“Well,” cried the general, as soon as he caught sight of his brother Don
Cesare, “here is the duchess ready to spend a hundred thousand crowns to
make a fool of me and save the prisoner.”
But for the present we must leave Fabrizio in his prison, high up in the
citadel of Parma. He is well guarded there, and when we come back we
shall find him safe enough, though perhaps a trifle changed. We must now
turn all our attention to the court, where his fate is to be decided by
the most complicated intrigues, and, above all, by the passions of a most
unhappy woman. As Fabrizio, watched by the governor, climbed the three
hundred and eighty steps which led to his dungeon in the Farnese Tower he
felt, greatly as he had dreaded that moment, that he had no time to think
of his misfortune.
When the duchess reached home after leaving Count Zurla’s party she waved
her women from her, and then, throwing herself, fully dressed, upon her
bed, she moaned aloud: “Fabrizio is in the hands of his enemies, and,
because of me, perhaps they will poison him.” How can I describe the
moment of despair which followed this summing up of the situation in the
heart of a woman so unreasonable, so enslaved by the sensation of the
moment, and, though she did not acknowledge it to herself, so desperately
in love with the young prisoner?
There were inarticulate exclamations, transports of rage, convulsive
movements, but not one tear. She had sent away her women that they might
not see her weep. She had thought she must burst into sobs the moment
she was left alone, but tears, the first relief of a great sorrow, were
denied her utterly. Her haughty soul was too full of rage, indignation,
and the sense of her own inferiority to the prince.
“Is not this humiliation enough?” she cried. “I am insulted, and, what
is far worse, Fabrizio’s life is risked! And shall I not avenge myself?
Beware, my prince! you may destroy me—so be it; that is in your power—but
after you have done it, I will have your life. Alas, my poor Fabrizio,
and what good will that do you? What a change from the day on which I
was about to leave Parma! And yet I thought myself unhappy then.… What
blindness! I was on the point of breaking up all the habits of a pleasant
life. Alas, all unknowingly, I stood on the brink of an event which was
to settle my fate forever. If the count’s vile habits of slavish toadyism
had not made him suppress the words ‘_unjust proceedings_’ in that fatal
note which I had wrung from the prince’s vanity, we should have been
safe. More by good luck than by good guidance, I must acknowledge, I had
nettled his vanity about his beloved city of Parma. Then it was I who
threatened to depart. Then I was free.… My God! now I am nothing but a
slave. Here I lie, nailed to this vile sewer; and Fabrizio lies chained
in the citadel—that citadel which has been death’s antechamber to so many
men. And I—I can no longer hold that wild beast by his fear of seeing me
forsake his lair!
“He is too clever not to feel that I shall never go far from the
hateful tower to which my heart is fettered. The man’s wounded vanity
may inspire him with the most extraordinary notions; their whimsical
cruelty would only tickle his astounding vanity. If he puts forward
his nauseous attempts at love-making again, if he says, ‘Accept the
homage of your slave or else Fabrizio dies,’ well, then it will be the
old story of Judith.… Yes, but though that would be suicide for me, it
would be murdering Fabrizio. That booby who would come after him, our
prince royal, and Rassi, his infamous torturer, would hang Fabrizio as my
accomplice.”
The duchess cried out in her distress. This alternative, from which she
could see no escape, put her agonized heart to torture. Her bewildered
mind could see no other probability in the future. For some ten minutes
she tossed about like a mad woman; this horrible restlessness was
followed at last, for a few moments, by the slumber of exhaustion; she
was worn out. But in a few minutes she woke again, with a start, and
found herself sitting on her bed. She had fancied the prince was cutting
off Fabrizio’s head before her very eyes. The duchess cast distracted
glances all about her. When she had convinced herself, at last, that
neither the prince nor Fabrizio were in her presence, she fell back upon
her bed, and very nearly fainted. So great was her physical weakness
that she had not strength to alter her position. “O God, if only I could
die!” she said. “But what cowardice! Could I forsake Fabrizio in his
misfortunes? My brain must be failing. Come, let me look at the truth;
let me coolly consider the horrible position into which I have sprung,
as though to please myself. What mad folly to come and live at the court
of an absolute prince, a tyrant who knows every one of his victims!
To him every glance they give seems a threat against his own power.
Alas! neither the count nor I thought of that when I left Milan. All I
considered were the attractions—a pleasant court, something inferior,
indeed, still somewhat resembling the happy days under Prince Eugène.
“One has no idea, at a distance, of what the authority of a despot, who
knows all his subjects by sight, really means. The external forms of
despotism are the same as those of other governments. There are judges,
for instance, but they are men like Rassi. The monster! He would not
think it the least odd to hang his own father at the prince’s order.… He
would call it his duty.… I might buy over Rassi, but—unhappy that I am—I
have no means of doing it. What have I to offer him? A hundred thousand
francs, perhaps. And the story goes that when Heaven’s wrath against this
unhappy country last saved him from a dagger thrust, the prince sent him
ten thousand gold sequins in a casket. And besides, what sum of money
could possibly tempt him? That grovelling soul, which has never read
anything but scorn in other men’s eyes, has the pleasure, now, of being
looked at with fear, and even with respect. He may become Minister of
Police—and why not? Then three quarters of the inhabitants of the country
will pay him abject court, and tremble before him as slavishly as he
himself trembles before the sovereign.
“As I can not fly this odious place, I must be useful to Fabrizio. If I
live on alone, solitary, despairing, what, then, am I to do for Fabrizio?
No! forward, miserable woman! Do your duty. Go out into the world.
Pretend you have forgotten Fabrizio. Pretend to forget you, dear angel?”
At the words the duchess burst into tears—she could weep at last. After
an hour claimed by the natural weakness of humanity, she became aware,
with some sense of consolation, that her ideas were beginning to grow
clearer. “If I had a magic carpet,” said she, “if I could carry off
Fabrizio from the citadel, and take refuge with him in some happy country
where they could not pursue us—in Paris, for instance—we should have
the twelve hundred francs his father’s agent sends me with such comical
regularity, to live on, at first; and I am sure I could get together
another three hundred thousand, out of the remnants of my fortune.”
The imagination of the duchess dwelt with inexpressible delight upon
all the details of the life she would lead three hundred leagues from
Parma. “There,” thought she to herself, “he might enter the army under
an assumed name. In one of those brave French regiments, young Valserra
would soon make himself a reputation, and he would be happy at last.”
These dreams of delight brought back her tears again, but this time, they
were softer. There was still such a thing as happiness, then, somewhere.
This frame of mind continued for a long time. The poor woman shrank with
horror from the contemplation of the terrible reality. At last, just as
the dawn began to show a white light above the tree tops in her garden,
she made a great effort. “Within a few hours,” said she to herself,
“I shall be on the battle-field. I shall have to act, and if anything
irritating should happen to me, if the prince took it into his head
to say anything about Fabrizio, I am not sure that I shall be able to
keep my self-control. Therefore, here and without delay, I must take my
resolution.
“If I am declared a state criminal, Rassi will seize everything there
is in the palace. On the first of the month, the count and I, according
to our custom, burned all the papers of which the police might take
advantage—and he is Minister of Police; there lies the beauty of the
joke. I have three rather valuable diamonds. To-morrow Fulgenzio, my old
boatman from Grianta, shall go to Geneva and place them in safe-keeping.
If ever Fabrizio escapes (O God! be favourable to me!” and she crossed
herself), “the Marchese del Dongo will perceive, in his unspeakable
meanness, that it is a sin to provide support for a man who has been
prosecuted by a legitimate prince. Then Fabrizio will get my diamonds,
and so he will have bread at all events.
“I must dismiss the count.… After what has happened I never could bear
to be alone with him again. Poor fellow! he is not wicked—far from it—he
is only weak. His commonplace soul can not rise to the height of ours.
My poor Fabrizio, would you could be with me for an instant, so that we
might take counsel together about our danger!
“The count’s scrupulous prudence would interfere with all my plans, and
besides, I must not drag him down into my own ruin.… For why should
not that tyrant’s vanity make him cast me into prison? I shall have
conspired … what is more easy to prove? If he would only send me to his
citadel, and I could contrive to buy even one instant’s conversation
with Fabrizio, how bravely we would go to death together! But a truce
to such folly—his Rassi would advise him to get rid of me by poison.
My appearance in the streets, dragged along in a cart, might touch the
hearts of his dear subjects … but what! more fancies? Alas! such foolery
must be forgiven to a poor woman whose real fate is so sad. The truth
in all this is that the prince will not send me to death, but nothing
would be easier for him than to cast me into prison and keep me there.
He can have all sorts of compromising papers hidden in a corner of my
palace, as was done in the case of poor L⸺. Then three judges—who need
not be too great rogues, for there will be authentic evidence—and a dozen
false witnesses, will do the rest. Thus I may be sentenced to death for
conspiracy, and the prince, in his boundless mercy, and considering that
I had formerly had the honour of being received by him, will commute the
penalty to ten years in the fortress. But I, not to belie the violent
character which has drawn so many foolish remarks from the Marchesa
Raversi and my other enemies, shall coolly poison myself—so, at least,
the public will kindly believe. But I will undertake that Rassi will make
his appearance in my dungeon, and politely offer me a phial of strychnine
or laudanum, in the prince’s name.
“Yes, I must have a very open rupture with the count, for I will not drag
him down with my own fall. That would be infamy. The poor man has loved
me so sincerely. It was my own folly which led me to believe any true
courtier’s soul had room in it for love. The prince will very probably
find some pretext for throwing me into prison. He will be afraid of my
perverting public opinion with regard to Fabrizio. The count has a deep
sense of honour; that instant he will do what the court hangers-on, in
their overwhelming astonishment, will style an act of madness—he will
leave the court. I braved the prince’s authority the night he wrote that
note; I must be prepared for anything from his wounded self-love. Can
a man who was born a prince ever forget the sensation I gave him that
evening? And besides, if the count is at variance with me, he will be in
a better position to serve Fabrizio. But supposing the count, whom my
decision will throw into despair, were to avenge himself.… But that is an
idea that would not occur to him. He is not an intrinsically mean man,
like the prince. The count may countersign an infamous decree, and groan
as he does it, but he is honourable. And then, what should he avenge?
The fact that after having loved him for five years, and never given his
love a single cause for complaint, I say to him: ‘Dear count, I was happy
enough to love you. Well, the flame has burned out; I do not love you
any more. But I know the very bottom of your heart; I have the deepest
regard for you, and you will always be the dearest of all my friends.’
“What reply can an honourable gentleman make to such a declaration?
“I will take a new lover, or, at all events, the world will think so. I
will say to that lover: ‘After all, the prince is quite right to punish
Fabrizio’s blunder. But on his fête day our gracious sovereign will, no
doubt, set him at liberty!’ Thus I shall gain six months. This new lover,
whom prudence recommends, should be that venal judge, that vile torturer,
Rassi. He would be ennobled, and as a matter of fact, I should give him
the _entrée_ into the best society. Forgive me, Fabrizio, dearest, that
effort is beyond my powers. What! that monster! still stained with the
blood of Count P⸺ and of D⸺? I should swoon with horror if he came near
me, or, rather, I should seize a knife and plunge it into his vile heart.
Ask me not things which are impossible!
“Yes, above all things, I must forget Fabrizio. I must not betray a
shadow of anger against the prince. I must be as cheerful as ever. And my
cheerfulness will seem yet more attractive to these sordid souls. First,
because I shall appear to submit to their sovereign with a good grace;
and secondly, because, far from making game of them, I shall take pains
to show off their pretty little points—for instance, I will compliment
Count Zurla on the beauty of the white feather in the hat he has just
sent a courier to fetch from Lyons, and which is his great delight.
“I might choose a lover in the Raversi’s party. If the count retires,
that will be the ministerial party, and there the power will lie. The man
who rules the citadel will be a friend of the Raversi, for Fabio Conti
will be one of the ministers. How will the prince, a well-bred man, a
clever man, accustomed to the count’s delightful methods, endure doing
business with that ox, that arch-fool, whose whole life has been taken
up with the all-important problem of whether his Highness’s soldiers
ought to wear seven buttons on the breasts of their tunics, or nine? It
is such idiotic brutes as these—all very jealous of me, and there lies
your danger, my dear Fabrizio—it is such idiotic brutes as these who will
decide my fate and yours. Therefore the count will not resign. He always
fancies resignation is the greatest sacrifice that can be made by a Prime
Minister, and every time his looking-glass tells him he is growing old,
he offers to make that sacrifice for me. Therefore my rupture with him
must be complete. Yes, and there must be no reconciliation unless that
should appear my only means of preventing his retirement. I will dismiss
him, indeed, with all the kindness possible. But after his courtier-like
suppression of the words ‘_unjust proceedings_’ in the prince’s note, I
feel that if I am not to hate him I must spend some months without seeing
him at all. On that decisive evening I had no need of his intelligence;
all he had to do was to write under my dictation. He had only to write
that one sentence, which I had won by my own resolution. His cringing
courtier’s instinct was too much for him. He told me next morning that
he could not ask his prince to sign anything so ridiculous—that he would
have had to issue letters of pardon. But, good heavens, when one has to
deal with such people—those monsters of vanity and spite known as the
Farnese—one takes what one can get.”
At the thought, the anger of the duchess blazed up afresh. “The prince
deceived me,” she said, “and how basely!… There is no excuse for that
man. He has intellect, he has cleverness, he has logic; the only mean
things in him are his passions. We have remarked it a score of times,
the count and I. He is never vulgar-minded, except when he thinks there
has been an intention to insult him. Well, Fabrizio’s crime has nothing
to do with politics; it is a mere trifle of an assassination, such as
occur by the hundred every year within his happy dominions, and the count
has sworn to me that he has made the most careful inquiries, and that
Fabrizio is innocent. Giletti was not devoid of courage. When he saw
himself close to the frontier, he was suddenly tempted to get rid of a
rival who found favour in the eyes of his mistress.”
The duchess pondered long over the question of Fabrizio’s possible
culpability. Not that she considered it a very heavy sin on the part of
a nobleman of her nephew’s rank to rid himself of an impertinent actor,
but, in her despair, she was beginning to have a vague feeling that she
would have to struggle desperately to prove Fabrizio’s innocence. “No,”
said she at last, “here is a decisive proof. He is like poor Pietranera;
he always carries arms in his pockets, and that day all he had was a
broken-down single-barrelled gun, which he had borrowed from one of the
workmen.
“I hate the prince, because he has deceived me, and deceived me after the
most cowardly fashion. After he had signed his pardon, he had the poor
boy carried off from Bologna. But this account shall be settled between
us.”
Toward five o’clock in the morning the duchess, worn out by her long fit
of despair, rang for her women. When they entered her room they screamed
aloud. Seeing her stretched on her bed, fully dressed, with all her
diamonds, her face white as her sheets, and her eyes closed, they almost
fancied she was lying in state after her death. They would have thought
her in a dead faint, if they had not recollected that she had just
rung. Every now and then a slow tear coursed down her cheeks; her women
understood, on a sign from her, that she desired to be put to bed.
Twice that morning, after Count Zurla’s party, the count had called upon
the duchess. Finding no admittance, he wrote that he desired her advice
for himself. Ought he to continue minister after the affront which had
been put upon him? “The young man is innocent; but even if he had been
guilty, ought he to have been arrested without any warning to me, his
declared protector?”
The count had no virtue; we may even add that what Liberals understand
by _virtue_ (to seek the happiness of the greatest number) seemed to him
folly. He believed his first duty to be to seek the happiness of Count
Mosca della Rovere; but when he spoke of resigning, he was thoroughly
honourable and perfectly sincere. Never in all his life had he spoken an
untruth to the duchess. She, however, paid not the slightest attention to
his letter. Her course, and a very painful one, was settled: she was to
pretend to forget Fabrizio. After that effort, everything else was quite
indifferent to her.
Toward noon next morning the count, who had called quite ten times at the
Palazzo Sanseverina, was at last admitted. He was thunder-struck when he
saw the duchess. “She looks forty,” said he to himself, “and yesterday
she was so brilliant, so young; every one tells me that during her long
conversation with Clelia Conti she looked quite as young as she, and far
more bewitching.”
The duchess’s voice and manner of speaking were just as strange as her
appearance. Her tone—passionless, devoid of all human interest, of any
touch of anger—drove the colour from the count’s face. It reminded him
of one of his friends who, a few months previously, when on the point
of death, and after having received the sacrament, had desired to speak
with him. After a few minutes, the duchess was able to speak to him. She
looked at him, but her eyes were still dim.
“Let us part, my dear count,” she said, in a voice that was weak, but
quite articulate, and which she did her best to render kind. “Let us
part! It must be done. Heaven is my witness that for the last five years
my conduct toward you has been above reproach. You have given me a
brilliant life in place of the boredom which would have been my dreary
lot at Grianta. But for you, old age and I would have met together some
years earlier.… On my part, my one care has been to endeavour to make you
happy. It is because I care for you that I propose this separation, ‘_à
l’amiable_,’ as they say in France.”
The count did not understand her. She was obliged to repeat herself
several times over. Then he grew deadly pale, and, casting himself on his
knees beside her bed, he poured out all that the deepest astonishment,
followed by the liveliest despair, could inspire in the heart of a clever
man who was desperately in love. Over and over again he offered to send
in his resignation, and follow his friend to some safe retreat a thousand
leagues from Parma.
“You dare to speak to me of departure,” she cried at last, “and Fabrizio
is here!” But seeing that the name of Fabrizio pained the count, she
added, after a moment’s rest, and with a slight pressure of his hand:
“No, dear friend, I will not tell you that I have loved you with those
passionate transports which nobody, it appears to me, can feel after
thirty, and I am long past that age. You will have been told that I love
Fabrizio, for I know that story has been rife at this _wicked_ court.”
For the first time during this conversation, her eyes flashed as she
spoke the word _wicked_. “I swear to you, before God, and on Fabrizio’s
life, that not the smallest thing has ever happened between him and me,
which a third person might not have seen. Neither will I tell you that
I love him exactly as a sister would love him. I love him, so to speak,
by instinct. I love his courage, so simple and so perfect that he may be
said to be unaware of it himself. I remember that this admiration began
when he returned from Waterloo. He was still a child, in spite of his
seventeen years. His great anxiety was to know whether he really had
been present at the battle; and if that were so, whether he could say
he had fought, seeing he had not shared in the attack on any battery or
any column of the enemy’s forces. It was during our serious discussion
of this important subject that I began to notice his perfect charm. His
great soul was revealed to me. What skilful lies a well-brought-up young
man would have put forward in his place! Well, if he is not happy, I can
not be happy. There; that sentence exactly describes the condition of my
heart. If it is not the truth, it is, at all events, as much of the truth
as I can see.” Encouraged by her tone of frankness and friendliness, the
count tried to kiss her hand. She drew it away with a sort of horror.
“Those days are over,” she said. “I am a woman of seven-and-thirty; I am
on the threshold of old age. I feel all its despondency already; perhaps,
indeed, I am very near my grave. That moment is a terrible one, so I
have heard, and yet I think I long for it. I have the worst symptom of
old age. This horrible misfortune has killed my heart; there is no love
left in me. When I look at you, dear count, I only seem to see the shadow
of some one who was once dear to me! I will say more. It is only my
gratitude which makes me speak to you thus.”
“What is to become of me?” reiterated the count; “of me, who feel I love
you more passionately than when I first saw you at the Scala?”
“Shall I tell you something, dear friend? Your talk of love wearies me,
and strikes me as indecent. Come,” she said, and she tried to smile, but
failed, “take courage; act like a clever man, a judicious man, full of
resource to meet events. Be with me that which you really are in the eyes
of the outside world—the cleverest man and the greatest politician whom
Italy has produced for centuries.”
The count rose to his feet and walked up and down for some moments in
silence.
“Impossible, dear friend,” said he at last. “I am torn in pieces by the
most violent passion, and you ask me to appeal to my own reason. There is
no reason for me at present.”
“Let us not speak of passion, I beg of you,” she replied in a hard
tone, and for the first time in their two hours’ conversation there was
some expression in her voice. In spite of his own despair, the count
endeavoured to console her.
“He has deceived me,” she exclaimed, without making any answer to
the reasons for hope which the count was putting before her; “he has
deceived me in the basest manner,” and for an instant her deadly pallor
disappeared. But the count remarked that even at that moment she had not
strength to raise her arms.
“Good God!” thought he, “can it be possible that she is only ill? In
that case this must be the beginning of some very serious illness.” And,
overcome with anxiety, he proposed sending for the famous Razori, the
chief physician of that country, and the best in Italy.
“Would you, then, give a stranger the pleasure of knowing all the depths
of my despair?… Is that the counsel of a traitor or of a friend?” and she
looked at him with wild eyes.
“It is all over,” said he to himself in despair, “She has no more love
for me, and, what is worse, she does not even reckon me among men of
ordinary honour.”
“I must tell you,” added the count, speaking rapidly, “that I was
determined, in the first instance, to know all the details of the arrest
which has thrown us into despair, and, curiously enough, I know nothing
positive as yet. I have had the gendarmes at the next post questioned.
They saw the prisoner come in by the road from Castelnovo, and were
ordered to follow his _sediola_. I immediately sent off Bruno, with whose
zeal and devotion you are acquainted. He has orders to go back from one
post to another, and to find out where and how Fabrizio was arrested.”
At the sound of Fabrizio’s name the duchess was seized with a slight
convulsion.
“Excuse me, my friend,” she said to the count, as soon as she could
speak. “These details interest me. Tell them all to me; help me to
understand the smallest incidents.”
“Well, signora,” continued the count, striving to speak lightly, in the
hope of distracting her thoughts a little. “I am rather tempted to send a
confidential message to Bruno, and tell him to push on as far as Bologna.
It is there, perhaps, that they may have laid hands upon our young
friend. What is the date of his last letter?”
“Tuesday; that is five days ago.”
“Had it been opened in transmission?”
“There was not a sign of that. I must tell you that it was written on
the most horrible paper; the address is in a woman’s handwriting, and
bears the name of an old washerwoman who is related to my waiting-maid.
The washerwoman believes the letters have to do with a love affair, and
Cecchina repays her the charges for delivery, and gives her nothing
more.” The count, who had now quite taken up the tone of a business man,
endeavoured, in talking the matter over with the duchess, to discover on
what day Fabrizio might have been carried off from Bologna. It was only
then that he, generally so full of tact, discovered that this was the
tone he had better take. These details interested the unhappy woman, and
seemed to distract her thoughts a little. If the count had not been so
desperately in love, this simple idea would have occurred to him as soon
as he entered her room.
The duchess dismissed him, so that he might send orders to the faithful
Bruno without delay. When they touched, for a moment, on the question of
finding out whether the sentence had actually been pronounced, when the
prince had signed the note addressed to the duchess, she, with a sort
of eagerness, seized the opportunity of saying to the count: “I will
not reproach you with having omitted the words ‘_unjust proceedings_’
from the note which you wrote, and he signed. That was your courtier’s
instinct, which was too strong for you. Unconsciously, you were
preferring the interests of your master to the interests of your friend.
Your acts, my dear count, have been subservient to my orders, and that
for a very long time. But it is not within your power to change your
nature. As a minister you have great talents, but you have the instincts
of your trade as well. The suppression of the word ‘unjust’ has worked my
ruin. But far be it from me to reproach you with it in any way. The fault
lay with your instincts, and not with your will.
“Remember,” she added in an altered voice, and in the most imperious
fashion, “that I am not too much overwhelmed by Fabrizio’s imprisonment,
that it has never occurred to me to leave this country, and that my
feeling for the prince is one of the most profound respect. That is what
you have to say. And this is what I have to say to you: As I propose,
in future, to direct my course alone, I wish to part from you ‘_à
l’amiable_’—that is to say, as good old friends. You must consider that
I am sixty years old, that youth is dead within me, that I can never
feel anything very strongly again, that love is no longer possible to
me. But I should be still more miserable than I am if I should happen to
compromise your future. It may become part of my plans to give myself
the appearance of having taken a young lover, and I should not like
to see you pained on that account. I can swear to you, on Fabrizio’s
happiness”—and she paused a minute on the words—“that I have never been
unfaithful to you once in all these five years—that is a very long
time,” she said. She tried to smile; there was a movement on her pallid
cheeks, but there was no curve upon her lips. “I will even swear to you
that I have never planned such a thing, nor even thought of it. Now I
have made that clear, so pray leave me.”
The count left the Palazzo Sanseverina in a state of despair. He saw
the duchess was thoroughly resolved to separate from him, and he had
never been so desperately in love with her. This is one of the matters
to which I am constantly obliged to return, because, outside Italy,
their improbability is so great. As soon as he reached his own house
he sent off six different people along the road from Castelnovo and
Bologna, all of them carrying letters. “But this is not all,” said the
unhappy count to himself. “The prince may take it into his head to
have the unhappy boy executed, just to avenge himself for the tone the
duchess took with him on the day of that fatal note. I felt then that
the duchess had overstepped a boundary beyond which one should never
go, and it was to patch things up that I fell into the incredible folly
of suppressing the words ‘_unjust proceedings_,’ the only ones which
bound the sovereign. But pooh! is there anything that binds a man in his
position? It was certainly the greatest mistake of my whole life, and has
risked everything which made it worth living to me. I must use all my
activity and skill to repair the blunder now. But if I utterly fail to
gain anything, even by sacrificing a certain amount of my dignity, I will
leave this man in the lurch, and we’ll see whom he will find to replace
me, and realize his mighty political dreams, and his idea of making
himself constitutional King of Lombardy! Fabio Conti is a mere fool, and
Rassi’s talent amounts to finding legal reasons for hanging a man whom
the ruler dislikes.”
Once the count had thoroughly made up his mind to resign his post if the
severity with which Fabrizio was treated exceeded that of an ordinary
imprisonment, he said to himself: “If an imprudent defiance of that man’s
vain whim costs me my life, I will preserve my honour at all events.…
By the way, now that I snap my fingers at my ministerial portfolio, I
can venture to do a hundred things which would have seemed impossible
to me, even this morning. For instance, I will attempt anything within
the bounds of human possibility to help Fabrizio to escape.… Good
God!” exclaimed the count, breaking off suddenly, and his eyes dilated
immensely, as if he had caught sight of some unexpected joy. “The duchess
said nothing about escape to me! Can she have failed in sincerity for
once in her life, and is her quarrel with me merely founded on her desire
that I should deceive the prince? My faith, the thing is done!”
The count’s eyes had regained their old expression of satirical
shrewdness. “That charming creature Rassi is paid by his master for all
those sentences of his which dishonour us in the eyes of Europe. But
he is not the man to refuse payment from me for betraying his master’s
secrets. The brute has a mistress and a confessor. But the mistress is
too vile a creature for me to converse with; all the fruit hucksters in
the neighbourhood would know the details of our interview by the next
morning.” The count, revived by this gleam of hope, was already on his
way to the cathedral. Astounded at the hastiness of his own action, he
laughed, in spite of his sorrow. “See what it is,” he said, “to be no
longer minister.”
This cathedral, like many Italian churches, was used as a passage from
one street to another. In the distance the count noticed one of the
archbishop’s grand vicars crossing the aisle.
“As I have met you,” said he, “I am sure you will be good enough to save
my gouty feet from the deadly fatigue of climbing up the archbishop’s
staircase. I should be profoundly grateful to him if he would be so kind
as to come down to the sacristy.” The archbishop was delighted at the
message. He had a thousand things to say to the minister about Fabrizio;
but the minister guessed these things were nothing but empty phrases, and
would not listen to any of them.
“What sort of a man is Dugnani, the curate of San Paolo?”
“A small mind and a huge ambition,” replied the archbishop; “very few
scruples, and excessive poverty, because of his vices.”
“Zounds! Monsignore,” exclaimed the minister, “your descriptions are
worthy of Tacitus,” and he took leave of him with a smile. As soon as he
was back in his palace he sent for Father Dugnani.
“You direct the conscience of my excellent friend Chief-Justice Rassi. Is
there not anything he would like to say to me?” and without more words,
or further ceremony, he dismissed the priest.