What happened now happened after I had left the festival, but I heard
all the facts later from eye-witnesses, so that I honestly think I can
make it as plain a tale as if I had seen the things myself. Messer
Maleotti, doing as he was told and rejoicing in the thought that he was
making mischief, came into the feasting-hall where Messer Folco sat
apart with certain old friends and kinsfolk of his, sober gentlefolk of
age and repute, that made merry in their grave way and laughed
cheerfully over the jests of yesteryear, and one of them was Master
Tommaso Severo, that was Madonna Beatrice's physician. Now Maleotti,
catching sight of a certain ancient servant of Messer Folco's, whom he
knew well to be an honest man and one much trusted by his master, made
for him and drew him a little apart, and whispered into his ear that
very amazing message with which Messer Simone had intrusted him.
This message, bluntly and baldly stated, came to this: that Maleotti,
taking his ease in the garden and wandering this way and that, came at
last by chance beneath the walls of that part of the palace where
Madonna Beatrice dwelt. There, on the loggia, very plain in the
moonlight, he saw Madonna Beatrice in discourse with a man. Though the
moonlight was bright and showed the face of Madonna Beatrice very
distinctly, the man stood at an angle, as it were, and he could make
nothing of him, face or figure. Such was the story which Maleotti,
primed thereto by Simone, had to tell. At first the man to whom he told
it seemed incredulous, as well he might be, albeit it chanced the tale
was true, and then he became doubtful--for, after all, youth is youth
and love love--and finally, upon Maleotti's insistence, he did indeed
consent to go toward his master, and, plucking him by the sleeve,
solicit the favor of a private word with him. Messer Folco, who was
always very affable in his bearing to those that served him, and who had
a special affection for this fellow, rose very good-humoredly from the
table and the converse and the wine, and going a little ways apart,
listened to what his old servant, who seemed so agitated and aghast, had
to tell him.
When Messer Folco heard what it was that his man had to say, Messer
Folco frowned sternly, and expressed a disbelief so emphatic and so
angry that there was nothing for the poor servitor to do but to call
Maleotti himself, who, with great seeming reluctance and with many
protestations of regret, that must have made him seem like a
particularly mischievous monkey apologizing for stealing nuts, repeated,
with a cunning lack of embellishment, the plain statement that he had
made to the retainer. Thereupon, Messer Folco, in a great rage which it
took all his boasted philosophy to keep under control, called to him two
or three of his old cronies that were still lingering about the deserted
tables. These folk were, indeed, also his kinsfolk, and it was from one
of them that I had the particulars which I am about to set forth with
almost as much certainty as if I had seen them myself.
Making hurried excuses to those few that remained at the table, Messer
Folco and his friends quitted the room upon their errand of folly. And
Maleotti, having done his devil's work, departed upon other business of
his master's, that was no less damnable in its nature and no less
threatening to Simone's enemies.
Messer Folco and his friends hurried swiftly and in silence through the
still, moon-lit gardens till they came to the gateway that Dante had
opened and the little staircase whereby Dante had ascended. Passing
through this gateway and mounting those steps, Messer Folco and his
friends came to the loggia and stood there for a moment in silence. Had
they been less busy upon a bad and unhappy errand, they must needs have
been enchanted by the beauty of all that lay before and around them in
that place and on that night of summer.
The air was very hot upon the loggia, and the night was very still. All
over the field of the sky the star-candles were burning brightly, and it
scarcely needed the torches that certain of Messer Folco's companions
carried to see what was to be seen. Those of Messer Folco's kinsfolk
that stood huddled together about the entrance of the loggia, curious
and confused at the suddenness of the unlovely business, could see that
their leader looked very pale and grave as he crossed the pavement and
struck sharply with his clinched hand at the door which faced him. In a
little while the door opened, and one of Madonna Beatrice's ladies
peeped out her head, and gave a little squeal of surprise at the sight
of her lord and the rest of the company, the unexpected presence, and
the unexpected torches. But Messer Folco bade her very sternly be still,
and when Messer Folco commanded sternly he was generally obeyed. Then he
ordered her that she should summon her mistress at once to come to him
there, where he waited for her. When the sorely frightened girl had
gone, there was silence for a little while on the loggia, while the
perplexed friends stared at each other's blanched faces, until presently
the little door opened again and Monna Beatrice came forth from it, and
saluted her father very sweetly and gravely, as if nothing were out of
the ordinary, though some thought, and Messer Tommaso Severo knew, that
there was a troubled look in her usually serene eyes.
Messer Folco addressed her calmly, with the calmness of one that, being
consciously a philosopher, seeks to restrain all needless, unreasonable
rages, and he said, slowly: "Madonna, I have been told very presently by
one that pretends to have seen what he tells, that you talked here but
now with a man alone. The thing, of course, is not true?"
The question which went with the utterance of his last words was given
in a very confident voice, and he carried, whether by dissimulation or
no, a very confident countenance.
The look of confidence faded from his face as Madonna Beatrice answered
him very simply. "The thing is true," she said, and then said no more,
as if there were no more to say, but stood quietly where she was,
looking steadily at her father and paying no heed to any other of those
that were present.
The voice of Folco was as stern as before, though harder in its tone as
he again addressed his daughter. "The thing is true, then? I am grieved
to hear it. Who was the man?"
Madonna Beatrice looked at him very directly. She seemed to be neither
at all abashed nor at all defiant, as she answered, tranquilly, "I
cannot tell you, father."
For a little while that seemed a great while a dreary quiet reigned over
that moon-bathed loggia. Father and daughter faced each other with fixed
gaze, and the others, very ill at ease, watching the pair, wished
themselves elsewhere with all their hearts.
While those that assisted reluctantly at this meeting wondered what
would happen next, seeing those two high, simple, and noble spirits
suddenly brought into such strange antagonism--before they, I say, could
formulate any solution of the problem, a man stepped out of the shadow
of the doorway and advanced toward Folco boldly, and the astonished
spectators saw that the man was none other than Messer Simone dei Bardi.
However he may have revelled at the now ended festival, there were no
signs of wine or riot about him now. He stood squarely and steadily
enough, and his red face was no redder than its wont. Only a kind of
ferocious irony showed on it as he loomed there, largely visible in the
yellow air.
"What is all this fuss about?" he asked, with a fierce geniality. "I am
the man you seek after, and why should I not be? Though why you should
seek for me I fail to see. May not a man speak awhile in private to the
lady of his honorable love, and yet no harm done to bring folk about our
ears with torches and talk and staring faces?"
As he spoke those present saw how Madonna Beatrice looked at him, and
they read in her face a proud disdain and a no less proud despair, and
they knew that somehow or other, though of course they could not guess
how, this fair and gracious lady was caught in a trap. They saw how she
longed to speak yet did not speak, and they knew thereby there was some
reason for her keeping silence. Messer Folco looked long at Messer
Simone dei Bardi as he stood there clearly visible in the mingled
lights--large, almost monstrous, truculent, ugly, the embodiment of
savage strength and barbaric appetites. Then Folco looked from Simone's
bulk to his daughter, who stood there as cold and white and quiet as if
she had been a stone image and not a breathing maid.
Folco advanced toward Beatrice and took her by the hand and drew her
apart a little ways, and it so chanced that the place where they came to
a pause was within ear-shot of one of those that Messer Folco had
brought with him, one who stood apart in the darkness and looked and
listened, and this one was Tommaso Severo, the physician. Messer Simone
kept his stand with his arms folded and a smile of triumph on his face,
and I have it on good authority--that, namely, of Messer Tommaso
Severo--that at least one of the spectators wished, as he beheld Simone,
that he had been suddenly blessed by Heaven with the strength of a
giant, that he might have picked the Bardi up by the middle and pitched
him over the parapet into the street below. But as Heaven vouchsafed
this spectator no such grace, Severo kept his place and his peace, and
he heard what Messer Folco said to his daughter Beatrice.
And what he said to her and what she answered to him was very brief and
direct.
Messer Folco asked his daughter, "Was this the man you talked with but
now?"
And Beatrice, looking neither at her father nor at any other one there
present, but looking straight before her over the gilded greenness of
the garden, answered, quietly, "No."
Then Folco questioned her again. "Will you tell me who the man was that
you talked with here?"
And again Beatrice, as tranquil, resolute to shield her lover from
danger, with the same fixed gaze over the green spaces below her,
answered as before the same answer, "No."
Then there came a breathing-space of quiet; Messer Folco looked hard at
his daughter; and she, for her part, looking, as before, away from him,
because, as I guess, she judged that there would be something irreverent
in outfacing her father while she denied his wishes and defied so
strangely his parental authority. Messer Simone stood at his ease a
little apart with the mocking smile of conquest on his face, and the
guests, kinsfolk, and friends, that were witnesses of the sad business,
huddled together uncomfortably.
Then Messer Folco, seeing that nothing more was to be got from the girl,
turned round and addressed himself to those of his kin that stood by the
entrance to the loggia. "Friends," he said, and his voice was measured,
and his words came slow and clear--"kinsmen and friends, I have a piece
of news for you. I announce here and now the betrothal of my daughter
Beatrice to Messer Simone dei Bardi, and I bid you all to the wedding
to-morrow in the church of the Holy Name."
Then, in the silence that greeted this statement, Messer Folco held out
his right hand to Simone and took his right hand, and he drew Simone
toward him and then toward Beatrice, and he lifted the right hand of
Beatrice, that lay limply against her side, and made to place its
whiteness on the brown palm of Messer Simone. Messer Simone's face was
flushed with triumph and Monna Beatrice's face was drawn with pain, and
those that witnessed and wondered thought a great wrong had been
wrought, and wondered why. But before Messer Folco could join the two
hands together Beatrice suddenly plucked her hand away from her father's
clasp.
"No! no! no!" she cried, in a loud voice, and then again cried "No!"
And even as she did so she reeled backward in a swoon, and would have
fallen upon the marble pavement if Messer Severo, that was watching her,
had not sprung timely forward and caught her in his arms.