His tone, grave and kindly, mollified her somewhat: she wavered an instant, and answered.
"It shocked me that you could speak of my niece's selling herself—an honourable marriage—"
"Just so, Madam, an 'honourably' married woman who does not love her husband and has not loved him, who has married him because he is wealthy or of good family—" he deliberately brought his argument within the range of her comprehension—"is lower in my eyes than the woman who gives herself for love only, dispensing with ceremony, or who sells herself for hire, to get her bread."
Fru Boyesen gasped with horror.
"Society!" she murmured, "religion! morality!"
"Society, indeed, dear lady, but neither religion nor morality as I understand them."
Fru Boyesen was in deep waters, her argumentative powers were not sufficient to cope with the Doctor, and she knew it, still she tried once more.
"But Herr Doctor, I don't want her to marry without love, I only want her to make up her mind to love a man she can marry—and do it soon!"
The Doctor rubbed his hands. He had not been able to resist the temptation of shocking the good lady; he was often tempted to jolt a bourgeois mind out of its self-complacent rut. Fru Boyesen's bewildered and horrified face had amused him intensely, but he realized that to push the matter further might seriously harm Ragna's cause, so he contented himself with replying:
"I am sure, Madam, that your niece will not disappoint you in the end; but if you really desire her welfare, do not urge the matter for the present, I beg of you. Give the child time—that is a panacea for all ills, you know. She is very young, and should she marry merely to please you, her inevitable unhappiness would be heavy on your conscience."
Fru Boyesen retied her bonnet strings but with less firm a touch than usual. The Professor had frightened her and, for the moment, shaken her conventional social beliefs; however, she made a last tentative effort.
"Then I am to understand that you positively refuse to use your influence, Herr Doctor?"
"Most decidedly, Madam—and as you value your future peace of mind and Ragna's, do not attempt to force her."
"And you advise me to do nothing, to wait?"
"Why not try a change of scene? A journey would probably drive some of the 'ologies' and 'isms' you object to out of her mind, and she would very likely come home prepared to settle down."
Fru Boyesen sighed. She was not satisfied with the result of the interview—it had been so different from what she had expected. She took her leave, thinking to herself, "Poor man, one can see that he doesn't know much of the practical side of life! How could he, being a bachelor?"
Doctor Tommsen, watching her substantial figure retreat down the street, drummed on the window and said to himself:
"What fools these women are! And the old ones who ought to know better are always trying to drag the girls into the same miserable mistakes they have made themselves." He was sorry for Ragna—"They will probably end by making a fool of her too, one girl can't stand out against the whole State of Society!"
Fru Boyesen went to Fru Bjork for consolation and over a cup of coffee discussed the Doctor's refusal.
Fru Bjork was more at a loss than her friend to understand Ragna's indifference to the advantages of the married state, and she held up her hands in horror at Fru Boyesen's account of Dr. Tommsen's speeches—it may be said that they lost nothing in the telling. Sentence by sentence she repeated them, punctuating them with indignant sniffs, and appreciative sips at her cup.
Fru Bjork listened, her fat hands clasped on her rotund person, her cap awry over her kindly face, her eyes wide and round with dismay.
"He says," stated Fru Boyesen, "that we respectable married women sell ourselves for hire like the women on the streets. He says that marriage is immoral and irreligious."
"Perhaps," said Fru Bjork, "he is a believer in free love. Try a little of this seed-cake, my dear, I made it myself."
Fru Boyesen helped herself and continued, her mouth half-full,
"He must be,—anyway he is outrageous, and it's no longer a mystery to me where Ragna gets her absurd ideas from. If I'd known what sort of a man he was, I never should have let her study under him. But his name is so well known! He is so universally respected! I don't understand it at all!"
Fru Bjork agreed with her—she had the amiable habit of agreeing with everyone, it saved so much trouble, and Fru Boyesen went on to recount the rest of the interview. Fru Bjork approved of the suggestion of sending Ragna away for a time.
"Travelling is good for young girls," she opined, "it takes the nonsense out of them and when they have seen how things are done in other countries, they are ready enough to settle down in their own."
Astrid had returned home some months before, and was a great favourite among the young people. Her vivacity and ready, if rather shallow wit, her delicate almost affected prettiness, her coquettishness attracted the young men and her good humour and readiness to oblige made her friends among the girls. It was natural for her to try to please everyone, and she exercised her blandishments on all who came near her, from the servants in the house, to the most important personages of her social world. She was quite sincere in her desire to please; approbation was the meat and drink of her existence. She admired Ragna and rather stood in awe of her attainments, but could not understand her indifference to social pleasures. Ragna had not cared to tell her more than the barest outline of the momentous home journey, and if she had, Astrid would not have understood, for constancy to a dream-memory could form no part of her spiritual make-up. She was not one to whom any impression would be lasting; to her, lovers might come and go as butterflies to a flower,—to all she would give of her smiles, but no one of them would leave a mark on her soul. Fidelity, to her, would mean the imposed constraint of public opinion, not the keeping of herself to one, and one only. She wished to marry, and to marry well,—all things considered, one man is very like another, when it comes to matrimony, she thought.
Innumerable times she had fancied herself in love, and each time she had gone to Ragna with the tale of her infatuation. After the first time or two, when she had taken the affair seriously, Ragna would listen with an amused smile,—it was always the same story over again,—and she ceased to be surprised, when a few days or weeks later, the Star waned and a new luminary rose above the horizon. Astrid had once said to her:
"One starts out with the idea that men are all different, but when they have kissed you, you know they are all alike—if one could not see, one would swear it was always the same man." Ragna had with difficulty repressed her impulse to protest, "but what's the use?" she thought, and wisely kept her own counsel.
Finally Astrid had announced her engagement, much to her own satisfaction. It was an excellent match and her mother was pleased; she stipulated, however, for a year's delay before the marriage, as Astrid was barely twenty, and far from strong.
Fru Bjork, then, on the strength of her daughter's conventional social success, felt herself complacently superior to Fru Boyesen, in the way that an ordinary hen would feel herself comfortably above one who had hatched ducklings. She could not but gloat a little over her friend's discomfiture before she presented a proposition of her own; she therefore remained silent a few minutes and pressed Fru Boyesen's hand sympathetically.
Fru Boyesen, who in ordinary circumstances would have resented anything savouring of commiseration, but who felt too perplexed to think of anything beyond her present difficulty, presently afforded an opening, by remarking that though a few months abroad would probably benefit Ragna and bring her to a more reasonable frame of mind, yet the thing was impossible; who was there to take her? Fru Boyesen herself had no desire to set forth on a journey, too many interests and occupations kept her at home.
Fru Bjork then suggested that Ragna be entrusted to her care.
"I have been thinking," she said, "of taking Astrid to spend the winter in Italy. The doctor advises it—she is just a little delicate, you know,—and why should not Ragna come too? She would be company for Astrid and such a serious, steady girl as she is would give me no trouble—I should enjoy having her with me."
Fru Boyesen, secretly much pleased by her friend's proposition, would not seem to seize upon it at once; she agreed to think it over, and the ladies parted on that understanding.
Ragna was now almost twenty-one; she had slightly matured in appearance, the curves of her figure were rounder and fuller, but her eyes still had the expression of the idealist, the visionary; she was as prone as ever to credulity, to taking those with whom she came in contact at their own valuation.
She had resolutely tried to put the Prince Mirko episode out of her mind, but with slight success. She had locked Angelescu's sketch of him away in her writing-case, and rarely allowed herself to look at it, but she knew it was there, she felt its occult presence as at times she still felt the presence of Mirko's lips on hers. When, by chance, she came upon his name in the newspapers the blood would rush to her heart. Once an illustrated journal had published a portrait of him, accompanied by a short biographical sketch, and she cut the page out, and laid it away with her sketch. She had never heard from her dream-hero directly, but each New Year's day brought her a card from Count Angelescu—He, at least, still remembered her!
She was at a loss to explain the restlessness that often possessed her. More often than she dared confess to herself, her work and her studies bored her; in vain did she try to throw herself entirely into her serious occupations; emptiness, the vanity of it all, would in spite of her efforts, rise up and confront her.
The truth was, her physical nature was awake and clamouring for satisfaction, and the difficulty lay in the fact that having tasted the caviare of the sophisticated passion of a Don Juan, she could not content herself with the bread-and-butter of a calm, everyday affection. Had she never been awakened, even if but partially, to the possibilities of the latent passion within her, her life would have been calmer, less eventful and happier—if happiness lie in the absence of upheaving emotion. Requiring less of life she would have been more easily satisfied, or would have imagined herself so. The narrow boundaries of conventional contentment would have shut out the larger horizon of emotional experience, pain and soul discipline. She would have remained iron, Destiny was to make her steel tempered by fire.
She was writing in the living-room when her Aunt came in. The comfortable room, with its low-raftered ceiling and large porcelain stove looked very cheerful in the glow of the lamp. The heavy red curtains were drawn across the windows, and the red table-cloth threw a rosy reflection on the girl's face, as she leaned over her work. Her hair was like live gold in the strong light of the hanging lamp.
Fru Boyesen came in and seated herself heavily in an upholstered armchair. Ragna had raised her head on her Aunt's entrance but had not interrupted her writing. Her Aunt scanned her closely; she had come to look upon the girl as her own; she enjoyed her presence in the house, and it was her proprietary feeling that was mortified by the girl's failure to take advantage of the opportunities offered her. Astrid's engagement, especially, rankled in the good woman's mind. Here was a girl not as pretty, not as clever as Ragna, and several months younger, whose mother had not the social influence and importance she herself possessed, yet this girl was making an excellent match. It was too vexatious!
Ragna looked up and meeting her Aunt's eyes, said:
"You have been out a long time, Auntie, did you enjoy yourself?"
"No," answered Fru Boyesen, "at least not very much. I don't see, Ragna, why you can't go out and enjoy yourself like other young people instead of moping here all by yourself and spoiling your looks with all your studying. Now Astrid goes about and has a good time—she is out skating with her friends now. Why can't you be more like her?"
"So you've been to Fru Bjork's," remarked Ragna quietly.
"I've been where I pleased," said Fru Boyesen, untying her bonnet-strings and smoothing them between her plump fingers. "I don't see what it has to do with you where I go. You shouldn't take me up so. I think you are a very strange girl—and Fru Bjork can't understand you any better than I do," she added.
"I do wish, Auntie, that you would not discuss me with Fru Bjork, or anyone else."
"Hoighty, toighty, Miss! I shall discuss whom I please, and if you will be so peculiar and different from other girls, you must expect people to talk."
"It's none of 'people's' business what I choose to do or not to do," returned Ragna, making little scribbles on the sheet of paper before her. When her Aunt came in, she had been asking herself if she were not really foolish in holding herself thus aloof from her fellows, but at the hint of public criticism on her actions she was up in arms again.
"Ragna, you are positively hopeless; I don't know how a niece of mine can have so little sense! If you lived in a hut in the woods or on the Desert of Sahara, you might do as you like, but here one has to consider the opinion of one's neighbours."
"Who is my neighbour?" quoted Ragna softly, smiling in spite of herself. She knew well that to her Aunt, "public opinion" consisted of the prejudices of four or five of the foremost families of Christiania; outside of that charmed circle she had a fine disregard as to what people might think, in fact she expected people of less importance to follow her example and conform to her opinions.
The smile was unwise in that it irritated the elder lady, already ruffled by the unsuccessful visit to Dr. Tommsen.
"Oh, you may well laugh in your sleeve at me, Miss Know-it-all! The day will come when you will realise that I am in the right—and it may be too late!"
Ragna made no reply; she returned to her writing and the scratching of her pen and the ticking of the clock filled the silence. Fru Boyesen, after one or two ineffectual efforts, rose from her chair and left the room.
"It's no use," she said to herself as she puffed up the stairs—she had grown very stout of late,—"she is quite impossible. I've more than half a mind to pack her off with the Bjorks. Else Bjork is not very clever, but she has brought Astrid up to be a credit to her and I think I'll let her try her hand with Ragna. I've been a fool to let her have her own way so long,—her head is full of the stuff these atheistic professors pour into it. I'll let her go; it can't do any harm, anyhow."
If she had entertained a secret hope that Ragna would elect to stay at home with her, and incidentally conform to her wishes in general, she was disappointed, for Ragna, when the proposition was broached to her, hailed it with delight. It would afford a welcome relief, she thought, from the growing monotony of her self-chosen occupations, which consistency forbade her to change of her own accord, and would at the same time remove her from her Aunt's ever more frequent innuendoes and reproaches, besides taking her to Italy, the land of her dreams. Of late the German Romanticists had formed the subject of her study and her mind was, as so many northern minds were at that time, possessed by the "Drang nach Italien."
There was much to be arranged for the journey, as Fru Bjork, in spite of her many travels was always flustered by a fresh start; Astrid was of no practical use and Ragna too much taken up with her personal preparations, and also too inexperienced a traveller to be of much help to her fussy chaperone. Fru Bjork was therefore glad to welcome an addition to the party in the shape of a spinster of uncertain age, Estelle Hagerup, who was expected to be the balance-wheel of the expedition.
Fru Boyesen devoted all her energies to getting Ragna ready, and supplied her with an amount of luggage remarkable for its bulk and variety, every possible contingency of sickness and health being provided for. Estelle Hagerup boldly risked the good lady's displeasure by declaring that at least half must be left behind, and herself undertook to separate the sheep from the goats by weeding out all but the indispensable articles. It was the reverse of Penelope's web, for what the uncompromising Estelle undid by day, Fru Boyesen and Ragna restored by stealth at night, and on her next visit, Estelle would find nobby parcels and piles of books more or less skilfully concealed beneath the clothing in the boxes—and the struggle would begin again. Fru Boyesen, having never left her native country, fondly imagined that mustard-plasters, rolls of flannel, bottles of spirit and sundry other necessities would be unobtainable in a strange land. Fröken Hagerup heartlessly rejected all these things, but Fru Boyesen was not to be out-done and the very last day after the boxes were closed and locked, Estelle caught her stuffing two large parcels into the shawl-strap—one containing a goodly provision of soap, the other, two bags, one of flax-seed for poultices, the other of camomile flowers.
When, eventually, the time for starting came, Fru Boyesen wished she had never thought of letting Ragna go out from under her control. "Else Bjork is too soft, she will spoil her," she thought, "and the girl will come back worse than when she left. I have been criminally weak with her, but she'll ride roughshod over poor Else!"
As the luggage was being carried out of the house, an impulse seized her to have it brought back again; then she chid herself for her inconsistency.
"The little minx has upset me entirely! This is the first time in my life I haven't known my own mind!" Therefore to hide the sinking of heart she felt at the prospect of imminent loneliness, she assumed such a stern and forbidding aspect that half Christiania, assembled to see the party off, was certain that Ragna was being banished for some heinous offence.
Ragna kissed her Aunt good-bye with a light heart,—was she not faring forth to the land of her dreams?—And the separation would be but for a few months.
When Ingeborg received her sister's letter announcing the prospective journey, she burst into tears, much to the amazement of the family.
"Ragna is going, we shall never see her again!" she sobbed.
Lars Andersen reproved her sternly.
"Stop this nonsense, Ingeborg!" he ordered, "I will have none of this foolish superstition in my house. The future rests with God."
But though he spoke boldly, yet his heart sank. Ingeborg's predictions had a strange way of coming true.
"Astrid," said Ragna, "do make haste! It will be luncheon time before we get out, and you can perfectly well finish your letter this evening."
Astrid looked up from her writing-board, nibbling her pen-holder reflectively. She was sitting near one window of the room, and by the other stood Ragna, pulling on her gloves impatiently. They had been in Rome a few weeks, and the first fervour of sight-seeing over, had fallen into a go-as-you-please sort of existence. Fru Bjork left the girls largely to their own devices; the long flight of stairs to be climbed after every outing so tired her legs and shortened her breath, that she declined to face them more than once a day, and she had conscientious scruples against eating in a restaurant, when her meals must be paid for, in any case, at the pension. Estelle Hagerup preferred to wander about alone; she would start out valiantly in the morning, her hat tied firmly on her sleek head, her skirt looped up in festoons by a series of flaps and buttons, displaying her sturdy broad-toed boots. The very glasses perched on her prominent nose gave an earnest inquiring expression to her face. Night-fall would see her home again, tired, dusty, radiant and quite unable to give a connected account of her peregrinations. She would blissfully say:
"I am drinking in the atmosphere, I am saturating myself with the essence of Rome!" and the word "Rome" as she said it with an awed expression and bated breath suggested a hoary cavern of antiquity, haunted by the ghosts of buried Cæsars. Her short-sighted eyes would grow round and she would clasp her large bony hands ecstatically. Good-natured Fru Bjork smiled at her enthusiasm and if the girls made fun of her at times, they did it pleasantly.
Astrid was inclined to be lazy; she enjoyed the sun and the warmth, and the picturesque figures on the Spanish Stairs, but museums and picture galleries bored her, and the churches, she declared, gave her the creeps. So it fell out that Ragna who wished to do her sight-seeing after a methodical plan, generally found herself alone. Armed with a guide book she began at the beginning, as it were, visiting first the most ancient ruins and relics, in their order, working on down to modern times. It disconcerted her to find ancient and modern mingled—as they so often were,—and at the Pantheon she resolutely shut her eyes to the monuments of the House of Savoy, until such time as she should have reached their place in history. It will be seen that her method involved no little difficulty and much returning over the same ground. It seemed pure lunacy to Astrid, who objected to being dragged over and over again to the same place to observe some addition or later adaptation which she had been forbidden to inspect on her first visit.
"It would be so easy to see it all at once," she plaintively protested, but Ragna was adamant.
Astrid therefore pleaded her delicate health and the overfatigue caused by such strenuous sight-seeing as an excuse to remain at home, where she composed lengthy epistles to her fiancé with whom she was comfortably, if not passionately, in love.
On this particular morning she was evolving a description of her impressions during a drive on the Pincio the afternoon before. She felt lazily content with the world, herself, and things in general and had no wish to bestir herself.
"I wish you weren't so awfully energetic, Ragna," she said.
"Well, I couldn't sit down in Rome and bite my pen all day, as if there were nothing better to do,—you might as well be in Christiania! Come, get on your things!"
"What are you going to see to-day?"
"I'm not going to see anything this morning. I have some shopping to do in the Corso."
Astrid's eyes brightened, then she shook her head.
"I must finish my letter first."
"Oh, nonsense! Edvard can wait a few hours!"
"You always say that—but then you don't know what it is to be engaged," she glanced at the pretty ring decorating her hand. "You see, Edvard gets so huffy if I'm not regular in my correspondence, and I haven't written to him for three days."
Ragna shrugged her shoulders.
"Oh, very well! I suppose I must wait. Do be as quick as you can, Astrid, the morning is almost all gone."
She stood drumming on the window-sill, looking down into the busy Piazza Montecitorio far below. A row of "botti" stretched across the sunny side, the drivers carrying on an animated conversation among themselves and with one or two flower sellers. The old woman who kept the news-stand at the corner, alternately sorted her newspapers and warmed her fingers over her scaldino, for the air was crisp, it being early in January. Through the Piazza streamed a motley procession of tourists, red-covered Baedeker in hand,—priests in cassock and beaver hat,popoliniand girls, and someTrasteverinewith coloured stays over whitecamicie, and strings of coral about their necks. Ragna watched them all with fascinated eyes. The variegated Roman crowds were a constant source of interest and delight to her; she could not but feel the charm of their casual, seemingly untrammelled existence. The Romans, she thought, had not a worry in the world, their happy care-free faces drew her; even in the beggar's professional whine she observed a lack of real distress—all seemed to float lightly on the surface of Life, passing the under-currents, the sunken rocks, skimming carelessly over the shallows. She remembered a boy she had seen the day before, breaking his fast on a hunch of bread and a glass of sour wine; his bare feet protruded from tattered trouser-legs, his elbows showed through rents in the sleeves of his ragged jacket. He was a flower-vendor and she had stopped to choose a bunch of flowers from his basket. When she paid him, he thanked her with a brilliant smile, displaying his white teeth, and in halting Italian she asked him what made him so happy.
"Happy, Signorina? Of course I am happy,—the sun is warm and I have my bread and wine—!"
It was little reason enough, in all conscience, thought Ragna; she wondered what made these people satisfied with the passing sensation, oblivious of ulterior good or ill, and she envied them.
Her eyes wandered to the clock on the Parliament buildings opposite,—it was almost eleven. She turned half angrily to Astrid who was gazing into space, still chewing her pen-holder.
"Haven't you finished yet?"
Astrid started and a look of contrition came over her face.
"Oh! I'm awfully sorry Ragna, but I just can't write quickly to-day. Don't wait for me, there's a dear! I'll go out with you this afternoon. I'll be ready by then, I truly will!"
Ragna pushed out her underlip, but made no answer; she merely shut the door quite firmly behind her as she left the room. She descended the long stairs and crossed the Piazza, shaking her head at the eagervetturinione or two of whom rattled after her cracking their whips, in hopes of a fare. She walked along resolutely, seemingly unconscious of the attention she attracted. She wore part of her thick golden hair down her back where it hung well below the waist, and the rest wreathed in massive plaits about her head. Men of the people often spoke to her as they passed, praising her "cappelli d'oro," calling her "bella biondina" and "simpaticona," but she had become accustomed to it, and took no notice of them. In her heart of hearts she was flattered by the simple homage which had nothing of either insolence or rudeness.
She walked on enjoying the crisp air, for though the sun was warm, snow lay on the Albon Hills and the breath of it gave a keen edge to the breeze. She was in the Corso, standing, looking in a shop window, when she saw, reflected in the plate glass, a man who had passed her suddenly turn on his heel and come to her side; at the same moment a voice, strangely familiar, asked her in French:
"Have I not the pleasure of addressing Mdlle. Andersen?"
She turned and met the eyes of Prince Mirko. The colour left her cheeks and she felt a suffocating sensation at her heart. She could not answer him, her voice seemed strangled in her throat. The Prince continued:
"Or is it Madame Something?"
The red came back to her cheeks with a rush, and recovering the use of her tongue, she murmured,
"Your Highness! Here?"
"Yes," he answered, "I'm not a ghost, but I'm not a 'Highness' either,—I left that at home; I am plain 'Count Romanoff,' for the present. But you are still Mademoiselle Andersen?"
She nodded affirmatively.
"What shall I say? That I am glad? But that would be selfish—poor unfortunate man that you have not married!" He laughed easily.
Ragna smiled; his playful assumption of comradeship put her at her ease; the ice was broken, it was a tacit resumption of their friendly relation before the far away evening of the kiss. Perhaps he had forgotten that episode, his cheerful friendliness of manner gave no intimation of any such recollection, and Ragna felt gladly assured that such was the case. The thought completed her composure, and she replied,
"But neither have you married, Your—"
"No! No!" he interrupted, "don't call me that! In the first place I am here incognito, and then I have always liked to think that to at least one charming person in the world, I am just myself, just 'Mirko.' We were comrades on the ship—let us begin again where we left off—shall we?"
Her eyes interrogated him intently, but she still saw no sign of an embarrassing memory, so she allowed herself to smile. In point of fact, he had no distinct recollection of those days on theNorje, nor of their ending; many new faces had come between, in the intervening years. He merely remembered Ragna as a charming child who had helped while away the hours on the little steamer, and the finding of her here in Rome was a windfall, when he most needed distraction. His eye followed approvingly the slightly more developed curves of her figure and the shining ripples of her hair. He had been to Monte Carlo and luck had been against him, even to his father's hearing of the escapade, and it had been intimated to him that a month or so of rustication incognito before coming home, in order to give the paternal wrath time to cool, would materially aid in the restoration of peace. Ragna's emotion at his sudden appearance laid a flattering unction to his soul; her northern, and to him, unusual beauty attracted him newly, and he said to himself,
"Unlucky at cards, lucky in love—chi lo sa?"
"Let us move on," he said to Ragna, "we are attracting attention as well as stopping the way. You will let me walk with you, and you shall tell me how it is you happen to be here."
Ragna found herself walking beside him as in a dream. In reply to his questions she told him of her journey to Italy with Fru Bjork and Astrid; she described Fröken Hagerup and her peculiarities, to his great amusement. Something in him seemed to draw out the wit and humour in her—or perhaps it was the excitement of the unexpected meeting,—in any case she talked to him as she had never talked to anyone in her life.
So they walked on until they reached the Piazza del Popolo, and Ragna looking at her watch found, to her horror and surprise, that it was half-past twelve.
"And I never heard the midday gun!" she exclaimed.
The large square was deserted; a beggar or two sat eating in the sun by the fountains. Even the busy Corso seemed empty.
"I must hurry home at once," said Ragna, turning swiftly.
"It is a long walk,—why go back? Why not celebrate our reunion by lunching with me?" suggested Mirko.
"Oh, no!" she shook her head, "that would never do! They would all be anxious about me if I did not turn up—and think what Fru Bjork would say when she heard I had been lunching with a young man!"
"But why should she hear of it? You can say you have been sight-seeing, too far away for you to get back in time. Make any excuse you like, but do be good! Come!" His voice was like that of a spoilt child begging for a new toy.
"Astrid knows I'm not sight-seeing to-day. I told her before I went out."
He observed that she appeared not to resent the idea of a mild deception—or was it that she wished to ignore the suggestion?
"You are afraid of me!" he said teasingly. "Believe me, I am not an ogre!"
She rose at once to the bait.
"Afraid? Why should I be afraid? I say 'no' because it is impossible." Her tone was final.
Mirko laughed.
"'When a woman won't, she won't, and there's an end on't!'" he quoted. "At least one hears so. What is it, obstinacy or propriety as personified by your compatriots?"
"In this case it would amount to the same."
"Not in the least; obstinacy is hopeless, but Mrs. Grundy may be got around."
"How so?" asked Ragna.
"In the first place, there is no reason at all why Mrs. Grundy should become aware of my existence—in the second place, there are ways of placating that worthy dame. I know something of that," he smiled to himself reminiscently. "However, that is beside the point,—prevention is better than cure, besides being simpler. No, little friend," he emphasized the word, "let our friendship be free from outside interference—let us keep it to our two selves."
Ragna thought that too delicate to hint of their difference in station, he was taking this way of urging on her the private character of their acquaintanceship,—of telling her that he did not care to be thrust into a bourgeoismilieu. That he should desire to prolong the chance renewal of their comradeship beyond the hour, flattered her, and she was too innocent-minded and too accustomed to the free intercourse between northern men and maidens to see any real harm in acceding to his suggestion. "Concealment," she told herself, "did not necessarily imply deceit, so why expose herself to the curiosity of Astrid and Estelle Hagerup, why hedge about this unexpected adventure with the formality that must of necessity follow on disclosure, when she might so easily keep it to herself?" Quite unconsciously she was actuated by a slight jealousy of Astrid; in spite of herself, the assured triumph of Astrid's career as symbolised in her engagement, the consequence it gave her in the eyes of others, rankled in Ragna's spirit. The thought that a prince sought her friendship raised her in her own eyes and gave her a sort of moral vertigo. If Mirko had shown the slightest sign of remembering that he had once kissed her, her pride would have been up in arms to defend her, but he seemed to remember her only as a merry comrade and it was as such that he sought her society. He saw her hesitation and pressed his point.
"Let me show you the charm of Italy, you will never learn it alone. Italy to be understood must be seen through two pairs of eyes—and you can always dismiss me the minute you are tired of me. I should so like to show you Rome,—the Rome I love—There is no reason why anyone should know, you have told me yourself that you go about alone. You don't know how useful I can make myself if I try!"
Ragna laughed.
"I confess you convey more the impression of a 'lily of the field,' than of an exponent of the beauty of utility!"
"Oh, but you've never seen me really hard at work! Nor has anyone else, for the matter of that," he added to himself.
"Then what is it, exactly, you expect to do for me?"
"I shall be your guide, philosopher and friend. 'Sous les remparts de Rome et sous ses vastes plaines!'" he declaimed, drawing himself up.
Ragna's eyes sparkled mischievously,
"I believe I should make a better cicerone than you, if it comes to that!"
"Oh, that is quite beside the point! It is unspeakably barbarian to insist on guide-book accuracy. I shall supply what is much more important: the atmosphere."
"That is what Fröken Hagerup says she is absorbing."
"She will never know anything about it. Haven't I told you it takes two to see it?"
"How so? One to pour it out and one to drink it in?"
"I didn't remember you so flippant—have you lost all respect for your elders?"
"The child is ready to learn," said Ragna, assuming an expression of becoming meekness. Indeed she hardly recognised her sedate self in this new and agreeable sensation of buoyancy.
"Now," said Prince Mirko, changing his tone, "where shall I meet you again? This afternoon—"
"Is out of the question; I must go out with Fru Bjork and Astrid."
"Then to-morrow morning meet me at the entrance to the Palatino."
"But I haven't said that I would come."
"Oh, yes, you will."
"You take too much for granted."
"I don't think so."
"Then I shan't come," said Ragna, nettled by his air of complacent certainty.
"I shall be there, and we shall see what we shall see," was his calm rejoinder.
They had reached the Piazza Colonna, and Mirko paused, hat in hand.
"I shall come no further—until to-morrow, then!" He turned and left her without waiting for a reply. Ragna watched his lithe figure as he strode easily across the open space. She felt dissatisfied with herself and angry with him for this somewhat cavalier leave-taking, and his confident assumption that she would do as he said.
"What does he take me for?" she asked herself as she sped with rapid steps towards her belated luncheon. "I shall not go to meet him, no I shall not."
She entered the dining-room of the pension, flushed and breathless from the stairs, and found it nearly empty, most of the guests having already finished. Fru Bjork, who liked to take things easily, was still busy with a slice of cold meat, and Astrid picked daintily at an orange with slender fingers.
"Wherever have you been, so long, Ragna?" she asked.
"Did you get the photographs in the Corso?"
"Yes,—or at least no," answered Ragna in some confusion. "It was such a lovely morning I went for a walk instead. I thought I would leave the photographs till you could come with me to choose them." Lying did not come easily to her, and her awkwardness would have betrayed her at once to a keen observer, but Fru Bjork was too unobservant to notice it and Astrid felt confused herself, owing to her failure to be ready to go out as she had promised.
Ragna sat down in her place, removing her gloves as she did so. She poured herself a glass of water, but her hand shook and the water streamed over the table cloth. Fru Bjork, seeing it, said kindly,
"My dear, you should not run up the stairs so fast,—it is bad for the heart. You are too young to think about such things, but when you are my age you will know."
Ragna blushed, thinking of the real reason of her excitement, and the good lady continued anxiously:
"And how flushed your face is, my dear! Oh really, really, you must be more careful!"
She was interrupted by Ragna's other neighbour, an old Swedish lady, whose long nose seemed to rest on her chin and that again on her voluminous bosom tightly sheathed in striped silk, and adorned by a cameo brooch and a frill of lace that had seen fresher days. She laid her mittened hand on Ragna's arm, and said:
"My sweet one, will you choose an orange, the very nicest one, for me? My poor eyes are so bad that I am afraid to trust them." She had drawn the fruit dish over to her and appeared to be trying the efficacy of her nose in selecting fruit.
Ragna picked out an orange at random and laid it on the lady's plate,—the interruption was not unwelcome to her.
"Ah, that is very nice indeed, my dear. Thank you so much! And are you quite sure it is the very best? Well then I know you will like to peel it for me!"
Astrid leant across the table, saying,
"I'll peel it for you while Ragna eats her luncheon."
"Thank you, my dear," said the old lady, a little stiffly.
"You are very kind, but I think the other young lady would have done it more carefully. Young folk are so apt to be inconsiderate, nowadays!" She sighed heavily. Presently she addressed herself to Fru Bjork.
"Don't you think that young people are apt to be inconsiderate nowadays?" she inquired raising her voice. Astrid winked at Ragna; the old lady was their pet antipathy; Astrid had christened her the "Old Woman of the Sea." She always came to the table first and left it last, and managed to keep her neighbours busily employed most of the time.
Fru Bjork answered slowly, a little streamer of salad waving at the corner of her mouth.
"I don't agree with you; I have not found them inconsiderate."
"Then you have been more fortunate than I. I must say, however, that the young men are worse than the young women. Only the other day I asked a young man to give methepiece of chicken in a fricassee, and he gave me the neck."
Astrid stifled a wild giggle in her serviette. The old lady turned to her.
"Are you choking? Get someone to thump your back! But there has been much worse—" she again trained her eye on Fru Bjork,—"just think, last night I never closed an eye, for two thoughtless young men who had the room next to mine, were packing up to go, and they dragged their heavy boxes about and made such a noise that I couldn't sleep at all! It was most inconsiderate of them towards one so much older and so far from strong!"
Astrid's choking became violent. Her room was next to that of the young men, and they had made such a noise that at last she had knocked on the partition asking them to be quiet. They had answered, begging her pardon, explaining that they had been trying to wake the old lady whose sonorous snoring made it impossible to sleep. And in fact, the snoring had been a running accompaniment to the various thumps and bangs, and had continued on, triumphant and undiminished.
"You had better go to your room, Astrid," said her mother. She had heard the story, and in her kindness of heart was afraid of hurting the old lady's feelings.
Ragna rose also, glad of an excuse to go.
"Oh," gasped Astrid, as they left the room, "that old woman will kill me yet. 'So inconsiderate of them!'" she mocked.
"Hush," said Ragna, laughing, "she will hear you!"
"I don't care if she does!" said Astrid, "horrid old mole! She told me I looked consumptive, and that my colour was a hectic flush. If she can see that much she ought to be able to help herself at table!"
Ragna went to her room and sat down on her bed. She felt all in a whirl. The Prince in Rome! And he wished her to be his friend! She was uneasily conscious that she should have spoken of the meeting to Fru Bjork—but the Prince did not wish it. "I suppose on account of his being incognito," she told herself—but reason told her that his official presence would have rendered any intercourse impossible.
"It's like a fairy-tale come true, to have seen him again," she thought, "but I will not meet him to-morrow. Of course there would be no harm if I did. I am old enough to take care of myself,—but I shall not, it would be better not."
She was still going over in her mind the conversation of the morning, when Astrid and Fru Bjork entered, ready for the drive. Ragna started guiltily and Astrid pointed a derisive finger:
"Behold the punctual Ragna! Who's late this time, Miss?"
"I'll be ready in a second," said Ragna flying about the room, while Fru Bjork subsided to a chair, settling her bonnet strings under her double chin.
"There, there!" she said in her comfortable way, "don't hurry so, there's no harm done!"
"Now I'm ready!" cried Ragna.
"Why, my child," exclaimed Fru Bjork, "you have one grey glove and one tan one, and you have put your green coat over your blue frock!"
Astrid giggled, "The air of Rome must have gone to your head!"
Ragna, much confused, rectified her mistakes, and the party set out. They drove to the Doria Pamphilj gardens and afterwards to the Janiculum. Fru Bjork stopped the carriage and they got out and walked. Ragna loved the view from that point better than any other she had seen; the huge mass of St. Peter's, towering like a Titan above the city dwarfing all else by the symmetrical immensity of the dome, fascinated and held her. It dominated humanity, she thought even as it dominated Rome,—the Mother Church, Mistress of the World, rising triumphant on the ruins of the past.
She would willingly have stood there for hours, but the early winter dusk was falling; Astrid shivered and Fru Bjork said "Home."
The return drive through the Trastevere was a delight to Ragna, though Astrid turned up her delicate nose at the variety of smells, and Fru Bjork commented at length on the unhealthfulness of defective drainage. To Ragna it seemed a fairy world, and the hour after sunset, "blind man's holiday" brought out all the wonder and mystery of it, throwing a kindly veil over dirt and sordid details. Lights twinkled in the winding streets, and as they passed Hilda's Tower they saw the glow of the lamp in the shrine. And beneath it all, there ran as an undercurrent in Ragna's mind, the Prince in Rome!
When Ragna opened her eyes the next morning, she had the impression of opening them to a new life, different from that of yesterday; there was something to look forward to,—just what, her sleepy memory refused to say. Then as she stirred and sat up, it came back to her, and again she declared: "I shall not go to meet him, it would be foolish!"
But she dressed with unusual care, and went to the dining-room for breakfast, afraid of finding Astrid ready to accompany her, and at the same time almost hoping for it. Astrid, however, had elected to spend the morning in bed; she had got a chill, she said, from the drive the day before, and yawning, buried her face in the sleeve of her blue flannel bed-jacket. So Ragna started out alone, and resolutely set her face towards the Vatican. She had gone but a short distance, however, when she wheeled about, and walked as rapidly in the opposite direction.
"It can do no harm if I meet him this once," she argued. Then, "I suppose I am a fool." A panic seized her, suppose he should not come, after all? As she turned the end of the Forum, she saw the graceful figure of Prince Mirko coming to meet her.
"I knew it!" he cried joyously, waving his hat like a school-boy. "I knew you would not disappoint me!"
His gaiety was infectious, and Ragna's laugh echoed his. He took the red guide-book from her hand, and held it up accusingly.
"Why have you brought this? I told you, you would not need one with me!" he cried, stuffing the offending book into his pocket.
They passed through the turnstile, and strolled up the path in the wake of the official guide. The bright Roman sunshine illuminated the Forum below, gilding the columns and casting short blue shadows in the excavations. Overhead, the sky was a deep rich blue, and the air was charged with the peculiar sweetness of approaching Spring. The guide walked slowly, his hands in his pockets, humming an air from Rigoletto: "Questao quella per me pari sono,"—Mirko hummed it also, then broke into "La donno è mobile," giving it with rollicking voice.
Ragna smiled at him.
"In the opera it is the man who is 'mobile,' in spite of what the song says!"
"Oh, no, the song is quite right—when a man is openly unfaithful, it is only in answer to a secret defection on the part of the woman. Any intelligent woman who wishes to keep a man, can do it—you can always be sure that it is really the woman's fault if a man strays in his allegiance."
"That is an extremely convenient theory," said Ragna, laughing, "but it is a poor rule that won't work both ways. Would you make the man responsible for infidelity on the part of the woman?"
"Oh, that is a very different matter!"
"Why should it be?"
"You will not pretend, I suppose, that a woman is exactly the same as a man? The difference between them alters the whole aspect of the case."
"Oh!" said Ragna, "you are incorrigible, you twist and turn so,—you will never meet me fairly!"
"The infidelity of man," continued Mirko, "is different in its very essence from that of woman,—it is quite possible for a man to be constant when he is apparently most unfaithful—the superficial change only enhances the charm of the real affection; he never tires of coming back to it,—if he were never to leave it, it would pall on him."
"Why will you be so paradoxical?"
"It is not I who am paradoxical,—it is life."
They were so absorbed in their conversation, that the guide found no way of attracting their attention; in vain did he hem and haw, and scrape his foot on the gravel.
"They are most certainly a 'viaggio di nozze,'" he thought, "or perhaps 'fidanzati'—as such they will be generous."
Finally, as they came to the entrance to the ruins, he stepped before them with a commanding gesture.
"This, Signori, is the gallery where the Empress sat with her ladies. You see it overlooks the street where the chariots passed up to the palace. The palace itself was built out over the way, and the people went under it as under a bridge."
"See," said Mirko, "can you not imagine it,—the beautiful gallery, with its marble balustrade, hung with woven carpets and silken draperies—there before you in the sunlight? Do you not see the Empress, beautiful, stately, robed in purple, gems and gold-dust in her dark hair, wonderful jewels on her neck and arms? There are the ladies,—the proud dark one just behind her, the fair girl leaning over the balustrade at her side, with the gold of the sun on her hair, on her white dress, and the other three, laughing together, over there to the left? The slave-girls are holding peacock-feather fans to shield their royal mistress, and the slave-boys, beautiful, fair-haired captives, have brought baskets of fruit and sweets. And down in the street below, what a crowd, what a riot of colour! The Cæsar on his white horse with the gold trappings—do you catch the gleam of his burnished helmet, of his cuirass? He turns his head haughtily, and gathers up the reins in his hand; his short sword clatters against his thigh as his horse moves on. There, just behind him, comes the centurion of his escort, brave to see in his flaunting scarlet cloak, and the legionaries follow, like so many animated bronze statues. See—the fair waiting-maid by the Empress has dropped a rose to the centurion—he looks up and smiles—his teeth flash white—the slaves, carrying jars and baskets on their heads, have flattened themselves against the walls, to let the procession go by,—it moves like a glittering snake up the narrow way.—Hark! the salute of the palace guard, spear rattling on shield, and the shout 'Ave Cæsar!' It echoes under the vaulted way—and all Rome is in that cry!"
Mirko was flushed with enthusiasm; he threw back his head, and the clear-cut features of his classic face glowed, his dark eyes flashed, he seemed the very incarnation of that "lust of the eye and pride of life," of that "grandeur that was Rome."
As he spoke, Ragna saw the pageant of those far off days unrolled before her. She felt the throbbing of all the passionate life of old, where but a few minutes before there had been but moss-grown stone and crumbling ruins. He had laid a spell on her; she was for the moment, by virtue of his imagination, and its dramatic expression, actually living in the past, feeling its reality.
And so it continued throughout the morning. In the long paved underground passage way, Mirko showed her Cæsar, carried along in his litter, returning from his theatre. She saw the flickering light of the torches, heard the sandalled footsteps of the slaves,—their heavy breathing, the creak of the poles. And at the foot of the stairs she saw the sudden confusion,—the dark-cloaked assassins stealing from the shadow, she heard the shrieks, the cries of "Treason!" "Murder!" She saw in glimpses between the surging figures, the white-faced Emperor, struggling from his litter,—his unwieldy form leapt upon, borne back and down, then blows,—a gurgling groan. She saw the overturned litter, the crumpled body on the floor, the widening pool of blood,—then flight to the long flare of torches snatched from the trembling slaves, then darkness, and the alarm.
She saw the gay crowds, trooping into the Circus Maximus, the arrival in procession of Cæsar, æditor of the games. She watched breathless the speeding chariots, and carried out of herself, with flushed cheeks and shining eyes, joined in the thunderous applause which acclaimed the victor,—the hoarse roar which must, it seemed, shake the very foundations of Rome.
When it was all over, and the guide had beamingly pocketed hismanciaand they were in the street again, Ragna drew a long breath.
"It has been wonderful!"
"Then you are satisfied with your cicerone? You are convinced that a guide-book is unnecessary?"
"Oh," she answered, "the book makes it all into a cemetery,—or a table of dates,—but you have made Rome live.—It can never be the same now, as it was before; I have been there, I have seen it, it is part of me,—and without you I should never have known anything of it at all. How do you do it? How do you bring it all to life?"
Mirko smiled, well pleased with the result of his effort and with himself.
"I have been there."
"Been there! How?"
"I was once a Roman, I feel it, I know it!"
"Yes," she answered, "I think you must have been,—I can feel that you have been—you have made me feel it."
They were silent for a few minutes, and Ragna repeated:
"It has been wonderful!"
When they had parted, and Ragna found herself alone, the wonder of it grew on her. How blind she had been until the Prince opened her eyes! She was very glad that she had come, all her half-formulated scruples were laid at rest. How foolish she had been to imagine any possible harm!—What could be more innocent or more delightful than their informal comradeship? He was quite right too, in wishing to keep it all to themselves. Astrid would not, could not understand, still less so good, prosaic-minded Fru Bjork, and as for Estelle Hagerup! Ragna laughed scornfully, as there rose before her mental vision the grasshopper-like silhouette of that strenuous spinster.
At luncheon, looking about her at the commonplace faces of her fellow sojourners, she could not repress a secret movement of vanity.
"How many of these," she thought, "would give their eyes to spend a morning like mine,—and with a friend like mine!" She even pitied Astrid,—poor Astrid, who had never known a Prince!
Estelle Hagerup announced a discovery—she had a voice.
"My dears," she said with pride, "what a voice! Just as clear as crystal, and very powerful—and to think I never knew of it before!"
"How did you find it out, Estelle?" asked Ragna and Astrid together.
"I was standing on the top tier of the Colosseum, and the impulse came over me to sing—so I lifted up my voice and sang. I wish you could have been there to hear! Acustodecame running at once and was much impressed. He said he had never heard anything like it in his life. I gave him a lira, and he said 'grazie Contessa.' He refused to leave me after that, and waited till I was ready to go with the greatest deference."
"Are you thinking of the operatic stage?" asked Astrid wickedly.
"Perhaps that may come later, when I shall have acquired a repertory."
"You will have to study," said the old Swedish lady. "There was a young woman here last winter studying music, and she sang scales three hours a day; she had a room next mine. I should advise you to go to Florence—they say there are better singing-masters there."
"I shall not sing scales," said Estelle firmly.
"I thought one always had to," put in Ragna.
"Not with a voice like mine; my voice is far beyond scales."
"That is very satisfactory, dear Fröken," said the old lady. "My dear," this to Ragna, "will you give me the largest tartlet,—the one with the most jam on it?"
"I hope," remarked Fru Bjork, "that you will do nothing so silly as to train for the stage, Estelle." She was about to add, "at your age, too," but refrained.
Estelle simpered.
"Why should it be silly, Fru Bjork, if I feel it to be my vocation? Why should I not give utterance to the sacred fire that is within me? Is it not my duty to humanity?"
Fru Bjork found no answer to this, and held her peace, but Ragna was more daring.
"Do you think you have a stage presence, Estelle?" she asked.
"Why not? I am tall—besides, it is much more important to have voice and temperament. I feel it my mission to redeem the stage. Why do you ask me such a question?"
Ragna was saved from answering by the old lady.
"My dear! My dear! Pick me out something before they carry the fruit around! Last evening that man with the whiskers at the end of the table took the last banana, before I had a chance."
Ragna rose from the table in disgust. She longed to be back in the past again with Prince Mirko—all these present things seemed so vulgar and common by contrast, and yet until now, they had amused her! She looked about the dining-room and despised the men in it. A stout German with his napkin tucked in at the neck, sprawled over his plate, emitting hideous grunts and smacks, at the other end of the room, two well-nourished Englishmen sat with their families like self-satisfied roosters with their feathered following. At her own table, an anæmic and dreamy-eyed art-student played with his dessert, an Italian Commendatore with white whiskers, and a rotund waistcoat, beamed on his neighbours, and a gentleman with marvellous tight striped trousers, a still more marvellous moustache and a flamboyant necktie, was lighting a cigarette.
"How vulgar, how horrid they are!" thought Ragna.
It seemed to Ragna that she had opened her eyes on a new Heaven and a new Earth. As the days went on and lengthened into weeks, she grew so dependent on the companionship of Prince Mirko, that if a day passed without her seeing him, she felt blank and as though defrauded of a pleasure that was hers by right. A curious change, too, had taken place in her mental or rather sentimental attitude, for whereas at first, she had dreaded his recalling the, to her, unforgetable episode of the last evening on theNorje, she now felt secretly piqued by his lack of memory, and by his mere friendliness. It was as though she were disappointed in not having to ward off unwelcome—or too welcome—advances. The passionate impulsiveness of him, as she remembered it, but threw into greater relief the measured comradeship of his present attitude towards her. A more experienced woman would have suspected him of "parti pris," for a purpose, but Ragna saw nothing but genuine indifference, and her feminine vanity urged her to force him into recognition of the womanhood he had been instrumental in awakening. Therefore the simple almost childlike relations of the first days had insensibly given way to a state of tension which Mirko understood and was ready to turn to his advantage, but which Ragna did not understand in the least. Here her real innocence was the weak point in her armour. Several days passed thus, each waiting for a sign. Mirko with perspicacity, and Ragna with a sort of subconscious expectation.
One afternoon towards the end of February they were standing by the balustrade of the Pincio watching the sunset. The sky was a gorgeous riot of crimson and gold, across which were flung like flaunting royal pennants, long streamers of dark purple clouds. The very air was luminous and golden, and the bells ringing for vespers in the amethyst and grey city below, filled the ear with triumphant clangour. The carriages were leaving the drive and rolled by silently under the grey-green ilexes, the noise of the horses and of the wheels drowned by the ringing of the bells. Ragna stood in ecstasy, her hands tightly clasped, looking out over the sea of roofs and towers to where the great Dome rose bubble-like, silhouetted against the glowing sky. Her face was flushed, her eyes shining, her parted lips quivered. Mirko watching her said to himself:
"She is ready."
She gave a sigh of deep enjoyment and murmured, "It is like what one would imagine Heaven to be!" Mirko echoed her sigh; she turned and her eyes met his and there was that in his glance, which caused her to lower her eyes and her heart to beat suddenly quicker.
"It is like Paradise," he said, "but the essential is lacking; it is like a beautiful woman without a soul."
Ragna made no answer and he continued dreamily as though thinking aloud:
"All is perfect—the stage is ready for the players—the outward semblance is awaiting the soul to animate it."
He paused again, but the girl still remained silent. Presently he addressed her directly:
"I told you I would unveil to you the spirit of Italy, I have done my part—the rest lies with you."
"I do not understand what you mean," she answered. "I think you have opened my eyes—what is there still to learn?"
"I have shown you the form, the outward shape, but you have not yet penetrated the spirit," he said, and his voice had the softness of a caress. "You have not guessed what is the real soul of Italy—that which makes her, though in ruins, the Soul of the World?"
"And that 'soul' is—?" she asked in a voice so faint he could hardly catch it.
"Love," he said, and taking her unresisting hand pressed it.
"Love," he repeated presently, and his musical voice aroused all the echoes in her heart. "Italy is love, and love is the spirit of Italy. That is why lovers come here; there is love magic in the air, and those who are destined to love cannot escape it. You," he said, looking into her eyes, "you were born to love and be loved, do you not feel that it is so?"
A deep blush crept over Ragna's cheeks, she drew her hand from his.
"Hush, this is folly. You must not talk to me like that!"
Now that he had spoken she wished that he had not, yet she knew now that for days past she had been waiting for him to say just this. She felt at the same time guiltily conscious of her delight that he should speak to her in this way and terrified lest he should continue.
"Ah," said Mirko, "why should you fear the awakening of your soul? A woman who has not loved, who does not love is a sweet instrument out of tune. Love brings you into harmony with the music of the Universe. Do you not want to learn all that life has to teach? The Book of Love is here for you to open, you have but to stretch forth your hand."
Ragna stood listening fascinated. No one had ever talked to her like this. The recollection of her Norwegian suitors rose to her mind and she scorned them in her heart. Who of them all could have spoken like this? This was fairyland, and the fairy Prince was at her side.
"Ragna," his voice caressed her, "Ragna, my Star of the North, tell me have you not felt it, the magic spell?"
She raised her eyes to his, and there passed from him to her a magnetic current that seized and shook her innermost being. It frightened her; with an effort she turned her eyes away and the spell was broken. She passed her hands to her heart, then stretched them out before her as though to thrust him away.
"Oh, you must not!" she cried, "indeed you must not!"
"Have I said anything that could offend you? Surely not! I would die rather than offend you, dear little friend!"
The word reassured her and soothed her conscience; how could she explain that it was far more the look than the words?
"Perhaps you misunderstood me," he continued, "but I did not think you would, I thought we knew each other too well for that!" He spoke as though wounded by a misconstruction put upon his sincerity.
Ragna felt foolish.
"I shall try not to offend you again," he said presently, and very humbly, "but you must bear me good-will enough not to look for offence where none is intended."
The girl smiled at him by way of answer.
It was growing rapidly dark and aguardia di pubblico sicurezzapassing by, eyed the isolated couple curiously, but also with the sympathy every Latin feels for a pair of lovers. The bells had long since ceased ringing and many lights twinkled in the city below. In the sky stood a fair large planet and Mirko drew Ragna's attention to it.
"Venus, the Star of Love," he said briefly, with no comment, but his voice emphasized the words.
Ragna turned and they walked to the Spanish Stairs. As they passed the Trinità del Monte a voice came out to them, a soprano voice marvellously clear and vibrant, the pure high notes almost startling in their passionate intensity.
"How beautiful!" said Ragna, and Mirko answered:
"But how sad! Think of a woman who can put that into her singing, eating her heart out in a cloister!"
As they descended the stairs Ragna looked up again at the white planet nearing the horizon, a whiter glow seemed to be overtaking the star, drowning it in a diffused effulgence.
"The moon is casting poor Venus in the shade."
"Ah, yes, she is wise to retire before the moon! Listen, Ragna, to-morrow the moon will be full,—you must give me the evening, we shall go to see the Colosseum by moonlight!"
"The evening? Oh, never! It would be impossible! It is bad enough for me to be out alone as late as this; Fru Bjork does not like it, I shall be scolded when I go in."
"You can manage it well enough, if you want to. Think of it! The Colosseum by moonlight—and there is no possible danger from malaria at this time of year."
"It would be lovely," she said wistfully, "but I don't see how I could—"
"Oh, easily! At dinner you say you have a headache and go to your room, and when all the people are in the drawing-room, you slip out quietly and I shall be waiting for you below."
"But how could I get in again?"
Mirko smiled at her simplicity.
"Tell the chambermaid you will give her a little present if she sits up for you."
"But will she?"
"As certainly as she is an Italian; she will love to think she is making the way easy for a pair ofinnamorati."
"Oh!" said Ragna.
"Of course," said Mirko, "we are notinnamorati, we are friends,—but she would not understand the distinction," he smiled to himself, "and in any case how can it matter to you what she supposes?"
"I won't promise to come," declared Ragna; still the charm of such an escapade appealed to her romantic imagination—and after all, there was no real harm in it!
Mirko was satisfied and took advantage of the dusk to kiss her hand twice when he had put her in a "botte" in the Piazza di Spagna. The act had lost its significance to her since she had come to Italy and had seen how generally it was practised, but this evening the pressure of Mirko's lips sent a thrill through her fingers.
As she lay in her bed that night, Mirko's words: "I would rather die than offend you!" rang in her ears and she smiled happily.
Dinner was drawing to an end and the long Pension dining-room was filled with a hubbub of conversation in many languages. Estelle Hagerup and Astrid were having a lively discussion on the advantages of matrimony as compared with single blessedness.
"I say," declared Estelle, "that no man living is worth a woman's giving up her whole life to him. Why should she? Why should the woman always give up to the man? Then there is the monotony of it. I should be tired to death of seeing the same face across the breakfast table every day in the year, and year in, year out!"
"You needn't look at him then," said Astrid, "or you could make him sit at the side, or have your breakfast in bed. Now I think it must be such a comfort to have someone to grumble at, and who is obliged to listen to you!"
"Oh, my dear, you'll find that all the grumbling won't be on your side!"
"I hope I shall bring my husband up too well for that!" said Astrid. Estelle snorted.
"If only my dear Peter were alive!" sighed Fru Bjork, "he was such an amiable man. I never knew him to grumble."
"Ah, well, there's no telling," said Estelle, "he might have in time."
"My blessed Peter would never have grumbled," said Fru Bjork with finality. Astrid giggled.
"I should hate a man with no spirit, there would be no satisfaction in managing him."
The old Swedish lady raised her head.
"My dear, it is most unseemly for a young woman to talk of 'managing' her husband. Young people nowadays have lost the virtue of obedience."