He was not surprised when Don Teodoro came in, a little later, and the two very soon fell into conversation together. Taquisara presently went away and left them, as he often did when they began to talk of books. Half an hour had not passed since his meeting with Veronica, but as he again entered the room where they had met, he found her standing before the window, looking out, and twisting her handkerchief slowly with both her hands. She started when she heard him come in, and she turned her head to see who it was that had opened the door. To go on, he had to pass near her, and she kept her eyes on his face as he approached her.
"How is he?" she asked in a voice hardly recognizable as her own.
She had an agonized look, and she raised her handkerchief to her mouth quickly, and held it, almost biting it, while he answered her.
"He says that he feels better. Don Teodoro is there. He has just come.Is there anything that I can do?"
She shook her head, still holding the handkerchief to her lips, and again looked out of the window. He waited a moment longer and then passed on, leaving her alone. He saw that she was half mad with anxiety, and he neither trusted himself to speak, nor believed that speaking could be of any use. He went down to the lower bastion, where he could be alone, and for a long time he walked steadily up and down, trying hard to think of nothing, and sometimes counting his steps as he walked, in order to keep his mind from itself.
He did not idealize the woman he loved, for he was not a man of ideals, nor of much imagination. Such defects as she might have, he did not see, and if he had seen them he would have been indifferent to them. To such a man, loving meant everything and admitted of no comment, because there was no part of him left free to judge. He was a whole-souled man, who asked no questions of himself and no advice of others. He had never needed counsel, in his own opinion, and for the rest, what he felt was himself and not a secondary, dual being of separate passions and impressions which he could analyze and examine. He had never comprehended that strange machine of nicely-balanced doubts and certainties, forever in a state of half-morbid equilibrium between the wish, the thought, and the deed—such a man as Pietro Ghisleri was, for instance, who would refuse a beggar an alms lest the giving should be a satisfaction to his own vanity, and then, perhaps, would turn back in pity and give the poor wretch half a handful of silver. When Taquisara once knew that he loved Veronica, he never reverted to a state of doubt. He fought against it, because his friend had loved her first, and rooting himself where he stood, as it were, he would have let the passion tear him piecemeal rather than be moved by it. But he never had the smallest doubt as to what the passion was in itself and might be, in its consequences, if he should be weak for one moment. Simple struggles, when they are for life and death, are more terrible than any complicated conflict can possibly be.
Don Teodoro was a long time alone with Gianluca. Whatever reasons he had of his own for not wishing to comply with Taquisara's request, he overcame them and faithfully carried out the mission imposed upon him. In itself it was no very hard one. Gianluca was a religious man, as Taquisara had said that he was, and he knew that he was very ill, though he did not believe himself to be dying. With his character and in his condition, he was glad to talk seriously with such a man as Don Teodoro, and then to lay before him the account of his few shortcomings according to the practice of his belief.
The old priest came out at last, grave and bent, and, going through the rooms, he came upon Veronica standing alone where Taquisara had left her. She did not know how long she had stood there, waiting for him. He paused before her, and her eyes questioned him.
"He wishes to see you," he said simply.
"How is he?" He had not understood her unspoken question. "How is he?" she repeated, as he hesitated a moment.
"To me he seems no worse. He says that he feels better to-day. But there is something, some change—something, I cannot tell what it is, since I last saw him."
"Stay here—please stay in the house!" said Veronica. "He may need you."
While she was speaking she had gone to the door, and she went out without looking back. A moment later, she was by Gianluca's side. She saw that what Don Teodoro had said was true. There was an undefinable change in his features since the previous day, and at the first sight of it her heart stood still an instant and the blood left her face, so that she felt very cold. She kept her back to the light, that he might not see that she was disturbed, and while she asked him how he was, her hands touched, and displaced, and replaced the little objects on the small table beside him,—the book, the glass, the flowers in the silver cup, the silver cigarette case, the things which, being quite helpless, he liked to have within his reach.
"I really feel better to-day," he said, watching her lovingly, as he answered her question. "I wish I could go out."
"You can be carried out upon the balcony in a little while," she said. "It is too cool, yet. It was a cold night, for we are getting near the end of August."
"And in Naples they are sweltering in the heat," he answered, smiling. "It is beautiful here. I can see the mountains through the open window, and the flowers tell me what the hillsides are like, in the sunshine. Taquisara says that your maid brings them every morning. Thank you—of course it is one of your endless kind doings."
"No," replied Veronica, frankly. "It is her way of showing her devotion, poor thing! Everybody loves you in the house—even the people who have hardly ever seen you. The women, speak of you as 'that angel'!" She tried to laugh cheerfully.
"I am glad they like me, though I have done nothing to be liked by them.Please thank your maid for me. It is very kind of her."
There was a little disappointment in his voice; for he had been happy in believing that Veronica sent the flowers herself, not because he needed coin of kindness to prove her wealth of friendship, but because whatever small thing came from her hand had so much more value for him than the greatest and most that any one else could give.
She sat down beside him, and endeavoured to talk as though she were quite unconcerned. She tried not to look at his face, upon which it seemed to her that death was already fixing the last mask of life's comedy. It was the more terrible, because he was so quiet and so sure of life that morning, so convinced that he was better, so almost certain that he should get well.
It seemed an awful thing to sit there, talking against death; but she did her best not to think, and only to talk and talk on, and make him believe that she was cheerful, while, in a kind way, she kept him from coming back to within a phrase's length of his love for her. It was hard for him, too, to make any effort. The doctor had said so. And all the time, she fancied that his features became by degrees less mobile, and that the transparent pallor so long familiar to her was turning to another hue, grey and stony, which she had never seen.
Suddenly, while she was speaking of some indifferent thing, his eyelids closed and twitched, and his hand went out towards hers, almost spasmodically. She caught it and held it, bending far forward, and again her heart stood still till she missed its beating.
"What is it?" she asked, staring into his face, and already half wild with fear.
He could shake his head feebly, but for a moment he could not speak. With one of her hands she still held his, and with the other she pressed his brow. He smiled, as in a spasm, and then his face was a little distorted. She felt his life slipping from her, under her very touch, as though it were her fault because she would not hold it and keep it for him.
"Gianluca!" she cried, repeating his name in an agonized tone."Gianluca! You must not die! I am here—"
He opened his eyes, and the faint smile came back, but without a spasm this time.
"It was a little pain," he said. "I am sorry—it frightened you."
"Thank God!" she exclaimed, still bending over him. "Oh—I thought you were gone!"
"Your voice—would bring me back—Veronica," he said, with many little efforts, word by word, but with life in his face.
She moved, and held the glass to his lips. Bravely he lifted his hand, and tried to hold it himself. He drank a little of the stimulant, and then his pale head sank back, with the short, fair hair about his forehead, like a glory.
"Ah yes!" he said, speaking more easily, a moment later. "Death could never be so near but that you might stand between him and me—if you would," he added, so softly that the three words just reached her ears, as the far echo of sad music, full of beseeching tenderness.
Still she held his hand, and gazed down into his face. They had told her long ago that he was dying of love for her. In that moment she believed it true. He seemed to tell her so, to be telling it with his last breath. And each breath might be the last. Science could not save him. Physicians disagreed—the great authority himself could not say whether he was to live or die. He fainted, fell back, seemed dead already, and her voice and touch brought him to life, happy for an instant, hoping still and living only by the beating of hope's wings. And with all that, though she did not love him, he was to her the dearest of all living beings. Holding his hand still, she looked upward, as though to be alone with herself for one breathing space. But as she stood there, she pressed his fingers little by little more tightly, not knowing what she did, so that he wondered.
Then she bent down again, and steadily gazed into the upturned blue eyes, and once more smoothed away the fair hair from the pallid brow.
"Do you wish it very much?" she asked simply.
Half paralyzed though he was, he started, and the light that came suddenly to his face, wavered and sank and rose once more. She seemed to hear his words again, saying that she could stand between death and him, were death ever so near.
"You?" he faltered. "Wish for you? Ah God! Veronica—" his face grew dead again. "No—no—I did not understand—"
"But I mean it!" she said, in desperate, low tones, for she thought he was sinking back. "I will marry you, Gianluca! I will, dear—I will—I am in earnest!"
Slowly his eyes opened again and looked at her, wide, startled, and half blind with joy. So the leader looks who, stunned to death between the door-posts of the hard-won gate, wakes unhurt to life in the tide of the victory he led, and hears the strong music of triumph, and the huge shout of brave men whose bursting throats cry out his name for very glory's sake, their own and his.
Gianluca's eyes opened, and with sudden pressure he grasped the hand that had so long held his, believing because he held it and felt the flesh and blood and the warmth in his own shadowy hold.
"Veronica—love!" She would not have thought that he could press her fingers so hard, weak as he was.
The word smote her, even then, with a small icy chill, and though she smiled, there was a shadow in her face. Again he doubted.
"Veronica—for the love of God—you are not deceiving me, to save my life?" The vision of despair rose in his eyes.
"Deceive you? I?" she cried, with sudden energy. "Indeed, indeed, I mean it, as I said it."
"Yes—but—but if, to-morrow—" Again his voice was failing, and she was hand to hand with death, for him.
"No! There shall be no to-morrow for that—it shall be now!"
"Now? To-day? Now?"
He seemed to rise and sink, and sink and rise again, on the low-surging waves of his life's ebbing tide.
"Yes—now!" she answered. "This moment Don Teodoro is in the house—I will call him—let me go for a moment—only one moment!"
"No—no! Do not leave me!" He clung frantically to her hand. "But—yes—call him—call him! And Taquisara. He is my friend—Oh! It kills me to let you go!"
It was indeed the very supreme moment. The great burst of happiness had almost killed him, and he was like a child, not knowing what he wanted. Still he clutched her hand. A quick thought crossed her mind. She had gone to the window for a moment, to fasten it back, and had seen Taquisara walking under the vines. He might be there.
"Let me go to the window," she said, regaining her self-possession."Taquisara may be on the bastion—I saw him there. He will call DonTeodoro, and I shall not have to leave you."
Any reasoning which kept her by his side was divinely good. Her words calmed him a little, and his hands gradually loosened themselves. But as she turned quickly, he uttered a very low cry, and tried to catch her skirt. She did not hear him. She was already speaking from the window; for the Sicilian was still there, walking up and down, as he had done for more than an hour. She called to him. He started, and looked up through the broad leaves.
"Get Don Teodoro at once, and bring him," she cried. "He is in the house—somewhere."
Taquisara thought that Gianluca was dying, and neither paused nor answered, as he disappeared within.
Veronica came back instantly. She had not been gone thirty seconds, but already the sick man's face was grey again, though his eyes were wide and staring. His head had fallen to one side, on the brown silk cushion, in his last attempt to reach her. With both hands, she raised him a little, so that he lay straight again.
"They are coming—they are coming, dear one!" she repeated. "Live, live!Gianluca—live, for me!"
In her agony of fighting for his life, she pushed his hair back, and pressed her lips in one long kiss upon his forehead. A shiver ran through him, and the sense came back to his eyes. But though she held his hand, there was no more strength in it to grasp hers. He sighed the words she heard.
"Love—is it you? Veronica—love—life! Ah, Christ!"
And his lids closed again. The door opened, and was shut, and Veronica half turned her head to see, but she brought her face tenderly nearer to his, as though to let him know that it was for his sake she looked away. Don Teodoro and Taquisara were both in the room. Even before she spoke, she had changed her hold upon Gianluca's fingers, and held his right hand in hers, as those hold hands who are to be wedded.
"Bless us!" she said to the priest. "This is our marriage! Say the words—quickly!"
Taquisara's face was livid, for he had as much of instant death in him as the dying man, though he could not die. But he did not fail. He came and knelt on the other side of the couch, away from Veronica. The priest stood at the foot, in pale hesitation. Veronica's eyes commanded.
"Speak quickly!" she said. "I will marry him—I have said it!Gianluca—say it—say that you will marry me!"
Holding his right hand, with her left thrust under his pillow she lifted him so that he sat almost upright. It needed all her strength, and she was very desperate for him.
"Volo!" The one word floated on the air, breathed, not spoken, and dead silence followed.
Again Veronica turned to Don Teodoro.
"Say the words. I command you! I have the right—I am free!"
The priest's face was white now. He stretched out his arms, lifting his eyes upwards.
A worse change was in Gianluca's face before Don Teodoro had spoken the words he had to say. Taquisara saw it. Both he and Veronica bent over the motionless head. Still Veronica held the cold hand in hers. Taquisara knew that in another instant the priest would speak. Gently, with womanly tenderness, though his soul was on the wheel of anguish, he took Veronica's right hand and loosed it, and Gianluca's fell cold and motionless from her fingers.
"He is gone," he whispered, close to her ear, and he held her right hand firmly, in his horror at the thought that she might be wedded to a man already dead.
Veronica made a slight effort of instinct, to loose his hold and to take the hand that had fallen from hers. But it was only instinctive and hardly conscious at all. Her eyes were on Gianluca's face, and the blackness of a vast grief already darkened her soul.
There was but an instant. The tall old priest, with eyes lifted heavenwards, neither saw nor heard.
"Ego conjungo vos—" He said all the words, and then, high in air, he made the great sign of the cross. "Benedictas vos omnipotens Deus—" and he spoke all the benediction.
He closed his eyes a moment in instant prayer. When he opened them and looked down, his face turned whiter still. On each side, before him, knelt the living, Veronica and Taquisara, their hands clasped and wedded, as they had been when he had spoken the high sacramental words, and between them, white, motionless, the halo of his fair hair about his marble brow, lay Gianluca della Spina, like an angel dead on earth.
"Merciful Lord! What have I done!" cried the priest.
At the sound of his voice Taquisara turned quickly. But Veronica did not hear. The Sicilian saw where Don Teodoro's starting eyes were fixed, and he understood, and his own blood shrieked in his ears, for he was married to Veronica Serra. Married—half married, wholly married, married truly or falsely, by the sudden leap of violent chance—but a marriage it was, of some sort. Both he and the priest knew that, and that it must be a voice of more authority than Don Teodoro's which could say that it was no marriage. For the Church's forms of office, that are necessary, are few and very simple, but they mean much, and what is done by them is not easily undone. But Veronica neither saw nor heard.
"I think—I assure you that nobody knows anything—but I think that DonGianluca will improve rapidly after this crisis."
That was the opinion of the great doctor, when he had seen the patient on the afternoon of that memorable day. For Veronica, Taquisara, and Don Teodoro had all three been mistaken when they had thought that Gianluca was dead. As the doctor said, there had been a crisis, an inward convulsion of the nerves, a fainting which had been almost a catalepsy, and, several hours later, a return to consciousness with a greatly increased chance of life, though with extreme momentary exhaustion.
It was Taquisara who went to find the doctor, leaving Veronica on her knees, while Don Teodoro stood motionless at the foot of the couch, his hands gripping each other till his nails cut the flesh, his grotesque face invested for the moment with an almost sublime horror of what he had unwittingly done.
And then had come the physician's systematic and painful search for life, his doubts, his hopes, his suspicions, his increasing hope again, his certainty at last that all was not over—and then the necessity for instantly carrying out his orders, the getting of all things needed for the sick man snatched out of death, and all the confusion that rises when the whole being of a great household must exert its utmost strength in one direction, to save one life.
Amidst it all, too, the helpless father and mother ran about tearful, incoherent, wringing their hands, believing no one and yet believing the impossible, praying, crying, talking, hindering everything in their supreme parents' right to be in the way and nearest to what they loved best—hysterical with joy, both of them, at the end, when the physician said that Gianluca was to live, and was not dead as they had thought him, and wildly, pathetically, insanely grateful to Veronica.
"I saw that he was dying," she told them simply, when he was out of danger. "I sent for Don Teodoro, and we were married."
They fell upon her neck, the old man and the prematurely old woman, kissing her, pressing her in their arms, crying over her, not knowing what they did.
When he saw that she was telling them, Taquisara went away from them to his own room and stayed there some time. And Don Teodoro also went home, and for the second time on that day he bolted his battered door and made sure that he was alone. But he did not sit at his table playing with his spectacles, as in the morning. He knelt in a corner, against one of his rough bookcases, bowed to the ground as though a mountain had come upon him unawares, and now and then he beat his forehead against the parchment bindings of his favourite folio Muratori, as certain wild beasts crouch on their knees and with a swinging of slow despair strike their heads against the bars of their cage many times in succession.
For Taquisara and Don Teodoro knew, each knowing also that the other knew, that what Veronica believed to have been done that day had not been really done, save in the intention, and that what had really been done must by Church law and right be undone before she could be truly married to Gianluca della Spina. That is to say, if the thing done had any value whatsoever before God and man.
It is easy to say that in other lands and under other practices of faith the four persons concerned in what had happened might have honestly told themselves that such a marriage was no marriage at all. An unbelieving Italian, and there are many in the cities, though few in the country, would have laughed and said that the important point was the legal union pronounced by the municipal authority, and that since there had been none here, there was nothing to undo. Yet if by any similar chance—more difficult to imagine, of course, but conceivable for argument's sake—the same mistake had occurred in a legal marriage by a syndic, that same unbelieving Italian would have felt in regard to it precisely what Taquisara and Don Teodoro felt, namely, that the union was well nigh indissoluble. For Italy, as a nation and a whole, while imitating other nations in many respects, has again and again refused to listen to any suggestion embodying a law of divorce. To all Italians, high, low, atheists, bigots, monarchists, republicans,—whatever they may be,—marriage is an absolutely indissoluble bond. The most that they will allow, and have always allowed, is that in such cases as Veronica's, it is in the power of the highest authority, ecclesiastic or legal, according to their persuasion, to annul a marriage altogether and declare that it never took place at all, on the ground that the requirements of the Church or of the law have not been properly fulfilled.
In society, of the two forms, which are both looked upon as necessary together, the blessing of the Church is considered by far the more indispensable, though most people acknowledge the importance and validity of the other, as well as its wisdom; and society, as an aristocratic body, as a rule refuses absolutely to receive within its doors an Italian couple who have not been married by a priest. Among all society's many traditions and prejudices, there is none more ancient, more deep-rooted, or more rigorous to-day than this one.
Under these circumstances it is not surprising that Taquisara, strong, loyal, and simple as he was, should honestly believe with all his heart that he had been married to Veronica; nor that Don Teodoro himself should look upon what he had unwittingly done as being something which he alone had no power to undo, if, in all conscience and truth, it had been done at all.
The worst point of all, in the opinion of those two men, was that Veronica sincerely believed herself married to Gianluca, as in her intention she really was, while Gianluca himself, having pronounced the solemn 'I will' with his last conscious breath and being told on coming to himself that the sacramental words had been spoken, had no reason at all for doubting that he was actually her husband. The position was as full of difficulties as could be imagined. To let Gianluca know the truth would have been almost certain to kill him. To speak of it to Veronica for the present seemed almost equally impracticable, though it was quite impossible to take any steps towards the annulling of the marriage without her open concurrence and help, as well as Taquisara's. Meanwhile, not only she and Gianluca, but the Duca and Duchessa, too, regarded the matter as altogether settled and accomplished. At any moment Veronica had it in her power to send for the syndic of Muro and cause the necessary formalities of the municipal marriage to be properly executed. She would then be legally married to Gianluca, while in the eyes of the Church she was already Taquisara's wife, by the fact of form though not by the intention of any one.
It did not occur either to Taquisara or to the priest that they could keep their secret forever and allow matters to proceed to such a conclusion. Don Teodoro was far too earnest a believer and a churchman at heart to allow what he should consider a great sin to be committed without any attempt to hinder it, and with the Sicilian the point of honour was concerned, as well as a deeply rooted adherence to social tradition and to the forms and ceremonies of religion in which he had been brought up. They were neither of them men to have so repudiated all they held the most sacred in faith and honour, even if either of them had held the secret alone without the other's knowledge.
But each knew that the other knew the truth, and on that first day, each departed to his own room lest he should be suddenly brought face to face again with the other.
It was his unwillingness to allow a thing to be done which, as a man and a gentleman, he thought both dishonourable and wrong, that prevented Taquisara from leaving Muro at once. For himself, his first impulse was to escape from the situation, from the horrible temptation he endured when he was with Veronica, from the barest possibility of any unfaithfulness to his friend. At that time the Italians were fighting in Massowah and as an officer of the reserve he could have volunteered for active service at a moment's notice—with a terribly good prospect of never coming back alive.
But even his death would hardly have mended matters, in his scrupulous opinion, unless Veronica should of her own accord and without any especial reason insist upon being again married in church, contrary to the Church's own rule, but on the reasonable ground that Gianluca had been unconscious during a part of the ceremony. If Taquisara were dead, such a marriage would be valid, of course; but the prospect of his death gave him no assurance that she would ever do such a thing at all; and, moreover, in spite of his passionate temperament, he was far too sensible a man to think deliberately of sacrificing his life for such reasons. Like many another man suddenly placed in a hard position as an obstacle in the path of a loved woman, he asked himself the question, whether, in honour and against religion, he should not commit suicide. But the answer was a foregone conclusion, and it was plainly his duty to stand by his friend and by Veronica, alive and able to do the best he could for them both. In immediate present circumstances his presence was of the greatest importance to Gianluca, who depended on him almost entirely for help, in his sensitive dislike of being touched and moved by servants.
And the man who was thus thrust into a situation from which it seemed hard to escape at all, loved Veronica Serra with all his heart, with all his soul, with the broad, deep, simple passion of simpler times, having in him much of that old plainness of character which made men take without question the things they wanted, and hold them by main strength and stoutness of heart against all comers while they lived.
There had been a time when he had been able to speak coldly to her, and to seem to dislike her. That was past, and his devotion was even in his hands and visible, if he did with them the smallest act for her service.
She saw it, and was glad, for he pleased her more and more in the days that followed the great day, while Gianluca lay pale and happy and gaining a little strength, and she, as his wife, sat through many hours of the day by his bedside, reading to him, and telling him much about her life, but not often allowing him to speak much, lest he should lose ground and be in danger again. It seemed to her at that time that Taquisara was learning to be another friend to her, less in most ways than Gianluca had been, but having much that Gianluca had not—the strength, the decision, the toughness. She did not miss those things in Gianluca. She would not have had him otherwise than he was, but she saw them all, and felt their influence, and admired them in the other man.
She felt, too, that she had often treated him with unnecessary and almost unmannerly coldness, and repenting of it, she meant, in pure innocence of maiden purpose, to make it up to him now, by being more kind. Indeed, she could not understand why she had ever been so hard to him in former days, excepting when he had spoken so rudely to her at Bianca's house; and since she had seen and learned to value his loyal affection for Gianluca, she had not only forgiven him for what he had said, but had found that, on the whole, he had been right to say it.
As for her marriage with Gianluca, it seemed to her to have changed nothing, beyond the great change it had wrought in him for the better. She talked with him as before. She felt, as before, that he was her dearest and best friend. To please him, she made plans with him for their future, though sometimes the sharp fear for his life ran through her heart like a needle of ice. They could live half the year in Naples and the other six months in Muro, but sometimes, when he should be quite well, they would travel and see the world together. It was pleasant to think that they had the right to be always together, now, for it would have seemed terrible even to Veronica to go back to the old days of letter-writing. To her, their marriage had been the final cementing of the most beautiful friendship in the world. She was glad that she had given her life for him, since, after all, the giving of it now changed it so little. It was clear, she thought, that she was made for friendship and not for love; and since she was so made, she had done the best in marrying her best friend.
One day, when Gianluca was asleep, she had gone alone to her little rose garden up by the dungeon tower. The autumn was beginning in the mountains; there were few roses left, and the northerly breeze blew up to her out of the vast depth at her feet. Alone there, she thought of all these things and of how she was intended by her nature for this friendship of hers. Seasoning about it with herself, she took an imaginary case. Suppose, she thought, that she had begun to be Taquisara's friend, instead of Gianluca's, on that day in Bianca's garden. Her mind worked quickly. She pictured to herself the long correspondence, the intimacy of thought, the meeting and the destruction of the dividing barrier, the daily, hourly growing friendship, and then—the marriage, the touch of hands, the first kiss.
The scarlet blood leapt up like fire to her face. She started and looked round, half dreading lest some one might be there to see. But she was quite alone, and she wondered at herself. It must be shame, she thought, at the mere idea of marrying another man when she was Gianluca's wife. At all events, she said in her heart, she would not think of such things again. It was probably a sin, and she would remember to speak of it, at her next confession. Don Teodoro would tell her what he thought. For in lonely Muro, she had no other confessor, nor desired any. Her faults, great and small, were such as she would have acknowledged and discussed with the good man, in her own drawing-room as willingly as in church—as, indeed, she often did. But not wishing to be alone with herself any longer on that day, she came down from the tower and went to her room, where she spent an hour with Elettra in examining the state of her very much reduced wardrobe.
"Your Excellency is in rags," observed the woman. "You cannot appear in Naples as a bride with any of the things you have. In the first place, you have scarcely anything that is not black or white. But also, though some of these clothes had a cheerful youth, their old age is very sad."
Veronica laughed at Elettra's way of expressing herself, and they went over all the wardrobe together that afternoon.
As Taquisara saw how those around him seemed to have recovered from the terrible emotions through which they had passed, and how the life in the castle quickly subsided again to its monotonous level and ran on in its old channel, the temptation to solve all difficulties by letting matters alone presented itself to him with considerable force. Ten days had gone by, and he had not once found himself alone with Don Teodoro. When they met, they avoided each other's eyes, and each remained separately face to face with the same trouble, while each had a trouble of his own with which the other had nothing to do.
There was little or no change now from what had formerly been the daily round. Again, as before, Taquisara carried his friend daily from his own room to the large one in which Veronica and the Sicilian again fenced almost every day. Sometimes, when it was fine and warm, Gianluca was taken out upon the balcony for a couple of hours. He no longer suffered in being moved; but his lower limbs were now completely paralyzed. He hardly thought of the fact, in his constant and increasing happiness. It was only when he saw the fencing that he sometimes looked down sadly at his useless legs and thin hands, for fencing was the only exercise for which he had ever cared. He had none of that sanguine vitality which would have made such an existence intolerable to Taquisara, or even to Veronica. With her beside him, or if he could not have her, with books or conversation, he was not only contented, but happy. It must be remembered, too, that he was not aware that his condition was hopeless and that he might live a total cripple for many years to come. If he had known that, he might have been less gay; not knowing it, married to the woman he loved and looking forward to complete recovery, life was little short of a paradise within sight of a heaven.
Veronica never tired of taking care of him, and one might have supposed that she was satisfied with the prospect of nursing him all her life, or all his. But she herself by no means believed the doctor's predictions. She had been too sure that he was to die, and too much surprised and delighted by his recovery, to accept on mere faith of any man's verdict the assurance that he was never to walk again. There was the reaction, too, after the strong emotion and the heart-rending anxiety, the relaxation of mind and nerve, and the willingness to be happy again after so much strain and stress.
As Gianluca's general health improved, the Duca and Duchessa began to speak of an early departure for their own place near Avellino. Their eldest son's illness had placed him first with them, but they had several other children, all of whom had been under the care of a sister of the Duchessa during the latter's stay at Muro. The motherly woman was beginning to be anxious about them, and the old gentleman had a fair-haired little daughter of eleven summers, whom he especially loved and longed to see.
They thought that before long Gianluca might be moved. It was growing colder, day by day, in the first chill of early autumn, and they believed that a little warmth would do him good. Veronica should come and pay them a visit, and Taquisara, too.
As for the marriage, they meant that it should be an open secret for a little while longer. The servants knew of it, and would tell other servants of course, and the Duchessa had written of it to her sister, on hearing which fact Veronica had written to Bianca Corleone, telling her exactly what had happened, lest Bianca should hear of it from some one else. It was long before she had an answer to this letter, and when it came Bianca's writing was full of her own desperate sadness, though there were words of congratulation for Veronica, such as the occasion seemed to require. Bianca wrote from a remote corner of Sicily, where she was living almost alone on her husband's principal estate. There had been trouble. Corleone had suddenly taken it into his head to come home for a few weeks. Then Bianca's brother, Gianforte Campodonico, had appeared and had taken a violent dislike to Pietro Ghisleri, so that Bianca feared a quarrel between them. Before anything had happened, she had induced Ghisleri to go to Switzerland, and she herself had gone to Sicily, whither her brother had accompanied her. But he had been obliged to leave her soon afterwards, and she suspected that he had followed Ghisleri to the north in order to pick a quarrel with him. She was very unhappy, and there was much more about herself in her letter than about Veronica's marriage.
The old couple grew daily more anxious to leave for Avellino. They proposed that as soon as Gianluca could safely travel, the whole party should go there together. Before returning to Naples for the winter, the legal formalities of the municipal wedding could be fulfilled, and the marriage should then be formally announced. Gianluca and Veronica would come and spend the winter in the Della Spina palace, wherein, as in all Italian patriarchal establishments, there was a spacious apartment for the establishment of the eldest son whenever he should marry.
Once, when this was discussed before them, Taquisara met Don Teodoro's eyes, and the two men looked steadily at each other for several seconds. But even after that they avoided a meeting. It did not seem absolutely necessary yet, and each knew that the other had not yet found the solution of the difficulty. To every one's surprise, Gianluca opposed the plan altogether. They all seemed to have taken it for granted that he need not be consulted, and Veronica, in her complete self-sacrifice, would have been willing to do whatever pleased the rest. But Gianluca quietly refused to go to Avellino at all. So long as his wife would give him hospitality, he said with a proud smile, he would stay in Muro. After that, he should prefer to return directly to Naples. It was not easy to argue against an invalid's prerogative. After some fruitless attempts to move him, his father and mother temporarily desisted.
"You shall not go to Avellino," he said to Veronica, when they were alone. "It is a den of wild children and intolerable relations, and you would not have a moment's peace. You have no idea how detestable that sort of existence would be after this heavenly calm. I am very fond of my father and mother, and my brothers and sisters, and my relations, and most of them are very good people in their way. But that is no reason why you and I should be set up to be looked at, and tallied at, by them all, twelve hours every day."
"I would certainly much rather stay here," answered Veronica, with a little laugh. "That is, if you can induce them to stay here, too."
"For that matter, they are quite unnecessary," said Gianluca. "There is no reason in the world why, if you like, we should not have the legal marriage here since you have a syndic and a municipality. Then we could announce it, and there would be no objection to our staying here alone."
"That is true," replied Veronica, thoughtfully. "We could always do that, if we chose."
But she did not propose to do it at once, and he did not like to press her. He saw no harm, however, in speaking of the project with Taquisara. The Sicilian looked at him, said nothing, and then carefully examined a cigar before lighting it. He had long expected that such a proposal would come either from Gianluca or Veronica, and he was not surprised. But when he at last heard it made he held his breath for a moment or two and then began to smoke in silence.
"You say nothing," observed Gianluca. "Do you see any possible objection to our doing that? Society ought to be satisfied."
"I should think so," answered Taquisara. "I should think that anything would be better than Avellino and all the relations. As for going back to Naples and having a municipal wedding there, and no religious ceremony, I would not do it if I were you. The two marriages are always supposed to take place on consecutive days, or at least very near together, since both are necessary nowadays."
"I know," said Gianluca.
Taquisara made up his mind that he must take the initiative and speak with Don Teodoro. He had been willing and ready to give up all right to hope for the woman he loved, in order that his friend might marry her, but the idea that there should be an irregularity about the marriage, or no real marriage at all, as he believed was the case, was more than he could, or would, bear. To speak with Veronica was out of the question. He knew enough of women to understand that if she ever knew how, by an accident, she had held his hand instead of Gianluca's at the moment when she was giving her very soul to save the dying man, she might never forgive him. She might even turn and hate him. She would never believe that he himself had not known what he was doing. If it were possible, he would not incur such risk. Anything in reason and honour would be better than to be hated by her. He had seen her change of manner, of late, and he knew very well that she was beginning to like him much more than formerly.
In the morning, after Don Teodoro had said mass, Taquisara went to him and found him over his books. This time the priest recognized him at once and rose to greet him gravely, as though he had expected his visit.
"Have you made up your mind what to do?" asked the Sicilian, as he sat down.
It was as though they had been in the habit of discussing the situation together, and were about to renew a conversation which had been broken off.
"I know what I shall have to do, if matters go any further," answered the priest, in a dull voice, unlike his own.
"What would that be?"
"It is in my power to cause the marriage to be declared null and void."
"By appealing to your bishop, I suppose. In that event Donna Veronica would have to be told."
"There is another way."
"Then why do you not take it and act at once? Why do you hesitate?"Taquisara watched him keenly.
"Because it would mean the sacrifice of my whole existence. I am human.I hesitate, as long as there is any other hope."
"I do not understand. As for sacrificing your existence—that must be an exaggeration."
"Not at all. If it were only my own, I should not have hesitated, perhaps. I do not know. But what I should do would involve a great and direct injury to many others—to hundreds of other people."
Taquisara looked at him harder than ever, understanding him less and less.
"You seem to have a secret," he said at last, thoughtfully.
"Yes," answered the priest, resting his elbow on the old table and shading his eyes with his hand, though there was no strong light to dazzle him. "Yes—yes," he repeated. "I have a secret, a great secret. I cannot tell it to you—not even to you, though you are one of the most discreet men I ever met. You must forgive me, but I cannot."
"I do not wish to know it," replied Taquisara. "Especially not, if it concerns many people."
A short silence followed, during which neither moved, nor looked at the other.
"Don Teodoro," asked the Sicilian, at last, in a low voice, "please tell me your view of the case, as a priest. Am I, at the present moment, in consequence of what happened a fortnight ago, actually married to Donna Veronica, or not?"
The priest hesitated, looked down, took off his spectacles, and put them on again, before he answered the question.
"I think," he said, "that most people, if any had been present, would be of opinion that it was enough of a marriage to require a formal annullation before any other could take place. I should certainly not dare to consider the princess and Don Gianluca as married, when it was you who held her right hand, and received the benediction with her in the prescribed attitude."
"Yes," answered Taquisara; "but in your own individual opinion, as a priest, am I married to her, or not?"
"As a priest, I can have no individual opinion. I can tell you, of course, that the marriage can be annulled. In the first place, you neither of you had the intention of being married to each other. In all the sacraments, the intention of those to whom they are administered is the prime consideration. It would only be necessary for you and the princess to swear that you had no intention of being married, and that it was, to the best of your knowledge, entirely an accident, and all difficulties could be removed."
"Ah, yes! But then Donna Veronica would know, and Gianluca would have to know it, too. I came here to tell you that they are seriously thinking of sending for the syndic, to publish the banns of marriage at the municipality and marry them legally, after which the Duca and Duchessa will go to Avellino, and leave them here together. Whether it costs your existence or mine, Don Teodoro, this thing shall not be done."
"No," said Don Teodoro. "It shall not. You are in a terrible position yourself. I feel for you."
"I?" Taquisara bent his brows. "I, in a terrible position?"
"Do not be angry," answered the priest, gently. "I know your secret well enough, though she does not guess it yet. Do not think me indiscreet because I mention the fact. It would be far better if you could go away for the present. But I know how you are situated, and you are helping to prevent mischief. We must help each other. If it is to cost the existence of one of us, it shall be mine. You are young, and I am old. And that is not the only reason. My secret is not like yours. I cannot let it go down into the grave with me. I have kept it long enough, and I should have kept it longer, if this had not happened. I shall probably go to Naples to-morrow. You must prevent them from publishing the banns until I come back, or until you hear from me. I may never come back. It is possible."
"What do you mean?" asked Taquisara, for he saw a strange look in the old man's clear eyes.
"I shall not end my life here," he said quietly.
"You? End your life? You, commit suicide? Are you mad, Don Teodoro?"
"Oh no! I may live many years yet. I hope that I may, for I have much to repent of. But I shall not live here."
"I hope you will," said Taquisara. "But if you know my secret—keep it."
"As I have kept mine till now," answered the old man.
So they parted, and Taquisara went back to the castle, leaving the lonely priest among his books.
Veronica did not wish the people of Muro to believe that she was marrying a cripple. That was the reason why she did not at once agree to Gianluca's proposal and send for the syndic to perform the legal ceremony. She had persuaded herself that by quick degrees of improvement, he would recover the power to stand upright, at least to the extent to which he had still retained his strength when he had first arrived. Since he had lived through the crisis, she grew sanguine for him and hoped much.
Her feeling was natural enough in the matter, though it was made up of several undefined instincts about which she troubled herself very little—pride of race, pride of personal wholeness and soundness, pride of womanhood in the manhood of a husband. Veronica named none of these in her thoughts, but they were all in her heart. Few women would not have felt the same in her place.
She was sure that he was to get better, if not quite well, and she wished that he might be well enough to stand beside her on his feet when they should be formally married. If he continued to improve as rapidly as during the past fortnight, she believed that the day could not be far off. When he could stand, in another month, perhaps, the syndic should come. It was even possible that by that time he might be able to walk a little with her in the village.
Her people were a sort of family to her. That was a remnant of feudalism in her character, perhaps, which had suddenly developed during the months she had spent in Muro. But that, too, was natural, as it was natural that they should love her and almost worship the ground she trod. For the poorer classes of Italians are sometimes very forgetful of benefits, but are rarely ungrateful. She had done in a few months, for their real advantage, so that they felt it, enough to make up for the oppression of generations of Serra, and almost enough to atone for the extortions of Gregorio Macomer. She was the last of her name, and her husband, if he lived, was to be the father of a new stock, which would be called Serra della Spina, and whose men would hold the lands and take the rents and do good, or not, according to their hearts, each in his generation. It seemed to her that the people had a right to see Gianluca standing on his feet beside her, since her marriage was to mean so much to them.
Don Teodoro came to her, soon after Taquisara had left him, to tell her that he must go to Naples without delay. She looked at him in astonishment at the proposal, and as she looked, she saw that his face was changed. Oddly enough, he held himself much more erect than usual; but his features were drawn down as though by much suffering, and his eyes, usually so clear and steady, wandered nervously about the room.
"You are not well," said Veronica. "Why must you go now?"
"It is because I must go now that I am not well," answered the priest, shaking his head. "I am very sorry to be obliged to leave you at this time. I only hope that, if you are thinking of fulfilling the legal formalities of your marriage, you will give me notice of the fact, so that I may come back, if I can. You know that all that concerns you concerns my life."
Veronica looked at him, and wondered why he was so much disturbed. But his words gave her an opportunity of speaking to him about her own decision. She did not wish him to think her capricious, much less to imagine that she looked upon the marriage as a mere piece of sentiment, which was not to change her life at all, except to bind her as a nurse to the bedside of a hopeless invalid. That idea itself was beginning to be repugnant to her, and the hope that Gianluca might recover was becoming a necessary part of her happiness, though she scarcely knew it.
"My dear Don Teodoro," she said, "so far as that is concerned, you may be quite sure that I will let you know in time. I have not the slightest intention of fulfilling any legal formalities until my husband is well enough to stand on his feet with me before the syndic; and I am afraid that he will not be well enough for that in less than a month, at the earliest."
The wandering eyes suddenly fixed themselves on her face, the strange great features relaxed, and the wide, thin lips smiled at her. His happiness was strangely founded, but it was genuine, though not altogether noble. Her words were a reprieve; and he could keep his secret longer, almost, perhaps, until he died, and when he should be dying, it would be easier to tell. But that was far from being all. He loved her, as the source of great charity and kindness from which the people were drawing life, with all his own passionate charity; and he loved her for herself, for her gentleness and her hardness, because she ruled him, and because she touched his heart. All other thoughts away, he could not bear to think of her as bound for life to be the actual wife of a helpless cripple.
And something of her own heart he half guessed and half knew. For in her innocence she had confessed to him how she had thought of Taquisara, when she had been alone that day, and how the blood had flowed in her face, and burned her so that she was almost sure that such thoughts must be wrong. It was because she had told him these things that he had watched Taquisara ever since, and he had seen that the man loved her silently.
But he knew also, as well as any one could know it, that Gianluca would never stand upon his feet again. And, moreover, he knew that though it would seem wrong to Veronica to love Taquisara, and would be wrong, if she had intention, as it were, yet there could be no real sin in it, for she was not Gianluca's wife. Had she been truly married, Don Teodoro, gentle and old, would have found strength to force Taquisara to go away—had anything more than the force of honour been needed in such a case.
"I am very glad, my dear Princess," he said, and his voice trembled in the reaction after his own anxiety. "You do not wish me to go to Naples, now?" he said with an interrogation, after a brief pause. "You would rather that I should wait until Christmas?"
"Of course—if you can," answered Veronica, somewhat surprised at his change of tone. "But if you really must go, if you are so very anxious to go at once, I must not hinder you."
"I will see," said Don Teodoro. "I will think of it. Perhaps it can be arranged—indeed, I think it can."
He was old, she thought, and he had never been decided in character, except about doing good to poor people, and studying Church history. So she did not press him with questions, but let him do as he would; and he did not go to Naples then, but he went and found Taquisara within the hour, and told him what Veronica had said about her marriage.
The Sicilian heard him in silence, as they stood together on the lower bastion where they had met, but Don Teodoro saw the high-cut nostrils quiver, while the even lips set themselves to betray nothing.
"If matters go no further than they have gone," he said at last, as the priest waited, "we need do nothing."
So they did nothing, and Don Teodoro did not go to Naples.
The daily life ran on in its channel. But Gianluca did not continue to improve so fast. Then it seemed as though improvement had reached its limit, and still he was helpless to stand, being completely and hopelessly paralyzed in his lower limbs. At first, neither the old couple nor Veronica realized that he was no longer getting better, though he was no worse. He himself did not believe it; but Taquisara saw and understood. Gianluca refused to be moved, insisting that he was gaining strength, and that some day the sensation would come suddenly to his feet, and he should stand upright. Otherwise, he was now almost as well as when he had come to Muro. They sent for a wheel-chair from Naples, and he wheeled himself through the endless rooms, and to luncheon, and to dinner, Veronica walking by his side. It gave his arms exercise, and he became very expert at it, laughing cheerfully as he made the wheels go round, and he went so fast that Veronica sometimes had to run a few steps to keep up with him.
Then, one day, Taquisara carried him out to the gate, and set him in the carriage, and Veronica took him for a short drive. The poor people were, most of them, at their work, but the very old men and the boys and girls turned out, and flocked after the victoria as it moved slowly through the narrow street. Some of them called out words of simple blessing on the couple, but others hushed them and said that the princess was not really married yet. Gianluca smiled as he looked into Veronica's face, and she smiled, too, but less happily.
The weather changed. There had been a short touch of cold in the air at the end of August, and breezes from the north that poured down from the heights behind the castle, into the tremendous abyss below, and shot up again to the walls and the windows, even as high as the dungeon tower. Then, at the new moon, the weather had changed, the sky grew warm again, the little clouds hung high and motionless above the peaks, melting from day to day to a serene, deep calm, in which, all the earth seemed to be ripening in a great stillness while heaven held its breath, and the mountains slept. In the rich valley the grapes grew full and dark, and the last figs cracked with full sweetness in the sun, the pears grew golden, and the apples red, and all the green silver of the olive groves was dotted through and through its shade, with myriad millions of dull green points, where the oil-fruit hung by little stems beneath the leaves.
An autumn began, such as no one in Muro remembered—an autumn of golden days and dewy moonlight nights, soft, breathless, sweet, and tender. It was a year of plenty and of much good wine, which is rare in the south, for when the wine is much it is very seldom good. But this year all prospered, and the people said that the Blessed Mother of God loved the young princess and would bless her, and hers also, and give her husband back his strength, even by a miracle if need should be.
Gianluca clung to the place where he was happy, and would not be taken away. His mother humoured him, and the old Duca, yearning for his little fair-haired daughter, went alone at last to Avellino.
Then came long conversations at night between the Duchessa and Veronica. The Duchessa loved her son very dearly, but since he was so much better, she was tired of Muro. She wished to see her other children. It was ridiculous to expect that she and her husband should relieve each other as sentries of propriety in Veronica's castle, the one not daring to go till the other came back. Why should Veronica not send for the syndic and have the formalities fulfilled? Once legally, as well as christianly, man and wife, the two could stay in Muro as long as they pleased.
But Veronica would not. Gianluca was improving, and before long he would walk. She had set her heart upon it, that he should be strong again. She would not have her people think that he was a cripple. The people were peasants, the Duchessa answered, peasants like any others. Why should the Princess of Acireale care what such creatures thought? But Veronica's eyes gleamed, and she said that they were her own people and a part of her life, and she told the Duchessa all that was in her mind, very frankly, and so innocently, yet with such unbending determination to have her way, that the Duchessa did not know what to do. Thereupon, after the manner of futile people, she repeated herself, and the struggle began again.
It was a tragedy that had begun. Veronica had escaped with her life from Matilde Macomer to find out in the consequence of her own free deeds what tragedy really meant, and how bitter the fruit of good could be.
Nor in the slightest degree had her affection for Gianluca diminished, nor did it change in itself, as days followed days to full weeks, and week choked week, cramming whole months back into time's sack, for time to bear away and cast into the abyss of the useless and irrevocable past.
Still he was her friend, still she would give her life to save him, and would have given it again if it had been to give. Still she could talk with him, and listen to him, and answer smile and word and gesture. She could sit beside him through quiet hours, and drive with him in the vast, still sunshine of that golden autumn, calling him by gentler names than friend and touching his hand softly in the long silence. All this she could do, and if there were ever any effort in it, that was surely not an effort to be kind, but one of those little doubting, uncertain, spontaneous efforts which we make whenever we unconsciously begin to feel that it will not be enough to do right, but that we must also seem to do right in other eyes, lest our right be thought half hearted.
The days were monotonous, but it was not their monotony which she felt, so much as that irrevocable quality of them all which made a grey background in her soul, against which something was moving, undefined, strong as the unseen wind, yet mistily visible sometimes, having more life than shape—a terrible thing which drew her to it against her will, and yet a thing which had in it much besides terror.
She turned from it when she knew that it was there, and fixed her sight upon Gianluca's face. Sometimes she found comfort in that, and she did all that was required of her, and more also, and was glad to do it.
But the wrong done to nature was deeper and more real than all the good she could do to hide it, and it cried out against her continually by the voice of the woman's instinct. It was not Gianluca who became intolerable to her, but she herself, and it was to escape from herself that she clung to him closely, as well as out of affection for him; for when she was by herself she was no longer alone. That other unshaped something kept her company.
She was bound hand and foot, soul, body, and intelligence, for life. She, the very strong, was tied to the helpless; she, the energetic, was bound to apathy; she, the active, was nailed to the passive; she, the free, the erect, was bowed under a burden which she must carry to her life's end, never to be free again.
She could bear the burden, and she said none of these things to herself. But the wrong was upon nature, and the mother of all turned against the one child that would be unlike all the rest.
The man who was a man, soul and body, heart, hand, and spirit, stood beside the other, who was a shadow, and beside her, who was a woman—and the tragedy began in the prologue of contrast. Strength to weakness, motion to immobility, the grace and carriage of manly youth to the sad restfulness of helpless, hopeless limbs that never again could feel and bear weight; that was the contrast from which there was no escaping. On the steps of love's temple, at the very threshold, the one lay half dead, never to rise again; and beside him stood the other, in the pride and glory of the morning of life.
It would have been hard, even if the contrast had been less strong to the eye, and the distance of the two souls greater one from the other—even if Taquisara had not been what he was. But as the one, in his being, was alive from head to heel, so the other was dead save in the thoughts in which he still had a shadowy life. And for the rest—flesh, blood, and life apart—they were equals. Was Gianluca true? Taquisara was as honest and loyal as the brave daylight. Was the one brave? So was the other, in thought and deed. Was Gianluca enduring? So was Taquisara, and he had the more to endure, the more to fight, the more to keep down in him.
She knew that he loved her. How it was that she knew it she could not tell, but sometimes the music of the truth rang in her ears till the flame shot up in her face and she shut her eyes to hide her soul—a loud, triumphant music, stately and grand as might herald the marching of archangels—till her inward cry of terror pierced it, and all was as still as the grave. Then, for a space, the vision of sin stood dark in the way, and she turned and fled from it back to Gianluca's side, back to the care of him, back to his helpless love for her, back to his pathetic, stricken restfulness, back to the maiden dreams of a life-long friendship, unbroken as the calm of the summer ocean, perfect as the cloudless sky of those golden autumn days.
For a time, the dark wraith of sin faded, and there was no music in the air, and her cheek was cool, while she looked all the world in the face with the fearless eyes of a child-empress. Again the monotonous, good day rolled in the same grooves, noiselessly, and surely, as all the days to come were to roll along, to the end of ends. She worked for her people, talked with Don Teodoro, talked, smiled, laughed with Gianluca, and bore the old Duchessa's ramblings with patience and kindness.
But all of a sudden, for a nothing, at the sight of a fencing foil, at the smell of Gianluca's cigarette, at the sound of a footfall she knew, there came the mad wish to be alone; and she resisted it, for it did not seem good to her, and even as she struggled the blood rose in her throat and was in her cheeks in a moment, so that if just then by chance Taquisara came upon her suddenly, the room swam and for an instant her brain reeled as she turned her face from him in mortal shame.
She knew so well that he loved her, and that he was suffering, too. It was love's hands that had chiselled the bronze of his face to leaner lines, and that threw a new darkness into his dark eyes. It was for her that there was that other note in his voice that had never been there before. It was for love of her that once or twice, when she took his hand in greeting, it was icy cold—not like Gianluca's, half dead, and dull, and chilly, and very thin—but cold from the heart, as it were, and more wildly living than if it had burned like fire; trembling, and not in weakness, with something that caught her own fingers and ran like lightning to the very core and quick of her soul, hurting it overmuch with its bolt of joy and fear. It was for her that, at the first, he had been cold and silent, because he was afraid of himself, and of love, and of the least, faintest breath that might tarnish the bright shield of his spotless loyalty to Gianluca.
All the little changes in his speech and manner were clear to her now, and each had its meaning, and all meant the same. His words, spoken from time to time, came back to her, and she understood them, and saw how, for his friend's sake, he had held his peace for himself, and had ever urged her to marry Gianluca, in spite of everything.
If he had not loved her, or if she had thought that he did not, she would have had the pride to tear her heart clean from love's terrible hands, whole or broken, as might be, and to toss it, with the dead dull weeks into old time's sack of irrevocably lost and useless things, and so to live her life out, loveless, in the still haven of Gianluca's friendship. But, having his love, she had not such pride; and the loyalty she truly had was matched alone against all human nature since the world began.
Do what she would, she yielded sometimes to that great wish to go suddenly to her own room and be alone. Then, standing at her window when the mist whitened in the valley under the broad moon, she listened, and instantly the air was full of music again as love lifted up its voice, and sweetly chanted the melody of life. With parted lips she listened, till the moonlight filled her eyes, and her heart fluttered softly, and her throat was warm.
And sometimes, too, while she was there, the man who loved her so silently and so well was by his friend's side, tending as his own the life that stood between him and the hope of happiness; loving both him and her, but honour best. But sometimes he, too, was alone in his own room, and even at his window, facing the same broad moon, the same white mist in the sleeping valley, the same dark, crested hills, but not hearing the music that the woman heard. He could be calm for a while as he looked out; but presently, without warning, he swallowed hard, and again, as on the fatal day, he held her little hand in his, under the priest's great sign of the cross, and his own blood shrieked in his ears. In cruel anger against himself, he turned from the window then and paced the room with short, braced steps, till at last he threw himself into a deep chair and sullenly took the first book at hand, to read himself back to the monotony of all he had to bear.
And so those two fearless ones went through the days and weeks in twofold terror of themselves and each of the other, and the slow, wordless tragedy was acted before eyes that saw but did not understand. Still Gianluca refused to go away, and still Veronica refused to send for the syndic. She would not yield to the Duchessa, who found herself opposed both by her son and her son's wife.
No one knew how much Veronica herself still hoped, when the bright autumn days were broken at last by the first winter storm that rose out of the dark south in monstrous wrath against such perpetual calm. She herself did not know whether she still hoped for any improvement, or whether, in her inmost thoughts, she had given up hope and had accepted the certainty that Gianluca was never to be better than he was now. There is something of habit in all hope that has been with us long, and the habits we notice the least are sometimes the hardest of all to break.
When Veronica said that Gianluca would yet stand up and walk, no one contradicted her, except the doctors, and she had no faith in them. They came and went. The great professor came three times from Naples and saw the patient, ate his dinner, slept soundly, and went away assuring Veronica that it was useless to send for him unless some great change took place. To please her, he recommended a little electricity, baths, light treatment such as could give little trouble, and he carefully instructed the young doctor of Muro in all he was to do. When he had finished, and the young man had promised to do everything regularly, they looked at each other, smiled sadly, but professionally, and parted with mutual good will and understanding, both knowing that the case was now perfectly hopeless. Their coming and going made little intervals in the tragic play of life, but never broke its continuity.
The old Duca appeared again, and slipped quietly into his place, as before. But at the end of a week there was an unexpected flaring-up of energy, as it were, in his docile and affectionate being. When he and his wife and Veronica were with Gianluca, he suddenly declared that the situation must end, and that they must all go down to Naples. Veronica should send for the syndic, and have the legal marriage at once, and then they would all go down together. It was quite clear in his mind, as simple as daylight, as easy of performance as breathing, as satisfactory as satisfaction itself. The Duchessa was with him, and supported all he said with approving nods and futile gestures and incoherent phrases thrown in, as one throws straws upon a stream to see the current carry them away.
Gianluca said nothing, and Veronica stood alone against them all, for she knew that he was on his father's side. She guessed, perhaps, that Gianluca had made up his mind never to leave her roof except as her lawful husband, clinging to her, as he had tried to cling to her skirt on that most eventful day when she had gone to the window for a moment; and she understood why, having spoken once, he would not speak again. He was too proud to repeat such a request, but his love was far too obstinate to be satisfied with less than its fulfilment. But his own hope for his recovery was more alive than hers.