It was sirocco in Rome; sirocco which, as every one knows, brings out a
damp ooze on the pavement, and makes the hills yet more slippery for the
overladen horses and mules; sirocco which disposes man and woman to take
peevish views of life, especially if they have no work on which to
fasten thought; sirocco, in fine, hot, baleful, depressing, sapping the
strength of one and the energy of another, a universal excuse for
whatever untoward may befall a Roman on the days when it makes itself
felt.
In spite of this languor, however, the young Marchesa di Sant'
Eustachio, and her sister Sylvia Brodrick, were walking briskly along
the street which, broken into three names and many hills, stretches the
long distance from the end of the Pincio to the foot of Santa Maria
Maggiore. There was little likeness between the sisters, in spite of
strangers asserting that it was to be found. The marchesa, or Donna
Teresa as she preferred to be called--for although no such title, as a
title, actually exists, it is given by courtesy to Italian women of rank
in place of the `signora'--was in mourning, and her face, while
intelligent, was not beautiful. But Sylvia's almost deserved the word.
A critical observer might have taken exception to a certain absence of
variety, a want of play about the pretty features; that allowed for, the
most grudging would have been unable to deny that the features in
themselves were charming, and the colouring delightful. Her dress was
absolutely neat, though there was nothing in it particularly to admire,
and perhaps something inharmonious in the lines.
Donna Teresa was the talker, and as she was in the best of spirits, her
talk was eager, and she laughed at small things which would have
scarcely amused her unless she held some inward cause for rejoicing.
She laughed at the placards on the walls, at the goldfish in their
bowls. There was not an old stone built into a wall, not a bright
cavern of vegetables, not a chestnut roaster stooping over his rusty
tripod and quickening dull embers with fan of turkey feathers, but she
noticed, and pointed them out gaily. Sirocco might blow, she cared
nothing. For the first time since she became a woman, she was rejoicing
in the breeziness of freedom, the bliss of living her own life, of
forming plans, and of carrying them out with no one to say her nay.
She had been very young--too young--when she met the marchese at
Florence, and, unfortunately, insisted upon marrying him. Three
miserable years followed, he being disappointed in two matters, the
amount of her fortune, and the recoil which she experienced from his
religion. As for her, she was disappointed in everything, and shocked
in a great deal, so that when he unexpectedly died, she felt rather
relief than grief. Then she blamed herself for the sensation, and in
one of the moments of rash remorse to which she was always liable,
offered to remain at Florence with the marchesa, his mother. The old
lady had been fairly kind to her, and Teresa had a notion that if she
had been a more forbearing wife, her husband might have been a better
man. Whether the idea were true or mistaken, it haunted her, and gave
her two more years, if not of such acute misery, at any rate of a
bondage irksome beyond words. The old marchesa had been a power in her
youth, and in age ruled her house as once she had ruled society, caring
for no visitors except priests, treating Teresa as a lost heretic;
untidy, unpunctual, and recognising neither right of solitude nor
cultivation of gifts in her daughter-in-law.
How long the girl--for she was still little more in years--would have
continued to reproach herself and to endure, is difficult to decide, but
it is certain that by the end of the years her first exalted ideas of
expiation had lost freshness and strength, and were taking refuge in
obstinacy. Happily, for her, two things came about. Her
brother-in-law, the marchesa's second son, developed a passion for
travel, and his wife and children were ready and anxious to make the
Palazzo Sant' Eustachio their home. At the same time Teresa heard that
her grandmother and sister were coming for the winter to Rome, and
wanted her to join them. She jumped at the opportunity, had a stormy
interview with the old marchesa, left Florence, as she hoped, for ever,
and renouncing palaces and the threadbare state belonging to an
impoverished family, found herself, to her unbounded joy, in a small
apartment in Rome with her grandmother and sister.
They were all poor together, and their apartment had no pretensions to
grandeur; but Teresa, whose artistic longings had been cramped and even
smothered in her Florentine rooms, was wild with joy at finding herself
able to pull the furniture about as she pleased, and to surround herself
with flowers, books, and pictures at will. Her energy leapt to life
again, and her companions were content to allow her to exercise it as
actively as she chose. She was a beneficent housekeeper, for she walked
long distances to get the best salad, the best cream, or the best
maritozzi. She scolded Nina, the good-natured careless untidy servant,
who adored her; she dusted books, bargained, painted, and insisted upon
her sister seeing Rome and Roman functions conscientiously. It was with
this aim that she was conducting her to the church of San Martino in
Monte, that day in festa.
The difference between the two sisters became more marked as they walked
along the pavement, and now it was to the advantage of Teresa, for she
carried herself with a light grace which was yet firm and decided, while
Sylvia wavered, and seldom knew on which side to pass the people she
met. Teresa's face, again, changed expression rapidly, and when she
spoke was lit with eager interest, while Sylvia's remained placid, and
if at times her eye became anxious, it never brightened. Still, she was
unusually pretty. She adored Teresa without in the least understanding
her, and her mind lumbered heavily after the freakish darts of
imagination in which this other--who had suffered enough to crush a less
elastic nature--revelled. Generally Sylvia was unconscious that she did
not understand, but there were times when a remark of Teresa's, flung
and forgotten, would leave her painfully struggling to catch its hidden
meaning, so that her very affection kept her as it were on the strain of
tiptoe.
When they had passed the heavy leathern curtain at the door of San
Martino, raised for them by one of the many clamorous beggars who
rattled their tins outside, they saw the large church crowded with such
a shuffling and shifting throng, that it was difficult to find
standing-room except at the back or in the aisles, and Donna Teresa was
obliged to skirt the congregation and pilot her less capable sister
until they reached the steps leading to the choir, where, although there
was no seat, they could lean against a pillar for support, and, as
Sylvia thankfully reflected, thus avoid contact with the children, whose
dirt and rags left her quite indifferent to the splendour of their eyes,
and to a certain unkempt artistic force. Such a crowd as filled San
Martino was incomparably more picturesque than the straight rows of
worshippers in an English church. Some stood, some sat, at intervals
all knelt; and the broken headline, the strong contrasts, the columns
and dim distances, the splashes of vivid colour sharply accentuated
against a somewhat misty background, the faces, often remarkable and
seldom insignificant, gave Donna Teresa, well accustomed as she was to
such sights, an immediate gratification. Sylvia, meanwhile,
concentrated her full attention upon the function. A cardinal
officiated, and a group of priests were assisting under the direction of
a short fat man, whose duty it was to instruct each what he should do--
to pull one and push another into place, to whisper how the book was to
be held, to indicate to the cardinal where he should read, to show the
boy-server where to stand for the censing, and when to hand the censer
to the cardinal; at all these varied movements Sylvia Brodrick stared
with a riveted attention which assured her sister that she was
interested. She was, therefore, the more amazed when Sylvia turned upon
her with a whisper which was almost a cry--
"Let us go! Please let us go! I can't bear it!"
Donna Teresa was always prompt. She immediately edged her way out,
asking no questions until they reached more open space at the end of the
church, where her quick eye caught sight of a vacant chair.
"Sit down, Sylvia. What is the matter? Are you ill?"
The other shook her head.
"I couldn't stay, it was too dreadful!"
She spoke in a frightened voice, and Teresa flung a hasty glance round
to see what had alarmed her.
"Do tell me," she said encouragingly.
"Oh, all," said Sylvia sighing. "That cardinal sitting on a stool like
a red idol, having his clothes pulled about and arranged, and that
little fat man. All!"
Teresa was half relieved, half provoked.
"Was that it?" she said, raising her eyebrows. "I thought you were
interested."
"I couldn't bear it," said Sylvia dolorously. "But if you really like
to stay, I can go home by myself of course."
Donna Teresa scarcely heard the words; her vigorous, somewhat impatient
personality found itself every now and then brought up suddenly and
unexpectedly against what could only be compared to a dead wall in her
sister's nature. She resented it, and then, as usual, smitten with
remorse, and acknowledging some emotion which she was sure was more
delicate and subtile than her own, began impetuously to carry out
Sylvia's wishes.
"Dear, we will go together," she said, "only I am afraid we must get
back to the big entrance. You needn't look at poor Cardinal Simone, you
know," she added, her smile broadening as she noticed that Sylvia was
indeed keeping her head carefully turned in an opposite direction. The
sisters were only able to make slow way, for the throng was thick, and
Teresa could never help becoming alertly interested in what was about
her. She moved on, however, determinedly, until, when pushing out the
heavy leathern door-pad, a man jostled her rudely, passed, and ran down
the steps. Teresa, sure of what had happened to her, cried, "Oh!" and
felt for her purse. It was gone. She exclaimed hastily to Sylvia,
"There is Mrs Scott, join her," and flew after the thief, who was
already out of sight.
By the time she reached the corner he was not far away, and her light
steps quickly overtook him. He glanced over his shoulder, hesitated,
and when she exclaimed indignantly, "You have my purse!" held it out
silently. Teresa caught it, but hers was not a nature to let
wrong-doing go free, and she promptly appealed to the bystanders. A
crowd in Rome will gather with inconceivable swiftness, so that in a
moment a dozen persons were hanging round, by no means actively engaged
in assisting law and order, rather, indeed, sympathising with the other
side, but sufficiently amused and curious to see what would come of this
accusation by a young and solitary lady, to put, for the moment, a few
apparently undesigned obstacles in the way of escape. These would have
soon vanished if two municipal guardie had not unexpectedly found
themselves where they were wanted, and to them with instinctive though
often disappointed confidence, Teresa breathlessly appealed.
"This man has just stolen my purse as I came out from San Martino," she
said.
"But the signorina holds it," returned one of the guardie, glancing at
it indifferently.
"As you see," broke in the young man violently. "I pick up this devil
of a purse in the church, the signorina pursues, I hand it to her at
once, and this is how she repays me! _Ecco_!" and he opened his hands
and looked round insolently. Teresa was becoming more angry.
"He gave it to me--yes! But it is probable he first emptied it. As you
see," she added in her turn, holding it out after brief examination.
"Signorina--" the guardia began again, shrugging his shoulders.