THE CITY IN THE SEA
From her window Kitty looked down on the Campo which lay patched with
black shadows and moonshine. A magic luster, effective as hoar-frost,
enveloped the ancient church, and the lines of the eaves and the turns
of the corners were silver-bright. How still at night was this fairy
city in the sea! Save for the occasional booming of bells--and in Italy
they are for ever and ever booming--and the low warning cry of the
gondoliers, there was nothing which spoke of life, certainly not here in
the Campo Santa Maria Formosa. There were no horses clattering over the
stone pavements, no trams, no omnibuses; the stillness which was of
peace lay over all things. And some of this had entered Kitty's heart.
She was not deeply read, but nevertheless she had her share of poetical
feeling. And to her everything in the venerable city teemed with
unexpressed lyric. What if the Bridge of Sighs was not true, or the fair
Desdemona had not dwelt in a palace on the Grand Canal, or the Merchant
had neither bought nor sold in the shadow of the Rialto bridge?
Historians are not infallible, and it is sometimes easier and pleasanter
to believe the poets.
But for one thing the hour would have been perfect. Kitty, ordinarily
brave and cheerful, was very lonesome and homesick. Tears sparkled in
her eyes and threatened to fall at any moment. It was all very well to
dream of old Venice; but when home and friends kept intruding
constantly! The little bank-account was so small that five hundred would
wipe it out of existence. And now she would be out of employment till
the coming autumn. The dismal failure of it all! She had danced, sung,
spoken her lines the very best she knew how; and none had noticed or
encouraged her. It was a bitter cup, after all the success at home. If
only she could take it philosophically; like La Signorina! She shut her
eyes. How readily she could see the brilliant, noisy, friendly Broadway,
the electric signs before the theaters, the gay crowds in the
restaurants! It was all very fine to see Europe on a comfortable letter
of credit, but to see it under such circumstances as these, that was a
different matter. To live in this evil-smelling old tenement, with
seldom any delicacy to eat, a strange jabber-jabber ringing in one's
ears from morning till night, and to wait day after day for that letter
from home, was not a situation such as would hearten one's love of
romance. The men had it much easier; they always do. There was ever some
place for a man to go; and there were three of them, and they could talk
to one another. But here, unless La Signorina was about--and she had an
odd way of disappearing--she, Kitty, had to twiddle her thumbs or talk
to herself, for she could understand nothing these people, kindly enough
in their way, said to her.
She opened her eyes again, and this time the tears flowed unheeded. Of
what use is pride, unless it be observed by others? She missed some one,
a frank, merry, kind-hearted some one; and it was balm to her heart to
admit it at last. Had he appeared to her at that moment, she must have
fallen gratefully into his arms.
And there were so many things she could not understand. Why should La
Signorina always go veiled? Why should she hide her splendid beauty?
Where did she disappear so mysteriously in the daytime? And those
sapphires, and diamonds, and emeralds? Why live here, with such a
fortune hanging round her neck? Kitty forgot that, for the sake of
sentiment, one will sometimes eat a crust when one might dine like a
prince.
"Kitty?" The voice came from the doorway. Kitty was startled for a
moment, but it was only La Signorina. Kitty furtively wiped her eyes.
"I am over here by the window. The moon was so bright I did not light
the lamp."
La Signorina moved with light step to the window, bent and caught
Kitty's face between her hands and turned it firmly toward the moon.
"You have been crying, _cara_!"
"I am very lonely," said Kitty.
"You poor little homeless bird!" La Signorina seized Kitty impulsively
in her arms. "If I were not--" She hesitated.
"If you were not?"
"If I were not poor, but rich instead, I'd take you to one of the
fashionable hotels. You are out of place here, in this rambling old
ruin."
"Not half so much as you are," Kitty replied.
"I am never out of place. I can live comfortably in the fields with the
peasants, in cities, in extravagant hotels. It is the mind, my dear, not
the body. My mind is always at one height; where the body is does not
matter much."
There was a subtle hauteur in the voice; it subdued Kitty's
inquisitiveness. And no other woman had, till recently, accomplished
this feat. Kitty was proud, but there was something in her companion
that she recognized but could not express in words.
"Come!" said the older woman. "I myself am lonely and desperate
to-night. I am going to throw away a precious bit of silver on a
gondolier. We haven't been out three times together since we arrived.
Perhaps it would have been better had we all remained in Rome; but there
I could not have helped you. The band plays in the Piazza to-night. They
are going to play light opera, and it will tone us both up a bit. More
than that, we'll have coffee at Florian's, if we can find a table.
To-morrow we may have to do without breakfast. But there's the old
saying that he who sleeps dines. _Avanti!_"
"Sometimes," said Kitty, drying the final tear, "sometimes I am afraid
of you."
"And wisely. I am often afraid of myself. I always do the first thing
that enters my head, and generally it is the wrong thing. Never mind.
The old woman here will trust us for some weeks yet." She leaned from
the window and called. "Pomp-_e_-o!"
From the canal the gondolier answered.
"Now then!" said the woman to the girl.
Kitty threw a heavy shawl over her head and shoulders, while the other
wound about her face the now familiar dark grey veil; and the two went
down into the Campo to the landing. Kitty longed to ask La Signorina why
she invariably wore that veil, but she did not utter the question,
knowing full well that La Signorina would have evaded it frankly.
Pompeo threw away his cigarette and doffed his hat. He offered his elbow
to steady the women as they boarded; and once they were seated, a good
stroke sent the gondola up the canal. The women sat speechless for some
time. At each intersection Pompeo called right or left musically.
Sometimes the moon would find its way through the brick and marble
canon, or the bright ferrule of another gondola flashed and disappeared
into the gloom. Under bridges they passed, they glided by little
restaurants where the Venetians, in olden days, talked liberty for
themselves and death to the Austrians, and at length they came out upon
the Grand Canal where the Rialto curves its ancient blocks of marble and
stalactites gleam ghostly overhead.
"There, this is better."
"It is always better when you are with me," said Kitty.
For years Kitty had fought her battles alone, independent and
resourceful; and yet here she was, leaning upon the strong will of this
remarkable woman, and gratefully, too. It is a pleasant thing to shift
responsibility to the shoulders of one we know to be capable of bearing
it.
"Now, my dear Kitty, we'll just enjoy ourselves to-night, and on our
return I shall lay a plan before you, and to-morrow you may submit it to
the men. It is as usual a foolish plan, but it will be something of an
adventure."
"I accept it at once, without knowing what it is."
"Kitty Killigrew," mused La Signorina. "The name is as pretty as you
are. Pretty Kitty Killigrew; it actually sings." Then she added
solemnly: "Never change it. There is no man worth the exchange."
Kitty was not wholly sure of this, so she made no response.
"What a beautiful palace!" she cried presently, pointing to a house in
darkness, not far from the house of Petrarch. It was only the interior
of the house that was in darkness. The moon poured broadly upon it. The
leaning gondola-posts stood like sleeping sentinels, and the tide
murmured over the marble steps.
Pompeo, seeing Kitty's gesture and not understanding her words, swung
the gondola diagonally across the canal.
"No, no, Pompeo!" La Signorina spoke in Italian. "I have told you never
to go near that house without express orders. Straight ahead."
The gondola at once resumed its former course. Never did Pompeo take a
tourist down the Grand Canal that he did not exalt in his best Italian
and French the beauties of yonder empty palace. Had he not spent his
youth in the service of the family? It was only of late years that
Pompeo had become a public gondolier, with his posts in the stand
fronting the Hotel de l'Europe.
"_A-oel!_ Look out!" he called suddenly. Another gondola scraped
alongside and passed on.
"Who lives there?" asked Kitty.
"Nobody," answered La Signorina. "Though once it was the palace of a
great warrior. How picturesque the gondolas look, with their dancing
double lights! Those without numbers are private."
"The old palace interests me more than the gondolas," declared Kitty.
But La Signorina was not to be trapped.
Presently they passed the row of great hotels, with their balconies
hanging over the water and their steps running down into it. Kitty eyed
them all regretfully. She saw men and women in evening dress, and she
was sure that they had dined well and were happy. Without doubt there
were persons who knew her by name and had seen her act. From the Grand
Canal they came out into the great Canal of San Marco, the beginning of
the lagoon. Here Kitty forgot for the moment her troubles; her
dream-Venice had returned. There were private yachts, Adriatic liners,
all brilliant with illumination, and hundreds of gondolas, bobbing,
bobbing, like captive leviathans, bunched round the gaily-lanterned
barges of the serenaders. There was only one flaw to this perfect dream:
the shrill whistle of the ferry-boats. They had no place here, and their
presence was an affront.
"How I hate them!" said La Signorina. "The American influence! Some day
they will be filling up the canals and running trams over them. What is
beauty and silence if there be profit in ugliness and noise?"
"La Signorina--" began Kitty.
"There! I have warned you twice. The third time I shall be angry."
"Hilda, then. But I am afraid whenever I call you that. You do not
belong to my world."
"And what makes you think that?" There was a smile behind the veil.
"I do not know, unless it is that you are at home everywhere, in the
Campo, in the hotels, in the theater or the palace. Now, I am at home
only in the theater, in places which are unreal and artificial. You are
a great actress, a great singer; and yet, as O'Mally would say, you
don't belong." Kitty had forgotten what she had started out to say.
La Signorina laughed. "Pouf! You have been reading too many novels. To
the _molo_, Pompeo."
At the _molo_, the great quay of Venice, they disembarked. The whilom
prima donna dropped fifty centesimi into Pompeo's palm, and he bowed to
the very gunwale of the boat.
"_Grazie, nobilita._"
"What does he say?" asked Kitty.
"He says, 'Thanks, nobility.' If I had given him a penny it
would have been thanks only. For a lira he would have added
_principessa_--princess. The gondolier will give you any title you
desire, if you are willing enough to pay for it. We shall return on
foot, Pompeo; this will be all for the night."
Pompeo lifted his hat again, and pushed off.
"He was very cheap," said Kitty. "Only ten cents for a ride like that!"
A ripple of laughter greeted this remark. "Pompeo can read human nature;
he knows that I am honest. What I gave him was a tip."
"Aren't you laughing at me sometimes?"
"Disabuse your mind of that fancy, _cara_. It is a long time since I
gave my affections to any one, and I do give them to you." With this she
caught Kitty by the arm, and the two went up the Piazzetta leisurely
toward the Piazza.
The Piazza San Marco, or Saint Mark, is the Mecca of those in search of
beauty; here they may lay the sacred carpet, kneel and worship. There is
none other to compare with this mighty square, with its enchanting
splendor, its haunting romance, its brilliant if pathetic history.
Light, everywhere light; scintillating, dancing, swinging light! Spars
and lances of light upon the shivering waters, red and yellow and white!
Light, the reflective radiance of jewels and happy eyes! Light, breaking
against the pink and white marbles, the columns of porphyry, malachite,
basalt, and golden mosaics! Let the would-be traveler dream of it never
so well; he will come to find his dreams vanquished. Nothing changes in
the Piazza San Marco, nothing save the tourists and the contents of the
bewildering shops; all else remains the same, a little more tarnished by
the sea-winds and the march of the decades, perhaps, but still the same.
Read your poets and study your romances, but delve into no
disillusioning guide-books. Let us put our faith in the gondolier; for
his lies are far more picturesque than a world of facts.
There were several thousand people in the square to-night, mostly
travelers. The band was playing selections from Audran's whimsical _La
Mascotte_. The tables of the many cafes were filled, and hundreds walked
to and fro under the bright arcades, or stopped to gaze into the
shop-windows. Here the merchant seldom closes his shop till the band
goes home. Music arouses the romantic, and the romantic temperament is
always easy to swindle, and the merchant of Venice will swindle you if
he can.
The two women saw no vacant tables at Florian's, but presently they
espied the other derelicts--O'Mally, Smith, and Worth--who managed to
find two extra chairs. They learned that O'Mally had had two beers, a
vast piece of recklessness. He was ripe for anything, and gaily welcomed
his fellow unfortunates. He laughed, told funny stories, and made
himself generally amusing. Smith made weak attempts to assist him. On
the other hand, Worth seldom smiled and rarely spoke.
Through her veil their former prima donna studied them carefully, with a
purpose in mind. The only one she doubted was Worth. Somehow he annoyed
her; she could not explain, yet still the sense of annoyance was always
there. It might have been that she had seen that look in other eyes, and
that it usually led to the same end. She could not criticize his
actions; he was always the perfection of courtesy to her, never
overstepped, never intruded.
"Gentlemen," she said during a lull, "I have a plan to propose to you
all."
"If it will get us back to old Broadway before we are locked up for
debt, let us have it at once, by all means," said O'Mally.
"Well, then, I propose to wait no longer for letters from home. The last
boat brought nothing; it will be fourteen days before the next arrives,
since you all tell me that you wrote to have your mail sent by the
Mediterranean. My plan is simple. They say that a gambler always wins
the first time he plays. Taking this as the golden text, I propose that
each of you will spare me what money you can, and Kitty and I will go to
Monte Carlo and take one plunge at the tables."
"Monte Carlo!" O'Mally brought down his fist resoundingly. "That's a
good idea. If you should break the bank, think of the advertisement when
you go back to New York. La Signorina Capricciosa, who broke the bank at
Monte Carlo, will open at the--"
"Be still," said Worth.
"Dash it, business is business, and without publicity there isn't any
business." O'Mally was hurt.
"Mr. O'Mally is right," said La Signorina. "It would be a good
advertisement. But your combined opinion is what I want."
The three men looked at one another thoughtfully, then drew out their
wallets, thin and worn. They made up a purse of exactly one hundred and
fifty dollars, not at all a propitious sum to trap elusive fortune. But
such as it was, O'Mally passed it across the table. This utter
confidence in her touched La Signorina's heart; for none of them knew
aught of her honesty. She turned aside for a moment and fumbled with the
hidden chain about her neck. She placed her hand on the table and opened
it. O'Mally gasped, Smith opened his mouth, and Worth leaned forward. An
emerald, a glorious green emerald, free from the usual cluster of
diamonds, alone in all its splendor, lay in the palm of her hand.
"I shall give this to you, Mr. O'Mally," said the owner, "till I return.
It is very dear to me, but that must not stand in the way."
"Ye gods!" cried O'Mally in dismay. "Put it away. I shouldn't sleep o'
nights with that on my person. Keep it. You haven't the right idea.
We'll trust you anywhere this side of jail. No, no! It wouldn't do at
all. But you're a brick all the same." And that was as near familiarity
as O'Mally ever came.
She turned to Smith, but he put out a hand in violent protest; then to
Worth, but he smiled and shook his head.
"O'Mally is right," he said. "We need no guaranty."
She put the ring away. It was her mother's. She never would smile in
secret at these men again. They might be vain and artificial and always
theatrical, but there was nevertheless a warm and generous heart
beneath.
"Thank you," she said quietly. "If I lose your money we will all go to
Florence. I have another plan, but that will keep till this one under
hand proves a failure. None of you shall regret your confidence in me."
"Pshaw!" said O'Mally.
"Nonsense!" said Smith.
And Worth smiled reassuringly.
O'Mally beckoned to a waiter. "_Oony_ bottle _vino dee Asti, caldo,
frappe_!" he said loudly, so that all might hear him give the order. A
month in Venice, and he would be able to talk like a native. True, if
any Italian spoke to him, he was obliged to shake his head; but that was
a trifling matter.
"Tom!" warned Smith.
"You let me alone," replied O'Mally. "A quart of Asti won't hurt
anybody."
So the thin sweet wine of Asti was served, and La Signorina toasted them
all gratefully.
Early the next morning she and Kitty departed for Monte Carlo in quest
of fortune. Fortune was there, waiting, but in a guise wholly
unexpected.