A learned man had just arrived at Parma from the north, with the intention of writing a history of the middle ages. He was searching for manuscripts in various libraries, and the count had given him all possible facilities. But this learned man, who was still very young, was of an irascible temper. He fancied, for instance, that every soul in Parma desired to turn him into ridicule. It is true that the street boys did occasionally run after him, attracted by the waving locks of pale red hair which he proudly displayed. This learned gentleman believed that his innkeeper charged him abnormal prices for everything, and he would never pay for the most trifling article without looking up its price in Mrs. Starke’s Travels, a book which has reached its twentieth edition, because it gives the prudent Englishman the price of a turkey, an apple, a glass of milk, and so forth.
On the very evening of the day on which Fabrizio had taken his involuntary part in the torch-light procession, the red-hairedsavantfell into a rage at his inn, and pulled a pair of pocket pistols out of his pocket to take vengeance on acamérierwho had asked him two sous for an inferior peach. He was immediately arrested, for it is a great crime, in Parma, to carry pocket pistols.
As this irascible gentleman was tall and thin, it occurred to the count, next morning, to pass him off on the prince as the foolhardy being who had endeavoured to carry off the Fausta, and on whom a trick had been played by her lover. In Parma the punishment for carrying pocket pistols is three years at the galleys, but the penalty is never exacted. After a fortnight in prison, during which he saw nobody but a lawyer, who filled him with the deepest terror of the abominable laws directed by the cowardice of the people in power against the bearers of concealed weapons, he wasvisited by a second lawyer, who told him the story of the mock procession in which Count M⸺ had forced a rival, whose identity had not been discovered, to bear a part. “The police do not want to confess to the prince that they can not find out who this rival is. Say that you desired to find favour in the Fausta’s eyes, that fifty rascals laid hands on you while you were singing beneath her windows, and that you were carried about in a sedan-chair for an hour by people who only spoke to you in a most respectful manner. There is nothing humiliating about this avowal, and one word is all that is asked of you. The instant you say it, and get the police out of this difficulty, you will be put into a post-chaise, taken to the frontier, and allowed to depart in peace.”
For a whole month the learned man held out. Two or three times over, the prince was on the point of having him brought before the Minister of the Interior, and himself presiding at the examination. But he had forgotten all about it before the historian, wearied out, made up his mind to confess everything, and was conducted to the frontier. The prince remained convinced that Count M⸺’s rival possessed a mass of red hair.
Three days after the procession, while Fabrizio, with his faithful Ludovico, in his hiding-place at Bologna, was plotting means of discovering Count M⸺, he learned that the count was in hiding, too, in a mountain village on the road to Florence, and that only three of hisbuliwere with him. Next day, as he was returning from a ride, the count was seized by eight masked men, who informed him they were police agents from Parma. He was conducted, after his eyes had been bandaged, to an inn some two leagues farther up in the mountains, where he was received with every attention, and found a liberal supper ready. The best Italian and Spanish wines were served.
“Pray, am I a state prisoner?” inquired the count.
“Not the least in the world,” was the polite response of Ludovico, who wore a mask. “You have insulted a private individual by venturing to have him carried about in a sedan-chair. To-morrow morning he means to fight a duelwith you. If you kill him, you will be provided with money and good horses, and there will be relays ready for you all the way to Genoa.”
“What may this ruffian’s name be?” quoth the count in a rage.
“His name is Bombace. You will have the choice of weapons, and good seconds, thoroughly loyal men; but one or the other of you must die.”
“It’s a murder, then!” cried Count M⸺ in alarm.
“God forbid! It is simply a duel to the death, with a young man whom you carried about the streets of Parma in the middle of the night, and who would be dishonoured if you lived on. The earth is not large enough for both of you. Therefore do your best to kill him. You will have swords, pistols, rapiers—all the weapons it has been possible to collect within a few hours, for time is precious; the Bolognese police are very diligent, as you know, and there must be no interference with this duel, for the sake of the honour of this young man, whom you have turned into ridicule.”
“But if the young man is a prince?”
“He is a private individual, like yourself, and indeed a much less rich man than you. But he is resolved to fight to the death, and he will force you to fight, I warn you.”
“I am not afraid of anything on earth,” exclaimed Count M⸺.
“That is what your adversary most earnestly desires,” replied Ludovico. “Make yourself ready to defend your life to-morrow, very early in the morning; to be attacked by a man who has good reason to be furious with you, and who will not spare you. I tell you again, you will have the choice of weapons, and now, make your will!”
About six o’clock the next morning, Count M⸺’s breakfast was served. Then one of the doors of the room in which he had been kept was opened, and he was requested to enter the courtyard of a country inn. This court was surrounded with tolerably high hedges and walls, and all the entrances had been carefully closed.
On a table in one corner, which the count was requestedto approach, stood several bottles of wine and brandy, two pistols, two rapiers, two swords, paper, and ink. About a score of peasants were at the windows of the tavern, which looked on to the yard. The count besought their pity. “These people want to murder me,” he cried; “save my life!”
“You are deceived, or else you desire to deceive,” shouted Fabrizio, who was standing in the opposite corner of the courtyard, beside a table covered with weapons. He had taken off his coat, and his face was hidden under one of those wire masks used in fencing-rooms.
“I advise you,” added Fabrizio, “to put on the wire mask you will find beside you, and then advance either with a rapier or with pistols. As you were told yesterday morning, you have the choice of weapons.” The count made endless difficulties, and seemed very unwilling to fight. Fabrizio, on his side, was afraid the police would arrive, although they were up in the mountains, and five full leagues from Bologna. He ended by hurling such frightful insults at his rival, that he had the satisfaction of goading Count M⸺ into fury. He snatched up a rapier, and advanced upon Fabrizio. The beginning of the fight was somewhat slack.
After a few minutes it was interrupted by a great noise. Our hero had been quite conscious that he was undertaking an enterprise which might be made a subject of reproach, or at all events of slanderous imputations upon him, all through his life. He had sent Ludovico into the fields to beat up witnesses. Ludovico gave money to some strangers who were working in a neighbouring wood, and they hurried up, shouting, under the impression that they were expected to kill an enemy of the man who had paid them. When they reached the inn, Ludovico begged them to watch with all their eyes, and see whether either of the young men did anything treacherous, or took any unfair advantage of the other.
The fight, which had been checked for a moment by the peasants’ shouts, again hung fire. Once more Fabrizio rained insults on the count’s self-conceit. “Signor Conte,”he cried, “when you are insolent, you must be brave as well. I know that is a hard matter for you; you would far rather pay other people to be brave.” The count, stung to fresh fury, yelled out that he had been a constant frequenter of the fencing school at Naples, kept by the famous Battistino, and that he would soon chastise his opponent’s impudence. Now that Count M⸺’s fury had revived, he fought with tolerable resolution, but this did not prevent Fabrizio from giving him a fine sword thrust in the chest, which kept him several months in bed. As Ludovico bent over the count to put a temporary bandage on his wound, he whispered in his ear, “If you dare to let the police know of this duel, I will have you stabbed in your bed.”
Fabrizio fled to Florence. As he had remained in hiding at Bologna, it was not till he reached Florence that he received all the duchess’s reproachful letters. She could not forgive him for coming to her concert, and not attempting to obtain speech of her. Fabrizio was delighted with Count Mosca’s letters; they breathed frank friendship and the noblest feelings. He guessed that the count had written to Bologna to dispel the suspicions of him which the duel might have caused. The police behaved with perfect justice. It reported that two strangers, only one of whom, the wounded man, was recognised (Count M⸺), had fought with rapiers in the presence of more than thirty peasants, joined, toward the end of the fight, by the village priest, who had unsuccessfully endeavoured to separate the combatants. As the name of Giuseppe Bossi had never been mentioned, Fabrizio ventured, before two months were out, to return to Bologna, more convinced than ever that he was fated never to make acquaintance with the noble and intellectual side of love. This he did himself the pleasure of explaining to the duchess, in very lengthy terms. He was very tired of his lonely life, and passionately longed to go back to the delightful evenings he had spent with his aunt and the count. He had not tasted the delights of good company since he had parted from them.
“I have brought so much worry upon myself on account of the love I had hoped to enjoy, and of the Fausta,” wrotehe to the duchess, “that now, if her fancy still turned my way, I would not ride twenty leagues to claim the fulfilment of her bond. Therefore, have no fear, as you say you have, that I may go to Paris, where I see she is appearing with the most brilliant success. I would ride any possible number of leagues to spend an evening with you and with the count, who is always so good to his friends.”
[5]Pietro Luigi, the first sovereign of the Farnese family, so famous for his virtues, was, as is well known, the natural son of Pope Paul III.
[5]Pietro Luigi, the first sovereign of the Farnese family, so famous for his virtues, was, as is well known, the natural son of Pope Paul III.
[5]Pietro Luigi, the first sovereign of the Farnese family, so famous for his virtues, was, as is well known, the natural son of Pope Paul III.
While Fabrizio was prosecuting his search for love in a village near Parma, Rassi, all unconscious of his vicinity, continued dealing with the young man’s case as if it had been that of a Liberal. He pretended it was impossible to find any witnesses for the defence, or rather, he browbeat those he did find. Finally, after protracted and skilful labour, lasting nearly a year, the Marchesa Raversi, one Friday evening some two months after Fabrizio’s last visit to Bologna, publicly announced in her drawing-room—that on the very next day young Del Dongo’s sentence, which had been pronounced just an hour before, would be presented for the prince’s signature, and would receive his approval.
Within a very few minutes the duchess was apprised of her enemy’s announcement. “The count’s agents must serve him very ill,” said she to herself. “Even this morning he thought the sentence could not be pronounced for another week. It would not break his heart, perhaps, to see my young grand vicar banished from Parma. But,” she added, and she began to sing, “we shall see him come back, and he will be our archbishop some day!” The duchess rang the bell. “Call all the servants together into the anteroom,” said she to her footman, “even the cooks. Go to the commandant of the fortress and get a permit from him for four post-horses, and see that those same horses are harnessed to my carriage before half an hour is out.” All the waiting-women in the house were busy packing trunks, the duchess hurriedly slipped on a travelling dress—all this without sending any warning to the count. The idea of making sport of him a little filled her with delight.
“My friends,” she said to the servants, who were now assembled, “I have just heard that my poor nephew is aboutto be sentenced, by default, for having had the impudence to defend his life against a madman. It was Giletti who would have killed him. You have all of you had opportunities of seeing how gentle and inoffensive Fabrizio is by nature. Infuriated, as I have a right to be, by this vile insult, I start instantly for Florence. I leave each of you ten years’ wages. If you fall into difficulties, write to me, and as long as I have a sequin, there will be something for you.”
The duchess thought exactly what she said, and at her last words, her servants burst into tears. Her own eyes were wet, and she added, in a voice that trembled with emotion, “Pray to God for me, and for Monsignore del Dongo, chief grand vicar of the diocese, who will be sentenced to-morrow morning to the galleys, or, which would be less ridiculous, to the penalty of death.”
The servants’ tears fell faster, and their sobs changed by degrees into shouts that were almost seditious. The duchess entered her coach, and had herself driven to the prince’s palace. In spite of the unwonted hour, she requested General Fontana, the aide-de-camp in waiting, to beg the prince to grant her an audience. The aide-de-camp observed, with great astonishment, that she was not in full court dress. As for the prince, he was not the least surprised, and even less displeased, by the request for an audience. “Now we shall see tears shed by lovely eyes,” said he to himself, rubbing his hands. “She comes to sue for mercy; this proud beauty is going to humble herself at last. And, indeed, she was quite unbearable, with her little airs of independence. Whenever the smallest thing displeased her, those speaking eyes seemed always to tell me ‘it would be far pleasanter to live at Naples, or at Milan, than in your little town of Parma.’ It is true I do not reign over Naples, nor over Milan, but at any rate this fine lady is coming to beg me for something which depends on me alone, and which she pines to obtain. I have always thought that the nephew’s arrival would help me to get something out of her.”
While the prince was smiling at his own thoughts, and indulging in these pleasing forecasts, he kept walking upand down his study, at the door of which General Fontana still stood, upright and stiff, like a soldier shouldering arms. When he saw the prince’s shining eyes and recollected the duchess’s travelling garments, he felt convinced the monarchy was about to drop to pieces, and his astonishment exceeded all limits when he heard the prince address him thus: “You will ask the duchess to be good enough to wait for a quarter of an hour or so.” The aide-de-camp turned to the right about, like a soldier on parade, and the prince smiled again. “Fontana is not accustomed,” said he to himself, “to see the haughty duchess kept waiting. His face of astonishment when he tells her to wait for a quarter of an hour will pave the way for the affecting tears that will shortly be shed in this study.” That quarter of an hour was an exquisite one to the prince. He walked up and down, with steady and even step; he reigned in very deed. “It is important that nothing should be said which is not perfectly correct. Whatever may be my feelings toward the duchess, I must not forget that she is one of the greatest ladies of my court. How did Louis XIV address the princesses, his daughters, when he had reason to be displeased with them?” and his glance lingered on the great king’s portrait.
The comical thing was that the prince never thought of asking himself whether he should show mercy to Fabrizio, and what kind of mercy he should extend. At last, after the lapse of twenty minutes, the faithful Fontana appeared once more at the door, this time without saying a word. “The Duchess Sanseverina is permitted to enter,” exclaimed the prince, with a theatrical air. “Now the tears will begin,” said he, and as though to prepare himself for the sight, he pulled out his own handkerchief.
Never had the duchess looked so active or so pretty; she did not seem more than five-and-twenty. When the poor aide-de-camp saw her float across the carpet which her light foot hardly appeared to touch, he very nearly lost his head altogether. “I have all sorts of apologies to make your Most Serene Highness,” said the duchess in her clear blithe voice. “I’ve taken the liberty of presenting myselfin a dress which is not exactly correct, but your Highness has so accustomed me to your kindnesses, that I have dared to hope you would grant me this favour.”
The duchess spoke rather slowly, so as to give herself time to enjoy the expression of the prince’s countenance, which was exquisite, by reason of his overwhelming astonishment and the remains of pomposity still indicated by the pose of his head and the position of his arms. The prince was thunder-struck. Every now and then he exclaimed almost inarticulately, in his little shrill, unsteady voice, “What! what!”
When the duchess had come to the end of her speech, she paused respectfully, as though to give him an opportunity of replying. Then she continued, “I venture to hope your Most Serene Highness will pardon the incongruity of my costume,” but even as she spoke the words, her mocking eyes shot out such brilliant shafts that the prince could not endure their glance. He stared at the ceiling, which, in his case, was always a sign of the most extreme embarrassment.
“What! what!” said he again. Then he was lucky enough to think of a remark.
“Duchess, pray be seated,” and he himself offered her a chair, and with considerable grace. The duchess was not unmoved by this politeness, and her indignant glance softened.
“What! what!” repeated the prince once more, fidgeting in his chair as though he could not settle himself firmly into it.
“I am going to take advantage of the coolness of the night hours to travel by post,” continued the duchess, “and as my absence may be of considerable duration, I would not leave your Most Serene Highness’s dominions without thanking you for all the kindness you have condescended to show me during the last five years.” At these words the prince understood at last, and turned pale. No man in the world suffered more than he, at the idea of having been mistaken in his forecast, but he took on an air of majesty quite worthy of the picture of Louis XIV which hung infront of him. “Ah, very good,” thought the duchess; “this is a man.”
“And what may be the reason of this sudden departure?” said the prince in a fairly steady voice.
“The plan is an old one,” replied the duchess, “and a petty insult which is being put on Monsignore del Dongo, who is to be sentenced either to death or to the galleys to-morrow, has hastened my departure.”
“And to what town do you proceed?”
“To Naples, I think.” Then, rising, she added: “All that now remains for me to do is to take leave of your Most Serene Highness, and to thank you, most humbly, for yourformerkindnesses.” Her tone was now so resolute that the prince clearly perceived that in two seconds everything would be over. Once the rupture of her departure had taken place, he knew any arrangement would be hopeless. She was not a woman to undo what she had once done. He hurried after her.
“But you know very well, duchess,” he said, taking her hand, “that I have always liked you, and that if you had chosen, that affection would have borne another name. A murder has been committed; that can not be denied. I employed my best judges to carry on the trial——”
At these words the duchess drew herself up to her full height. Like a flash every semblance of respect and even of urbanity disappeared. The offended woman stood unveiled before him, and an offended woman speaking to a being whom she knew to be false. With an expression of the liveliest anger and even scorn, she addressed the prince, laying stress on every word:
“I am leaving your Most Serene Highness’s dominions forever, so that I may never again hear the names of Rassi and of the other vile assassins who have passed sentence of death on my nephew, and on so many others. If your Most Serene Highness does not desire to mingle a feeling of bitterness with the memory of the last moments I have to spend in the presence of a prince who is both courteous and witty, when he is not deceived, I very humbly beseech your Highness not to remind me of those shameless judgeswho sell themselves for a decoration, or for a thousand crowns.” The ring of nobility, and above all of truth, in her words, made the prince shiver. For a moment he feared his dignity might be compromised by a yet more direct accusation. But on the whole, his sensation soon became one of pleasure. He admired the duchess; her whole person, at that moment, breathed a beauty that was sublime. “Good God, how beautiful she is!” said the prince to himself; “something must be forgiven to such a woman—there is probably not another like her in Italy.… Well, with a little careful policy, I may not find it impossible to make her my mistress some day. Such a creature would be very different from that doll-faced Balbi, who steals at least three hundred thousand francs a year from my poor subjects into the bargain.… But did I hear aright?” thought he suddenly. “She said, ‘sentenced my nephew and so many others’!” Then rage got the upper hand, and it was with a haughtiness worthy of his supreme position that the prince said, after a silence, “And what must be done to prevent the duchess from departing?”
“Something of which you are not capable,” replied the duchess, and the most bitter irony and the most open scorn rang in her voice.
The prince was beside himself, but the habit of reigning with absolute authority had brought him strength to resist his first impulses. “I must possess this woman,” thought he; “I owe it to myself. And then I must kill her with my scorn. If she leaves this study I shall never see her again.” But wild as he was, at that moment, with rage and hatred, how was he to pitch on a phrase which would at once fulfil what was due to himself, and induce the duchess not to forsake his court that instant? “A gesture,” thought he, “can neither be repeated nor turned into ridicule,” and he put himself between the duchess and the door of the room. Soon after he heard somebody tapping at the door. “Who is the damned fellow,” he exclaimed, swearing with all the strength of his lungs, “who is the damned fellow who wants to intrude his idiotic person here?” Poor General Fontana put in a pale and completely puzzled countenance.With a face like the face of a dying man he murmured inarticulately, “His Excellency Count Mosca craves the honour of an audience.”
“Let him come in,” shouted the prince, and as Mosca bowed before him, “Well,” said he, “here is the Duchess Sanseverina, who says she is instantly leaving Parma to go and settle in Naples, and who has been making impertinent remarks to me into the bargain.”
“What!” said Mosca.
“What! You knew nothing about the plan of departure?”
“Not a single word. When I left the duchess at six o’clock she was cheerful and gay.” The words produced an incredible effect upon the prince. First of all he looked at Mosca, whose increasing pallor proved that he had spoken the truth, and had nothing to do with the duchess’s sudden freak. “In that case,” said he to himself, “she is lost to me forever. My pleasure and my vengeance both fly away together. At Naples she and her nephew Fabrizio will write epigrams on the mighty rages of the little Prince of Parma.” Then he looked at the duchess; the most violent scorn and anger were struggling in her breast, her eyes were riveted on Count Mosca, and the delicate lines of her beautiful mouth expressed the bitterest disdain. Her whole expression seemed to say “Cringing courtier!”
“Thus,” thought the prince after having scrutinized her, “I have lost the means of recalling her to my country. Once more, if she leaves the study at this moment, she is lost to me. God only knows what she will say about my judges at Naples. And with the wit and divine powers of persuasion Heaven has given her, she will make everybody believe her. Thanks to her, I shall bear the reputation of an undignified tyrant, who gets up in the night to look under his bed.” Then, by a skilful manœuvre, as if he were walking about to calm his agitation, the prince once more placed himself in front of the study door. The count was at his right, some three paces off, pale, discomposed, and trembling to such an extent that he was obliged to support himself by leaning on the back of the arm-chair whichthe duchess had occupied during the beginning of the audience, and which the prince had pushed away with an angry gesture.
The count was in love. “If the duchess goes,” he was saying to himself, “I shall follow her. But will she allow me to follow her? That is the question.” On the prince’s left the duchess stood erect, her arms folded tightly across her bosom, superbly angry, watching him. The brilliant colour which had lately flushed her beautiful face had faded into the deepest pallor. The prince’s face, unlike those of the other two actors in the scene, was red, and he looked worried. His left hand convulsively jerked the cross fastened to the ribbon of his order, which he wore under his coat; his right hand caressed his chin.
“What is to be done?” said he to the count, hardly knowing what he said, and carried away by his habit of consulting Mosca about everything.
“Truly I know not, your Most Serene Highness,” said the count, like a man who was breathing out his last sigh; he could hardly speak the words. The tone of his voice was the first consolation to his wounded pride which the prince had enjoyed during the audience, and this small piece of good fortune inspired him with a remark that was very grateful to his vanity.
“Well,” said he, “I am the most sensible of us three. I am willing to completely overlook my own position in the world. I shall speakas a friend,” and he added, with a noble smile of condescension—a fine imitation of the good old times of Louis XIV—“as afriend speaking to his friends. Duchess,” he added, “what must I do to induce you to forget this untimely decision?”
“Truly, I know not,” said the duchess with a great sigh; “truly I know not, so hateful is Parma to me.” There was not the smallest epigrammatic intention in her words; her sincerity was quite evident. The count turned sharply toward her; his courtier’s soul was horrified. Then he cast a beseeching glance toward the prince. The prince paused for a moment; then, turning with great dignity and calmness to the count, “I see,” said he, “that your charming friendis quite beside herself; that is quite natural—sheadoresher nephew.” Then to the duchess—speaking in the most gallant manner, and at the same time with the sort of air with which a man quotes the key word of a comedy—he added, “What must I do to find favour in those fair eyes?”
The duchess had had time to reflect. In a slow and steady voice, as if she had been dictating her ultimatum, she replied: “Your Highness would write me a gracious letter, such as you so well know how to write, in which you would say that, not being convinced of the guilt of Fabrizio del Dongo, chief grand vicar to the archbishop, you will not sign the sentence when it is presented to you, and that these unjust proceedings shall have no further effect.”
“What! unjust?” said the prince, reddening up to the whites of his eyes and falling into a rage again.
“That is not all,” replied the duchess with all the dignity of a Roman matron. “This very evening, and,” she added, looking at the clock, “it is already a quarter past eleven—this very evening your Most Serene Highness would send word to the Marchesa Raversi that you advise her to go to the country to recover from the fatigue which a certain trial, of which she was talking in her drawing-room early this evening, must doubtless have caused her.”
The prince was raging up and down his study like a fury.
“Did any one ever see such a woman?” he cried. “She actually fails in respect to my person!”
The duchess replied with the most perfect grace: “Never in my life did it enter my head to fail in respect to your Most Serene Highness. Your Highness was so extremely condescending as to say that you would speakas a friend to his friends. And, indeed, I have no desire to remain in Parma,” she added, shooting a glance of the most ineffable scorn at the count. That glance decided the prince, who had been hitherto very uncertain in his mind, although his words might have been taken to indicate an undertaking,—but words meant little to him.
A few more remarks were exchanged, but at last Count Mosca received orders to write the gracious note for which the duchess had asked. He omitted the sentence: “Theseunjust proceedings shall have no further effect.” “It will be quite enough,” said the count to himself, “if the prince promises not to sign the sentence when it is presented to him.” As the prince signed the paper he thanked him with a glance.
The count made a great blunder. The prince was tired out, and he would have signed everything. He flattered himself he had got through the scene very well, and the whole matter was overshadowed in his mind by the thought, “If the duchess goes away the court will grow tiresome to me in less than a week.” The count noticed that his master had corrected the date, and inserted that of the next day. He glanced at the clock; it was almost midnight. The correction only struck the minister as a proof of the prince’s pedantic desire to show his exactness and careful government. As to the exile of the Marchesa Raversi, he made no difficulty at all. The prince took a particular delight in banishing people.
“General Fontana!” he called out, half opening the door. The general appeared, wearing a face of such astonishment and curiosity that a swift glance of amusement passed between the count and the duchess, and in that glance, peace was made between them.
“General Fontana,” said the prince, “you will get into my carriage, which is waiting under the colonnade, you will go to the Marchesa Raversi’s house, you will send up your name. If she is in bed you will add that you come from me, and when you reach her room, you will say these exact words, and no others: ‘Signora Marchesa Raversi, his Most Serene Highness invites you to depart to-morrow, before eight o’clock in the morning, to your castle at Velleia. His Highness will inform you when you may return to Parma.’” The prince’s eyes sought those of the duchess, who, without thanking him, as he had expected, made him an exceedingly respectful courtesy, and went swiftly out of the room.
“What a woman!” said the prince, turning toward Count Mosca.
The count, who was delighted at the Marchesa Raversi’sexile, which immensely facilitated all his ministerial actions, talked for a full half-hour, like the consummate courtier he was; his great object was to heal the sovereign’s vanity, and he did not take leave until he had thoroughly convinced him that there was no finer page in the anecdotic history of Louis XIV than that which he had just furnished for his own future historians.
When the duchess got home she closed her doors, and gave orders that nobody was to be admitted—not even the count. She wanted to be alone, and to make up her mind as to what she ought to think of the scene that had just taken place. She had acted at random, just as her fancy led her at the moment. But whatever step she might have been carried away into undertaking, she would have adhered to it steadily. She never would have blamed herself, and much less repented, when her coolness had returned. It was to these characteristics that she owed the fact that she was still, at six-and-thirty years of age, the prettiest woman at the court.
At that moment she was dreaming over all the charms Parma might possess, as she might have done on her way back there, after a long absence, so sure had she been, from nine to eleven o’clock, that she was about to leave the city forever.
“That poor dear count did cut a comical figure when he heard of my departure in the prince’s presence! He really is a charming fellow, and one does not come across such a heart as his every day. He would have resigned all his portfolios to follow me. But, then, for five whole years he has never once had to complain of any want of attention on my part. How many regularly married women could say the same to their lord and master? I must admit there is no self-importance nor pedantry about him; he never makes me feel I should like to deceive him. He always seems ashamed of his power when he is with me. How droll he looked before his lord and master! If he were here I would kiss him. But nothing on earth would induce me to undertake the task of amusing a minister who has lost his portfolio. That is an illness which nothing but death cancure, and which kills other folks. What a misfortune it must be to be a minister when you are young! I must write to him. He must know this thing officially before he quarrels with his prince. But I was forgetting my poor servants.”
The duchess rang the bell. Her women were still busy filling trunks, the carriage was standing underneath the portico, and the men were packing it. All the servants who had no work to do were standing round the carriage with tearful eyes. Cecchina, the only person allowed to enter the duchess’s room on solemn occasions, informed her mistress of all these details.
“Send them upstairs,” said the duchess. A moment later she herself went into the anteroom. “I have received a promise,” said she, addressing them, “that the sentence against my nephew will not be signed by the sovereign” (the Italian mode of expression). “I have put off my departure. We shall see whether my enemies have enough credit to get this decision altered.”
There was silence for a moment. Then the servants began to shout “Long live our lady the duchess!” and clapped their hands furiously. The duchess, who had retired into the next room, reappeared, like a popular actress, dropped a little graceful courtesy to her people, and said, “My friends, I thank you.” At that moment, on the slightest hint from her, they would all have marched in a body to attack the palace. She beckoned to one of her postillions, a former smuggler, and most trusty servant, who followed her out.
“You must dress yourself as a well-to-do peasant, you must get out of Parma as best you can; then hire asediola, and get to Bologna as quickly as possible. You will enter Bologna, as if you were taking an ordinary walk, by the Florence gate, and you will deliver a packet, which Cecchina will give you, to Fabrizio, who is living at the Pellegrino. Fabrizio is in hiding there, and calls himself Signor Giuseppe Bossi. Do not betray him by any imprudence; do not appear to know him. My enemies may set spies upon your heels. Fabrizio will send you back here in afew hours, or a few days. It is on your way back, especially, that you must be careful not to betray him.”
“Ah, the Marchesa Raversi’s servants, you mean,” exclaimed the postillion. “We’re ready for them, and if it were the signora’s will they should soon be exterminated.”
“Some day, perhaps. But for your life beware of doing anything without my orders.” It was the copy of the prince’s note that the duchess wanted to send to Fabrizio. She could not deny herself the pleasure of amusing him, and she added a few words concerning the scene of which the note had been the outcome. These few words swelled into a letter of ten pages. She sent for the postillion again. “You can not start,” she said, “until four o’clock, when the gates open.”
“I thought I would get out by the main sewer; the water would be up to my chin, but I could get through.”
“No,” said the duchess. “I will not let one of my most faithful servants run the risk of a fever. Do you know any one in the archbishop’s household?”
“The second coachman is a friend of mine.”
“Here is a letter for the holy prelate; slip quietly into his palace, and have yourself taken to his valet—I would not have his Grace disturbed. If he is already shut up in his own room, spend the night at the palace, and as he always gets up at daybreak, send in to-morrow at four o’clock, say you have been sent by me, ask the holy archbishop’s blessing, give him this packet, and take the letters he may possibly give you to Bologna.” The duchess was sending the archbishop the original of the prince’s letter, requesting him, as the note concerned his chief grand vicar, to place it among the archiepiscopal archives, where she hoped her nephew’s colleagues, the other grand vicars and canons, would take note of its existence—all this under seal of the most profound secrecy.
The duchess wrote to Monsignore Landriani in a style of familiarity which was certain to delight that worthy man; her signature took up three lines. The letter, couched in the most friendly terms, ended with the words:
“Angelina Cornelia Isola Valserra del Dongo, Duchess Sanseverina.”
“I don’t believe I have written my name in full,” said the duchess, laughing, “since I signed my marriage contract with the poor duke. But it is trifles such as these that impress people, and common folk take caricature for beauty.”
She could not resist winding up her evening by yielding to the temptation of writing a tormenting letter to the poor count. She announced to him,officially, andfor his guidance, so she expressed it,in his intercourse with crowned heads, that she did not feel herself equal to the task of entertaining a disgraced minister. “You are afraid of the prince,” she wrote. “When you can no longer see him, shall you expect me to frighten you?” She despatched the letter instantly.
The prince, on his side, sent, at seven o’clock the next morning, for Count Zurla, Minister of the Interior, and said: “Give fresh and most stringent orders to everypodestàto arrest Fabrizio del Dongo. I hear there is some chance that he may venture to reappear in my dominions. The fugitive is at Bologna, where he seems to brave the action of our law courts. You will therefore place police officers who are personally acquainted with his appearance: 1. In the villages on the road from Bologna to Parma. 2. In the neighbourhood of the Duchess Sanseverina’s house at Sacca and her villa at Castelnovo. 3. All round Count Mosca’s country-house. I venture, Count, to rely on your great wisdom to conceal all knowledge of your sovereign’s orders from discovery by Count Mosca. Understand clearly that I will have Fabrizio del Dongo arrested.”
As soon as this minister had departed, Rassi, the chief justice, entered the prince’s study by a secret door, and came forward, bent well-nigh double, and bowing at every step. The rascal’s face was a study for a painter, worthy of all the vileness of the part he played, and while the swift and disturbed glance of his eye betrayed his consciousness of his own value, the grinning expression of arrogant self-confidence upon his lips showed that he knew how to struggle against scorn.
As this individual is destined to exert great influence over Fabrizio’s fate, I may say a word of him here. He was tall, with fine and very intelligent eyes, but his face was seamed by small-pox. As for intelligence, he had plenty of it, and of the sharpest. His thorough knowledge of legal matters was uncontested, but his strongest point was his resourcefulness. Whatever might be the aspect of a matter, he always, with the greatest ease and in the shortest space of time, discovered the most logical and well-founded means of obtaining a sentence or an acquittal. He was, above all things, a past master in attorney’s tricks.
This man, whose services mighty monarchs would have envied the Prince of Parma, had only one great passion—to talk familiarly with exalted personages, and entertain them with buffooneries. Little did he care whether the great man laughed at what he said, or at his own person, or even made disgusting jokes about his wife. So long as he saw him laugh, and was himself treated with familiarity, he was content. Sometimes, when the prince had exhausted all possible means of belittling his chief justice’s dignity, he would kick him heartily. If the kicks hurt him, the chief justice would cry. But the instinct of buffoonery was so strong in him that he continued to prefer the drawing-room of a minister who scoffed at him, to his own, where he held despotic sway over the whole legal profession. Rassi had made himself quite a peculiar position, owing to the fact that not the most insolent noble in the country could humiliate him. His vengeance for the insults showered on him all the day long consisted in retailing them to the prince, to whom he had acquired the privilege of saying everything. It is true that the prince’s answer frequently consisted in a hearty box on the ear, which hurt him horribly, but to that he never took exception. The presence of the chief justice distracted the prince’s thoughts in his hours of bad temper, and he would then amuse himself by ill treating him. My readers will perceive that Rassi was almost the perfect man for a court. He had no honour and no humour.
“Secrecy, above all things!” exclaimed the prince, withoutany recognition of his salutation. The most courteous of men, as a rule, he treated Rassi like the merest varlet. “What is the date of your sentence?”
“Yesterday morning, your Most Serene Highness.”
“How many of the judges signed it?”
“All five.”
“And the penalty?”
“Twenty years in the fortress, as your Most Serene Highness told me.”
“A death sentence would have horrified people,” said the prince, as though talking to himself. “A pity! What a shock it would have been to that woman! But he is a Del Dongo, and the name is honoured in Parma because of the three archbishops who came almost one after the other.… Twenty years in the fortress, you say?”
“Yes, your Most Serene Highness,” replied Rassi, who was still standing doubled up in an attitude of obeisance. “To be preceded by a public apology before a portrait of your Most Serene Highness; and besides, a fast of bread and water every Friday and on the eves of all the chief feast days, because ofthe prisoner’s notorious impiety. This with a view to the future, and to break the neck of his career.”
“Write,” said the prince, “‘His Most Serene Highness, having deigned to grant a favourable hearing to the very humble petitions of the Marchesa del Dongo, mother of the culprit, and the Duchess Sanseverina, his aunt, who have represented that at the period of the crime their son and nephew was very young, and carried away by his mad passion for the wife of the unfortunate Giletti, has condescended, notwithstanding his horror of the murder, to commute the penalty to which Fabrizio del Dongo has been condemned to that of twelve years’ detention in the fortress.’
“Give the paper to me to sign.” The prince added his signature and the date of the preceding day. Then, handing the sheet back to Rassi, he said: “Write just below my signature: ‘The Duchess Sanseverina having once more cast herself at his Highness’s feet, the prince has granted theculprit permission to walk for an hour, every Thursday, on the platform of the square tower, vulgarly called the Farnese Tower.’
“Sign that,” said the prince, “and keep your lips sealed, whatever you may hear in the town. You will tell Councillor de’ Capitani, who voted for two years’ imprisonment, and even held forth in support of his ridiculous opinion, that I advise him to read over the laws and regulations. Now, silence again, and good-night to you.”
Chief-Justice Rassi made three deep bows, very slowly indeed, and the prince never even looked at them.
All this happened at seven o’clock in the morning. A few hours later, the news of the Marchesa Raversi’s exile had spread all over the town and thecafés. Everybody was talking at once about the great event. For some time, thanks to the marchesa’s banishment, that implacable enemy of small cities and small courts, known as boredom, fled from the town of Parma. General Fabio Conti, who had believed himself sure of the ministry, pretended he had the gout, and never showed his nose outside his fortress for several days. The middle class, and consequently the populace, concluded from current events that the prince had resolved to confer the archbishopric of Parma on Monsignore del Dongo. The more cunningcafépoliticians went so far as to declare that Archbishop Landriani had been invited to feign serious illness, and send in his resignation. He was to be compensated with a large pension, charged on the tobacco duties. They were quite certain of this. The rumour reached the archbishop, who was very much disturbed, and for some days his zeal in our hero’s cause was largely paralyzed in consequence. Some two months later, this fine piece of news appeared in the Paris press, with the trifling alteration that it was Count Mosca, the Duchess Sanseverina’s nephew, who was supposed to be likely to be appointed archbishop.
Meanwhile the Marchesa Raversi was raging at her country house at Velleia. There was nothing womanish about her. She was not one of those weak creatures who fancy they slake their vengeance when they pour out violentdiatribes against their enemies. The very day after her disgrace, Cavaliere Riscara and three other friends of hers waited on the prince, and sued permission to go and see her in her country place. His Highness received these gentlemen with the utmost graciousness, and their arrival at Velleia was a great consolation to the marchesa.
Before the second week was out she had gathered quite thirty persons about her—all those who would have obtained office in the Liberal government. Every evening the marchesa sat in council with the best-informed of her adherents. One day, when she had received numerous letters from Parma and Bologna, she retired at a very early hour. Her favourite waiting-woman introduced to her presence first of all her acknowledged lover, Count Baldi, a young man of great beauty and utter futility, and later on Cavaliere Riscara, who had been Baldi’s predecessor. This last was a short man, dusky, both physically and morally speaking, who had begun life by teaching geometry in the Nobles’ College at Parma, and was now a councillor of state, and knight of several orders.
“I have the good habit,” said the marchesa to the two men, “of never destroying any paper, and it serves me well now. Here are nine letters which the Sanseverina has written to me on various occasions. You will both of you start for Genoa; there, among the convicts at the galleys, you will seek out an ex-notary whose name is Burati, like the great Venetian poet, or, it may be, Durati. You, Count Baldi, will be pleased to sit down at my table, and write at my dictation:
“‘An idea has just struck me, and I send you a word. I am going to my hut near Castelnovo. If you like to come and spend twelve hours there with me, it will make me very happy. I do not think there is any great danger in this, after what has happened. The clouds are growing lighter. Nevertheless, stop before you go into Castelnovo. You will meet one of my servants on the road. They are all passionately devoted to you. Of course you will keep the name of Giuseppe Bossi for this little expedition. I am told you have a beard worthy of the most splendid Capuchin,and at Parma you have only been seen with the decent countenance of a grand vicar.’
“Do you understand, Riscara?”
“Perfectly. But the journey to Genoa is a quite unnecessary luxury. I know a man in Parma who has not been to the galleys yet, indeed, but who can not fail to get there. He will forge the Sanseverina’s handwriting in the most successful manner.”
At these words Count Baldi opened his fine eyes desperately wide. He was only beginning to understand.
“If you know this worthy gentleman at Parma, whose interests you hope to advance,” said the marchesa to Riscara, “he probably knows you too. His mistress, his confessor, his best friend, may be bought by the Sanseverina. I prefer to delay my little joke for a few days, and run no risk whatsoever. Start within two hours, like two good little lambs, don’t see a soul at Genoa, and come back as quickly as you can.” Cavaliere Riscara sped away, laughing, and talking through his nose like Pulcinello. “I must pack up,” he cried, cantering off with the most ludicrous gestures.
He wanted to leave Baldi alone with the fair lady. Five days later, Riscara brought the marchesa back her lover, very stiff and sore. To save six leagues, he had made him cross a mountain on mule-back. He swore nobody should ever catch him making a long journey again. Baldi brought the marchesa three copies of the letter she had dictated, and six others, in the same hand, of Riscara’s composition, and which might come in usefully later. One of these letters contained some very pleasing jokes about the prince’s terrors at night, and the deplorable thinness of his mistress, the Marchesa Balbi, who, so it declared, left a mark like that of a pair of tongs on the cushion of every arm-chair in which she sat. Anybody would have sworn these missives were all in the Duchess Sanseverina’s handwriting.
“Now,” said the marchesa, “I know, without any possibility of doubt, that the duchess’s best beloved, her Fabrizio, is at Bologna, or in the neighbourhood.”
“I am too ill,” interrupted Count Baldi. “I beseechyou to excuse me from making another journey, or, at all events, let me rest for a few days, and recover my health.”
“I will plead your cause,” said Riscara. He rose, and said something to the marchesa in an undertone.
“Very good; I consent to that,” she answered with a smile.
“Make your mind easy. You will not have to go away,” said the marchesa to Baldi, with a somewhat scornful look.
“Thanks,” he cried, and his tone was heartfelt. Riscara did, in fact, set off alone, in a post-chaise. He had hardly been two days at Bologna before he caught sight of Fabrizio and Marietta in a carriage. “The devil!” he cried. “Our future archbishop does not appear to deny himself any pleasure. This must be revealed to the duchess, who will be delighted.” All Riscara had to do, to discover Fabrizio’s residence, was to follow him there. The very next morning, the post brought the young man the letter of Genoese manufacture. He thought it a little short, but no idea of suspicion occurred to him. The idea of seeing the duchess and the count again sent him frantic with delight, and in spite of all Ludovico’s remonstrances, he hired a post-horse and started off at a hard gallop. All unknown to himself, he was followed by Riscara, who, when he reached the posting-station before Castelnovo, about six leagues from Parma, had the pleasure of seeing a crowd collected in the square in front of the local prison. Its doors had just closed upon our hero, who had been recognised, as he was changing horses, by two myrmidons of the law, chosen and sent out by Count Zurla.
Riscara’s small eyes twinkled with delight. With the most exemplary patience, he verified every incident connected with the affair that had just taken place in the little village, and then sent off a messenger to the marchesa Raversi. After which, by dint of walking about the streets as though to visit the church—a very interesting building—and to hunt up a picture by Parmegiano which, he had heard, existed in that neighbourhood, he contrived to come across thepodestà, who hastened to pay his respects to a councillor of state. Riscara appeared surprised that thepodestàhad not despatched the conspirator, on whom he had so luckily laid his hand, straight to the citadel.
“There is some risk,” Riscara added unconcernedly, “that his many friends, who were out looking for him yesterday, to help him to get across the dominions of his Most Serene Highness, might meet the gendarmes. There were quite twelve or fifteen of the rebels, all mounted.”
“Intelligenti pauca!” exclaimed thepodestà, with a knowing look.
Two hours later, poor unlucky Fabrizio, securely handcuffed, and fastened by a long chain to his ownsediola, into which he had been thrust, started for the citadel at Parma, under the guard of eight gendarmes. These men had been ordered to collect all the gendarmes stationed in the villages through which the procession might pass as they went along, and thepodestàhimself attended the important prisoner. Toward seven o’clock in the evening thesediola, escorted by all the little boys in Parma, and guarded by thirty gendarmes, was driven across the beautiful promenade, past the little palace in which the Fausta had lived a few months previously, and stopped before the outer gate of the citadel just as General Fabio Conti and his daughter were about to issue from it. The governor’s carriage stopped before reaching the drawbridge, to allow thesediolato which Fabrizio was bound to pass across it. The general at once shouted orders to close the citadel gate, and hastened down to the doorkeeper’s office to make inquiries. He was more than a little surprised when he recognised the prisoner, whose limbs had grown quite stiff from being bound to thesedioladuring the long journey. Four gendarmes had picked him up, and were carrying him to the jailer’s office. “It appears, then,” said the self-sufficient governor to himself, “that the celebrated Fabrizio del Dongo, the man to whom the best society in Parma has seemingly sworn to devote its whole thoughts for the past year, is in my power.”
The general had met him a score of times—at court, in the duchess’s house, and elsewhere—but he took good care to make no sign of recognition; he would have been afraid of compromising himself.
“Draw up a most circumstantial report of the prisoner’s delivery into my hands by the worthypodestàof Castelnovo,” he called out to the prison clerk.
Barbone, the clerk in question, a most alarming-looking person, with his huge beard and generally martial air, began to look even more self-important than usual; he might have been taken for a German jailer. Believing that it was the Duchess Sanseverina’s influence which had prevented his master, the governor, from becoming Minister of War, he was even more insolent than usual to this particular prisoner, addressing him in the second person plural, which, in Italy, is the tense used in speaking to servants. “I am a prelate of the Holy Roman Church,” said Fabrizio steadily, “and grand vicar of this diocese; my birth alone entitles me to respect.”
“I know nothing about that,” replied the clerk impudently. “Prove your assertions by producing the patents which give you a right to those highly respectable titles.” Fabrizio had no patents to show, and held his peace. General Fabio Conti, standing beside the clerk, watched him write without raising his own eyes to the prisoner’s face, so that he might not be obliged to say he really was Fabrizio del Dongo.
Suddenly Clelia Conti, who was waiting in the carriage, heard a terrible noise in the guard-room. Barbone, after writing an insolent and very lengthy description of the prisoner’s person, had ordered him to open his clothes, so that he might verify and note down the number and condition of the scratches he had received in his affair with Giletti.
“I can not,” said Fabrizio with a bitter smile. “I am not in a position to obey this gentleman’s orders; my handcuffs prevent it.”
“What!” cried the general; “the prisoner is handcuffed inside the fortress! That’s against the rules; there must be a distinct order. Take off the handcuffs!”
Fabrizio looked at him. “Here’s a pretty Jesuit,” thought he to himself; “for the last hour he has been looking at me in these handcuffs, which make me horriblyuncomfortable, and now he pretends to be astonished.”
The gendarmes at once removed the handcuffs. They had just found out that Fabrizio was the Duchess Sanseverina’s nephew, and lost no time in treating him with a honeyed politeness which contrasted strongly with the clerk’s rudeness. This seemed to annoy the clerk, and he said to Fabrizio, who had not moved:
“Now then, make haste. Show us those scratches poor Giletti gave you at the time of his murder.”
With a bound Fabrizio sprang upon the clerk, and gave him such a cuff that Barbone fell off his chair across the general’s legs. The gendarmes seized Fabrizio’s arms, but he did not move. The general himself, and the gendarmes who were close to him, hastily picked up the clerk, whose face was streaming with blood. Two others, who were standing a little farther off, ran to shut the office door, thinking the prisoner was trying to escape. The non-commissioned officer in command was convinced young Del Dongo could not make any very successful attempt at flight, seeing he was now actually within the citadel, but at any rate, with the instincts of his profession, and to prevent any scuffle, he moved over to the window. Opposite this open window, and about two paces from it, the general’s carriage was drawn up. Clelia had shrunk far back within it, so as to avoid witnessing the sad scene that was being enacted in the office. When she heard all the noise she looked out.
“What is happening?” said she to the officer.
“Signorina, it is young Fabrizio del Dongo, who has just cuffed that impudent rascal Barbone.”
“What! is it Signor del Dongo who is being taken to prison?”
“Why, there’s no doubt about that,” said the officer. “It’s on account of the poor fellow’s high birth that there is so much ceremony. I thought the signorina knew all about it.” Clelia continued to look out of the carriage window. Whenever the gendarmes round the table scattered a little she could see the prisoner.
“Who would have dreamed,” thought she, “when I met him on the road near the Lake of Como, that the very next time I saw him he would be in this sad position? He gave me his hand then, to help me into his mother’s coach. Even then he was with the duchess. Can their love story have begun at that time?”
My readers must be informed that the Liberal party, led by the Marchesa Raversi and General Conti, affected an absolute belief in the tender relations supposed to exist between Fabrizio and the duchess; and the gullibility of Count Mosca, whom it loathed, was a subject of never-ending pleasantry on its part.
“Well,” thought Clelia, “here he is a prisoner, and the captive of his enemies. For, after all, Count Mosca, even if one takes him to be an angel, must be delighted at seeing him caught.”
A peal of loud laughter burst forth in the guard-room.
“Jacopo,” said she to the officer, in a trembling voice, “what can be happening?”
“The general asked the prisoner angrily why he struck Barbone, and Monsignore Fabrizio answered very coldly: ‘He called me a murderer; let him show the patents which authorize him to give me that title,’ and then everybody laughed.”
Barbone’s place was taken by a jailer who knew how to write.
Clelia saw the clerk come out of the guard-room, mopping up the blood that streamed from his hideous face with his handkerchief; he was swearing like a trooper. “That d—d Fabrizio,” he shouted at the top of his voice, “shall die by no hand but mine! I’ll cheat the executioner of his job,” and so forth. He had stopped short between the guard-room window and the carriage to look at Fabrizio, and his oaths grew louder and deeper.
“Be off with you!” said the officer; “you’ve no business to swear in that way before the signorina.” Barbone raised his head to glance into the carriage; his eyes and Clelia’s met, and she could not restrain an exclamation of horror. She had never had so close a view of so vile a countenance.“He will kill Fabrizio,” said she to herself. “I must warn Don Cesare.”
This was her uncle, one of the most respected priests in the town. His brother, General Conti, had obtained him the appointment of steward and chief chaplain of the prison.
The general got back into the carriage. “Would you rather go home?” said he to his daughter, “or sit and wait for me, perhaps for a long time, in the courtyard of the palace? I must go and report all this to the sovereign.”
Fabrizio, escorted by the gendarmes, was just leaving the guard-room to go to the room allotted to him. Clelia was looking out of the carriage; the prisoner was quite near her. Just at that moment she answered her father’s question in these words: “I will go with you.” Fabrizio, hearing them spoken so close to him, raised his eyes, and met the young girl’s glance. The thing that struck him most was the expression of melancholy on her face. “How beautiful she has grown since we met at Como!” he thought. “What deep thoughtfulness in her expression! Those who compare her with the duchess are quite right. What an angelic face!”
Barbone, the gory clerk, who had his own reasons for keeping near the carriage, stopped the three gendarmes in charge of Fabrizio with a gesture, and then, slipping round the back of the carriage so as to get to the window on the general’s side, he said: “As the prisoner has used violence within the citadel, would it not be well to put the handcuffs on him for three days, by virtue of Article 157 of the regulations?”
“Go to the devil!” shouted the general, who saw difficulties ahead of him in connection with this arrest. He could not afford to drive either the duchess or Count Mosca to extreme measures, and besides, how was the count likely to take this business? After all, the murder of a man like Giletti was a mere trifle, and would have been nothing at all but for the intrigue that had been built upon it.
During this short dialogue, Fabrizio stood, a superb figure, amid the gendarmes. Nothing could exceed thepride and nobility of his mien. His delicate, well-cut features, and the scornful smile which hovered on his lips, contrasted delightfully with the common appearance of the gendarmes who stood round him. But all that, so to speak, was only the external part of his expression. Clelia’s celestial beauty transported him with delight, and his eyes spoke all his surprise. She, lost in thought, had not withdrawn her head from the window. He greeted her with the most deferential of half smiles, and then, after an instant—
“It strikes me, signorina, that some time ago, and near a lake, I had the honour of meeting you, attended by gendarmes.”
Clelia coloured, and was so confused that she could not find a word in reply. “How noble he looked among those rough men!” she had been saying to herself, just when he spoke to her. The deep pity, and we might almost say emotion, that overwhelmed her, deprived her of the presence of mind which should have helped her to discover an answer. She became aware of her own silence, and blushed still more deeply. Just at this moment the bolts of the great gate of the citadel were shot back with much noise. Had not his Excellency’s carriage been kept waiting for a minute at least? So great was the echo under the vaulted roof that even if Clelia had thought of any reply, Fabrizio would not have been able to hear her words.
Whirled away by the horses, which had broken into a gallop as soon as they had crossed the drawbridge, Clelia said to herself, “He must have thought me very absurd”; and then suddenly she added: “Not absurd only. He must have thought me a mean-souled creature. He must have fancied I did not return his salutation because he is a prisoner, and I am the governor’s daughter.”
This idea threw the high-minded young girl into despair. “What makes my behaviour altogether degrading,” she added, “is that when we first met, long ago, and also attended by gendarmes, as he said, it was I who was a prisoner, and he rendered me a service—and helped me out of a great difficulty. Yes, I must acknowledge it; my behaviour lacks nothing; it is full of vulgarity and ingratitude.Alas, for this poor young fellow! Now that misfortune has overtaken him, every one will be ungrateful to him. I remember he said to me then, ‘Will you remember my name at Parma?’ How he must despise me now! I might so easily have said a civil word. Yes, I must acknowledge it, my conduct to him has been abominable. But for his mother’s kindly offer to take me in her carriage, I should have had to walk after the gendarmes through the dust, or, which would have been far worse, to ride on horseback behind one of the men. Then it was my father who was arrested, and I who was defenceless. Yes, indeed, there is nothing lacking to my behaviour, and how bitterly such a being as he must have felt it! What a contrast between his noble face and my actions! what dignity! what composure! How like a hero he looked, surrounded by his vile enemies! I can understand the duchess’s passion for him now. If this is the effect he produces in the midst of a distressing event, which must lead to terrible results, what must he be when his heart is full of happiness?”
The governor’s carriage waited for more than an hour in the courtyard of the palace, and yet, when the general came down from the prince’s study, Clelia did not think he had stayed too long.
“What is his Highness’s will?” inquired Clelia.
“His lips said ‘imprisonment,’ but his eyes said ‘death.’”
“Death! Great God!” exclaimed Clelia.
“Come, come! hold your tongue,” said the general angrily. “What a fool I am to answer a child’s questions!”
Meanwhile Fabrizio had climbed the three hundred and eighty steps which led to the Farnese Tower, a new prison built at an immense height on the platform of the great tower. He never gave one thought—one distinct thought, at all events—to the great change which had just taken place in his life. “What eyes!” he kept saying to himself. “How much they express! what depths of pity! She seemed to be saying: ‘Life is such a vale of misery; don’t grieve too much over what happens to you. Are we not sent hereon earth to be unhappy?’ How those lovely eyes of hers gazed at me, even when the horses moved forward so noisily under the arch!”
Fabrizio was quite forgetting to be miserable.
That night Clelia accompanied her father to several great houses. In the earlier part of the evening nobody knew anything about the arrest of thegreat culprit—this was the name the courtiers bestowed on the rash and unlucky young man only two hours later. That evening it was noticed that Clelia’s face showed more animation than usual. Now animation, the air of taking an interest in what was going on about her, was the one thing generally wanting to this beautiful creature. When comparisons were drawn between her beauty and that of the duchess, it was this unmoved appearance, this look of being above everything, which turned the scale in her rival’s favour. In England or France, the homes of vanity, this opinion would probably have been completely reversed. Clelia Conti was a young girl, too slight as yet to permit of her being compared to Guido’s exquisite figures; we will not conceal the fact that, according to the rules of antique beauty, her features were somewhat too strongly marked. Her lips, for instance, exquisitely graceful as their outline was, were somewhat too full.
The delightful peculiarity of her face, that shone with the artless charm and celestial impress of the noblest nature, was that, in spite of its rare and most extraordinary beauty, it bore no resemblance whatever to the heads of the old Greek statues. The beauty of the duchess, on the contrary, was almost too much on the lines of the recognised ideal, and her essentially Lombard type recalled the voluptuous smile and tender melancholy of Leonardo da Vinci’s pictures of the fair Herodias. While the duchess was sprightly, bubbling over with wit and merriment, interesting herself personally, if I may so say, in every subject which the current of conversation brought before her mental eye, Clelia, to an equal extent, was calm and slow to betray emotion—either because she scorned her surroundings, or because she regretted some absent dream. For a long time it hadbeen believed she would end by embracing the religious life. She was now twenty. She disliked going to balls, and when she did accompany her father to such gatherings, she did it in obedience to his command, and in order to serve the interests of his ambition.