Amilcare gaily struggled for vent, and--"voglio!" he concluded the word.
"You may not relish the trophy, my wife; but him you undoubtedly
charmed. And now Don Cesare is coming. Him also it will be as needful as
easy to please."
Molly turned in her husband's arms to consider him. Something in his
tone (rather than the words he had used) struck bodefully upon her.
Amilcare was kissing her hair and would not give over: she cast down her
eyes unsatisfied.
"I hope I may always please my lord's friends," she said in a low voice.
Amilcare settled himself yet more luxuriously in his cushions, and
looked at the ceiling.
"You must charm him, my soul," he said intensely; "you must charm him. I
am in his hands, in his way; he has sought my ruin and I believe still
seeks it. Twice he has tried to poison me, once to have me stabbed; if
he tries again he will succeed. Nothing can turn Don Cesare from his
path but a woman. Therefore, you must charm him, ravish his eyes. You
know very well how to do that."
Molly stared, grew red, began to stammer. "But how can I--? Oh,
Amilcare, what do you ask of me?"
Then he looked at her, severely but without malice. She noticed for the
first time the cold-steel hue in his eyes, the complete absence of
friendliness--a tinge which his men knew very well, and other men's men
even better.
"I ask of you, my Molly, that the man be put at his ease," he said
deliberately (happy in ordering at last); "more, that his direction be
turned. He must be made high-hearted, full of glorious hope, not
counting cost, keen in pursuit. He must blow off the cobwebs of his
doubt; rather, these must shred from him as he flies in chase. I cannot
afford his distrust. I can do nothing without you. Light of Heaven! am I
asking too much? Or do you suppose that my safety with the Borgia is not
yours also?" He shrugged his intolerable indignation and threw back his
head. Thus he avoided to look at his wife.
She still sat upon his knee, but like an alien, bolt upright, reasoning
out her misery with wide tearless eyes, and a hand to press her bosom
down. Shocks were no more for her--she had learned too much; but these
things seemed like hard fingers on a familiar wound, which opened the
old sore and set it aching. The part he now put to her had only to be
named to be shown for horrible; was yet too horrible to be named; yet
had to be named.
"You ask of me to charm your enemy," she said in a still, fascinated
voice (as if she were forced by a spell to speak obscenity): "to beguile
your enemy--to make him--make him--seek me? Him, the man who tried to
murder you? Charm him? Charm him? Lead him to pursue?"
She could hardly drag the words out of her, but Lord! what a fool she
was. At least, Amilcare thought so. The plainest duty, the easiest; this
childish woman's game! He jumped up, quivering with nerves on edge, and
the sympathy between the pair lacked even touch. Molly found her feet,
stood brooding before him, all her hair about her lowered face.
To see her thus, a mute, a block, maddened Amilcare. He clenched his
fists. "Yes, Madam"--his words bit the air--"you shall charm this enemy
of mine, if you please; this assassin, this ravener of other men's
goods. You shall charm him in the way you best know--you and your
nation. Bentivoglio I excused you: he was not worth your pains. Borgia I
shall not excuse you. I showed you to him with this only view; I asked
him here, I speak to you now, with this only view. You are adorable in
every part, if you choose to be. Italy has no woman like you, so
winning, so much the sumptuous child: such tall buds shoot only in the
North. To it, then! Charm him as you charmed me. Teach him--_Santo
Dio_!--teach him to die for a smile. At least afford him the smile or
the provocation of it: the rest shall be my affair. Soul of Christ! am I
to miss this astounding opportunity? Never in the world. I bid you by
all you hold sacred to do your duty. Am I plain enough?"
He was. She had grown as grey as a cloth, could say nothing, only motion
with her dry lips. But she bent her head to him, and stretched out her
hands in token of obedience to law.
"Good," said Amilcare; "my wife understands me." And he went out then
and there to his Council. His conviction of her submissiveness (and of
other things about her to modify it) may be gauged by the fact that he
never saw her again (except ceremonially) until a certain moment after
the dinner with Borgia.
Grifone saw her all the more for that. What he saw satisfied him that
she was in terrible trouble. She slunk about, to his view, as if beaten
down by shame. He had seen young girls in that strait very often, when
the first step had been taken, the first flush faded from the venture,
the first after-knowledge come. They always went as though they were
watched. More than that, he discerned that she was nearly broken for
want of a counsellor: he caught her long gaze fixed upon him sometimes.
She seemed to be peering through him, spoke to herself (he thought) as
she sat vacantly upon her throne, or at table among the quick wits, with
all her spying ladies to fence her in. If any one addressed the word to
her she flushed suddenly and began to catch after her breath. He could
see how shortly that breath came, and how it seemed to hurt her. If she
answered at all, it was stupidly and beside the purpose; then she would
look conscious of her dulness, grow uncomfortably red, be at the point
to cry. All this, while it could not but gratify him, made him a little
sorry too.
One night, at a very brilliant assembly given by the notorious Donna
Smeralda Buonaccorso, he saw her standing forlorn on the terrace, like a
lonely rock in the sea--the most beautiful woman in Nona and the most
splendidly attired, absolutely alone in all that chattering, grimacing
crowd. The Duchess of Nona! This consideration alone moved him to real
pity--for to be great and unfortunate has a freakish way of touching
your heart--it moved him quietly towards her, to whisper in her ear--
"Madonna"--(and Heaven! how she started), "Madonna, what you need now is
the courage of your race. But courage, I well know, comes only by
confidence, and confidence is what I can give you. Trust for trust; will
you hear me?"
But she looked piteously at him, as if she had been found out, and put
her hands to her ears.
"I dare not hear you! I dare not! How can you speak to me when I have
never asked--never thought? Ah, leave me, Grifone. I have not heard you
yet: ask me not--but go!"
It was she that went, that hurried from him, stumbling in her haste,
like a hunted thing. He could see no more of her that night, so with a
shrug turned to his quiet amusement. There were women there pleasant
enough. It was true that he wanted but one woman superlatively; but it
was eminently Grifone's maxim that, failing that which you need, you
should take that which you can get.
The last stage in the education of Molly, Amilcare found must positively
be left to the Secretary.
On the night before Duke Cesare's arrival, when every other preparation
had been made, Grifone came into his master's room, late. He said
nothing, nor got any greeting; but he placed a little phial on the
table, and waited. Amilcare looked at it, did not touch it. It was a
very small phial, half full of a clear liquid.
"You prepared it yourself, Grifone?"
Grifone nodded pleasantly.
"Then I may rest assured--?"
"You may, my lord."
"I will ask you to make all arrangements, Grifone. When the time comes
you will take the cup to Madonna Duchessa, with a hint of so much as may
be necessary to provide against mischances. Will this be done?"
"Punctually and surely, Excellence." The Secretary retired with his
bottle.
Amilcare sat on with a tight smile which neither waxed nor waned, but
seemed frozen on his face. He may thus have sat for two or three hours,
his eyes fixed on a point at the table's edge. That point, whatever it
was, a speck of dust, may be, seemed to grow and grow till it was
monstrous and a burden intolerable to endure. Amilcare, with an effort,
stretched out his hand and cuffed at it. He knocked a book off the table
by this means, then started, then swore at himself. Twice after this he
spoke, smiling all the while. "Is it now indeed?" he asked, raising one
eyebrow; "is it now indeed?" Then he got up, stretched himself noisily,
and lay down as he was on the sofa, to sleep in a moment.
Molly lay with a young maid of hers that night and never had a wink.