One evening Cornélie made the acquaintance of the Dutch family beside
whom the marchesa had first wished to place her at the table: Mrs.
Van der Staal and her two daughters. They too were spending the whole
winter in Rome: they had friends there and went out visiting. The
conversation flowed smoothly; and mevrouw invited Cornélie to come
and have a chat in her sitting-room. Next day she accompanied her new
acquaintances to the Vatican and heard that mevrouw was expecting
her son, who was coming to Rome from Florence to continue his
archæological studies.
Cornélie was glad to meet at the hotel a Dutch element that was
not repellant. She thought it pleasant to talk Dutch again and she
confessed as much. In a day or two she had become intimate with Mrs.
Van der Staal and the two girls; and on the evening when young Van der
Staal arrived she opened her heart more than she had ever thought that
she could do to strangers whom she had known for barely a few days.
They were sitting in the Van der Staals' sitting-room, Cornélie in a
low chair by the blazing log-fire, for the evening was chilly. They
had been talking about the Hague, about her divorce; and she was now
speaking of Italy, of herself:
"I no longer see-anything," she confessed. "Rome has quite bewildered
me. I can't distinguish a colour, an outline. I don't recognize people.
They all seem to whirl round me. Sometimes I feel a need to sit alone
for hours in my bird-cage upstairs, to recollect myself. This morning,
in the Vatican, I don't know: I remember nothing. It is all grey
and fuzzy around me. Then the people in the boarding-house: the same
faces every day. I see them and yet I don't see them. I see ... I see
Madame von Rothkirch and her daughter, I see the fair Urania ... and
Rudyard ... and the little Englishwoman, Miss Taylor, who is always
so tired with sight-seeing and who thinks everything most exquisite.
But my memory is so bad that, when I am alone, I have to think to
myself: Mrs. von Rothkirch is tall and stately, with the smile of the
German Empress--she _is_ rather like her--talking fast and yet with
indifference, as though the words just fell indifferently from her
lips...."
"You're a good observer," said Van der Staal.
"Oh, don't say that!" said Cornélie, almost vexed. "I see nothing and
I can't remember. I receive no impressions. Everything around me is
colourless. I really don't know why I have come abroad.... When I'm
alone, I think of the people I meet. I know Madame von Rothkirch now
and I know Else. Such a round merry face, with arched eyebrows, and
always a joke or a witticism: I find it tiring sometimes, she makes me
laugh so. Still, they are very nice. And the fair Urania. She tells me
everything. She is as communicative ... as I am at this moment. And
Rudyard: I see him before me too."
"Rudyard!" smiled mevrouw and the girls.
"What is he?" Cornélie asked, inquisitively. "He is so civil, he
ordered my wine for me, he can always get one all sorts of cards."
"Don't you know what Rudyard is?" asked Mrs Van der Staal.
"No; and Mrs. von Rothkirch doesn't know either."
"Then you had better be careful," laughed the girls.
"Are you a Catholic?" asked mevrouw.
"No."
"Nor the fair Urania either? Nor Mrs. von Rothkirch?"
"No."
"Well, that is why la Belloni put Rudyard at your table. Rudyard is a
Jesuit. Every _pension_ in Rome has a Jesuit who lives there free of
charge, if the proprietor is a good friend of the Church, and who tries
to win souls by making himself especially agreeable."
Cornélie refused to believe it.
"You can take my word for it," mevrouw continued, "that in a _pension_
like this, a first-class _pension_, a _pension_ with a reputation, a
great deal of intrigue goes on."
"La Belloni?" Cornélie enquired.
"Our marchesa is a thorough-paced _intrigante_. Last winter, three
English sisters were converted here."
"By Rudyard?"
"No, by another priest. Rudyard is here for the first time this winter."
"Rudyard walked quite a long way with me in the street this morning,"
said young Van der Staal. "I let him talk, I heard all he had to say."
Cornélie fell back in her chair:
"I am tired of people," she said, with the strange sincerity which was
hers. "I should like to sleep for a month, without seeing anybody."
And, after a short pause, she got up, said good-night and went to bed,
while everything swam before her eyes.