For the next few days everything was merry as marriage-bells; and though
Kate felt even the fondness and double consideration with which she was
treated when she was alone with her aunt and cousin to belong somehow to
the mystery, she had no excuse even to herself for finding fault with
it. They were very good to her. Ombra, at least, had never been so kind,
so tender, so anxious to please her. Why should she be anxious to please
her? She had never done so before; it had never been necessary; it was a
reversal of everything that was natural; and, like all the rest, it
meant something underneath, something which had to be made up for by
these superficial caresses. Kate did not go so far as this in her
articulate thoughts; but it was what she meant in the confused and
painful musings which now so often possessed her. But she could not
remonstrate, or say, ‘Why are you so unnecessarily, unusually tender?
What wrong have you done me that has to be made up for in this way?’ She
could not say this, however much she might feel it. She had to hide her
wonder and dissatisfaction in her own heart.
At last the day came for the visit to the Buoncompagni palace. They were
to walk to Lady Caryisfort’s, to join her, and all had been arranged on
the previous night. The ladies were waiting, cloaked and bonneted, when
Bertie Eldridge made his appearance alone.
‘I hope I have not kept you waiting,’ he said; ‘that ridiculous cousin
of mine won’t come. I don’t know what has come over him; he has taken
some absurd dislike to poor Buoncompagni, who is the best fellow in the
world. I hope you will accept my company alone.’
Ombra had been the first to advance to meet him, and he stood still
holding her hand while he made his explanation. She dropped it, however,
with an air of disappointment and annoyance.
‘Bertie will not come--when he knows that I--that we are waiting for
him! What a strange thing to do! Bertie, who is always so good; how very
annoying--when he knew we depended on him!’
‘I told him so,’ said the other,--‘I told him what you would say; but
nothing had any effect. I don’t know what has come to Bertie of late. He
is not as he used to be; he has begun to talk of work, and all sorts of
nonsense. But to-day he will not come, and there is nothing more to be
said. It is humbling to me to see how I suffer without him; but I hope
you will try to put up with me by myself for one day.’
‘Oh! I cannot think what Bertie means by it. It is too provoking!’ said
Ombra, with a clouded countenance; and when they got into the street
their usual order of march was reversed, and Ombra fell behind with
Kate, whose mind was full of a very strange jumble of feeling, such as
she could not explain to herself. On ordinary occasions one or other of
the Berties was always in attendance on Ombra. To-day she indicated, in
the most decided manner, that she did not want the one who remained. He
had to walk with Mrs. Anderson, while the two girls followed together.
‘I never knew anything so provoking,’ Ombra continued, taking Kate’s
arm. ‘It is as if he had done it on purpose--to-day, too, of all days in
the world!’
‘What is particular about to-day?’ said Kate, who, to tell the truth,
was at this moment less in sympathy with Ombra than she had ever been
before.
‘Oh! to-day--why, there is---- well,’ said Ombra, pausing suddenly, ‘of
course there is nothing particular about to-day. But he must have known
how it would put us out--how it would spoil everything. A little party
like ours is quite changed when one is left out. You ought to see that
as well as I do. It spoils everybody’s pleasure. It changes the feeling
altogether.’
‘I don’t think it does so always,’ said Kate. But she was generous even
at this moment, when a very great call was made on her generosity. ‘I
never heard you call Mr. Hardwick Bertie before,’ she added, not quite
generous enough to pass this over without remark.
‘To himself, you mean,’ said Ombra with a slight blush. ‘We have always
called them the Berties among ourselves. But I think it is very
ridiculous for people who see so much of each other to go on saying Mr.
and Miss.’
‘Do they call you Ombra, then?’ said Kate, lifting her eyebrows. Poor
child! she had been much, if secretly, exasperated, and it was not in
flesh and blood to avoid giving a mild momentary prick in return.
‘I did not say so,’ said Ombra. ‘Kate, you, too, are contradictory and
uncomfortable to-day; when you see how much I am put out----’
‘But I don’t see why you should be so much put out,’ said Kate, in an
undertone, as they reached Lady Caryisfort’s door.
What did it mean? This little incident plunged her into a sea of
thoughts. Up to this moment she had supposed Bertie Eldridge to be her
cousin’s favourite, and had acquiesced in that arrangement. Somehow she
did not like this so well. Kate had ceased for a long time to call
Bertie Hardwick ‘my Bertie,’ as she had once done so frankly; but still
she could not quite divest herself of the idea that he was more her own
property than anyone else’s--her oldest friend, whom she had known
before any of them. And he had been so kind the other morning, when the
others had deserted her. It gave her a strange, dull, uncomfortable
sensation to find him thus appropriated by her cousin. ‘I ought not to
mind--it can be nothing to me,’ she said to herself; but, nevertheless,
she did not like it. She was glad when they came to Lady Caryisfort’s
door, and her _tête-à-tête_ with Ombra was over; and it was even
agreeable to her wounded _amour-propre_ when Count Antonio came to her
side, beaming with smiles and self-congratulations at having something
to show her. He kept by Lady Caryisfort as they went on to the palazzo,
which was close by, with the strictest Italian propriety; but when they
had entered his own house the young Count did not hesitate to show that
his chief motive was Kate. He shrugged his shoulders as he led them in
through the great doorway into the court, which was full of myrtles and
greenness. There was a fountain in the centre, which trickled shrilly in
the air just touched with frost, and oleanders planted in great vases
along a terrace with a low balustrade of marble. The tall house towered
above, with all its multitudinous windows twinkling in the sun. There
was a handsome _loggia_, or balcony, over the terrace on the first
floor. It was there that the sunshine dwelt the longest, and there it
was still warm, notwithstanding the frost. This balcony had been
partially roofed in with glass, and there were some chairs placed in it
and a small white covered table.
‘This is the best of my old house,’ said Count Antonio, leading them in,
hat in hand, with the sun shining on his black hair. ‘Such as it is, it
is at the service of _ces dames_; but its poor master must beg them to
be very indulgent--to make great allowances for age and poverty.’ And
then he turned and caught Kate’s eye, and bowed to the ground, and said,
‘_Sia padrona!_’ with the pretty extravagance of Italian politeness,
with a smile for the others, but with a look for herself which made her
heart flutter. ‘_Sia padrona_--consider yourself the mistress of
everything,’--words which meant nothing at all, and yet might mean so
much! And Kate, poor child, was wounded, and felt herself neglected. She
was left out by others--banished from the love and confidence that were
her due--her very rights invaded. It soothed her to feel that the young
Italian, in himself as romantic a figure as heart could desire, who had
been ‘out’ for his country, whose pedigree ran back to Noah, and perhaps
a good deal further, was laying his half-ruined old house and his noble
history at her feet. And the signs of poverty, which were not to be
concealed, and which Count Antonio made no attempt to conceal, went to
Kate’s heart, and conciliated her. She began to look at him, smiling
over the wreck of greatness with respect as well as interest; and when
he pointed to a great empty space in one of the noble rooms, Kate’s
heart melted altogether.
‘There was our Raphael--the picture he painted for us. That went off in
’48, when my father fitted out the few men who were cut to pieces with
him at Novara. I remember crying my eyes out, half for our Madonna, half
because I was too small to go with him. Nevare mind’ (he said this in
English--it was one of his little accomplishments of which he was
proud). ‘The country is all the better; but no other picture shall ever
hang in that place--that we have sworn, my mother and I.’
Kate stood and gazed up at the vacant place with an enthusiasm which
perhaps the picture itself would scarcely have called from her. Her eyes
grew big and luminous, ‘each about to have a tear.’ Something came into
her throat which prevented her from speaking; she heard a little flutter
of comments, but she could not betray the emotion she felt by trying to
add to them. ‘Oh!’ she said to herself with that consciousness of her
wealth which was at times a pleasure to her--‘oh! if I could find that
Madonna, and buy it and send it back!’ And then other thoughts
involuntarily rushed after that one--fancies, gleams of imagination,
enough to cover her face with blushes. Antonio turned back when the
party went on, and found her still looking up at the vacant place.
‘It is a sad blank, is it not?’ he said.
‘It is the most beautiful thing in all the house,’ said Kate; and one of
the tears fell as she looked at him, a big blob of dew upon her glove.
She looked at it in consternation, blushing crimson, ashamed of herself.
Antonio did what any young Italian would have done under the
circumstances. Undismayed by the presence of an audience, he put one
knee to the ground, and touched the spot upon Kate’s little gloved thumb
with his lips; while she stood in agonies of shame, not knowing what to
do.
‘The Signorina’s tear was for Italy,’ he said, as he rose; ‘and there is
not an Italian living who would not thank her for it on his knees.’
He was perfectly serious, without the least sense that there could be
anything ridiculous or embarrassing in the situation; but it may be
imagined what was the effect upon the English party, all with a natural
horror of a scene.
Lady Caryisfort, I am sorry to say, showed herself the most ill-bred
upon this occasion--she pressed her handkerchief to her lips, but could
not altogether restrain the very slightest of giggles. Ombra opened her
eyes, and looked at her mother; while poor Kate, trembling, horrified,
and overwhelmed with shame, shrank behind Mrs. Anderson.
‘It was not my fault,’ she gasped.
‘Don’t think anything of it, my love,’ whispered Mrs. Anderson, in
consolation. ‘They mean nothing by it--it is the commonest thing in the
world.’ A piece of consolation which was not, however, quite so
consolatory as it was intended to be.
But she kept her niece by herself after this incident as long as it was
practicable; and so it came about that the party divided into three.
Lady Caryisfort and Antonio went first, Mrs. Anderson and Kate next, and
Ombra and Bertie Eldridge last of all. As Kate moved gradually on, she
heard that a very close and low-toned conversation was going on behind
her; and Ombra did not now seem so much annoyed by Bertie Hardwick’s
absence as she had been a little while ago. Was she--an awful revelation
seemed to burst upon Kate--was Ombra a coquette? She dismissed the
thought from her mind as fast as possible; but after feeling so
uncomfortable about her cousin’s sudden interest in Bertie, she could
not help feeling now a certain pity for him, as if he too, like herself,
were slighted now. Not so would Kate herself have treated anyone. It was
not in her, she said to herself, to take up and cast down, to play with
any sentiment, whether friendship or anything else; and in her heart she
condemned Ombra, though secretly she was not sorry. She was a
coquette--that was the explanation. She liked to have both the young men
at her feet, without apparently caring much for either. This was a sad
accusation to bring against Ombra, but somehow Kate felt more kindly
disposed towards her after she had struck this idea out.
When they reached the _loggia_, the table was found to be covered with
an elegant little breakfast, which reminded Kate of the pretty meals to
be seen in a theatre, which form part of so many pretty comedies. It was
warm in the sunshine, and there was a _scaldina_, placed Italian
fashion, under the table, for the benefit of the chilly; and an old man,
in a faded livery, served the repast, which he had not cooked, solely
because it had been ordered from an hotel, to poor old Girolamo’s
tribulation. But his master had told him the reason why, and the old
servant had allowed that the expenditure might be a wise one. Kate
found, to her surprise, that she was the special object of the old man’s
attention. He ran off with a whole string of ‘Che! che’s,’ when he had
identified her, which he did by consultation of his master’s eye. ‘Bella
Signorina, this is from the old Buoncompagni vineyards,’ he said, as he
served to her some old wine; and, with another confidential movement,
touched her arm when he handed her the fruit, ‘From the gardens,
Signorina mia,’ he whispered; and the honey ‘from Count Antonio’s own
bees up on the mountains;’ and, ‘Cara Signorina mia, this the Contessa’s
own hands prepared for those beautiful lips,’ he said, with the
preserves. He hung about her; he had eyes for no one else.
‘What is the old man saying to you, Kate?’ said her aunt.
‘Nothing,’ answered Kate, half amused and half distressed; and she met
Count Antonio’s eye, and they both blushed, to the admiration of the
beholders.
This was how the visit terminated. Old Girolamo followed them
obsequiously down the great staircase, bowing, with his hand upon his
breast, and his eyes upon the young English lady, who was as rich as the
Queen of Sheba, and as beautiful as the Holy Mother herself. And Kate’s
heart beat with all the little magic flutter of possibilities that
seemed to gather round her. If her heart had been really touched, she
would not have divined what it all meant so readily; but it was only her
imagination that was touched, and she saw all that was meant. It was the
first time that she had seen a man pose himself before her in the
attitude of love, and (though no doubt it is wrong to admit it) the
thing pleased her. She was not anxious, as she ought to have been, to
preserve Antonio’s peace of mind. She was flattered, amused, somewhat
touched. That was what he meant. And for herself, she was not unwilling
to breathe this delicate incense, and be, as other women, wooed and
worshipped. Her ideas went no further. Up to this moment it was somewhat
consolatory, and gave her something pleasant to think of. Poor old
Girolamo! Poor old palace! She liked their master all the better for
their sake.