Ah, my friend,” said the Marchesa, “you Englishmen are like to our
mountain which we see smoking over there.” She threw herself into
the attitude of the ‘_prima donna assoluta_ in an impassioned moment
preceding the singing of the romanza, as she pointed across the blue Bay
of Naples to where Vesuvius was sending forth a delicate hazy fume.
“I don’t know anything about Englishmen,” said Sir Percival morosely;
“but I know that when you are near me my heart is a volcano--my
soul----”
The lady’s laugh interrupted him--one cannot make use of similes with a
poetical flavour about them when a violet-eyed lady is leaning back her
head in laughter, even though the action displays a beautiful throat and
the curves of a superb neck. The Marchesa del Grippo displayed a
marvellous throat and neck, and was fully aware of this fact. Her laugh
rang out like a soprano dwelling with delight on a high note and
producing it _tremolo_.
“Ah,” she cried, “you are at pains to prove to me that I am right in the
way I judge you Englishmen: to-day you are volcanic, to-morrow we find
not the blaze and the thunder but only--_ecco!_ a puff of smoke.”
Once again she pointed--but this time carelessly--in the direction of
the mountain.
The man frowned.
“For heaven’s sake do not say ‘You Englishmen’ when I am by!” he cried.
“I have nothing in common with Englishmen.”
“I have never met an Englishman who did not try to impress upon me that
he was not as other Englishmen,” said the Marchesa. “The last one to say
so to me was your wicked young Lord Byron. The Guicciola presented him
to me at Genoa. Heavens! the old Count is more like an Englishman than
Lord Byron! He can keep his eyes fast shut when it suits him. Enough; I
said ‘You Englishmen,’ and he became red with anger. Droll! I had to ask
forgiveness for having accused his lordship of being English. Oh, you
are a nation of patriots.”
“You do not mean to keep up the acquaintance of Lord Byron, I would fain
hope,” said Sir Percival with another frown.
Again the lady laughed.
“After that do not tell me that you are not an Englishman,” she
said. “It is so very English to frown when the name of Lord Byron is
mentioned--to give a young woman with a husband a solemn warning to
beware of that wicked young noble, while all the time the one that
utters the warning is doing his best to earn the reputation of the
disreputable Byron. The English detest Byron; but if you want to flatter
an Englishman to the farthest point, all you have to do is to tell him
that you believe him to be a second Lord Byron. Never mind: I like the
Lord Byron, and I like--yes, a little--another of his countrymen, though
he is, I fear, very wicked.”
“Wicked?--wicked?” cried Sir Percival--he was plainly flattered. “What
is it to be wicked?”
“Ah, do not ask me to give it a definition: I might say that it was to
be you--you yourself.”
“If it is wicked to love--madly--blindly--then indeed I admit that----”
“That you are _aut Diabolus, aut Byron?_ I know not which of the two the
English regard as the worse. Well, suppose I do not admit your right to
tell me of your love: I suppose I dare not dispute your right to love,
but I can dispute your right to tell me of it--that is, if it exists.”
“If it exists? Heavens! my beloved creature, would I have followed you
here from England if I did not love you to distraction?”
“It needs such extraordinary self-sacrifice on the part of an Englishman
to leave England for Italy! I think you were glad to make some
excuse--even so feeble a one as that of being in love with an Italian
woman--to make a journey to Naples. But I forgot; you were in Italy once
before, were you not?”
“Yes; I was in some parts,--the north--Tuscany--Florence--never
here--no, never here.”
“Never here? ah, yes; now I remember well. You said you had never been
to Sorrento. I wonder did I hold out any inducement to you to come to
Sorrento?--you must have been studying a map of our bay, for you knew by
name every landmark, every island, when I tried to be your cicerone just
now.”
The glance that he cast at her after giving a little start had something
of suspicion in it.
“Everyone knows the landmarks of the lovely Bay of Naples,” said he;
“but I--ah, my beloved, did you not tell me all its beauties when we
first met in London six months ago? Had you no idea that every word
which fell from your lips--even the words in which you described the
scenery around your home--should be burnt into my memory for evermore?
Ah, sweet one, will you never listen to me? Does my devotion count for
nothing with you?”
“My husband,” she whispered with a tremulous downward glance--the glance
of love’s surrender--he knew it well: he was a man of considerable
experience of woman in all her phases. He knew that he had not been
fooled by the Marchesa.
“Did not you tell me that you detested him?” he cried. “If a husband
treats a wife cruelly, as he has treated you, he has wilfully forfeited
all claim to her devotion. There are some acts so atrocious that it is
impossible to find an adequate punishment for them.”
“You think that even if the punishment were a crime in the eyes of the
world it would be sanctified by heaven if it were meted out to a monster
of cruelty?” The Marchesa was looking at him through half-closed eyes.
He saw that her hands were clenched tightly, and he did not fail to
notice how tumultuously her bosom was heaving. He was exultant. He had
conquered. That opportune word which he had thrown in regarding her
husband’s cruelty had overcome her last scruple.
She was his.
“My beloved--my beloved,” he whispered, “cruelty to such a woman as you
makes sacred the mission of avenging it. You will leave him--with me you
will never know aught save happiness.”
She gave a little laugh, and then put her hand in his, not doubtfully,
but with an expression of the amplest trustfulness.
“My last scruple is gone,” said she in the same low tone that he had
employed. “What you have said has made my mind easy.”
“You will come to me?”
“Till one of us dies.”
She spoke the words with the fire flashing from her eyes as she gazed
into his face. The force of that gaze of hers gave him a little shock.
It was only a momentary sensation, however; in a second he recollected
that he was talking to an Italian, not an Englishwoman.
“Till one of us dies--till one of us dies,” he whispered, poorly
imitating her intensity. “Ah, I knew that it would come, my darling.
Would I have travelled from England if I had not been certain of
you--certain of my own love for you, I mean? And you will come with
me--you will leave him? It is his punishment--his righteous punishment.”
“I shall leave him with you, I swear to you,” cried the Marchesa.
For a moment he failed to catch her exact meaning. He did not want
the Marchese to be left with him; but of course he perceived the next
instant that she meant to say that she would leave her husband and go
with him, her lover; and there was no tremor in his voice as he said--
“You will never repent it! Ah, what happiness will be ours, my soul!
Shall it be tomorrow? I can hire a vessel to take us to Malta,--there we
shall be safe.”
“Nay, it is too sudden,” said she. “My husband could not fail to have
his suspicions aroused. Nay, we shall have to await our opportunity. If
he asks you to pay us a visit you must come. He will be going to Rome in
a day or two, and I shall contrive to be left behind.”
“Ah, that will be our chance,” he cried. “Fate is on our side, my dear
one.”
“Yes, Fate is on our side,” she said in a low tone that could not
possibly reach the ear of the tall and straight man who approached them
as they stood at the balustrade of the Villa Galeotto overlooking the
lovely Bay of Naples.
“It is such a great pleasure to me to meet you once again, Sir Percival
Cleave,” said the Marchese, with a smile. “I hope that the Marchesa has
offered you the hospitality of our humble home?”
“The Marchesa has been so very kind as suggest that I should visit your
castle for an hour or two before I leave this lovely neighbourhood,”
said Sir Percival.
“Nay, surely she made you name the day,” said the Marchese, turning
to his wife. “Is it possible, my dear, that you failed to be more
specific?” he asked with great gravity.
The lady gave a shrug in response, and her husband became still more
grave.
“The hospitality which I received in England can never be forgotten
by me, though my mission was an unpleasant one,” said he. “The King
of Naples--but we will avoid politics, as people must if they mean
to remain good friends. Enough; you will honour us by paying us a
visit--but when? What day will suit your convenience?”
“I am only remaining in this neighbourhood for a day or two,” said
Sir Percival. “I have, alas! some important business that will take me
northward; but--well, I have no engagement to-morrow, if that day would
suit your Excellency.”
“It will suit me better than any other day,” replied the Marchese. “I
have myself to go to Rome almost at once. I shall never cease to be
thankful to Fate for having so delayed my departure as to enable me to
have the pleasure of meeting Sir Percival Cleave. You will come in
the afternoon and eat a simple dinner at our table. You are already
acquainted with the road to the Castle?”
“Oh yes--that is, no; I do not know the road, but I do not suppose I
shall have any difficulty in finding it out.”
“What!” the Marchese had turned once more to his wife and had assumed
the tone of a reproof. “What! you did not make Sir Percival aware of the
direction to the Castle?”
“Sir Percival has been studying a map of the Bay,” said she. “Though he
has never before been here he shows a remarkable acquaintance with the
neighbourhood.”
“It is not right to take so much for granted,” said the Marchese. “Allow
me to repair the negligence of the Marchesa, Sir Percival.”
He then pointed out to the Englishman the direction to take in order to
reach the road leading to the cliffs a mile beyond Sorrento, where
the Castello del Grippo stood in the centre of its olive-groves.
Sir Percival thanked him, and said that having received such plain
directions he would not now carry out his intention of driving to the
castle; he would ride there instead.
Before the Marchese and his wife took their departure, the latter
had managed to whisper in the ear of Sir Percival as she returned the
pressure of his hand--
“Without fail.”
“Till one of us dies,” he replied.
How strange it all was! he thought that night as he stood at the door of
the inn where he was staying at Sorrento, and listened to the singing
of the fishermen putting out to sea. How strange it all was! The seven
years that had passed since he had last heard the hymn of the fishermen
in that Bay seemed no more than so many days. He had had his adventures
since he had been so foolish as to fancy himself in love with
Paolina--poor Paolina! A good many faces had interposed between the
face of the Italian girl of 1815 and the face of the Italian Marchesa
in 1822. But what a whimsical fate it was that had made him fall in
love with the Marchesa del Grippo more deeply than he had ever permitted
himself to fall in regard to other women! He had never known what it was
to love before, though she was the woman whom he should have avoided,
even if there were no other woman to love in the wide world.
Ah, it was fate--the Marchesa had said so that afternoon at the Villa
Galeotto. She had loved him from the first--he was ready to swear to
that. He remembered now certain indications of her passion which he
had noticed the first evening they had met, but which had escaped his
memory. It was at Lady Blessington’s in Kensington, and the Marchesa
had expressed the pleasure it gave her to meet with an Englishman who
spoke such excellent Italian. He had been very cautious at that time in
replying to her questions as to the length of time he had been in Italy
and the places that he had visited. It was not beyond the bounds
of possibility that, after the lapse of seven years, any one might
recognise him as the lover of Paolina, so it was just as well, he
thought, to be careful. He had not mentioned a word about Sorrento, and
not until the Marchesa had stood by his side in the garden of the Villa
Galeotto had he lapsed in his feigning a complete ignorance of the
locality. It was the force of his passion for that lovely woman which
had overwhelmed him, causing him to forget himself and to refer by name
to various landmarks.
But what did it matter now? The woman had responded to him, and in a
day or two would be by his side for--well, for as long as he pleased. A
short distance away Lord Byron was affording the Italians a new reading
of the cold-blooded Englishman; but Sir Percival Cleave would take very
good care that he was not made such a fool of by the Marchesa as Lord
Byron was by the Contessa Guicciola. Byron was practically a pauper,
whereas he, Sir Percival Cleave, was rich. He could therefore (the logic
was his) prevent himself from ever being made a fool of by any woman,
Marchesa or Contessa though she might be.
But he loved her--of that he was certain. He had asked her if he would
have faced the discomforts of a journey from England to Italy had he not
been in love with her; and now as he stood listening to the fishermen’s
hymns sung in the boats that were drifting out of the Bay, he asked
himself the same question. Oh yes, he loved her! and her husband was
cruel to her--she had told him so in England, and she had been greatly
comforted by his assurance--given in answer to her inquiry--that the
crime of being cruel to her was so great as to condone any act of
hers--say, running away with another man.
She was superstitious; she had some scruples. The priests, no doubt,
were in the pay of her husband, and they had probably exaggerated the
crime of a wife’s leaving a husband,--it would be so like a greasy
Italian priest to lay emphasis upon this one particular act; but he, an
English gentleman to the core, and properly sensible of the blessings of
a Protestant king and constitution, had succeeded in counteracting the
insidious teaching of the priests. She had listened to him. She
had readily accepted that great truth: a woman’s retaliation to her
husband’s cruelty is sanctified in the eyes of heaven. That was his
point: the eyes of heaven. It was immaterial in what light such an act
of retaliation as he suggested to her would appear in the eyes of the
people of the world.
Before he slept he had brought himself to believe that he was actually
the lady’s honourable champion, boldly coming forward to rescue her from
an intolerable oppressor.
The Castello del Grippo was built on the summit of the headland that
sloped away from the sea at one side, but was very precipitous on
the other. For three hundred years the family of Del Grippo had been
accustomed to display a light in the tower nightly for the guidance of
the fishing-boats, for the Castle could be seen from the north as well
as the south. For more than a mile on the shoreward side of the Castle
the olive-trees grew mixed with lemons and oranges; and as Sir
Percival rode along the somewhat rough avenue on his way to accept
the hospitality of the man whose wife he had the previous day been
instructing on some interesting points in regard to her duty, he was
entranced with the perfumes of the fruits and flowers. The air was heavy
with odours of the citrons, and the gold of the luscious fruit gleamed
among the glossy leaves. Though he had never been on the avenue before,
the gleam of the fruit and the exquisite scents brought back to him the
sweet memory of Paolina. It was not at this side of the great garden
that he had been accustomed to meet her, but on the other side--that
nearest the cliff, a mile away.
It was a sweet sad memory, and it was so poignant that it even caused
him to sigh and murmur--
“Ah, la povera Paolina! la povera Paolina!”
And having thereby satisfied himself that his heart was as soft as the
heart of a little child, he urged his horse forward.
He soon reached the Castle, and it seemed gloomy enough, outlined
against the wonderful blue sky. He had seen numbers of the peasants
working among the olives, but close to the Castle none were in sight.
It was not until he had dismounted and pulled the handle of the old iron
bell that a servant appeared. In a few moments the Marchese himself came
out of a room at one side of the hall and welcomed his guest, giving
instructions to another servant to stable the horse.
“You have not met the Marchesa?” he inquired of Sir Percival. “She left
the Castle half-an-hour ago, trusting to meet you. Pray enter and we
shall have some refreshment.”
But Sir Percival declined to enter in the absence of the Marchesa. He
felt that to do so would be very gross--to say the least of it. The
idea of sitting down with the Marchese while the lady--his lady--was
wandering disconsolately around the grounds in search of him was very
repugnant to him.
“As you will,” said the Marchese with a shrug when he remarked that he
would like to go in search of the Marchesa. “As you will. She is not
likely to get lost. Oh yes; we shall go in search of her, and that
will serve me as an excuse for showing you some of the spots to which
interest attaches within our grounds.”
He picked up a hat and stick and left the Castle with his visitor.
“We shall first go to the grove where the historic duel was fought
between my ancestor and the two nephews of Pope Adrian,” said the
Marchese. “You have heard of that affair, no doubt.”
“Shall we be likely to find the Marchesa there?” asked Sir Percival.
“As likely as not we shall meet her as we go there,” replied the
Marchese.
He led the way through an avenue of ilex, and they soon came upon a
cleared space at the foot of a terrace of rocks. The Marchese explained
the position occupied by the combatants in the famous duel that had so
consolidated the position of the family of Del Grippo. But all the time
the details of the incident were being explained to him Sir Percival was
casting his eyes around for the appearance of the lady. What did he care
about Pope Adrian or his nephews so long as his lady--he had come to
think of her as his lady--was roaming the grounds in search of him?
Then his host brought him to where the body of his grandfather had been
found by the side of the three men whom he had killed before receiving
the fatal blow from behind, dealt by that poltroon, Prince Roberto, who
had hired four of his bravos to attack the old man. At another part of
the grounds were the ruins of the ancient summer-house, where a certain
member of this distinguished family had strangled his wife, whom he had
suspected of infidelity, though, as the Marchese explained, the lady had
saved him more than once from assassination and was perfectly guiltless.
An hour had been passed viewing these very interesting localities, about
which the air of the middle ages still lingered, and still the Marchesa
was absent.
“Should we not return to the Castle? the Marchesa may be waiting for
us,” suggested Sir Percival.
“A thousand pardons,” cried the Marchese. “I fear I have fatigued you.
You are thirsty.”
“Well, yes; I am somewhat thirsty,” laughed the visitor.
“How discourteous I have been! We shall have the refreshment of an
orange before returning. There is a famous grove a short way toward the
cliff.”
He strode onward, and then, suddenly turning down a narrow path made
among the olives, Sir Percival gave a start, for he found himself by the
side of the Marchese, at the one part of those grounds with which he was
well acquainted. They stood among the orange-trees at the summit of the
cliff which he had nightly climbed to meet Paolina.
“Here are our choicest fruits,” said the Marchese, plucking an orange
and handing it to his visitor. “Break it open and you will see how
exquisite the fruit is.”
Sir Percival broke the orange, but the moment he did so it fell from his
fingers and he gave a cry of horror, for out of the fruit had come a red
stream staining his hands.
The Marchese laughed loud and long.
“Your hands are embrued with blood,” he said. “Oh, a stranger might
fancy for a moment that Sir Percival Cleave was a murderer. Ah! pray
pardon my folly. That is only the refreshing juice of the orange. And
yet you fancied that it was blood! Come, my friend, take courage; here
is another. Eat it; you will find it delicious. I have heard that there
are in the world such strange monsters as are refreshed by drinking
blood--we have ourselves vampires in this neighbourhood. But you and I,
sir, we prefer only the heart’s blood of a simple orange. You will eat
one.”
“I could not touch one,” said Sir Percival. “Nay; to do me the favour?
What! an Englishman and superstitious?”
Sir Percival took another orange and made a pretence of eating it. His
hands trembled so, however, they were soon dripping with the crimson
juice.
“You are caught red-handed in the act,” said the Marchese, “red-handed--
but the man who came here long ago was not so captured.”
“Another medieval story?” said Sir Percival. “Had your Excellency not
better reserve it for the evening?”
“This story is not a medieval one; and it can only be told on the spot,”
said the Marchese. “You have never been here before or you would not
need to be told that this orange-grove was until seven years ago an
ordinary one. It was not until blood was spilt here seven years ago that
the fruit became crimson when bruised, and blood--your hands are dyed
with it----flowed from it as you have seen--it is on your lips--you have
drunk of her blood--Paolina’s.”
“For Gods sake let us leave this place!” said Sir Percival hoarsely. “I
have heard enough stories of bloodshed.”
“Nay; this one is so piteous, you shall hear it and weep, sir--ah!
tears of blood might be drawn from the most hard-hearted at the story of
Paolina. She was a sweet girl. She lived with her sister, who is now the
Marchesa----”
“Good God!”
“What amazes you, sir? Is it remarkable that my wife should have had a
sister?’
“No, no; of course not; I was only surprised to find those horrid marks
still on my hands. Pray let us return to the Castle and permit me to
remove the stains.”
“Poor Paolina!--she lived at the Castle with our aunt seven years ago.
She was a flower of girlhood. I thought myself in love with her; but
when my brother Ugo--he was the elder--confided in me that he loved her,
I left the Castle. He loved her, and it seemed that she returned his
affection. They were betrothed, and one could not doubt that their
happiness was assured. But one evil day she met a man--a scoundrel; I
regret to say that he was an Englishman--do not move, sir, you shall
hear me out. This villain spoke to her of love. He tempted her. She was
accustomed to meet him every evening on this very spot--we learned
that he sailed from Sorrento and climbed the cliff. My brother began to
suspect. He followed her here one evening, and she confessed everything
to him. He was a passionate man, and he strangled her here--here--and
then flung himself headlong from the cliff.”
“A gruesome story, Marchese. Now, shall we return?”
“Villain!--assassin!--look at your hands--they are wet with her
blood--your lips--they have drunk her blood, but ‘tis their last
draught--for----”
Sir Percival sprang at the man and caught him by the throat, but in an
instant his hands relaxed. He had only strength to glance round. He saw
the woman who had stabbed him, before he fell forward.
“That one was for her--for her--my beloved sister. This one is for our
dear brother--the man whom you wronged. This----”
She stabbed him again. His blood mixed with the crimson stains on the
earth.
“Look at it--bear witness that I have kept my oath,” cried the Marchesa.
“Did not I swear that his blood should be drunk by the same earth that
drank hers?”
“Beloved one, you are an angel--an avenging angel!” cried the Marchese,
embracing his wife.
The next day Sir Percival Cleave’s horse was found dead at the foot of
one of the cliffs; but the body of the “unfortunate baronet”--so he was
termed by the newspapers (English)--was never recovered.