Ferrati found the children in bed, reeking of the arnica with which
Carolina and Assunta had been bathing their bruises.
"Signor Dottore!" cried Carolina, as he entered, "their poor little
bodies are striped like zebras! If the Santissima Madonna and Gesù
Bambino had not protected them they would have been killed!"
Both children burst out sobbing at this rehearsal of their woes, and
Ferrati had some ado to make himself heard.
"Now then! Now then!" he said, "there will be a treat to-morrow for good
boys who don't cry! Be little men, don't let these women see you sobbing
like babies!" He waved his hand laughingly "Who's my good boy? Let us
see which of you can stop first!"
"I want my mammina!" sobbed Mimmo.
"I wants her too!" echoed Beppino.
"Ah, già, where is the Signora?" Ferrati asked turning to Assunta.
"_Ma chi lo sa_, Sor Dottore?" she answered in some confusion, busying
herself about Beppino's cot. "She has gone out."
"But where?"
"How should I know? The Signora's affairs are not mine! Nando said she
told the _fiaccheraio_ to drive to the Grand Hotel, but more than that I
do not know."
Ferrati knitted his brows--the Grand Hotel! She must have gone there to
meet someone, for it was too expensive and fashionable a hostelry as
well as too much in the public eye, for her to have chosen had she
merely been seeking other lodgings than her husband's house. The
children had ceased crying and were watching him intently as were also
the women.
He set about bandaging the little wrists where they had been cut, still
in silence. When he had finished he turned to Carolina:
"Keep the children quiet, you can go on with the arnica. In half an hour
you can give them a bowl of milk each, or a little broth. _Addio
bimbi!_" kissing them each in turn, "to-morrow Zia Virginia and I will
bring you a treat if you are good."
"Zio Rico!" called Mimmo as Ferrati reached the door.
"Yes, caro?"
"You won't let _him_ come up?"
"No, caro, he shan't come to-night."
"And Zio, I want my mammina."
"_Cuor mio_, I am going to look for your mammina now. When I find her I
shall fetch her to you."
"That's right, as soon as she knows we want her she'll come, won't she,
Zio?"
"_Sicuro!_" answered Ferrati cheerfully--Would he be able to find her
though, and would it be in time?
It seemed that the two women read his thoughts for they exchanged a
significant glance.
Ferrati, however, had not far to go, for as he descended the stairs he
met Ragna coming up, alarm and anxiety writ large on her face, though
her eyes were still starry and her cheeks aflame with the joy of the
afternoon.
"Are they--tell me, are they--?" she gasped.
"They are not badly hurt," he said soothingly.
"Let me by, let me go to them!" her breath came in swift pants, her
bosom heaved.
He took her arm firmly.
"Come now, Ragna, calm yourself. You can't go to them like this, you
would excite them and do them harm; you must not!"
"Ah, but you don't know how nearly I--" she exclaimed, and wrenching her
arm free sped up the stairs and into the nursery where she flung herself
between the cots, sobbing convulsively.
Ferrati stood on the stair gazing after her a moment, then followed her
slowly. He looked in through the nursery door and saw her, one arm
across either cot, her face hidden, her shoulders shaking with sobs, her
hat awry, and Mimmo patting her neck and stray locks of hair with his
little bandaged hand, while Beppino on the other side, cuddled close to
her protecting arm.
Carolina with fine intuition made a sign to Assunta, and they withdrew
noiselessly, leaving their mistress alone with her children.
"We knowed 'oo would come," said Beppino contentedly.
A great wave of emotion had Ragna on its crest, carrying her on,
unresisting. She felt dominant within her the powerful impulse of
renunciation, it overwhelmed all else. Words Ferrati had spoken to her
in Venice, long ago, rang in her ears. "Remember that you are not only a
woman, you are a mother, your duty is towards your child, you have no
right to cheat him of what should be his!" For the first time she
actually realised that Beppino too was her child, bone of her bone and
flesh of her flesh as was Mimmo. Hitherto she had always looked on him
as altogether his father's, as remote from her personally, and her
hatred of the father had been continued in indifference towards the
child. Now as she felt the helpless little body lying close within her
arm, as she heard the soft little voice lisp out words of confidence,
her innermost being stirred at recognition of his oneness with her. But
to renounce happiness, to renounce Angelescu! The dark waters of despair
engulfed her, she sank down and down--it had been bad enough before, but
what would be the torment of life now, without him? How could she give
him up, just as she had found him? Her entire being, body and spirit,
recoiled from the thought of re-entering that prison from which she had
so lately thought to escape forever. For one wild moment the impulse
seized her to wrap up the children and carry them off with her. Her
fingers twitched feverishly at the bed-clothes. Then the recollection
came to her of how Angelescu had involuntarily recoiled at mention of
the children. He had not meant her to see it, she knew that, she knew
also that he would be unfailingly kind and considerate--but at what cost
to himself, to their love? Would she not be preparing a worse torment
for both of them? A pale dawn broke on the night of her thoughts; she
saw herself no longer as an individual, as a personality warring against
circumstance, rebellious towards fate, but rather as an integral part of
Fate, a particle of elementary force given in the service of these young
lives for their guidance and protection. She saw her task as a mother as
she had not yet understood it and in the light of the new vision stood
prepared to strip herself of all selfish attributes, of pride and the
desire for happiness. Yet she saw it without exaltation, her sacrifice
stood in the cold light of the commonplace, a natural sequence of her
enlarged understanding. The chill weight of the years before her settled
down on her shoulders, but she accepted that weight, bent her neck
consciously and consentingly to the unwelcome yoke. Unwelcome it would
be, but no longer galling as in the past, she knew in her soul that in
the instant of her renunciation, she had passed beyond Egidio's power to
hurt her,--at least more than superficially, he had shrunk to
insignificance. Never again would she be afraid of him, or stirred to
anger on her own account by his vulgar insults.
Mimmo broke in upon her train of thought, she heard his sweet voice in
her ear:
"Mammina you have come back to us, you will never leave us again? _Di!
mammina, mai più?_"
She raised her head and kissing him, answered smiling:
"No, _cuoricino mio, mai più_."
She rose to her feet straightening her hat mechanically as she did so,
then as she became conscious of its existence, drew out the long pins,
folded up her veil, removed the hat and laid it on the table. There was
a finality in her action that struck Ferrati, and when she turned
towards him her face startled him, so pale was it, so calm, so stamped
with thoughtful decision.
"Ah, you are there, my friend," she said.
"Yes," he answered simply, adding, "I am going home now."
"Is _he_ downstairs?"
"Yes, in the studio, very much subdued. I shall see him on my way out.
Be as kind to him as you can--he is disposed to meet you half way."
A faint ironical smile crept over her face, then faded leaving it in its
former marble like calm. She made no direct answer.
"After all life is a question of compromises."
He started--this from Ragna!
"You look surprised, my friend--I have grown older, and let us hope,
wiser, since morning."
He made no comment, and turned to go.
"Wait a minute," she said, calling him back, "I should like you to leave
a note for me at the Grand Hotel, if it is not out of your way."
The Grand Hotel!
"Not at all," he answered, "Command me in any way, I am entirely at your
service."
The sincerity of the words pleased her, but she was past feeling much,
for the moment. She signed to him to wait so he sat down and watched
Carolina feeding the children with a bowl of milk she had just brought.
Presently Ragna returned and handed him an envelope; within were these
words:--
"MY DEAR ONE,--
"The children claim me, I cannot go,--if I were false to them I
should be false to myself and to you. We were wrong to-day when we
imagined that we could cut a path for ourselves in spite of
circumstance. So we must part. I shall never see you again, but
remember that as I was yours to-day, so shall I be throughout the
years to come. Your love has set me free, the material world exists
for me now but as a dream--I have achieved through you the ultimate
emancipation, not death, but freedom from the material
circumstances of life. What matters the fate of that charnel house,
my body? My spirit is yours, nothing can prevent that. Good-bye,
my soul, my life.
"RAGNA."
The envelope was addressed to Count Angelescu, Grand Hotel, Città.
Ferrati, taking the letter, glanced at the superscription; his instinct
divined the truth, but like the wise man he was, he gave no sign. Only,
he lifted Ragna's hand and pressed his lips upon it with the reverence
he would have accorded a saint.
As he left the room he turned on the threshold, and the picture he saw:
Ragna very pale but consummately calm, leaning on the foot of one of the
cots, gazing down at the children, a faint smile parting her lips, her
dark-circled eyes shaded by the long lashes, remained with him to the
end of his life.