The short Roman season was advancing rapidly to its premature fall,
which is on Ash Wednesday, after which it struggles to hold up its head
against the overwhelming odds of a severely observed Lent, to revive
only spasmodically after Easter and to die a natural death on the first
warm day. In that year, too, the fatal day fell on the fifteenth of
February, and progressive spirits talked of the possibility of fixing
the movable Feasts and Fasts of the Church in a more convenient part of
the calendar. Easter might be made to fall in June, for instance, and
society need not be informed of its inevitable and impending return to
dust and ashes until it had enjoyed a good three months, or even four,
of what an eminent American defines as "brass, sass, lies and sin."
Rome was very gay that year, to compensate for the shortness of its
playtime. Everything was successful, and every one was rich. People
talked of millions less soberly than they had talked of thousands a few
years earlier, and with less respect than they mentioned hundreds twelve
months later. Like the vanity-struck frog, the franc blew itself up to
the bursting point, in the hope of being taken for the louis, and
momentarily succeeded, even beyond its own expectations. No one walked,
though horse-flesh was enormously dear and a good coachman's wages
amounted to just twice the salary of a government clerk. Men who, six
months earlier, had climbed ladders with loads of brick or mortar, were
now transformed into flourishing sub-contractors, and drove about in
smart pony-carts, looking the picture of Italian prosperity, rejoicing
in the most flashy of ties and smoking the blackest and longest of long
black cigars. During twenty hours out of the twenty-four the gates of
the city roared with traffic. From all parts of the country labourers
poured in, bundle in hand and tools on shoulder to join in the enormous
work and earn their share of the pay that was distributed so liberally.
A certain man who believed in himself stood up and said that Rome was
becoming one of the greatest of cities, and he smacked his lips and said
that he had done it, and that the Triple Alliance was a goose which
would lay many golden eggs. The believing bulls roared everything away
before them, opposition, objections, financial experience, and the
vanquished bears hibernated in secret places, sucking their paws and
wondering what, in the name of Ursa Major and Ursa Minor, would happen
next. Distinguished men wrote pamphlets in the most distinguished
language to prove that wealth was a baby capable of being hatched
artificially and brought up by hand. Every unmarried swain who could
find a bride, married her forthwith; those who could not followed the
advice of an illustrious poet and, being over-anxious to take wives,
took those of others. Everybody was decorated. It positively rained
decorations and hailed grand crosses and enough commanders' ribbons were
reeled out to have hanged half the population. The periodical attempt to
revive the defunct carnival in the Corso was made, and the yet unburied
corpse of ancient gaiety was taken out and painted, and gorgeously
arrayed, and propped up in its seat to be a posthumous terror to its
enemies, like the dead Cid. Society danced frantically and did all those
things which it ought not to have done--and added a few more,
unconsciously imitating Pico della Mirandola.
Even those comparatively few families who, like the Saracinesca, had
scornfully declined to dabble in the whirlpool of affairs, did not by
any means refuse to dance to the music of success which filled the city
with, such enchanting strains. The Princess Befana rose from her
deathbed with more than usual vivacity and went to the length of opening
her palace on two evenings in two successive weeks, to the intense
delight of her gay and youthful heirs, who earnestly hoped that the
excitement might kill her at last, and kill her beyond resurrection this
time. But they were disappointed. She still dies periodically in winter
and blooms out again in spring with the poppies, affording a perpetual
and edifying illustration of the changes of the year, or, as some say,
of the doctrine of immortality. On one of those memorable occasions she
walked through a quadrille with the aged Prince Saracinesca, whereupon
Sant' Ilario slipped his arm round Corona's waist and waltzed with her
down the whole length of the ballroom and back again amidst the applause
of his contemporaries and their children. If Orsino had had a wife he
would have followed their example. As it was, he looked rather gloomily
in the direction of a silent and high-born damsel with whom he was
condemned to dance the cotillon at a later hour.
So all went gaily on until Ash Wednesday extinguished the social flame,
suddenly and beyond relighting. And still Orsino did not meet Maria
Consuelo, and still he hesitated to make another attempt to find her at
home. He began to wonder whether he should ever see her again, and as
the days went by he almost wished that Donna Tullia would send him a
card for her lenten evenings, at which Maria Consuelo regularly assisted
as he learned from the papers. After that first invitation to dinner, he
had expected that Del Ferice's wife would make an attempt to draw him
into her circle; and, indeed, she would probably have done so had she
followed her own instinct instead of submitting to the higher policy
dictated by her husband. Orsino waited in vain, not knowing whether to
be annoyed at the lack of consideration bestowed upon him, or to admire
the tact which assumed that he would never wish to enter the Del Ferice
circle.
It is presumably clear that Orsino was not in love with Madame
d'Aranjuez, and he himself appreciated the fact with a sense of
disappointment. He was amazed at his own coldness and at the
indifference with which he had submitted to what amounted to a most
abrupt dismissal. He even went so far as to believe that Maria Consuelo
had repulsed him designedly in the hope of kindling a more sincere
passion. In that case she had been egregiously mistaken, he thought. He
felt a curiosity to see her again before she left Rome, but it was
nothing more than that. A new and absorbing interest had taken
possession of him which at first left little room in his nature for
anything else. His days were spent in the laborious study of figures and
plans, broken only by occasional short but amusing conversations with
Andrea Contini. His evenings were generally passed among a set of people
who did not know Maria Consuelo except by sight and who had long ceased
to ask him questions about her. Of late, too, he had missed his daily
visits to her less and less, until he hardly regretted them at all, nor
so much as thought of the possibility of renewing them. He laughed at
the idea that his mother should have taken the place of a woman whom he
had begun to love, and yet he was conscious that it was so, though he
asked himself how long such a condition of things could last. Corona was
far too wise to discuss his affairs with his father. He was too like
herself for her to misunderstand him, and if she regarded the whole
matter as perfectly harmless and as a legitimate subject for general
conversation, she yet understood perfectly that having been once
rebuffed by Sant' Ilario, Orsino must wish to be fully successful in his
attempt before mentioning it again to the latter. And she felt so
strongly in sympathy with her son that his work gradually acquired an
intense interest for her, and she would have sacrificed much rather
than see it fail. She did not on that account blame Giovanni for his
discouraging view when Orsino had consulted him. Giovanni was the
passion of her life and was not fallible in his impulses, though his
judgment might sometimes be at fault in technical matters for which he
cared nothing. But her love for her son was as great and sincere in its
own way, and her pride in him was such as to make his success a
condition of her future happiness.
One of the greatest novelists of this age begins one of his greatest
novels with the remark that "all happy families resemble each other, but
that every unhappy family is unhappy in its own especial way."
Generalities are dangerous in proportion as they are witty or striking,
or both, and it may be asked whether the great Tolstoi has not fallen a
victim to his own extraordinary power of striking and witty
generalisations. Does the greatest of all his generalisations, the wide
disclaimer of his early opinions expressed in the postscript
subsequently attached by him to his _Kreutzer Sonata_, include also the
words I have quoted, and which were set up, so to say, as the theme of
his _Anna Karjenina_? One may almost hope so. I am no critic, but those
words somehow seem to me to mean that only unhappiness can be
interesting. It is not pleasant to think of the consequences to which
the acceptance of such a statement might lead.
There are no statistics to tell us whether the majority of living men
and women are to be considered as happy or unhappy. But it does seem
true that whereas a single circumstance can cause very great and lasting
unhappiness, felicity is always dependent upon more than one condition
and often upon so many as to make the explanation of it a highly
difficult and complicated matter.
Corona had assuredly little reason to complain of her lot during the
past twenty years, but unruffled and perfect as it had seemed to her she
began to see that there were sources of sorrow and satisfaction before
her which had not yet poured their bitter or sweet streams into the
stately river of her mature life. The new interest which Orsino had
created for her became more and more absorbing, and she watched it and
tended it, and longed to see it grow to greater proportions. The
situation was strange in one way at least. Orsino was working and his
mother was helping him to work in the hope of a financial success which
neither of them wanted or cared for. Possibly the certainty that failure
could entail no serious consequences made the game a more amusing if a
less exciting one to play.
"If I lose," said Orsino to her, "I can only lose the few thousands I
invested. If I win, I will give you a string of pearls as a keepsake."
"If you lose, dear boy," answered Corona, "it must be because you had
not enough to begin with. I will give you as much as you need, and we
will try again."
They laughed happily together. Whatever chanced, things must turn out
well. Orsino worked very hard, and Corona was very rich in her own right
and could afford to help to any extent she thought necessary. She could,
indeed, have taken the part of the bank and advanced him all the money
he needed, but it seemed useless to interfere with the existing
arrangements.
In Lent the house had reached an important point in its existence.
Andrea Contini had completed the Gothic roof and the turret which
appeared to him in the first vision of his dream, but to which the
defunct baker had made objections on the score of expense. The masons
were almost all gone and another set of workmen were busy with finer
tools moulding cornices and laying on the snow-white stucco. Within, the
joiners and carpenters kept up a ceaseless hammering.
One day Andrea Contini walked into the office after a tour of
inspection, with a whole cigar, unlighted and intact, between his teeth.
Orsino was well aware from this circumstance that something unusually
fortunate had happened or was about to happen, and he rose from his
books, as soon as he recognised the fair-weather signal.
"We can sell the house whenever we like," said the architect, his bright
brown eyes sparkling with satisfaction.
"Already!" exclaimed Orsino who, though equally delighted at the
prospect of such speedy success, regretted in his heart the damp walls
and the constant stir of work which he had learned to like so well.
"Already--yes. One needs luck like ours! The count has sent a man up in
a cab to say that an acquaintance of his will come and look at the
building to-day between twelve and one with a view to buying. The sooner
we look out for some fresh undertaking, the better. What do you say, Don
Orsino?"
"It is all your doing, Contini. Without you I should still be standing
outside and watching the mattings flapping in the wind, as I did on that
never-to-be-forgotten first day."
"I conceive that a house cannot be built without an architect," answered
Contini, laughing, "and it has always been plain to me that there can be
no architects without houses to build. But as for any especial credit to
me, I refute the charge indignantly. I except the matter of the turret,
which is evidently what has attracted the buyer. I always thought it
would. You would never have thought of a turret, would you, Don Orsino?"
"Certainly not, nor of many other things," answered Orsino, laughing.
"But I am sorry to leave the place. I have grown into liking it."
"What can one do? It is the way of the world--'lieto ricordo d'un amor
che fù,'" sang Contini in the thin but expressive falsetto which seems
to be the natural inheritance of men who play upon stringed instruments.
He broke off in the middle of a bar and laughed, out of sheer delight at
his own good fortune.
In due time the purchaser came, saw and actually bought. He was a
problematic personage with a disquieting nose, who spoke few words but
examined everything with an air of superior comprehension. He looked
keenly at Orsino but seemed to have no idea who he was and put all his
questions to Contini.
After agreeing to the purchase he inquired whether Andrea Contini and
Company had any other houses of the same description building and if so
where they were situated, adding that he liked the firm's way of doing
things. He stipulated for one or two slight improvements, made an
appointment for a meeting with the notaries on the following day and
went off with a rather unceremonious nod to the partners. The name he
left was that of a well-known capitalist from the south, and Contini was
inclined to think he had seen him before, but was not certain.
Within a week the business was concluded, the buyer took over the
mortgage as Orsino and Contini had done and paid the difference in cash
into the bank, which deducted the amounts due on notes of hand before
handing the remainder to the two young men. The buyer also kept back a
small part of the purchase money to be paid on taking possession, when
the house was to be entirely finished. Andrea Contini and Company had
realised a considerable sum of money.
"The question is, what to do next," said Orsino thoughtfully.
"We had better look about us for something promising," said his partner.
"A corner lot in this same quarter. Corner houses are more interesting
to build and people like them to live in because they can see two or
three ways at once. Besides, a corner is always a good place for a
turret. Let us take a walk--smoking and strolling, we shall find
something."
"A year ago, no doubt," answered Orsino, who was becoming worldly wise.
"A year ago that would have been well enough. But listen to me. That
house opposite to ours has been finished some time, yet nobody has
bought it. What is the reason?"
"It faces north and not south, as ours does, and it has not a Gothic
roof."
"My dear Contini, I do not mean to say that the Gothic roof has not
helped us very much, but it cannot have helped us alone. How about those
two houses together at the end of the next block. Balconies, travertine
columns, superior doors and windows, spaces for hydraulic lifts and all
the rest of it. Yet no one buys. Dry, too, and almost ready to live in,
and all the joinery of pitch pine. There is a reason for their ill
luck."
"What do you think it is?" asked Contini, opening his eyes.
"The land on which they are built was not in the hands of Del Ferice's
bank, and the money that built them was not advanced by Del Ferice's
bank, and Del Ferice's bank has no interest in selling the houses
themselves. Therefore they are not sold."
"But surely there are other banks in Rome, and private individuals--"
"No, I do not believe that there are," said Orsino with conviction. "My
cousin of San Giacinto thinks that the selling days are over, and I
fancy he is right, except about Del Ferice, who is cleverer than any of
us. We had better not deceive ourselves, Contini. Del Ferice sold our
house for us, and unless we keep with him we shall not sell another so
easily. His bank has a lot of half-finished houses on its hands secured
by mortgages which are worthless until the houses are habitable. Del
Ferice wants us to finish those houses for him, in order to recover
their value. If we do it, we shall make a profit. If we attempt anything
on our own account we shall fail. Am I right or not?"
"What can I say? At all events you are on the safe side. But why has not
the count given all this work to some old established firm of his
acquaintance?"
"Because he cannot trust any one as he can trust us, and he knows it."
"Of course I owe the count a great deal for his kindness in introducing
me to you. He knew all about me before the baker died, and afterwards I
waited for him outside the Chambers one evening and asked him if he
could find anything for me to do, but he did not give me much
encouragement. I saw you speak to him and get into his carriage--was it
not you?"
"Yes--it was I," answered Orsino, remembering the tall man in an
overcoat who had disappeared in the dusk on the evening when he himself
had first sought Del Ferice. "Yes, and you see we are both under a sort
of obligation to him which is another reason for taking his advice."
"Obligations are humiliating!" exclaimed Contini impatiently. "We have
succeeded in increasing our capital--your capital, Don Orsino--let us
strike out for ourselves."
"I think my reasons are good," said Orsino quietly. "And as for
obligations, let us remember that we are men of business."
It appears from this that the low-born Andrea Contini and the high and
mighty Don Orsino Saracinesca were not very far from exchanging places
so far as prejudice was concerned. Contini noticed the fact and smiled.
"After all," he said, "if you can accept the situation, I ought to
accept it, too."
"It is a matter of business," said Orsino, returning to his argument.
"There is no such thing as obligation where money is borrowed on good
security and a large interest is regularly paid."
It was clear that Orsino was developing commercial instincts. His
grandfather would have died of rage on the spot if he could have
listened to the young fellow's cool utterances. But Contini was not
pleased and would not abandon his position so easily.
"It is very well for you, Don Orsino," he said, vainly attempting to
light his cigar. "You do not need the money as I do. You take it from
Del Ferice because it amuses you to do so, not because you are obliged
to accept it. That is the difference. The count knows It too, and knows
that he is not conferring a favour but receiving one. You do him an
honour in borrowing his money. He lays me under an obligation in lending
it."
"We must get money somewhere," answered Orsino with indifference. "If
not from Del Ferice, then from some other bank. And as for obligations,
as you call them, he is not the bank himself, and the bank does not lend
its money in order to amuse me or to humiliate you, my friend. But if
you insist, I shall say that the convenience is not on one side only. If
Del Ferice supports us it is because we serve his interests. If he has
done us a good turn, it is a reason why we should do him one, and build
his houses rather than those of other people. You talk about my
conferring a favour upon him. Where will he find another Andrea Contini
and Company to make worthless property valuable for him? In that sense
you and I are earning his gratitude, by the simple process of being
scrupulously honest. I do not feel in the least humiliated, I assure
you."
"I cannot help it," replied Contini, biting his cigar savagely. "I have
a heart, and it beats with good blood. Do you know that there is blood
of Cola di Rienzo in my veins?"
"No. You never told me," answered Orsino, one of whose forefathers had
been concerned in the murder of the tribune, a fact to which he thought
it best not to refer at the present moment.
"And the blood of Cola di Rienzo burns under the shame of an
obligation!" cried Contini, with a heat hardly warranted by the
circumstances. "It is humiliating, it is base, to submit to be the tool
of a Del Ferice--we all know who and what Del Ferice was, and how he
came by his title of count, and how he got his fortune--a spy, an
intriguer! In a good cause? Perhaps. I was not born then, nor you
either, Signor Principe, and we do not know what the world was like,
when it was quite another world. That is not a reason for serving a
spy!"
"Calm yourself, my friend. We are not in Del Ferice's service."
"Better to die than that! Better to kill him at once and go to the
galleys for a few years! Better to play the fiddle, or pick rags, or beg
in the streets than that, Signor Principe. One must respect oneself. You
see it yourself. One must be a man, and feel as a man. One must feel
those things here, Signor Principe, here in the heart!"
Contini struck his breast with his clenched fist and bit the end of his
cigar quite through in his anger. Then he suddenly seized his hat and
rushed out of the room.
Orsino was less surprised at the outburst than might have been expected,
and did not attach any great weight to his partner's dramatic rage. But
he lit a cigarette and carefully thought over the situation, trying to
find out whether there were really any ground for Contini's first
remarks. He was perfectly well aware that as Orsino Saracinesca he would
cut his own throat with enthusiasm rather than borrow a louis of Ugo Del
Ferice. But as Andrea Contini and Company he was another person, and so
Del Ferice was not Count Del Ferice, nor the Onorevole Del Ferice, but
simply a director in a bank with which he had business. If the interests
of Andrea Contini and Company were identical with those of the bank,
there was no reason whatever for interrupting relations both amicable
and profitable, merely because one member of the firm claimed to be
descended from Cola di Bienzo, a defunct personage in whom Orsino felt
no interest whatever. Andrea Contini, considering his social relations,
might be on terms of friendship with his hatter, for instance, or might
have personal reasons for disliking him. In neither case could the
buying of a hat from that individual be looked upon as an obligation
conferred or received by either party. This was quite clear, and Orsino
was satisfied.
"Business is business," he said to himself, "and people who introduce
personal considerations into a financial transaction will get the worst
of the bargain."
Andrea Contini was apparently of the same opinion, for when he entered
the room again at the end of an hour his excitement had quite
disappeared.
"If we take another contract from the count," he said, "is there any
reason why we should not take a larger one, if it is to be had? We could
manage three or four buildings now that you have become such a good
bookkeeper."
"I am quite of your opinion," Orsino answered, deciding at once to make
no reference to what had gone before.
"The only question is, whether we have capital enough for a margin."
"Leave that to me."
Orsino determined to consult his mother, in whose judgment he felt a
confidence which he could not explain but which was not misplaced. The
fact was simple enough. Corona understood him thoroughly, though her
comprehension of his business was more than limited, and she did nothing
in reality but encourage his own sober opinion when it happened to be at
variance with some enthusiastic inclination which momentarily deluded
him. That quiet pushing of a man's own better reason against his half
considered but often headstrong impulses, is after all one of the best
and most loving services which a wise woman can render to a man whom she
loves, be he husband, son or brother. Many women have no other secret,
and indeed there are few more valuable ones, if well used and well kept.
But let not graceless man discover that it is used upon him. He will
resent being led by his own reason far more than being made the
senseless slave of a foolish woman's wildest caprice. To select the best
of himself for his own use is to trample upon his free will. To send him
barefoot to Jericho in search of a dried flower is to appeal to his
heart. Man is a reasoning animal.
Corona, as was to be expected, was triumphant in Orsino's first success,
and spent as much time in talking over the past and the future with him
as she could command during his own hours of liberty. He needed no
urging to continue in the same course, but he enjoyed her happiness and
delighted in her encouragement.
"Contini wishes to take a large contract," he said to her, after the
interview last described. "I agree with him, in a way. We could
certainly manage a larger business."
"No doubt," Corona answered thoughtfully, for she saw that there was
some objection to the scheme in his own mind.
"I have learned a great deal," he continued, "and we have much more
capital than we had. Besides, I suppose you would lend me a few
thousands if we needed them, would you not, mother?"
"Certainly, my dear. You shall not be hampered by want of money."
"And then, it is possible that we might make something like a fortune in
a short time. It would be a great satisfaction. But then, too--" He
stopped.
"What then?" asked Corona, smiling.
"Things may turn out differently. Though I have been successful this
time, I am much more inclined to believe that San Giacinto was right
than I was before I began. All this movement does not rest on a solid
basis."
A financier of thirty years' standing could not have made the statement
more impressively, and Orsino was conscious that he was assuming an
elderly tone. He laughed the next moment.
"That is a stock phrase, mother," he continued. "But it means something.
Everything is not what it should be. If the demand were as great as
people say it is, there would not be half a dozen houses--better houses
than ours--unsold in our street. That is why I am afraid of a big
contract. I might lose all my money and some of yours."
"It would not be of much consequence if you did," answered Corona. "But
of course you will be guided by your own judgment, which, is much
better than mine. One must risk something, of course, but there is no
use in going into danger."
"Nevertheless, I should enjoy a big venture immensely."
"There is no reason why you should not try one, when the moment comes,
my dear. I suppose that a few months will decide whether there is to be
a crisis or not. In the meantime you might take something moderate,
neither so small as the last, nor so large as you would like. You will
get more experience, risk less and be better prepared for a crash if it
comes, or to take advantage of anything favourable if business grows
safer."
Orsino was silent for a moment.
"You are very wise, mother," he said. "I will take your advice."
Corona had indeed acted as wisely as she could. The only flaw in her
reasoning was her assertion that a few months would decide the fate of
Roman affairs. If it were possible to predict a crisis even within a few
months, speculation would be a less precarious business than it is.
Orsino and his mother might have talked longer and perhaps to better
purpose, but they were interrupted by the entrance of a servant, bearing
a note. Corona instinctively put out her hand to receive it.
"For Don Orsino," said the man, stopping before him.
Orsino took the letter, looked at it and turned it over.
"I think it is from Madame d'Aranjuez," he remarked, without emotion.
"May I read it?"
"There is no answer, Eccellenza," said the servant, whose curiosity was
satisfied.
"Read it, of course," said Corona, looking at him.
She was surprised that Madame d'Aranjuez should write to him, but she
was still more astonished to see the indifference with which he opened
the missive. She had imagined that he was more or less in love with
Maria Consuelo.
"I fancy it is the other way," she thought. "The woman wants to marry
him. I might have suspected it."
Orsino read the note, and tossed it into the fire without volunteering
any information.
"I will take your advice, mother," he said, continuing the former
conversation, as though nothing had happened.
But the subject seemed to be exhausted, and before long Orsino made an
excuse to his mother and went out.