CHAPTER XII.
Thus passed the days of the prisoner; and after whole hours devoted to inquiry and analysis, Charney loved to turn from the weariness of his studies to the brightness of his illusions—from Picciola the blooming plant, to Picciola the blooming girl. Whenever the awakening perfumes of his flower ascended to his chamber, oppressing his senses, and creating misty confusion before his eyes, he used to exclaim, “To-night Picciola will hold her court; I must hasten to Picciola.”
Thus predisposed to reverie, his mind was promptly attuned into the sort of doze in which, during the absence of reason, “mimic fancy wakes.” Oh! were it not, indeed, adearer enjoyment than any yet vouchsafed to human nature, if man could so far acquire authority over his dreams, as to live at will that secondary life where events succeed each other with such rapidity; where centuries cost us but one breathing hour; where a magic halo environs all the actors of the drama, and where nothing is read but the emotions of our thrilling hearts? Would you have music? Harmonious concerts might arise in spontaneous unison, unprefaced by discordant tuning, the anxious looks of the musicians, or the ungraceful and quaint forms of their instruments. Such is the world of dreams! Pleasure without repentance; the rainbow without the storm!
To such illusions did Charney resign himself. Faithful to the gentle image of his Picciola, it was toherhe invariably appealed; and the vision came at his call, simple, modest, and beautiful, as at its first advent. Sometimes he surrounded her with the companions of his early studies; sometimes, united with his mother and sister, his imaginary love served to create around him the domestic happiness of his youth. Sometimes she seemed to introduce him into a dwelling cheered by competence, and adorned with elegance, where pleasures, hitherto unknown, came wooing his enjoyment. After evoking the joys of memory and calling up reminiscences of the past, she gave existence to hope, to ties undreamed of, and joys unknown. Mysterious influence! Where was he to find the solution of the mystery? With the view of future comparison, the Count actually began to record on his cambric pages the wild illusions of his dreams!
One evening, in the midst of a flight of fancy, Picciola for the first time dispelled the charm of happiness and serenity, by the exercise of a sinister influence! At a later moment he recurred to the event as the effect of a fatal presentiment!
It was just as the fragrance of the plant indicated the sixth hour of evening, and Charney was musing at his accustomed post. Never had that aromatic vapour exercised its powers more potently: for more than thirty full-blown flowers were emitting the magnetic atmosphere, so influentialover the senses of the Count. He fancied himself surrounded once more by the crowds of society; having drawn aside from which, towards an esplanade of verdure, his beloved Picciola deigned to follow his footsteps. The graceful phantom advanced smiling towards him; and Charney, in a musing attitude, stood admiring the supple grace of the young girl, around whose well-turned form the drapery of her snow-white dress played in harmonious folds, and her raven tresses, amid which bloomed the never absent flower! On a sudden he saw her start, stagger, and extend her arms towards him. He tried to rush towards her; but an insurmountable obstacle seemed to separate him from her side. A cry of horror instantly escaped his lips, and lo! the vision disappears! He wakes, but it is to hear a second cry, respondent to his own; yes, the cry, the voice of a female!
Nevertheless, the Count is still in his usual place—in the old court, and reclining on the rustic bench beside his Picciola! But at the grating of the little window appeared the momentary glimpse of a female form! A soft and melancholy countenance, half hid in shade, seems gazing upon him; but when, rising from his seat, he hastens towards it, the vision vanishes, or rather the young girl hastens from the window. However swift her disappearance, Charney was able to distinguish her features, her hair, her form, the whiteness of her robe. He paused. Is he asleep, or waking? Can it be that the insurmountable obstacle which divides him from Picciola is no other than the grating of a prison?
At that moment Ludovico hastens towards him with an air of consternation.
“Are you again indisposed,Signor Conte?” cried the jailer. “Have you had another attack of your old disorder?Trondidio!If we are obliged, for form’s sake, to send for the prison doctor, I’ll take care,thistime, that no one but Madame Picciola and myself have a hand in the cure!”
“I am perfectly well,” replied Charney, trying to recover his composure. “What put it into your head that I was indisposed?”
“The fly-catcher’s daughter came in search of me. She saw you stagger, and hearing you cry aloud, fancied you were in need of assistance.”
The Count relapsed into a fit of musing. It seemed to occur to him, for the first time, that a young girl occasionally inhabited that part of the prison.
“The resemblance I fancied I could discover between the stranger and Picciola, is doubtless a new delusion!” said he to himself. And he now recalled to mind Teresa’s interest in his favour, mentioned to him by the venerable Girardi. The young Piedmontese had compassionated his condition during his illness. Toherhe is indebted for the possession of his microscope. His heart becomes suddenly touched with gratitude, and in the first effusion, a sudden remark seems to sever the double image, the young girl of his dreams, from the young girl of his waking hours; “Girardi’s daughter wore no flower in her hair.”
That moment, but not without hesitation, not without self-reproach, he plucked with a trembling hand from his plant a small branch covered with blossoms.
“Formerly,” thought Charney, “what sums of money did I lavish to adorn, with gold and gems, brows devoted to perjury and shame! upon how many abandoned women and heartless men did I throw away my fortune, without caring more for them than for the feelings of my own bosom, which, at the same moment, I placed in the dust under their feet! Oh, if a gift derives its value from the regard in which it is held by the donor, never was a richer token offered by man to woman, my Picciola, than these flowers which I borrow from thy precious branches to bestow on the daughter of Girardi!”
Then, placing the blossomed bough in the hands of the jailer, “Present these in my name to the daughter of my venerable neighbour, good Ludovico!” said he. “Thank her for the generous interest she vouchsafes me; and tell her that the Count de Charney, poor, and a prisoner, has nothing to offer her more worthy her acceptance.”
Ludovico received the token with an air of stupefaction.He had begun to enter so completely into the passion of the captive for his plant, that he could not conjecture by what services the daughter of the fly-catcher had merited so distinguished a mark of munificence.
“No matter!Capo di San Pasquali!” exclaimed Ludovico, as he passed the postern. “They have long admired my god-daughter at a distance. Let us see what they will say to the brightness of her complexion, and sweetness of her breath, on a nearer acquaintance,Piccioletta mia, andiamo!”