards me down this very gallery? Unconsciously the thought shaped itself, and then I grew crimson in the solitude. What had Andrea to do with the altered state of things? How could his home-coming affect the little governess, the humblest member of that stately household?
There in the glow of the fading sunlight hung the Bronzino, its eyes—so like some other eyes—gazingsteadily at me from the canvas. "Beautiful eyes," I thought; "honest eyes, good eyes! There was never anything very bad in that person's life. I think he was good and happy, and that every one was fond of him."
And then again I blushed, and turned away suddenly. To blush at a picture!
Down in the deserted garden the spring was carrying on her work, in her own rapid, noiseless fashion. No doubt it was the spring also that was stirring in my heart; that was causing all sorts of new, unexpected growths of thought and feeling to sprout into sudden life; that was changing the habitual serenity of my mood into something of the fitfulness of an April day.
Alternately happy and miserable, I continued to pace the gallery till the last remnant of sunlight had died away, and the brilliant moonlight came streaming in through the windows.
Then my courage faded all at once. The stony place struck chill, my own footsteps echoed unnaturally loud; the eyes of the Bronzino staring through the silver radiance, filled me with unspeakable terror.
With a beating heart I gathered up my skirts and fled up the silent stairs, along the corridor, to my room.
Leaning out from the window of my room the next morning, I saw Andrea and his father walking slowly along the Lung' Arno in the sunlight.
In the filial relation, Andrea, I had before observed, particularly shone. His charming manner was never so charming as when he was addressing his father; and the presence of his younger son appeared to have a vitalizing, rejuvenating effect on the old Marchese.
And now, as I watched them pacing amicably in the delightful spring morning, the tears rose for a moment to my eyes; I remembered that it was Sunday, that a long way off in unromantic Islington my mother was making ready for the walk to church, while I, an exile, looked from my palace window with nothing better in prospect than a solitary journey to theChiesa Inglese. Annunziata had not gone tomass, and when I came downstairs ready dressed she explained that she had a headache, and was in need of a little company to cheer her up.
Of course I could not do less than offer to forego my walk and attendance at church, which I did with a wistful recollection of the beauty and sweetness of the day.
"Have you heard?" she said. "Costanza goes back to Florence to-night. She prefers not to miss the last two days of Carnival, Monday and Tuesday. So she says," cried the Marchesina, with a frankness that astonished me, even from her; "so she says; but between ourselves, Andrea was very attentive last night to Emilia di Rossa. Costanza ought to understand what he is by now. She has known him all her life; she ought certainly to be aware that his one little weakness—Andrea is as good as gold—is the ladies."
I bent my head low over my work, with an indignant, shame-stricken consciousness that I was blushing. "He is evidently engaged to Costanza," I thought, and I wished the earth would open and swallow me.
"And a young girl, like Emilia," went on Annunziata; "who knows what construction she might putupon his behaviour? It is not that he says so much, but he has a way with him which is open to misinterpretation. Poor little thing, she has no money to speak of, and, even if she had, who are the Di Rossas? Andrea, for all he is so free and easy, is as proud as the devil, and the very last man to make amésalliance. A convent, say I, will be the end of the Di Rossa." And she sighed contentedly.
Was it possible that she was insulting me? Was this a warning, a warning to me, Elsie Meredith? Did she think me an adventuress, setting traps for a rich and noble husband, or merely an eager fool liable to put a misconstruction on the simplest acts of kindliness and courtesy?
My blazing cheeks, no doubt, confirmed whichever suspicion she had been indulging in, but I was determined to show her that I was not afraid. Lifting my face—with its hateful crimson—boldly to hers, I said: "We in England regard marriage and—and love in another way. I know it is not so in Italy; but with us the reason for getting married is that you are fond of some one, and that some one is fond of you. Other sorts of marriages are not thought nice," with which bold and sweeping statement on behalf of my native land I returned with trembling fingers to my needlework.
To do me justice, I fully believed in my own words. That marriage which had not affection for its basis was shameful had been the simple creed of the little world at home.
"Indeed?" said Annunziata, with genuine interest; "but, as you say, it is not so with us."
My lips twitched in an irresistible smile. Her round eyes met mine so frankly, her round face was so unruffled in its amiability, that I could not but feel I had made a fool of myself. The guileless lady was prattling on, no doubt as usual, as a relief to her own feelings, and not with any underlying intention.
I felt more ashamed than before of my own self-consciousness.
"What is the matter with you, Elsie Meredith?" cried a voice within me. "I think your own mother wouldn't know you; your own sisters would pass you by in the street."
"Andrea ought to know," went on Annunziata, "that such freedom of manners is not permissible in Italy between a young man and young women. He seems to have forgotten this in America, where, I am told, the licence is something shocking."
I wished the good lady would be less confidential—what was all this to me?—and I was almost glad whenthe ladies came sailing in from mass, all of them evidently in the worst possible tempers.
There was an air of constraint about the whole party at lunch that day. Wedged in between the Marchesa and Romeo I sat silent and glum, having returned Andrea's cordial bow very coldly across the table. Every one deplored Costanza's approaching departure, rather mechanically, I thought, and that young lady herself repeatedly expressed her regret at leaving.
"Dear Marchesa," she cried, "I am at my wits' end with disappointment; but my mother's letter this morning admits of but one reply. She says she cannot spare me from the gaieties of the next two days."
"You might come back after Ash Wednesday," said Bianca, who sat with her arm round her friend between the courses, and whose friendship seemed to have been kindled into a blaze by the coming separation.
"Dearest Bianca, if I could only persuade you to return with me!"
"Bianca never makes visits," answered her mother, drily.
"Were you at church this morning, MissMeredith?" asked the old Marchese, kindly, as the figs and chestnuts were put on the table.
It was the first time that any one had addressed me directly throughout the meal, and I blushed hotly as I gave my answer.
The departure of Costanza, her boxes and her maid, was of course the great event of the afternoon.
The three gentlemen and Annunziata drove with her to the station, and I was left behind with my pupil and her mother.
A stiff bow from Costanza, a glare through her double eyeglass, and a contemptuous "Good-bye, Miss," in English, had not tended to raise my spirits. To be an object of universal dislike was an experience as new as it was unpleasant, and I was losing confidence in myself with every hour.
Even Bianca had deserted me, and, ensconced close to her mother, shot glances at me of her early curiosity and criticism.
As for the Marchesa, that inscrutable person scarcely stopped talking all the afternoon, rattling on in her dry, colourless way about nothing at all. Speech was to her the shield and buckler which silence is to persons less gifted. Behind her own volubility she could withdraw as behind a bulwark,whence she made observations safe from being herself observed.
I was quite worn out by eight o'clock, when the usual Sunday visitors began to arrive.
With my work in my hand, I sat on the outskirts of the throng, not working indeed, but pondering deeply.
"Miss Meredith, you are very industrious."
There before me stood Andrea, a very obstinate look on his face, unmindful of Annunziata's proximity and Romeo's scowls.
"As it happens, I haven't put in a stitch for the last ten minutes," I answered quietly, though my heart beat.
He drew a chair close to mine.
"You are unfair, Andrea, you are unfair," I thought, "to make things worse for Miss Meredith by singling her out in this way, when you know it makes them all so cross. Things are bad enough for her as it is, and you might forego your little bit of amusement."
I began really to stitch with unnatural industry, bending an unresponsive face over the work in my hand.
"That is very pretty," said Andrea.
"No, no, Marchesino," I thought again, "you are as good as gold, any one could see that from your eyes; but you have a little weakness, only one—'the ladies'—and you must not be encouraged."
I turned to Annunziata, who, baffled by the English speech, sat perplexed and helpless.
"Marchesina," I said aloud in Italian, "the Marchesino admires my work."
"I taught her how to do it," cried Annunziata, breaking into a smile. "See, it is not so easy to draw the fine gold thread through the leather, but she is an apt pupil."
"Miss Meredith, I am sorry to see you looking so pale." Andrea dropped his voice very low, adhering obstinately to English and fixing his eyes on mine.
"I haven't been out to-day."
"What, wasting this glorious weather indoors. Is it possible that you are falling into the worst of our Italian ways?"
"I generally go for a walk."
I rose as I spoke, and turned to the Marchesina. "I am so tired; do you think I may be excused?"
"Certainly, dear child."
Bowing to the assembled company I made my way deliberately to the door. Andrea was there beforeme, holding it open, a look of unusual sternness on his face.
"Good-night, Miss Meredith," and then before them all he held out his hand.
Only for a moment did our fingers join in a firm eager clasp, only for a moment did his eyes meet mine in a strange, mysterious glance. Only for a moment, but as I fled softly, rapidly along the corridor I felt that in that one instant of time all my life's meaning had been changed. "As good as gold; as good as gold." These words went round and round in my head as I lay sobbing on the pillow.
Somehow that was the only part of Annunziata's warning which remained with me.
I rose early next morning, and without waiting for my breakfast, ran downstairs, made Pasquale, the vague servant, open the door for me, and I escaped into the sunshine.
In the long and troubled night just passed I had come to a resolution—I would go home.
From first to last, I told myself, the experiment had been a failure. From first to last I had been out of touch with the people with whom I had come to dwell; the almost undisguised hostility of the last few days was merely the culmination of a growing feeling.
In that atmosphere of suspicion, of disapprobation, I could exist no longer. Defeated, indeed, but in no wise disgraced, I would return whence I came. I would tell them everything at home, and they would understand.
That I had committed some mysterious breach of Italian etiquette, outraged some notion of Italian propriety, I could not doubt; but at least I had been guilty of nothing of which, judged by my own standard, I could feel ashamed.
But my heart was very heavy as I sped on through the streets, instinctively making my way to the cathedral.
It was the second week in March, and the spring was full upon us. The grass in the piazza smelt of clover, and here and there on the brown hills was the flush of blossoming peach or the snow of flowering almonds.
In the soft light of the morning, cathedral, tower, and baptistery seemed steeped in a divine calm. Their beauty filled me with a great sadness. They were my friends; I had grown to love them, and now I was leaving them, perhaps for ever.
Pacing up and down, and round about, I tried to fix my thoughts on my plans, to consider with calmness my course of action. But this was the upshot of all my endeavours, the one ridiculous irrelevant conclusion at which I could arrive—"He is certainly not engaged to Costanza."
As I came round by the main door of the cathedralfor perhaps the twentieth time, I saw Andrea walking across the grass towards me.
A week ago, I had never seen his face; now as I watched him advancing in the sunlight, it seemed that I had known him all my life. Never was figure more familiar, never presence more reassuring, than that of this stranger. The sight of him neither disturbed nor astonished me; now that he was here, his coming seemed inevitable, part of the natural order of things.
"Ah, I have found you," he said quietly, and we turned together and strolled towards the Campo Santo.
"Do you often come here?" He stopped and looked at me dreamily.
"Often, often. It is all so beautiful and so sad."
"It is very sad."
"Do you not see how very beautiful it is?" I cried, "that there is nothing like it in the whole world? And I am leaving it, and it breaks my heart!"
"You are going away?"
"Yes." I was calm no longer, but strangely agitated. I turned away, and began pacing to and fro.
"Ah! they have not made you happy?" His eyes flashed as he came up to me.
"No," I said, "I am not happy; but it is nobody's fault. They do not like me, and I cannot bear it any more. It has never happened to me before—no one has thought me very wonderful, very clever, very beautiful, very brilliant; but people have always liked me, and if I am not liked I shall die."
With which foolish outbreak—which astonished no one more than the speaker—I turned away again with streaming eyes.
"Let us come in here," said Andrea, still with that strange calm in voice and manner, and together we passed into the Campo Santo.
A bird was singing somewhere among the cypresses; the daffodils rose golden in the grass; the strip of sky between the cloisters was intensely blue.
"Miss Meredith," said Andrea, taking my hand, "will you make me very happy—will you be my wife?"
We were standing in the grass-plot, face to face, and he was very pale.
His words seemed the most natural thing in the world. I ought, perhaps, to have made a protest, to have reminded him of family claims and dues, to have made sure that love, not chivalry, was speaking.
But I only said, "Yes," very low, looking at him as we stood there among the tombs, under the blue heavens.
* * * * * *
"As you came down the gallery, in the sunlight, with the little grey gown, and the frightened look in the modest eyes, I said to myself, 'Here, with the help of God, comes my wife!'"
I do not know how long we had been in the cloisters, pacing slowly, hand in hand, almost in silence. The sun was high in the heavens, and the bird in the cypresses sang no more.
"Do you know," cried Andrea, stopping suddenly, and laughing, "here is a most ridiculous thing! What is your name? for I haven't the ghost of an idea!"
"Elsie." I laughed, too. The joke struck us both as an excellent one.
"Elsie! Ah, the sweet name! Elsie, Elsie! Was ever such a dear little name? What shall we do next, Elsie, my friend?"
"Take me to the mountains!" I cried, suddenly aware that I was tired to exhaustion, that I had had no sleep and no breakfast. "Take me to themountains; I have longed, longed for them all these days!"
I staggered a little, and closed my eyes.
When I opened them he was holding me in his arms, looking down anxiously at my face.
"Yes, we will go to the mountains; but first I shall take you home, and give you something to eat and drink, Elsie."