XVIIIDon Agostino was quite right when he said that a little rest after walking since daybreak would be a good thing. Silvio, at any rate, found it so, for he very soon fell fast asleep in the room that had been prepared for him—so fast, indeed, that even the church-bells ringingmezzogiornodid not awaken him.Don Agostino, fearing for the omelette his house-keeper had already placed on the table as the first dish of the mid-day meal, had gone up-stairs to rouse his guest, and, receiving no response to his knock, had quietly entered the bedroom.Silvio was lying as he had flung himself on the bed, after having divested himself of most of his clothes. He lay on his back, with one arm under his head and the hand half-buried in the short, curly hair, in face and form resembling some Greek statue of a sleeping god, his well-made, graceful limbs relaxed, and his lips just parted in a slight smile.Don Agostino stood and watched him for a moment or two. It seemed a pity to rouse him—almost sacrilege to wake the statue into life."It is the Hermes of the Vatican," he said to himself, smiling—"the Hermes reposing after taking a message from the gods. Well, well, one must be young to sleep like that! I would let him sleep on, but then Ernana will say that the dinner is spoiled," and he laid his hand gently on Silvio's arm.Apparently the sleeper was more sensitive to touch than to sound, for he opened his eyes instantly, and then started up with a confused apology."It is I who should apologize for waking you," said Don Agostino; "but it is past twelve o'clock, and my housekeeper is a tyrant. She is afraid her dishes will be spoiled!"Silvio sprang from the bed. "I will be ready in a few minutes," he said; and before Don Agostino could beg him not to hurry himself, he had filled a basin with cold water, into which he plunged his face as a preliminary to further ablutions.In ten minutes he had rejoined Don Agostino in the little dining-room, and the two sat down to the dinner which Ernana had produced, not without some grumbling at the delay, which, she declared, had turned the omelette into a piece of donkey's hide.Silvio did ample justice to her cookery, however, and indeed Don Agostino's house-keeper looked with scarcely concealed admiration and approval at him as she served the various dishes. She also wondered what thisbel giovanottowas doing at Montefiano, and several times came very near to asking him the question, being only restrained therefrom by the thought that she would learn all she wanted to know from Don Agostino so soon as the visitor should have departed.After dinner, Don Agostino produced a bottle of old wine—such wine as seldom comes to the market in Italy, and which, could it only travel, would put the best French vintages to shame. Ernana served the coffee and then departed to her kitchen, and Don Agostino proceeded to prepare cigars by duly roasting the ends in the flame of a candle before handing one of them to his guest to smoke."And so," he observed, presently, "you actually live in the Palazzo Acorari at Rome. Your father, no doubt, knows the princess and Donna Bianca?"Silvio shook his head. "No," he replied. "You must remember—" he added, and then paused, abruptly.Don Agostino blew a ring of smoke into the air."What must I remember?" he asked, smiling at Silvio's obvious embarrassment."You know my father's opinions," continued Silvio, "and perhaps you have read some of his works. He is not—I speak with all respect—of theNeri, and Princess Montefiano is, they say, a very good Catholic."Don Agostino laughed. "Ah, I forgot," he said. "No, I never looked upon your father as a good Catholic. It really was never any business of mine whether he was so or not. But the princess—yes, I believe she is very strict in her opinions, and your father is, very naturally, not beloved by the Vatican party."Silvio glanced at him. "You have read his books, Don Agostino?" he asked."Certainly I have read them—all of them.""And yet you continue to regard him as a friend?"Don Agostino smiled. "Why not?" he asked. "I do not always agree with his conclusions on certain subjects. If I did, I should not wear this dress; it would be to me as the shirt of Nessus. But is it necessary always to agree with one's friends? I think the best friends and the best lovers are those who know how to disagree. However, we were talking of Princess Montefiano. I can quite understand that she would not desire to be on friendly terms with Professor Rossano.""Or with any of his family," added Silvio, bluntly.Don Agostino gave him a scrutinizing glance."Ah," he said, "you mean that she visits the sins of the father upon the son."Silvio hesitated. There was something very sympathetic about this priest—something that seemed to ask, almost to plead, for his trust and confidence. And yet could he, knowing so little of him, dare to confide to him why he was in the neighborhood of Montefiano? Certainly this Don Agostino was a friend of his father, and, as such, might be disposed to help him. Moreover, Silvio could not help seeing that his host was disposed to like him for his own sake, and that for some reason or other there was a current of sympathy between them, though as yet they were almost strangers to each other.Perhaps Don Agostino observed his companion's hesitation, for he spoke again, and this time it was to ask a question which did not tend to diminish it."I suppose," he said, "that you have seen Donna Bianca Acorari? I do not ask you if you know her personally, after what you have just told me; but no doubt, as you live under the same roof, so to speak, you know her by sight?"Silvio felt the color rising in his face, and felt, too, that Don Agostino's eyes were fixed upon him with a strange intensity. Could it be, he wondered, that the priest suspected the truth, or had, perhaps, been warned about him by the princess herself? The thought was a disagreeable one, for it made him mistrust his host's good faith, as Don Agostino had distinctly denied any acquaintance with Princess Montefiano. The expression of Don Agostino's face puzzled him. It spoke of pain, as well as of curiosity, and he seemed to be anxiously hanging upon the answer to his question. That the priest should be curious, Silvio could well understand, but there was no apparent reason why Bianca Acorari's name should call forth that look of pain on his countenance."Yes," Silvio replied, guardedly. "I know Donna Bianca Acorari by sight, extremely well."Don Agostino leaned forward in his chair. "Ah," he exclaimed, eagerly, "you know her by sight! Tell me about her. I saw her once—once only—and then she was quite a little child. It was in Rome—years ago. She is, no doubt, grown into a beautiful girl by now."Silvio looked at him with surprise. The eagerness in his voice was unmistakable, but there was the same strange expression of pain on his face."But surely," he replied, "your reverence must have seen her here at Montefiano, or, at least, others must have seen her who could tell you about her?"Don Agostino shook his head. "Nobody has seen her since her arrival here," he said. "The castle is large, and the park behind it is very extensive. There is no reason why its inmates should ever come into thepaese, and they never do come into it.""But the servants—the household?""The servants were all brought from Rome. Most of the provisions also are sent from Rome. There is practically no communication with the town of Montefiano, and, except thefattore, I have heard of nobody who has been admitted inside the castle walls since the princess and Donna Bianca arrived.""It is very strange," said Silvio."Yes," returned Don Agostino, "it is certainly strange. But," he added, "you do not tell me of Donna Bianca—what she is like; whether she is beautiful, as beautiful as—" he stopped abruptly and passed his hand almost impatiently across his eyes, as though to shut out some vision."Beautiful?" repeated Silvio, in a low voice. "I do not know—yes, I suppose that she is beautiful—and—and— But why do you ask me?" he suddenly burst out, impetuously, and the hot color again mounted to his cheeks and brow.Don Agostino suddenly turned and looked at him keenly."Why should I not ask you?" he replied, quietly. "You have seen her," he added, "and I—I am interested in her. Oh, not because she is the Princess of Montefiano—that does not concern me at all—but—well, for other reasons."Silvio was silent. Indeed, he did not know how to answer. What he had just heard confirmed his suspicions that Bianca was practically isolated from the world, as though she were within the walls of a convent. He had asked in Montefiano about the castle and its inmates, and had learned absolutely nothing, save what might be implied by the shrugging of shoulders.Suddenly Don Agostino spoke again."And you?" he said, laying his hand for a moment on Silvio's—"forgive me if I am inquisitive—but you, also, are interested in Donna Bianca Acorari—is it not true?"Silvio started. "I!" he exclaimed.Don Agostino smiled. His agitation seemed to have passed, and he looked at the boy beside him searchingly, but very kindly."If I am mistaken," he repeated, "you must forgive me; but if I am not, I think that you will not regret telling me the truth."Silvio looked at him steadily."It is true," he said, slowly, "that I am interested in Donna Bianca—very much interested. You have been very good to me, Don Agostino," he added, "and I will be quite open with you. I feel that you will not betray a confidence, even though it may not be told you in the confessional."Don Agostino made a slight gesture, whether of impatience Silvio could not quite be sure."A confidence between gentlemen," he said, "and, I hope, between friends.""Then," returned Silvio, quietly, "I will confide to you that it is my interest in Donna Bianca Acorari which brings me to Montefiano.""And she?" asked Don Agostino, quickly. "Is she—interested—in you, Signor Rossano?"Silvio blushed. "Please," he said, "do not address me so formally. Surely, as an old friend of my father, it is not necessary! Yes," he added, simply, "we are going to marry each other.""Diamine!" ejaculated Don Agostino; and then he seemed to be studying Silvio's face attentively."But what made you suspect this?" asked Silvio, presently; "for it is evident that you have suspected it."Don Agostino smiled. "I hardly know," he replied. "Your manner, perhaps, when I mentioned Donna Bianca's name, coupled with the fact that, though you asked me many questions about Montefiano and the princess, you studiously avoided any allusion to her step-daughter. But there was something besides this—some intuition that I cannot explain, though I know the reason of it well enough. I am glad you have told me, Silvio—I may call you Silvio, may I not? And now, as you have told me so much, you will tell me all your story; and afterwards, perhaps, I will explain to you why you will not regret having done so."In a very few words Silvio related all there was to tell. Don Agostino listened attentively, and every now and then he sighed, and Silvio, glancing at him, saw the pained look occasionally flit across his countenance."Of course," he said, as Silvio finished his story, "they have brought the girl here to be out of your way, and they will keep her here. I suspected something of the kind when I first heard that the princess was coming to Montefiano. And when I saw you, an instinct seemed to tell me that in some way you were connected with Bianca Acorari being here. When you told me who you were, and that you lived in Palazzo Acorari, I was certain, or nearly certain of it. You wonder why I am interested in Donna Bianca, as I have only once seen her as a child, and why I should wish to know what she is like now, do you not? Well, you have given me your confidence, Silvio, and I will give you mine. Come with me into my study," and Don Agostino led the way into a little room beyond the dining-room, in which they were still sitting.Silvio followed him in silence, greatly wondering what link there could be between Bianca and this newly found friend who had so unexpectedly risen up at Montefiano, where a friend was so badly needed.Don Agostino went to the cabinet standing in the corner of his little study, and, unlocking a drawer, took out the miniature, which he had not again looked at since the day, now nearly two months ago, when he had heard that the Princess Montefiano and her step-daughter were coming to inhabit the castle."I asked you to tell me what Donna Bianca Acorari is like now," he said, quietly. "At least," he added, "you can tell me if there is a resemblance between her and this miniature." And, opening the case, he placed it in Silvio's hand.Silvio uttered an exclamation of astonishment as he looked at the portrait."But it is Bianca—Bianca herself!" he said, looking from the miniature to Don Agostino in amazement. "The same hair, the same eyes and mouth, the same coloring. It is Bianca Acorari.""No," interrupted Don Agostino, "she was Bianca Acorari afterwards. Then, when the miniature was painted, she was Bianca Negroni.""I do not understand," muttered Silvio, in bewilderment.Don Agostino took the case from him. "She was Bianca Negroni then," he repeated, in a low voice, as though speaking to himself. "She should have been Bianca Lelli—my wife. We were engaged. Afterwards she was called Bianca Acorari, Principessa di Montefiano."Silvio looked at him in silence. He understood now."We were engaged," continued Don Agostino, "as you and her child are engaged, without the consent of her family. They forced her to marry Prince Montefiano. It was an unhappy marriage, as, perhaps, you have heard."Then he turned away, and gently, reverently, as though replacing some holy relic in its shrine, put the miniature back into the drawer of the cabinet."You can understand now," he said, quietly, "why I wished to know what her child is like. As for you, Silvio—" he paused, and looked at Silvio Rossano earnestly. "Well," he continued, "I have had one intuition to-day which did not mislead me, and I think my second intuition will prove equally true. I believe that you would make any woman a good husband—that your character does not belie your face."Silvio looked at him with a quick smile."I will make her a good husband," he said, simply. The words were few, but they appealed to Don Agostino more than any lover's protestations would have appealed to him."And she?" asked Don Agostino, suddenly. "You are sure that she would make you a good wife? If her nature is like her mother's she will be faithful to you in her heart. I am sure of that. But she is her father's daughter as well, and—well, he is dead, so I say no more. And no doubt the knowledge that he had married a woman whose love was given elsewhere accounted for much of his conduct after his marriage. We will not speak of him, Silvio. But you are sure that you have chosen wisely?""Oh, very sure!" exclaimed Silvio.Don Agostino smiled—a somewhat pathetic smile. "I am very sure, also," he said. "It is strange," he added, thoughtfully, "that your story should be an exact repetition of my own. Almost one would think that she"—and he glanced towards the cabinet—"had sent me here to Montefiano to help her child; that everything during these years had been foreordained. I wondered, when they sent me to Montefiano, whether it were not for some purpose that would one day be made clear to me; for at Montefiano her child was born, and at Montefiano she died, neglected, and practically alone."Don Agostino sat down at his writing-table. He covered his eyes with his hands for a moment or two, and above him the ivory Christ gleamed white in the sunlight which filtered through the closed Venetian blinds."It is strange—yes," said Silvio, in a low voice; "and I, too," he added—"I have felt some power urging me to tell you my story, and my true reason for being here. But," he continued, "our case—Bianca's and mine—is different from yours in one particular, Don Agostino."Don Agostino looked up. "Yes," he replied; "Donna Bianca Acorari's mother, though she had money, was not the heiress to estates and titles.""I did not mean that," returned Silvio. "I forgot it," he added. "I am always forgetting it. Perhaps you do not believe me, but when I do remember it I wish that Bianca Acorari were penniless and not noble. There would be nothing then to keep us apart. No; I mean that, in her case, there can be no forcing of another marriage upon her, because I am very sure that Bianca would never submit."Don Agostino glanced at him. "Are you so sure?" he asked. "That is well. But, Silvio, we can hardly realize the pressure that may be placed upon a young girl by her family.""She has no family," observed Silvio, tranquilly. "It is true," he continued, "that there is her step-mother, who is her guardian until she is of age. But Bianca is not a child,reverendo. She will not allow herself to be coerced."Don Agostino looked at him for a moment and appeared to be considering something in his mind."How come you to know her character so well?" he asked, presently. "How can you know it? You guess at it, that is all."Silvio shook his head. "Her character is written on her face," he said. "Besides, when one loves, one knows those things."Don Agostino smiled. "Yes," he observed, "or one thinks one knows them, which does quite as well, so long as one is never undeceived. So," he continued, "you think that the girl has sufficient strength of will to resist any pressure that might be brought to compel her to marry somebody else. That is well; for, unless I am mistaken, she has been brought to Montefiano for no other purpose than to be exposed to pressure of the kind."Silvio started. "What do you mean?" he exclaimed. "I thought you said you knew nothing of the princess and Donna Bianca—that nobody went inside the castle. Do you mean to say that they are already trying to coerce her in some way? But not by forcing her into another marriage. Giacinta declares they do not want her to marry, and she knows.""Giacinta?" said Don Agostino, inquiringly."My sister. Ah, I forgot; I have not spoken to you about her. She is sure that a priest whom the princess confides in does not wish Bianca to marry at all, for some reason—""Yes," interrupted Don Agostino; "the Abbé Roux—a Belgian.""You know him?" asked Silvio, surprised."Oh yes, I know him," replied Don Agostino, dryly."Therefore," Silvio continued, "you see that I have not to fear anything of that kind, as—as you had."Don Agostino was silent.Silvio looked at him inquiringly. "You think that I have?" he asked, hastily."It is possible," returned Don Agostino. "I do not know for certain. I have no means of knowing for certain," he added, "but I hear rumors—suppositions. Perhaps they are purely imaginary suppositions. In a small place like Montefiano people like to gossip, especially about what they do not understand. Apparently the princess and her daughter are not alone in the castle. A brother of the princess, Baron d'Antin, is staying with them, and also the Abbé Roux, who says mass in the chapel every morning. So, you see, my services are not required.""Her brother!" said Silvio. "I did not know the Princess Montefiano had a brother."Don Agostino nodded. "Yes," he returned, "and—well, it is precisely about this brother that people talk."Silvio looked at him with amazement."About him!" he exclaimed. "What could there be to say about him and Bianca? It is too ridiculous—"Don Agostino interrupted him. "I should not call it ridiculous," he said, "if the suppositions I have heard are true. I should rather call it revolting.""But it would be an unheard-of thing—an impossibility!" said Silvio, angrily, and his eyes flashed ominously."No," Don Agostino observed, quietly, "it would be neither the one nor the other, Silvio. Such alliances have been made before now—in Rome, too. There is no consanguinity, you must remember. No dispensation even would be required. But if it is true that such a crime is in contemplation, the child must be saved from it—ah, yes, she must be saved from it at all costs!"Silvio suddenly grasped the priest's hand. "You will help me to save her, Don Agostino!" he exclaimed. "For her own sake and for her mother's sake—who, as you said a few minutes ago, perhaps sent you here to protect her—you will help me to save her!"Don Agostino, still holding Silvio's hand in his own, looked into his eyes for a moment without speaking."I have seen you to-day," he said, at length, "for the first time, but I trust you for your father's sake and also for your own. Yes, I will help you, if I can help you, to save Bianca Acorari from being sacrificed, for the sake of her mother,anima benedetta. But we must act prudently, and, first of all, I have a condition to make.""Make any condition you please," said Silvio, eagerly, "so long as you do what I ask of you.""Is your father aware that you are here—I mean, that you are in the neighborhood of Montefiano?" asked Don Agostino.Silvio shrugged his shoulders. "I cannot tell you," he replied. "My sister, Giacinta, knows it, and she may have told him. My father, Don Agostino, told me that he had done all he could in asking the consent of the princess to an engagement between his son and her step-daughter, and that, as this consent had been unconditionally refused, I must in future manage my own affairs in my own way. This is what I am doing to the best of my ability."Don Agostino smiled slightly. "I understand," he said. "Well, Silvio, my condition is that I should see your father and discuss the matter with him before doing anything here. He will give you a good character, I have no doubt, and will assure me that you would make Bianca Acorari a good husband. I owe it to—well, you know now to whom, to make this condition."Silvio smiled. "Is that all,reverendo?" he asked. "It is a condition very easily carried out," he added."We will go to Rome, you and I, to-morrow," said Don Agostino, "and for to-night you will stop with me here. In the evening, when it is cooler, we will go to Civitacastellana, and we will bring your things back with us. No; I am doing you no kindness—I am doing a kindness to myself. As I told you before, it is not often that I have a friend to talk to at Montefiano, and in this case, well—"Don Agostino did not complete his sentence. His gaze fixed itself upon the cabinet before him, and Silvio understood all that he had left unsaid.XIXAlthough Rome is supposed to be abandoned during the months of August and September by all who can afford the time and the money to leave it, there is always a certain number of people who from choice remain within its walls throughout the summer, declaring, not without reason, that the heat is felt far less in the vast, thick-walled palaces than in country villas and jerry-built hotels.Among this number was the Senator Rossano. He had fitted up for himself a library in Palazzo Acorari, a long, high room looking to the north, which, if difficult to keep heated in winter, was always deliciously cool even on the hottest of summer days. Here he did the greater part of his writing, and passed the weeks when Rome is deserted, both pleasantly and profitably. Usually he was quite alone during these weeks, for Giacinta as a rule went with friends to one or another of the summer resorts in the Apennines or the north of Italy, or perhaps southward to the fresh sea-breezes of Sorrento.This year, however, she had delayed hervilleggiaturalater than usual, and was still in Rome. The professor was engaged upon a new scientific work, dealing with no less complicated a theme than the moral responsibility of criminals for the crimes they happened to have committed. Giacinta had been busily engaged in making a clear copy of her father's manuscript. The wealth of detail and example which the professor had brought to bear in order to support certain of his theories did not, it must be owned, always form suitable reading for even the comparatively young, and certainly not for an unmarried woman of Giacinta's age.But Professor Rossano did not trouble himself about such a trifle as this. He regarded his illustrations as illustrations, mere accidents necessary to his arguments; and it would never have entered into his head that his daughter might not look at them from the same detached point of view. As a matter of fact, Giacinta did so look at them; consequently, no harm was done.She was sitting with her father in his library, engaged in sorting some papers. It was nearly five o'clock and the great heat of the day was nearly over; in another hour or so she would insist on dragging the professor away from his work, and making him accompany her in a drive outside one of the gates of the city. She was contemplating some suggestion of the kind when her father suddenly looked up from his writing."I tell you what we will do this evening, Giacinta," he observed. "We will go and dine at the Castello di Costantino. I have not been there yet this summer. Perhaps we shall find some friends there. The Countess Vitali—she often dines there at this time of year, and nobody can be more amusing when she is in the vein. Her dry humor is most refreshing; it is like something that has been sealed up in an Etruscan tomb and suddenly brought to light with all the colors fresh upon it. Yes, we will go to the Castello di Costantino, and you can tell the servants we shall not eat here."Giacinta was more than ready to fall in with the idea. She was about to ring the bell in order to tell the servants not to prepare dinner, when the door opened and Silvio walked into the room.The professor gazed at him placidly."I thought that you were at Terni," he said."So I was," replied Silvio, smiling, "a fortnight ago. But I completed my business there, and placed the order for the steel girders. Since then I have been in the Sabina. I came from Montefiano this morning."Giacinta started. "From Montefiano?" she exclaimed."From Montefiano—yes," repeated Silvio. "I have not been staying at the castle there," he added, dryly."You have been committing some folly, I suppose," remarked the professor, "and I do not wish to hear about it. You will have the goodness, Silvio, not to mention the subject.""I have been staying with a friend of yours, Babbo," Silvio replied, laughing. "Don Agostino—""Don Agostino?" repeated his father. "The devil take your Don Agostino! I do not know whom you mean.""Monsignor Lelli, then," returned Silvio. "He has come to Rome with me, and he is here—in the house. I left him in the drawing-room. I suppose you will go there to see him; or shall I tell him that you hope the devil may take him?"The professor burst out laughing. "Lelli! Here?" he exclaimed. "Certainly I will go. I have not seen him for years. I remember now, of course—they sent him to Montefiano—thoseimbroglioniat the Vatican! And so you have been staying with Lelli? Well, at least you have been in good company. I hope he has succeeded in putting a little common-sense into your head."He hurried out of the room to greet his old friend, leaving Silvio and Giacinta alone together."I suppose," said the latter, "that you have seen Donna Bianca again—otherwise I cannot imagine what you have found to do at Civitacastellana for nearly a fortnight? I am told there is nothing to see there.""It is very picturesque," observed Silvio. "The river, and the situation—""No doubt; but I never supposed you went there to look at the river. When I heard it was only four or five miles from Montefiano, then I understood! But who is this Monsignor Lelli, Silvio? I think I have heard Babbo tell some story about him, but I have forgotten what it was.""He is theparrocoof Montefiano," replied Silvio, "and he used to be at the Vatican some years ago. I do not know the story—he would not tell it me; but Babbo knows it well, and we will ask him—the history of his earlier life—that he did tell me. Imagine, Giacinta, he was engaged to Bianca Acorari's mother. They forced her to marry the Principe di Montefiano, and then he became a priest. But he never ceased to love her, although he did become a priest; that I know."Giacinta looked at him."And now?" she asked."Now he has come to ask Babbo for my character," answered Silvio, smiling. "If he gets a good one, he will help me to marry Bianca. Do you know, Giacinta, that they want to marry her to a brother of the princess—a Baron d'Antin? Did you ever hear of anything so outrageous? As Don Agostino—he will not be calledmonsignore—says, such a thing must be prevented, and, of course, I am the proper person to prevent it.""Of course!""You must admit that it is strange, Giacinta, that Don Agostino should have been engaged to Bianca's mother—and her name was Bianca also—just as I am engaged to the daughter, and that he should be at Montefiano. It seems like a destiny. As for this Baron d'Antin—""I have seen him several times," observed Giacinta. "He always stares very hard. I asked the porter who he was. He is not so very old, Silvio; he looks younger than the princess.""You had better marry him," returned Silvio; "then you will become my step-aunt by marriage as well as being my sister."Giacinta laughed. "Don't talk nonsense," she said; "but tell me what you and Monsignor Lelli propose to do. I never expected that you would confide your love affairs to a priest. First of all a French governess, and now amonsignore. You are certainly an original person, Silvio.""Ah, but Don Agostino is not like most priests—""Because he has been in love himself?" interrupted Giacinta, laughing."Oh, not at all! There would be nothing unusual in that," answered Silvio, dryly. "Priests are no different from other people, I suppose, although they may profess to be so. No; Don Agostino is not like the majority of his brethren, because he has the honesty to be a man first and a priest afterwards. He does not forget the priest, but one hears and feels the man all the time he is talking to one."As to what I am going to do, Giacinta," Silvio continued, tranquilly, "I am going to marry Bianca Acorari, as I have told you before—""Very often," added Giacinta."But how I am going to do it, is certainly not quite clear at present. I would have waited, and so would she; but how can we wait now that they are trying to force her to marry this old baron in order to prevent her from marrying me?""It is very strange," said Giacinta, thoughtfully. "I certainly believed they did not intend her to marry at all—at any rate, for some years.""Ah, but that was before I appeared on the scene," observed Silvio. "Now they are afraid of her marrying me, and so would marry her to anybody who happened to be noble."Giacinta shook her head. "There is some other reason than that," she replied. "The princess could find scores of husbands for the girl without being obliged to fall back on her own brother, who must be nearly thirty years older than Donna Bianca. A marriage between those two would be a marriage only in name."Silvio stared at her. "What in the world do you mean, Giacinta?" he exclaimed."Oh," she returned, hurriedly, "I don't mean—well, what you think I mean! I meant to say that, supposing Bianca Acorari were married to this old baron, everything would go on as before in Casa Acorari. It would be, so to speak, merely a family arrangement, which would, perhaps, be very convenient.""Perbacco!" exclaimed Silvio, "but you have your head upon your shoulders, Giacinta! I never thought of that. I thought it was simply a scheme to marry Bianca as soon as possible, in order to get her away from me. But very likely you are quite right. There is probably some intrigue behind it all. We will hear what Don Agostino thinks of your supposition—ah, here they come!" he broke off suddenly as his father and Don Agostino entered the library together.Silvio made the priest acquainted with his sister, and then turned to the professor."I hope, Babbo," he said, "that you have given me a fairly good character.""I have explained that you are as obstinate as a mule," replied his father.Don Agostino laughed. "I have heard a few other things about you also," he said, laying his hand on Silvio's shoulder. "After all," he added, "they were only things I expected to hear, so I might quite as well have stopped at Montefiano instead of coming to Rome—except for the pleasure of seeing an old friend again.""Don Agostino will spend the evening with us," said Silvio to his father, "and early to-morrow morning I am going back with him to Montefiano."Giacinta looked somewhat perplexed. "Do you know," she said, "we had settled to dine at the Castello di Costantino this evening? You see, Silvio, I had no idea you were coming back, and still less that we should have a visitor—""But we will all go and dine at the Costantino," interposed the professor, jovially. "Why not? We shall be a party of four—and four is a very good number to sit at table, but not to drive in abotte—so we will have twobotti, and then nobody need sit on the back seat. You will go with Silvio, Giacinta, andmonsignoreand I will go together."Don Agostino hesitated for a moment. "It is a place where one may meet people," he said, "and nobody knows that I am in Rome—""No, no," returned the professor, hastily, "you are not likely to meet any one you know at the Costantino, unless it be Countess Locatelli—and you certainly would not mind meeting her?""On the contrary," said Don Agostino. "It is always a pleasure to meet her—and to talk to her. Doubly so," he added, "after so long an exile at Montefiano. I do not find the female society of Montefiano very—what shall I say? sharpening to the intellect. My house-keeper is occasionally amusing—but limited as to her subjects."Silvio and his father both laughed. "At any rate, she gives you a better dinner than you will get to-night," said the former.A quarter of an hour's drive brought them to the Aventine, the most unspoiled and picturesque of the seven hills of Rome, with its secluded convent-gardens and ancient churches, its wealth of tradition and legend. In no other quarter of Rome—not even in the Forum, nor among the imperial ruins of the Palatine—does the spirit of the past seem to accompany one's every step as on the almost deserted Aventine. Especially as evening draws on, and the shadows begin to creep over the vineyards and fruit-gardens beyond the city walls; as the scattered ruins that have glowed rose-red in the rays of the setting sun now stand out—purple masses against the green background of thecampagna, and Tiber reflects the orange and saffron tints of the sky, the dead present seems to be enwrapped by the living past in these groves and gardens hidden away on the Aventine and far removed from the turmoil and vulgarity of modern Rome.In those years the so-called Castello di Costantino was not the well-known resort that it has recently become. It was, indeed, little more than a somewhat superiortrattoria, where one ate a bad Roman dinner and drank good Roman wine on a terrace commanding one of the most picturesque, as it is assuredly one of the most interesting, views in the world. In those days it was not the scene of pompous gatherings in honor of foreign or home celebrities, followed by wearisome speeches breathing mutual admiration in hackneyed phrases. A few artists, a few secretaries of embassies left to conduct international affairs while their chiefs were in cooler climates; a few ladies of the Roman world who happened to be still left in the city, these, and a family party or two of the Romanmezzo-ceto, were its occasional visitors in the hot summer evenings when it is pleasant to get away from the baked pavements and streets of the town, and to breathe the fresh, sweet air stealing in from the open country and the sea.The terrace behind the restaurant was almost deserted, and Professor Rossano selected a table at one corner of it, whence an uninterrupted view could be obtained over a part of the city, and across thecampagnato the Sabine mountains in the nearer background; while between these and the Alban Hills the higher summits of the Leonessa range glowed red against the far horizon as they caught the last rays of the setting sun.Monsignor Lelli cast a rapid glance around him as he seated himself at the little table, while the professor discussed the ordering of the dinner with the waiter. There was nobody, however, who would be likely to know him by sight, and comment on his presence in Rome in quarters where he would prefer it to remain unknown. A few couples, already half-way through their meal, or smoking their cigars over a measure of white wine, were the only visitors to the Castello di Costantino that evening besides Professor Rossano and his party, and these were evidently students either of art or of love."And so," observed Professor Rossano to his guest, as the waiter retired with his order, "you have come to Rome to tell me that you mean to help my son to make an idiot of himself. I suppose you are a little short of something to occupy you at Montefiano?"Don Agostino laughed. "There was certainly more to occupy me when I lived in Rome," he said, dryly. "As for helping Silvio to make an idiot of himself, I am inclined to think he would make a worse idiot of himself without my assistance.""Grazie, Don Agostino!" murmured Silvio, placidly."I wonder when they will call you back?" the professor said; "not," he added, with a quick movement of the head towards the Vatican, "as long as—""Caro senatore!" interrupted Don Agostino, deprecatingly."Of course—of course!" returned Professor Rossano, hastily. "I forgot yoursoutane—I always did, in the old days, if you recollect. We will talk of something else. It is always like that—when a man insists upon his right to use his own reason and to think for himself—""I thought you proposed to talk of something else," suggested Giacinta, mildly, to her father.Don Agostino looked at her and laughed."He is the same as he was twenty years ago—our dear professor," he said."You are quite right, Giacinta," returned Professor Rossano. "When I think of the intellects—God-given—that have been warped and crushed in the name of God, it makes me fly into a rage. Yes, it is certainly better to talk of something else. All the same, Monsignor Lelli understands what I mean. If he did not, he would still be at the Vatican, and not at Montefiano.""I am particularly glad that Don Agostino understands," interposed Silvio."You!" exclaimed the professor, witheringly. "I have told you more than once that you are a pumpkin-head. A fine thing, truly, to make my old friend Monsignor Lelli a confidant of your love affairs! Not but what you appear to have confided them to him at a tolerably early stage. It is usually at a later stage that a priest hears of a love affair—is it not so,caro monsignore?" he added, with a twinkle of amusement in his brown eyes.Don Agostino smiled. "Yes," he replied, "at a much later stage;" and then he paused and glanced across the table at Giacinta.The professor saw the look and misinterpreted it. "Oh," he observed, carelessly, "my daughter knows all about Silvio's folly. But I do not wish to hear anything more about that. You have asked me certain questions about Silvio, and I have answered them, and that is enough. If you choose to help the boy in making an idiot of himself, my dear friend, I suppose you must do so, but I do not wish to know anything of the matter. There will be disturbances, and I am too busy for disturbances. I am preparing my work on criminal responsibility. It will be followed by another volume on responsibility in mental diseases. By-the-way, if I had the time I would study Silvio's case. It might be useful to me for my second volume. No; Giacinta and I are decidedly too busy to be troubled with Silvio's love affairs. Giacinta, you must know, acts as my secretary and copies out my manuscripts."Don Agostino raised his eyebrows slightly."All of them?" he asked."Certainly, all of them. Her handwriting is exceedingly clear, whereas mine is frequently almost illegible. If it were not for Giacinta, I should have to employ a typewriter."Don Agostino said nothing, but he glanced again at the girl, and wondered how much she understood of the professor's physiological arguments, and of the examples upon which many of them were based. The few minutes' conversation he had had alone with Professor Rossano had speedily convinced him that the professor was both proud and fond of his son. He had given Silvio the character which Don Agostino, a practised reader of countenances and the natures those countenances reflected, had felt sure would be given. At the same time, the professor had expressed his opinion of his son's passion for Donna Bianca Acorari in very decided terms, and had upbraided his old friend for encouraging the boy in his folly. Don Agostino had not explained his motives for espousing Silvio's cause. He had learned all he wanted to know, and was satisfied that he had gauged Silvio's nature and character correctly. He felt, indeed, an unconquerable aversion from explaining the motives which prompted him to interest himself in a love affair between two headstrong young people. Everybody knew why he had left the Vatican; but very few people knew why, some four-and-twenty years ago, a good-looking young fellow, by name Agostino Lelli, became a priest. Most of us have an inner recess in our hearts—unless we are of that fortunate number who have no hearts—a recess which we shrink from unlocking as we would shrink from desecrating a tomb over which we are ever laying fresh flowers. Something which he could scarcely define had impelled Don Agostino to allow Silvio Rossano to glance into his jealously guarded shrine. He felt as though he had received some message from his beloved dead that the boy had a right to do so. He was convinced, moreover, in his own mind that the living spirit of the woman he had loved was urging him to save her child from the unhappiness that had fallen upon herself. Perhaps he had brooded too long and too deeply over the strange change of coincidences which had brought him and Silvio together—at the strange similarity between his own life's story and that of his old friend Professor Rossano's son, between the dead Bianca, Princess of Montefiano, and the child who bore her name and bodily likeness. In any case, it seemed to Don Agostino as though he were living over again those far-off years in Venice; as though he saw in Silvio Rossano his own youth, with all its hopes and all its joys, and yet with the same dark shadows—shadows that only youth itself had prevented him from realizing—threatening to overwhelm and destroy both."The boy is in earnest," he had said to Professor Rossano during their conversation together before setting out for the Castello di Costantino. "Cannot you see that he is in earnest?"He spoke almost angrily, the more so, perhaps, on account of that strange feeling which never left him—the feeling that he was pleading his own cause and that of his dead."My dear friend," the professor had responded, with a slight shrug of the shoulders, "when one is young and in love, one is always in earnest—each time. Are you so old that you cannot remember? Ah, I forgot, you had no experience of such things—at least, no official experience."Don Agostino smiled. "No," he repeated, "no official experience."The professor glanced at him with a gleam of satirical amusement. He fancied he had detected a note of irony in the other's voice, but in his interpretation of it he was very wide of the mark.And Don Agostino had found that the result of his conversation with Silvio's father was exactly what Silvio himself had foretold. The professor had dismissed the whole affair with airy good-humor as apazzia, a folly in which he had so far participated as to have made formal overtures on his son's behalf for Donna Bianca Acorari's hand, and of which he did not wish to hear anything more. If Silvio thought the girl would make him a good wife, then by all means let him marry her, if he could. If he could not, there were plenty of other girls to choose from, and any one of them who married Silvio would be a great deal luckier than she most probably deserved to be.Don Agostino had very soon come to the conclusion that the professor would place no serious obstacles in the way to hinder his son from marrying Donna Bianca Acorari, should Silvio find means to accomplish that object. During the remainder of their dinner at the Castello di Costantino he threw himself, as it were, into Professor Rossano's humor, and it soon became evident to Silvio and Giacinta that their father and his guest were mutually enjoying one another's conversation. Giacinta, indeed, was not a little astonished at hearing the professor discourse so readily with a priest. But then, as she noted the facility with which Monsignor Lelli met her father on his favorite ground, the knowledge which he displayed of the scientific and political problems of the day, the serene tolerance with which he would discuss questions which she knew to be anathema to the ecclesiastical temperament, it was at once revealed to her that this was no ordinary priest, whose mental vision was limited by the outlook of the sacristy. The professor, as the evening wore on, seemed to be in his element. From subject to subject he flew with a rapidity which would have been bewildering had it not been for the conciseness and pungency of the arguments he brought to bear upon each of them. But Monsignor Lelli met him at every turn, agreeing with him often, but often parrying his thrusts with rapier-like stabs of keenest satire. The summer twilight was already fading into dusk, and the moon was rising over the Aventine, casting long shadows from the cypress-trees over the gardens and vineyards stretching away beneath the terrace, and still the two continued their discussions.People seated at little tables near them ceased from laughing and talking, and turned round to listen, for the waiters had whispered that thesignorewith the beard was the famous Senator Rossano, and that the priest was without doubt a cardinal who had dressed as an ordinary priest lest he should be compromised by being seen in public in such company.Suddenly, in the midst of a more than usually brilliant sally, provoked by some observation from his host, Monsignor Lelli stopped abruptly and addressed an entirely irrelevant remark to Giacinta. Silvio, who happened to be looking at him, saw his face change slightly as he looked beyond the professor towards the door leading from the restaurant on to the terrace. A small group of new arrivals was issuing from this door, and its members began to make their way to a vacant table a short distance from that occupied by the professor and his party.Giacinta also had caught sight of the new-comers. "Look, Silvio!" she exclaimed, in a low tone; "look, father, there is Princess Montefiano's brother, Monsieur d'Antin, with those people!""Very well, Giacinta," returned the professor, vexed at the interruption; "he can go to the devil! Go on with what you were saying," he added to Don Agostino. "It was well put—very well put, indeed—but I think that I have an argument—""Caro senatore," observed Don Agostino, tranquilly, "are you aware that it grows late? We can continue our discussion as we return to the city.Signorina," he continued, turning to Giacinta, "you are sitting with your back to the view. Is it not beautiful, with the moonlight falling on those ruins?"He rose from his chair as he spoke, and motioned to Giacinta to accompany him to the parapet of the terrace."Bring your father away," he said to her, in a low voice, "and Silvio. It is as well for us not to be seen together.""But Baron d'Antin does not know Silvio by sight," returned Giacinta, "and I doubt if he knows either my father or me by sight. Do you know him,monsignore?" she added."I have never seen him," said Don Agostino, "and it is not of him I am thinking—but of the other, the young man who is with him. No, do not look round,signorina! At present I think that we are unobserved. It will be more prudent for me to leave you without any further ceremony. We can meet again outside the restaurant.""But who is he—that other one?" asked Giacinta, quickly."A person I would rather not meet," replied Don Agostino—"at least," he added, "I would rather not be seen by him under the present circumstances,signorina. I beg of you to explain to your father that he will find me waiting for him outside," and, turning from her, Don Agostino walked rapidly towards the door, having satisfied himself that the new-comers were occupied with the head-waiter in ordering their dinner, and that he could probably leave the terrace unobserved by them.
XVIII
Don Agostino was quite right when he said that a little rest after walking since daybreak would be a good thing. Silvio, at any rate, found it so, for he very soon fell fast asleep in the room that had been prepared for him—so fast, indeed, that even the church-bells ringingmezzogiornodid not awaken him.
Don Agostino, fearing for the omelette his house-keeper had already placed on the table as the first dish of the mid-day meal, had gone up-stairs to rouse his guest, and, receiving no response to his knock, had quietly entered the bedroom.
Silvio was lying as he had flung himself on the bed, after having divested himself of most of his clothes. He lay on his back, with one arm under his head and the hand half-buried in the short, curly hair, in face and form resembling some Greek statue of a sleeping god, his well-made, graceful limbs relaxed, and his lips just parted in a slight smile.
Don Agostino stood and watched him for a moment or two. It seemed a pity to rouse him—almost sacrilege to wake the statue into life.
"It is the Hermes of the Vatican," he said to himself, smiling—"the Hermes reposing after taking a message from the gods. Well, well, one must be young to sleep like that! I would let him sleep on, but then Ernana will say that the dinner is spoiled," and he laid his hand gently on Silvio's arm.
Apparently the sleeper was more sensitive to touch than to sound, for he opened his eyes instantly, and then started up with a confused apology.
"It is I who should apologize for waking you," said Don Agostino; "but it is past twelve o'clock, and my housekeeper is a tyrant. She is afraid her dishes will be spoiled!"
Silvio sprang from the bed. "I will be ready in a few minutes," he said; and before Don Agostino could beg him not to hurry himself, he had filled a basin with cold water, into which he plunged his face as a preliminary to further ablutions.
In ten minutes he had rejoined Don Agostino in the little dining-room, and the two sat down to the dinner which Ernana had produced, not without some grumbling at the delay, which, she declared, had turned the omelette into a piece of donkey's hide.
Silvio did ample justice to her cookery, however, and indeed Don Agostino's house-keeper looked with scarcely concealed admiration and approval at him as she served the various dishes. She also wondered what thisbel giovanottowas doing at Montefiano, and several times came very near to asking him the question, being only restrained therefrom by the thought that she would learn all she wanted to know from Don Agostino so soon as the visitor should have departed.
After dinner, Don Agostino produced a bottle of old wine—such wine as seldom comes to the market in Italy, and which, could it only travel, would put the best French vintages to shame. Ernana served the coffee and then departed to her kitchen, and Don Agostino proceeded to prepare cigars by duly roasting the ends in the flame of a candle before handing one of them to his guest to smoke.
"And so," he observed, presently, "you actually live in the Palazzo Acorari at Rome. Your father, no doubt, knows the princess and Donna Bianca?"
Silvio shook his head. "No," he replied. "You must remember—" he added, and then paused, abruptly.
Don Agostino blew a ring of smoke into the air.
"What must I remember?" he asked, smiling at Silvio's obvious embarrassment.
"You know my father's opinions," continued Silvio, "and perhaps you have read some of his works. He is not—I speak with all respect—of theNeri, and Princess Montefiano is, they say, a very good Catholic."
Don Agostino laughed. "Ah, I forgot," he said. "No, I never looked upon your father as a good Catholic. It really was never any business of mine whether he was so or not. But the princess—yes, I believe she is very strict in her opinions, and your father is, very naturally, not beloved by the Vatican party."
Silvio glanced at him. "You have read his books, Don Agostino?" he asked.
"Certainly I have read them—all of them."
"And yet you continue to regard him as a friend?"
Don Agostino smiled. "Why not?" he asked. "I do not always agree with his conclusions on certain subjects. If I did, I should not wear this dress; it would be to me as the shirt of Nessus. But is it necessary always to agree with one's friends? I think the best friends and the best lovers are those who know how to disagree. However, we were talking of Princess Montefiano. I can quite understand that she would not desire to be on friendly terms with Professor Rossano."
"Or with any of his family," added Silvio, bluntly.
Don Agostino gave him a scrutinizing glance.
"Ah," he said, "you mean that she visits the sins of the father upon the son."
Silvio hesitated. There was something very sympathetic about this priest—something that seemed to ask, almost to plead, for his trust and confidence. And yet could he, knowing so little of him, dare to confide to him why he was in the neighborhood of Montefiano? Certainly this Don Agostino was a friend of his father, and, as such, might be disposed to help him. Moreover, Silvio could not help seeing that his host was disposed to like him for his own sake, and that for some reason or other there was a current of sympathy between them, though as yet they were almost strangers to each other.
Perhaps Don Agostino observed his companion's hesitation, for he spoke again, and this time it was to ask a question which did not tend to diminish it.
"I suppose," he said, "that you have seen Donna Bianca Acorari? I do not ask you if you know her personally, after what you have just told me; but no doubt, as you live under the same roof, so to speak, you know her by sight?"
Silvio felt the color rising in his face, and felt, too, that Don Agostino's eyes were fixed upon him with a strange intensity. Could it be, he wondered, that the priest suspected the truth, or had, perhaps, been warned about him by the princess herself? The thought was a disagreeable one, for it made him mistrust his host's good faith, as Don Agostino had distinctly denied any acquaintance with Princess Montefiano. The expression of Don Agostino's face puzzled him. It spoke of pain, as well as of curiosity, and he seemed to be anxiously hanging upon the answer to his question. That the priest should be curious, Silvio could well understand, but there was no apparent reason why Bianca Acorari's name should call forth that look of pain on his countenance.
"Yes," Silvio replied, guardedly. "I know Donna Bianca Acorari by sight, extremely well."
Don Agostino leaned forward in his chair. "Ah," he exclaimed, eagerly, "you know her by sight! Tell me about her. I saw her once—once only—and then she was quite a little child. It was in Rome—years ago. She is, no doubt, grown into a beautiful girl by now."
Silvio looked at him with surprise. The eagerness in his voice was unmistakable, but there was the same strange expression of pain on his face.
"But surely," he replied, "your reverence must have seen her here at Montefiano, or, at least, others must have seen her who could tell you about her?"
Don Agostino shook his head. "Nobody has seen her since her arrival here," he said. "The castle is large, and the park behind it is very extensive. There is no reason why its inmates should ever come into thepaese, and they never do come into it."
"But the servants—the household?"
"The servants were all brought from Rome. Most of the provisions also are sent from Rome. There is practically no communication with the town of Montefiano, and, except thefattore, I have heard of nobody who has been admitted inside the castle walls since the princess and Donna Bianca arrived."
"It is very strange," said Silvio.
"Yes," returned Don Agostino, "it is certainly strange. But," he added, "you do not tell me of Donna Bianca—what she is like; whether she is beautiful, as beautiful as—" he stopped abruptly and passed his hand almost impatiently across his eyes, as though to shut out some vision.
"Beautiful?" repeated Silvio, in a low voice. "I do not know—yes, I suppose that she is beautiful—and—and— But why do you ask me?" he suddenly burst out, impetuously, and the hot color again mounted to his cheeks and brow.
Don Agostino suddenly turned and looked at him keenly.
"Why should I not ask you?" he replied, quietly. "You have seen her," he added, "and I—I am interested in her. Oh, not because she is the Princess of Montefiano—that does not concern me at all—but—well, for other reasons."
Silvio was silent. Indeed, he did not know how to answer. What he had just heard confirmed his suspicions that Bianca was practically isolated from the world, as though she were within the walls of a convent. He had asked in Montefiano about the castle and its inmates, and had learned absolutely nothing, save what might be implied by the shrugging of shoulders.
Suddenly Don Agostino spoke again.
"And you?" he said, laying his hand for a moment on Silvio's—"forgive me if I am inquisitive—but you, also, are interested in Donna Bianca Acorari—is it not true?"
Silvio started. "I!" he exclaimed.
Don Agostino smiled. His agitation seemed to have passed, and he looked at the boy beside him searchingly, but very kindly.
"If I am mistaken," he repeated, "you must forgive me; but if I am not, I think that you will not regret telling me the truth."
Silvio looked at him steadily.
"It is true," he said, slowly, "that I am interested in Donna Bianca—very much interested. You have been very good to me, Don Agostino," he added, "and I will be quite open with you. I feel that you will not betray a confidence, even though it may not be told you in the confessional."
Don Agostino made a slight gesture, whether of impatience Silvio could not quite be sure.
"A confidence between gentlemen," he said, "and, I hope, between friends."
"Then," returned Silvio, quietly, "I will confide to you that it is my interest in Donna Bianca Acorari which brings me to Montefiano."
"And she?" asked Don Agostino, quickly. "Is she—interested—in you, Signor Rossano?"
Silvio blushed. "Please," he said, "do not address me so formally. Surely, as an old friend of my father, it is not necessary! Yes," he added, simply, "we are going to marry each other."
"Diamine!" ejaculated Don Agostino; and then he seemed to be studying Silvio's face attentively.
"But what made you suspect this?" asked Silvio, presently; "for it is evident that you have suspected it."
Don Agostino smiled. "I hardly know," he replied. "Your manner, perhaps, when I mentioned Donna Bianca's name, coupled with the fact that, though you asked me many questions about Montefiano and the princess, you studiously avoided any allusion to her step-daughter. But there was something besides this—some intuition that I cannot explain, though I know the reason of it well enough. I am glad you have told me, Silvio—I may call you Silvio, may I not? And now, as you have told me so much, you will tell me all your story; and afterwards, perhaps, I will explain to you why you will not regret having done so."
In a very few words Silvio related all there was to tell. Don Agostino listened attentively, and every now and then he sighed, and Silvio, glancing at him, saw the pained look occasionally flit across his countenance.
"Of course," he said, as Silvio finished his story, "they have brought the girl here to be out of your way, and they will keep her here. I suspected something of the kind when I first heard that the princess was coming to Montefiano. And when I saw you, an instinct seemed to tell me that in some way you were connected with Bianca Acorari being here. When you told me who you were, and that you lived in Palazzo Acorari, I was certain, or nearly certain of it. You wonder why I am interested in Donna Bianca, as I have only once seen her as a child, and why I should wish to know what she is like now, do you not? Well, you have given me your confidence, Silvio, and I will give you mine. Come with me into my study," and Don Agostino led the way into a little room beyond the dining-room, in which they were still sitting.
Silvio followed him in silence, greatly wondering what link there could be between Bianca and this newly found friend who had so unexpectedly risen up at Montefiano, where a friend was so badly needed.
Don Agostino went to the cabinet standing in the corner of his little study, and, unlocking a drawer, took out the miniature, which he had not again looked at since the day, now nearly two months ago, when he had heard that the Princess Montefiano and her step-daughter were coming to inhabit the castle.
"I asked you to tell me what Donna Bianca Acorari is like now," he said, quietly. "At least," he added, "you can tell me if there is a resemblance between her and this miniature." And, opening the case, he placed it in Silvio's hand.
Silvio uttered an exclamation of astonishment as he looked at the portrait.
"But it is Bianca—Bianca herself!" he said, looking from the miniature to Don Agostino in amazement. "The same hair, the same eyes and mouth, the same coloring. It is Bianca Acorari."
"No," interrupted Don Agostino, "she was Bianca Acorari afterwards. Then, when the miniature was painted, she was Bianca Negroni."
"I do not understand," muttered Silvio, in bewilderment.
Don Agostino took the case from him. "She was Bianca Negroni then," he repeated, in a low voice, as though speaking to himself. "She should have been Bianca Lelli—my wife. We were engaged. Afterwards she was called Bianca Acorari, Principessa di Montefiano."
Silvio looked at him in silence. He understood now.
"We were engaged," continued Don Agostino, "as you and her child are engaged, without the consent of her family. They forced her to marry Prince Montefiano. It was an unhappy marriage, as, perhaps, you have heard."
Then he turned away, and gently, reverently, as though replacing some holy relic in its shrine, put the miniature back into the drawer of the cabinet.
"You can understand now," he said, quietly, "why I wished to know what her child is like. As for you, Silvio—" he paused, and looked at Silvio Rossano earnestly. "Well," he continued, "I have had one intuition to-day which did not mislead me, and I think my second intuition will prove equally true. I believe that you would make any woman a good husband—that your character does not belie your face."
Silvio looked at him with a quick smile.
"I will make her a good husband," he said, simply. The words were few, but they appealed to Don Agostino more than any lover's protestations would have appealed to him.
"And she?" asked Don Agostino, suddenly. "You are sure that she would make you a good wife? If her nature is like her mother's she will be faithful to you in her heart. I am sure of that. But she is her father's daughter as well, and—well, he is dead, so I say no more. And no doubt the knowledge that he had married a woman whose love was given elsewhere accounted for much of his conduct after his marriage. We will not speak of him, Silvio. But you are sure that you have chosen wisely?"
"Oh, very sure!" exclaimed Silvio.
Don Agostino smiled—a somewhat pathetic smile. "I am very sure, also," he said. "It is strange," he added, thoughtfully, "that your story should be an exact repetition of my own. Almost one would think that she"—and he glanced towards the cabinet—"had sent me here to Montefiano to help her child; that everything during these years had been foreordained. I wondered, when they sent me to Montefiano, whether it were not for some purpose that would one day be made clear to me; for at Montefiano her child was born, and at Montefiano she died, neglected, and practically alone."
Don Agostino sat down at his writing-table. He covered his eyes with his hands for a moment or two, and above him the ivory Christ gleamed white in the sunlight which filtered through the closed Venetian blinds.
"It is strange—yes," said Silvio, in a low voice; "and I, too," he added—"I have felt some power urging me to tell you my story, and my true reason for being here. But," he continued, "our case—Bianca's and mine—is different from yours in one particular, Don Agostino."
Don Agostino looked up. "Yes," he replied; "Donna Bianca Acorari's mother, though she had money, was not the heiress to estates and titles."
"I did not mean that," returned Silvio. "I forgot it," he added. "I am always forgetting it. Perhaps you do not believe me, but when I do remember it I wish that Bianca Acorari were penniless and not noble. There would be nothing then to keep us apart. No; I mean that, in her case, there can be no forcing of another marriage upon her, because I am very sure that Bianca would never submit."
Don Agostino glanced at him. "Are you so sure?" he asked. "That is well. But, Silvio, we can hardly realize the pressure that may be placed upon a young girl by her family."
"She has no family," observed Silvio, tranquilly. "It is true," he continued, "that there is her step-mother, who is her guardian until she is of age. But Bianca is not a child,reverendo. She will not allow herself to be coerced."
Don Agostino looked at him for a moment and appeared to be considering something in his mind.
"How come you to know her character so well?" he asked, presently. "How can you know it? You guess at it, that is all."
Silvio shook his head. "Her character is written on her face," he said. "Besides, when one loves, one knows those things."
Don Agostino smiled. "Yes," he observed, "or one thinks one knows them, which does quite as well, so long as one is never undeceived. So," he continued, "you think that the girl has sufficient strength of will to resist any pressure that might be brought to compel her to marry somebody else. That is well; for, unless I am mistaken, she has been brought to Montefiano for no other purpose than to be exposed to pressure of the kind."
Silvio started. "What do you mean?" he exclaimed. "I thought you said you knew nothing of the princess and Donna Bianca—that nobody went inside the castle. Do you mean to say that they are already trying to coerce her in some way? But not by forcing her into another marriage. Giacinta declares they do not want her to marry, and she knows."
"Giacinta?" said Don Agostino, inquiringly.
"My sister. Ah, I forgot; I have not spoken to you about her. She is sure that a priest whom the princess confides in does not wish Bianca to marry at all, for some reason—"
"Yes," interrupted Don Agostino; "the Abbé Roux—a Belgian."
"You know him?" asked Silvio, surprised.
"Oh yes, I know him," replied Don Agostino, dryly.
"Therefore," Silvio continued, "you see that I have not to fear anything of that kind, as—as you had."
Don Agostino was silent.
Silvio looked at him inquiringly. "You think that I have?" he asked, hastily.
"It is possible," returned Don Agostino. "I do not know for certain. I have no means of knowing for certain," he added, "but I hear rumors—suppositions. Perhaps they are purely imaginary suppositions. In a small place like Montefiano people like to gossip, especially about what they do not understand. Apparently the princess and her daughter are not alone in the castle. A brother of the princess, Baron d'Antin, is staying with them, and also the Abbé Roux, who says mass in the chapel every morning. So, you see, my services are not required."
"Her brother!" said Silvio. "I did not know the Princess Montefiano had a brother."
Don Agostino nodded. "Yes," he returned, "and—well, it is precisely about this brother that people talk."
Silvio looked at him with amazement.
"About him!" he exclaimed. "What could there be to say about him and Bianca? It is too ridiculous—"
Don Agostino interrupted him. "I should not call it ridiculous," he said, "if the suppositions I have heard are true. I should rather call it revolting."
"But it would be an unheard-of thing—an impossibility!" said Silvio, angrily, and his eyes flashed ominously.
"No," Don Agostino observed, quietly, "it would be neither the one nor the other, Silvio. Such alliances have been made before now—in Rome, too. There is no consanguinity, you must remember. No dispensation even would be required. But if it is true that such a crime is in contemplation, the child must be saved from it—ah, yes, she must be saved from it at all costs!"
Silvio suddenly grasped the priest's hand. "You will help me to save her, Don Agostino!" he exclaimed. "For her own sake and for her mother's sake—who, as you said a few minutes ago, perhaps sent you here to protect her—you will help me to save her!"
Don Agostino, still holding Silvio's hand in his own, looked into his eyes for a moment without speaking.
"I have seen you to-day," he said, at length, "for the first time, but I trust you for your father's sake and also for your own. Yes, I will help you, if I can help you, to save Bianca Acorari from being sacrificed, for the sake of her mother,anima benedetta. But we must act prudently, and, first of all, I have a condition to make."
"Make any condition you please," said Silvio, eagerly, "so long as you do what I ask of you."
"Is your father aware that you are here—I mean, that you are in the neighborhood of Montefiano?" asked Don Agostino.
Silvio shrugged his shoulders. "I cannot tell you," he replied. "My sister, Giacinta, knows it, and she may have told him. My father, Don Agostino, told me that he had done all he could in asking the consent of the princess to an engagement between his son and her step-daughter, and that, as this consent had been unconditionally refused, I must in future manage my own affairs in my own way. This is what I am doing to the best of my ability."
Don Agostino smiled slightly. "I understand," he said. "Well, Silvio, my condition is that I should see your father and discuss the matter with him before doing anything here. He will give you a good character, I have no doubt, and will assure me that you would make Bianca Acorari a good husband. I owe it to—well, you know now to whom, to make this condition."
Silvio smiled. "Is that all,reverendo?" he asked. "It is a condition very easily carried out," he added.
"We will go to Rome, you and I, to-morrow," said Don Agostino, "and for to-night you will stop with me here. In the evening, when it is cooler, we will go to Civitacastellana, and we will bring your things back with us. No; I am doing you no kindness—I am doing a kindness to myself. As I told you before, it is not often that I have a friend to talk to at Montefiano, and in this case, well—"
Don Agostino did not complete his sentence. His gaze fixed itself upon the cabinet before him, and Silvio understood all that he had left unsaid.
XIX
Although Rome is supposed to be abandoned during the months of August and September by all who can afford the time and the money to leave it, there is always a certain number of people who from choice remain within its walls throughout the summer, declaring, not without reason, that the heat is felt far less in the vast, thick-walled palaces than in country villas and jerry-built hotels.
Among this number was the Senator Rossano. He had fitted up for himself a library in Palazzo Acorari, a long, high room looking to the north, which, if difficult to keep heated in winter, was always deliciously cool even on the hottest of summer days. Here he did the greater part of his writing, and passed the weeks when Rome is deserted, both pleasantly and profitably. Usually he was quite alone during these weeks, for Giacinta as a rule went with friends to one or another of the summer resorts in the Apennines or the north of Italy, or perhaps southward to the fresh sea-breezes of Sorrento.
This year, however, she had delayed hervilleggiaturalater than usual, and was still in Rome. The professor was engaged upon a new scientific work, dealing with no less complicated a theme than the moral responsibility of criminals for the crimes they happened to have committed. Giacinta had been busily engaged in making a clear copy of her father's manuscript. The wealth of detail and example which the professor had brought to bear in order to support certain of his theories did not, it must be owned, always form suitable reading for even the comparatively young, and certainly not for an unmarried woman of Giacinta's age.
But Professor Rossano did not trouble himself about such a trifle as this. He regarded his illustrations as illustrations, mere accidents necessary to his arguments; and it would never have entered into his head that his daughter might not look at them from the same detached point of view. As a matter of fact, Giacinta did so look at them; consequently, no harm was done.
She was sitting with her father in his library, engaged in sorting some papers. It was nearly five o'clock and the great heat of the day was nearly over; in another hour or so she would insist on dragging the professor away from his work, and making him accompany her in a drive outside one of the gates of the city. She was contemplating some suggestion of the kind when her father suddenly looked up from his writing.
"I tell you what we will do this evening, Giacinta," he observed. "We will go and dine at the Castello di Costantino. I have not been there yet this summer. Perhaps we shall find some friends there. The Countess Vitali—she often dines there at this time of year, and nobody can be more amusing when she is in the vein. Her dry humor is most refreshing; it is like something that has been sealed up in an Etruscan tomb and suddenly brought to light with all the colors fresh upon it. Yes, we will go to the Castello di Costantino, and you can tell the servants we shall not eat here."
Giacinta was more than ready to fall in with the idea. She was about to ring the bell in order to tell the servants not to prepare dinner, when the door opened and Silvio walked into the room.
The professor gazed at him placidly.
"I thought that you were at Terni," he said.
"So I was," replied Silvio, smiling, "a fortnight ago. But I completed my business there, and placed the order for the steel girders. Since then I have been in the Sabina. I came from Montefiano this morning."
Giacinta started. "From Montefiano?" she exclaimed.
"From Montefiano—yes," repeated Silvio. "I have not been staying at the castle there," he added, dryly.
"You have been committing some folly, I suppose," remarked the professor, "and I do not wish to hear about it. You will have the goodness, Silvio, not to mention the subject."
"I have been staying with a friend of yours, Babbo," Silvio replied, laughing. "Don Agostino—"
"Don Agostino?" repeated his father. "The devil take your Don Agostino! I do not know whom you mean."
"Monsignor Lelli, then," returned Silvio. "He has come to Rome with me, and he is here—in the house. I left him in the drawing-room. I suppose you will go there to see him; or shall I tell him that you hope the devil may take him?"
The professor burst out laughing. "Lelli! Here?" he exclaimed. "Certainly I will go. I have not seen him for years. I remember now, of course—they sent him to Montefiano—thoseimbroglioniat the Vatican! And so you have been staying with Lelli? Well, at least you have been in good company. I hope he has succeeded in putting a little common-sense into your head."
He hurried out of the room to greet his old friend, leaving Silvio and Giacinta alone together.
"I suppose," said the latter, "that you have seen Donna Bianca again—otherwise I cannot imagine what you have found to do at Civitacastellana for nearly a fortnight? I am told there is nothing to see there."
"It is very picturesque," observed Silvio. "The river, and the situation—"
"No doubt; but I never supposed you went there to look at the river. When I heard it was only four or five miles from Montefiano, then I understood! But who is this Monsignor Lelli, Silvio? I think I have heard Babbo tell some story about him, but I have forgotten what it was."
"He is theparrocoof Montefiano," replied Silvio, "and he used to be at the Vatican some years ago. I do not know the story—he would not tell it me; but Babbo knows it well, and we will ask him—the history of his earlier life—that he did tell me. Imagine, Giacinta, he was engaged to Bianca Acorari's mother. They forced her to marry the Principe di Montefiano, and then he became a priest. But he never ceased to love her, although he did become a priest; that I know."
Giacinta looked at him.
"And now?" she asked.
"Now he has come to ask Babbo for my character," answered Silvio, smiling. "If he gets a good one, he will help me to marry Bianca. Do you know, Giacinta, that they want to marry her to a brother of the princess—a Baron d'Antin? Did you ever hear of anything so outrageous? As Don Agostino—he will not be calledmonsignore—says, such a thing must be prevented, and, of course, I am the proper person to prevent it."
"Of course!"
"You must admit that it is strange, Giacinta, that Don Agostino should have been engaged to Bianca's mother—and her name was Bianca also—just as I am engaged to the daughter, and that he should be at Montefiano. It seems like a destiny. As for this Baron d'Antin—"
"I have seen him several times," observed Giacinta. "He always stares very hard. I asked the porter who he was. He is not so very old, Silvio; he looks younger than the princess."
"You had better marry him," returned Silvio; "then you will become my step-aunt by marriage as well as being my sister."
Giacinta laughed. "Don't talk nonsense," she said; "but tell me what you and Monsignor Lelli propose to do. I never expected that you would confide your love affairs to a priest. First of all a French governess, and now amonsignore. You are certainly an original person, Silvio."
"Ah, but Don Agostino is not like most priests—"
"Because he has been in love himself?" interrupted Giacinta, laughing.
"Oh, not at all! There would be nothing unusual in that," answered Silvio, dryly. "Priests are no different from other people, I suppose, although they may profess to be so. No; Don Agostino is not like the majority of his brethren, because he has the honesty to be a man first and a priest afterwards. He does not forget the priest, but one hears and feels the man all the time he is talking to one.
"As to what I am going to do, Giacinta," Silvio continued, tranquilly, "I am going to marry Bianca Acorari, as I have told you before—"
"Very often," added Giacinta.
"But how I am going to do it, is certainly not quite clear at present. I would have waited, and so would she; but how can we wait now that they are trying to force her to marry this old baron in order to prevent her from marrying me?"
"It is very strange," said Giacinta, thoughtfully. "I certainly believed they did not intend her to marry at all—at any rate, for some years."
"Ah, but that was before I appeared on the scene," observed Silvio. "Now they are afraid of her marrying me, and so would marry her to anybody who happened to be noble."
Giacinta shook her head. "There is some other reason than that," she replied. "The princess could find scores of husbands for the girl without being obliged to fall back on her own brother, who must be nearly thirty years older than Donna Bianca. A marriage between those two would be a marriage only in name."
Silvio stared at her. "What in the world do you mean, Giacinta?" he exclaimed.
"Oh," she returned, hurriedly, "I don't mean—well, what you think I mean! I meant to say that, supposing Bianca Acorari were married to this old baron, everything would go on as before in Casa Acorari. It would be, so to speak, merely a family arrangement, which would, perhaps, be very convenient."
"Perbacco!" exclaimed Silvio, "but you have your head upon your shoulders, Giacinta! I never thought of that. I thought it was simply a scheme to marry Bianca as soon as possible, in order to get her away from me. But very likely you are quite right. There is probably some intrigue behind it all. We will hear what Don Agostino thinks of your supposition—ah, here they come!" he broke off suddenly as his father and Don Agostino entered the library together.
Silvio made the priest acquainted with his sister, and then turned to the professor.
"I hope, Babbo," he said, "that you have given me a fairly good character."
"I have explained that you are as obstinate as a mule," replied his father.
Don Agostino laughed. "I have heard a few other things about you also," he said, laying his hand on Silvio's shoulder. "After all," he added, "they were only things I expected to hear, so I might quite as well have stopped at Montefiano instead of coming to Rome—except for the pleasure of seeing an old friend again."
"Don Agostino will spend the evening with us," said Silvio to his father, "and early to-morrow morning I am going back with him to Montefiano."
Giacinta looked somewhat perplexed. "Do you know," she said, "we had settled to dine at the Castello di Costantino this evening? You see, Silvio, I had no idea you were coming back, and still less that we should have a visitor—"
"But we will all go and dine at the Costantino," interposed the professor, jovially. "Why not? We shall be a party of four—and four is a very good number to sit at table, but not to drive in abotte—so we will have twobotti, and then nobody need sit on the back seat. You will go with Silvio, Giacinta, andmonsignoreand I will go together."
Don Agostino hesitated for a moment. "It is a place where one may meet people," he said, "and nobody knows that I am in Rome—"
"No, no," returned the professor, hastily, "you are not likely to meet any one you know at the Costantino, unless it be Countess Locatelli—and you certainly would not mind meeting her?"
"On the contrary," said Don Agostino. "It is always a pleasure to meet her—and to talk to her. Doubly so," he added, "after so long an exile at Montefiano. I do not find the female society of Montefiano very—what shall I say? sharpening to the intellect. My house-keeper is occasionally amusing—but limited as to her subjects."
Silvio and his father both laughed. "At any rate, she gives you a better dinner than you will get to-night," said the former.
A quarter of an hour's drive brought them to the Aventine, the most unspoiled and picturesque of the seven hills of Rome, with its secluded convent-gardens and ancient churches, its wealth of tradition and legend. In no other quarter of Rome—not even in the Forum, nor among the imperial ruins of the Palatine—does the spirit of the past seem to accompany one's every step as on the almost deserted Aventine. Especially as evening draws on, and the shadows begin to creep over the vineyards and fruit-gardens beyond the city walls; as the scattered ruins that have glowed rose-red in the rays of the setting sun now stand out—purple masses against the green background of thecampagna, and Tiber reflects the orange and saffron tints of the sky, the dead present seems to be enwrapped by the living past in these groves and gardens hidden away on the Aventine and far removed from the turmoil and vulgarity of modern Rome.
In those years the so-called Castello di Costantino was not the well-known resort that it has recently become. It was, indeed, little more than a somewhat superiortrattoria, where one ate a bad Roman dinner and drank good Roman wine on a terrace commanding one of the most picturesque, as it is assuredly one of the most interesting, views in the world. In those days it was not the scene of pompous gatherings in honor of foreign or home celebrities, followed by wearisome speeches breathing mutual admiration in hackneyed phrases. A few artists, a few secretaries of embassies left to conduct international affairs while their chiefs were in cooler climates; a few ladies of the Roman world who happened to be still left in the city, these, and a family party or two of the Romanmezzo-ceto, were its occasional visitors in the hot summer evenings when it is pleasant to get away from the baked pavements and streets of the town, and to breathe the fresh, sweet air stealing in from the open country and the sea.
The terrace behind the restaurant was almost deserted, and Professor Rossano selected a table at one corner of it, whence an uninterrupted view could be obtained over a part of the city, and across thecampagnato the Sabine mountains in the nearer background; while between these and the Alban Hills the higher summits of the Leonessa range glowed red against the far horizon as they caught the last rays of the setting sun.
Monsignor Lelli cast a rapid glance around him as he seated himself at the little table, while the professor discussed the ordering of the dinner with the waiter. There was nobody, however, who would be likely to know him by sight, and comment on his presence in Rome in quarters where he would prefer it to remain unknown. A few couples, already half-way through their meal, or smoking their cigars over a measure of white wine, were the only visitors to the Castello di Costantino that evening besides Professor Rossano and his party, and these were evidently students either of art or of love.
"And so," observed Professor Rossano to his guest, as the waiter retired with his order, "you have come to Rome to tell me that you mean to help my son to make an idiot of himself. I suppose you are a little short of something to occupy you at Montefiano?"
Don Agostino laughed. "There was certainly more to occupy me when I lived in Rome," he said, dryly. "As for helping Silvio to make an idiot of himself, I am inclined to think he would make a worse idiot of himself without my assistance."
"Grazie, Don Agostino!" murmured Silvio, placidly.
"I wonder when they will call you back?" the professor said; "not," he added, with a quick movement of the head towards the Vatican, "as long as—"
"Caro senatore!" interrupted Don Agostino, deprecatingly.
"Of course—of course!" returned Professor Rossano, hastily. "I forgot yoursoutane—I always did, in the old days, if you recollect. We will talk of something else. It is always like that—when a man insists upon his right to use his own reason and to think for himself—"
"I thought you proposed to talk of something else," suggested Giacinta, mildly, to her father.
Don Agostino looked at her and laughed.
"He is the same as he was twenty years ago—our dear professor," he said.
"You are quite right, Giacinta," returned Professor Rossano. "When I think of the intellects—God-given—that have been warped and crushed in the name of God, it makes me fly into a rage. Yes, it is certainly better to talk of something else. All the same, Monsignor Lelli understands what I mean. If he did not, he would still be at the Vatican, and not at Montefiano."
"I am particularly glad that Don Agostino understands," interposed Silvio.
"You!" exclaimed the professor, witheringly. "I have told you more than once that you are a pumpkin-head. A fine thing, truly, to make my old friend Monsignor Lelli a confidant of your love affairs! Not but what you appear to have confided them to him at a tolerably early stage. It is usually at a later stage that a priest hears of a love affair—is it not so,caro monsignore?" he added, with a twinkle of amusement in his brown eyes.
Don Agostino smiled. "Yes," he replied, "at a much later stage;" and then he paused and glanced across the table at Giacinta.
The professor saw the look and misinterpreted it. "Oh," he observed, carelessly, "my daughter knows all about Silvio's folly. But I do not wish to hear anything more about that. You have asked me certain questions about Silvio, and I have answered them, and that is enough. If you choose to help the boy in making an idiot of himself, my dear friend, I suppose you must do so, but I do not wish to know anything of the matter. There will be disturbances, and I am too busy for disturbances. I am preparing my work on criminal responsibility. It will be followed by another volume on responsibility in mental diseases. By-the-way, if I had the time I would study Silvio's case. It might be useful to me for my second volume. No; Giacinta and I are decidedly too busy to be troubled with Silvio's love affairs. Giacinta, you must know, acts as my secretary and copies out my manuscripts."
Don Agostino raised his eyebrows slightly.
"All of them?" he asked.
"Certainly, all of them. Her handwriting is exceedingly clear, whereas mine is frequently almost illegible. If it were not for Giacinta, I should have to employ a typewriter."
Don Agostino said nothing, but he glanced again at the girl, and wondered how much she understood of the professor's physiological arguments, and of the examples upon which many of them were based. The few minutes' conversation he had had alone with Professor Rossano had speedily convinced him that the professor was both proud and fond of his son. He had given Silvio the character which Don Agostino, a practised reader of countenances and the natures those countenances reflected, had felt sure would be given. At the same time, the professor had expressed his opinion of his son's passion for Donna Bianca Acorari in very decided terms, and had upbraided his old friend for encouraging the boy in his folly. Don Agostino had not explained his motives for espousing Silvio's cause. He had learned all he wanted to know, and was satisfied that he had gauged Silvio's nature and character correctly. He felt, indeed, an unconquerable aversion from explaining the motives which prompted him to interest himself in a love affair between two headstrong young people. Everybody knew why he had left the Vatican; but very few people knew why, some four-and-twenty years ago, a good-looking young fellow, by name Agostino Lelli, became a priest. Most of us have an inner recess in our hearts—unless we are of that fortunate number who have no hearts—a recess which we shrink from unlocking as we would shrink from desecrating a tomb over which we are ever laying fresh flowers. Something which he could scarcely define had impelled Don Agostino to allow Silvio Rossano to glance into his jealously guarded shrine. He felt as though he had received some message from his beloved dead that the boy had a right to do so. He was convinced, moreover, in his own mind that the living spirit of the woman he had loved was urging him to save her child from the unhappiness that had fallen upon herself. Perhaps he had brooded too long and too deeply over the strange change of coincidences which had brought him and Silvio together—at the strange similarity between his own life's story and that of his old friend Professor Rossano's son, between the dead Bianca, Princess of Montefiano, and the child who bore her name and bodily likeness. In any case, it seemed to Don Agostino as though he were living over again those far-off years in Venice; as though he saw in Silvio Rossano his own youth, with all its hopes and all its joys, and yet with the same dark shadows—shadows that only youth itself had prevented him from realizing—threatening to overwhelm and destroy both.
"The boy is in earnest," he had said to Professor Rossano during their conversation together before setting out for the Castello di Costantino. "Cannot you see that he is in earnest?"
He spoke almost angrily, the more so, perhaps, on account of that strange feeling which never left him—the feeling that he was pleading his own cause and that of his dead.
"My dear friend," the professor had responded, with a slight shrug of the shoulders, "when one is young and in love, one is always in earnest—each time. Are you so old that you cannot remember? Ah, I forgot, you had no experience of such things—at least, no official experience."
Don Agostino smiled. "No," he repeated, "no official experience."
The professor glanced at him with a gleam of satirical amusement. He fancied he had detected a note of irony in the other's voice, but in his interpretation of it he was very wide of the mark.
And Don Agostino had found that the result of his conversation with Silvio's father was exactly what Silvio himself had foretold. The professor had dismissed the whole affair with airy good-humor as apazzia, a folly in which he had so far participated as to have made formal overtures on his son's behalf for Donna Bianca Acorari's hand, and of which he did not wish to hear anything more. If Silvio thought the girl would make him a good wife, then by all means let him marry her, if he could. If he could not, there were plenty of other girls to choose from, and any one of them who married Silvio would be a great deal luckier than she most probably deserved to be.
Don Agostino had very soon come to the conclusion that the professor would place no serious obstacles in the way to hinder his son from marrying Donna Bianca Acorari, should Silvio find means to accomplish that object. During the remainder of their dinner at the Castello di Costantino he threw himself, as it were, into Professor Rossano's humor, and it soon became evident to Silvio and Giacinta that their father and his guest were mutually enjoying one another's conversation. Giacinta, indeed, was not a little astonished at hearing the professor discourse so readily with a priest. But then, as she noted the facility with which Monsignor Lelli met her father on his favorite ground, the knowledge which he displayed of the scientific and political problems of the day, the serene tolerance with which he would discuss questions which she knew to be anathema to the ecclesiastical temperament, it was at once revealed to her that this was no ordinary priest, whose mental vision was limited by the outlook of the sacristy. The professor, as the evening wore on, seemed to be in his element. From subject to subject he flew with a rapidity which would have been bewildering had it not been for the conciseness and pungency of the arguments he brought to bear upon each of them. But Monsignor Lelli met him at every turn, agreeing with him often, but often parrying his thrusts with rapier-like stabs of keenest satire. The summer twilight was already fading into dusk, and the moon was rising over the Aventine, casting long shadows from the cypress-trees over the gardens and vineyards stretching away beneath the terrace, and still the two continued their discussions.
People seated at little tables near them ceased from laughing and talking, and turned round to listen, for the waiters had whispered that thesignorewith the beard was the famous Senator Rossano, and that the priest was without doubt a cardinal who had dressed as an ordinary priest lest he should be compromised by being seen in public in such company.
Suddenly, in the midst of a more than usually brilliant sally, provoked by some observation from his host, Monsignor Lelli stopped abruptly and addressed an entirely irrelevant remark to Giacinta. Silvio, who happened to be looking at him, saw his face change slightly as he looked beyond the professor towards the door leading from the restaurant on to the terrace. A small group of new arrivals was issuing from this door, and its members began to make their way to a vacant table a short distance from that occupied by the professor and his party.
Giacinta also had caught sight of the new-comers. "Look, Silvio!" she exclaimed, in a low tone; "look, father, there is Princess Montefiano's brother, Monsieur d'Antin, with those people!"
"Very well, Giacinta," returned the professor, vexed at the interruption; "he can go to the devil! Go on with what you were saying," he added to Don Agostino. "It was well put—very well put, indeed—but I think that I have an argument—"
"Caro senatore," observed Don Agostino, tranquilly, "are you aware that it grows late? We can continue our discussion as we return to the city.Signorina," he continued, turning to Giacinta, "you are sitting with your back to the view. Is it not beautiful, with the moonlight falling on those ruins?"
He rose from his chair as he spoke, and motioned to Giacinta to accompany him to the parapet of the terrace.
"Bring your father away," he said to her, in a low voice, "and Silvio. It is as well for us not to be seen together."
"But Baron d'Antin does not know Silvio by sight," returned Giacinta, "and I doubt if he knows either my father or me by sight. Do you know him,monsignore?" she added.
"I have never seen him," said Don Agostino, "and it is not of him I am thinking—but of the other, the young man who is with him. No, do not look round,signorina! At present I think that we are unobserved. It will be more prudent for me to leave you without any further ceremony. We can meet again outside the restaurant."
"But who is he—that other one?" asked Giacinta, quickly.
"A person I would rather not meet," replied Don Agostino—"at least," he added, "I would rather not be seen by him under the present circumstances,signorina. I beg of you to explain to your father that he will find me waiting for him outside," and, turning from her, Don Agostino walked rapidly towards the door, having satisfied himself that the new-comers were occupied with the head-waiter in ordering their dinner, and that he could probably leave the terrace unobserved by them.