It was ten o'clock in the morning and Giannella was waiting alone
in the second anteroom for the advent of Signora Dati. Mariuccia,
after also waiting a little, had left her, saying she would return in
half-an-hour to fetch her; meanwhile there was work to do at home,
and she was loth to waste any more time. At the end of a few months
of her new life, waiting had become a familiar trial to Giannella.
She often had to sit for a couple of hours in Signora Dati's room
while the Princess's lieutenant interviewed the numberless clients and
employees of the family, attended to the commands of the Excellency,
inspected the mountains of linen in the "guarda roba," and kept an eye
on the maids, all of whom were under her supervision and kept entirely
apart, in employment, housing, and feeding, from the men-servants,
for whom Ferretti, the maestro di casa, was alone responsible. When
Signora Dati knew that some time must elapse before she could speak
to Giannella, the latter was brought at once to her room, there to
occupy herself as best she might until her turn came. When the moment
at last arrived the pale little lady would glide in, sink into a chair
with a half-suppressed sigh of intense fatigue, and then throw herself
gallantly into the matter in hand with as much energy as if it had been
the first task of her day. Each question that came up was gone into
thoroughly--whether the passion-flowers on the violet chasuble should
be picked out with crystal or amethyst beads; whether the web of beauty
which was to be the wedding handkerchief of Donna Laura Bracciano, the
Princess's niece, should have square or rounded corners; whether the
coarse but ample layettes piled up in the left-hand cupboard, for the
Foundling Hospital had better be counted over once again to make sure
that each was complete? In all these handiworks Giannella was employed
as best suited the needs of the moment, and nothing connected with them
seemed too infinitesimal for Signora Dati's profound consideration.
Giannella, who took her instructions day after day, conceived a deep
admiration for the character of the dignified but self-effacing
subordinate, who was often white to the lips with weariness but
who never neglected one of the thousand minutiæ of her overlapping
responsibilities.
On this particular morning a treat was in store for Giannella. After
Mariuccia's departure word had come that Signora Dati was obliged
to go out and would take the "ricamatrice" (embroideress) with her.
She would join her in the sala in a few minutes. After receiving the
message Giannella sat tingling with pleasant excitement at the prospect
before her and ready to jump up the moment Signora Dati should appear.
The door opened suddenly and she ran forward with a smile of greeting,
ran almost into the arms of a young man who seemed to be choking with
laughter--Onorato, fresh from a long maternal lecture on the sin and
folly of owning too many expensive horses. He stopped half way and just
saved Giannella, crimson and rooted to the spot with embarrassment,
from impact with his singularly radiant waistcoat. She knew at once who
he was; only the son of the house would venture to race through it in
that fashion. But he, surprised for once out of his manners, stared at
her, took in the charming face with its arrested smile, appraised the
Etruscan gold of the hair under its light lace covering, found time
to wonder who the girl was and why she had seemed so pleased and then
so distressed at seeing him; then, with a word of apology, he passed
out of the room, much more sedately than he had entered it. Giannella,
conscious of having made an unpardonable mistake in thus thrusting
herself into his path, sank back into her seat, pale and trembling.
What would Signora Dati say?
Signora Dati, coming upon the scene a moment later, and receiving
Giannella's almost tearful apology for her stupidity, smiled away her
anxieties at once. The Prince would not be offended--oh dear no. He
was most amiable and simple; it might have happened to anybody; it
was his fault, not Giannella's. He always rushed about the house in a
hurry, knocking things down sometimes as he dashed through the rooms.
He was still such a boy! Signora Dati smiled with the incorrigible
indulgence of middle-aged spinsterhood for impetuous young masculinity.
Yes, Giannella might set her mind at rest, the Prince would certainly
have forgotten all about her before he was half way down the stairs.
Had she brought the patterns with her? Here they were at Massoni's,
and now for the white velvet for Donna Laura's wedding dress. Oh,
Giannella would have to treat the material like melting sugar when
she embroidered it. A breath, a speck of dust--and irretrievable ruin
would follow. Yes, please Sora Luisa, her Excellency had selected the
pattern, and now it must be seen in the piece, in a good light.
The magnificent material was reverently unrolled and spread out in
snowy, sumptuous billows in the sunshine. Signora Dati examined it
with the gravity of the expert, and Giannella stood by, trying to find
the answer to the first disquieting question that had ever presented
itself to her mind. What mysterious ruling caused one girl to be born
Donna Laura Bracciano, clothed her in robes beautiful enough for an
angel, bestowed upon her at seventeen the dignity of espousing a young
man as fortunate as herself, amid the rejoicings and congratulations
of hundreds of friends--and decided that Giannella Brockmann, without
a relation of her own in the world, was to be a dependent on charity,
working in a lonely room for ten hours a day to pay charity's account?
There was no rebellion in her thoughts as she meditated on the problem,
only wonder, and a strange new sense of bereavement--the unconscious
hunger for something young and sweet to love and laugh with, the
reaching out of the plant in the shade to its comrades tossing their
heads in the sun.
The encounter with Don Onorato, the light-hearted heir to accumulated
honors and wealth, the catching mirth that seemed bubbling over in his
laugh, in his bright face, had shaken her peace in some way, had, as
it were, blown aside the gray veil which closed in her own existence,
and shown her in a flash all that lay outside of it--for others. And
now the pictured vision of the radiant bride on whose finery she must
work till her back ached and her eyes smarted, had driven home the
sense of privation like a sword. The keenest pain of it all lay in the
fact that the few denizens of her tiny world took her fate as a settled
question, a matter of course, and considered that she ought to be
enthusiastically grateful for it. Ah, she was grateful, yes indeed, she
appreciated all that had been done for her by kind human beings; but if
they, on whom she had no claim, were so good and generous, could not
the Giver of all good things have been a little open-handed too? It all
seemed strange and sad, and Divine love just a little less loving than
she had been taught to believe.
During the next two or three weeks Giannella had several glimpses
of Onorato Santafede. Once she and Mariuccia met him on the great
staircase; twice he burst into Signora Dati's room when she was sitting
there receiving instructions about the design of orange blossoms and
roses to be embroidered in silver on the grand white velvet dress.
Signora Dati smiled at the young gentleman, attended to his imperious
commands about some silk handkerchiefs which he declared had been
vilely mishandled by the laundrymaids, and seemed totally unconscious
that the true object of his visit was to have another look at the
young embroideress, who stood silently aside and never opened her
lips during his laughing colloquy with the domestic oracle of the
household. No nascent romance had caught him in its web; Onorato
was as free from romance as most young Romans of his class, which,
whatever its failings, has rarely loved out of its sphere and in which
a _mésalliance_ is practically a thing unknown. But he frankly admired
beauty, and enjoyed looking at Giannella as he would have enjoyed
contemplating a charming and rather strange picture. He had discovered
that she was the official embroideress for the family, that she was
often in the house, and he saw no reason for not taking advantage
of the facts to pass a pleasant moment or two in her presence. The
instant he entered the room, Giannella seemed relegated to Limbo by its
mistress. She simply did not exist until Onorato had departed. And he
was in the habit of lingering there sometimes, for it was the room to
which he had been accustomed to come all his life, first with childish
joys and sorrows, afterwards with his little fastidiousnesses about
wardrobe and service; and often, since he was a kind-hearted young
autocrat, to cheer up "that victim of piety and recluse of duty," as he
called Signora Dati, with some bit of fun and mischief.
But the perspicacious little lady, while smiling at his extravagances,
noted that his eyes rested long on the golden head and half-averted
face near the window, and she decided that under no circumstances
must he find Giannella there again. Who could tell what evil snare the
devil (whose frantic machinations Signora Dati saw in every departure
from the established order of things) might not weave around two young
people who saw each other continually, even if no word passed between
them? She would say nothing to the Princess, but in future Giannella
should only come when she was sent for, and that would be when Onorato
was safely out of the house. He probably did not know that she lived
just across the courtyard, for he was never up in time to see her go
out with Mariuccia. All would be well, and the Excellency, who had so
much on her noble mind, need never even hear of her faithful acolyte's
passing anxiety.
And all would have been well had not Onorato, who took a profane
delight in exploiting his solemn mother's complete lack of humor,
come in that evening to take his place at table with a long face and
some heavy sighs. To the Princess's anxious questions he replied that
he was not ill, but that a strange melancholy had come over him. He
believed--mamma must keep his secret--he really believed he had fallen
in love! There!
Mamma gave a cry like a soul in pain, and then braced herself for the
worst. Onorato had been singularly stubborn in the matter of taking a
wife and to all his mother's entreaties had replied that life was very
pleasant now, that no one could say what marriage would make of it,
and finally that when mamma found a woman as charming as herself to
propose to him he would think about it--not till then. Thus placated,
the Princess would hold her peace for a while, but Heaven was daily
stormed with prayers for the ideal daughter-in-law. Consternation
and hope divided her feelings at this sudden announcement. Unaided,
unguided--was it yet possible that her son's choice had fallen on some
really desirable maiden? With clasped hands she entreated him to speak,
she could bear the suspense no longer.
Then the young rascal, with much sham hesitation and contrition,
confessed that his heart was gone from him forever--into the keeping of
the exquisitely beautiful creature who embroidered the family arms on
the sheets and towels! The Princess sank back in her chair, white with
the shock. This was the most dreadful thing that could have happened.
"My son," she gasped, "do you know what you are saying? But this is
perfectly horrible. I cannot believe it."
"I never meant you to, you dear, solemn, innocent mamma," he cried,
laughing as he jumped up and came to throw his arms round her neck
and kiss her--he was very much of a child for all his twenty-eight
years--"I was only joking. Don't you understand? When I fall in
love--oh then there really will be trouble, for I intend to devote my
whole attention to the accomplishment. But now--no. There mamma mia
cara, smile again. Your little embroideress is as pretty as an angel,
but I am not going to make a fool of myself by losing my heart to her.
Come, let us find her a husband. Wouldn't you like to marry her to
Ferretti? They say he is looking out for a second wife."
The Princess rallied her courage with a heroic effort and pretended
to believe him. Calling up a strained smile, she said, "These are
not proper subjects for joking, my son. Marriage is a sacrament,
matrimony a holy state into which I trust you will enter with fitting
dispositions when the time comes. You are quite old enough, you know I
was thinking--"
"For the love of Heaven," cried Onorato, terrified in his turn, "don't
'think,' I conjure you, don't think. You promised not to speak again on
that subject for at least six months. As for fitting dispositions, I
have not the first symptom of the disease at present and cannot imagine
where I shall find them when the fatal moment arrives. If Churchmen
could drive fast horses I assure you I could more easily catch the
distemper called a vocation. Uncle Paolo was a wise man and he strikes
me as a very happy one."
"Your uncle had two elder brothers when he decided to enter the
Church," the Princess replied. "It pleased God to remove them before
either of them was married--a great misfortune. Pray speak of these
subjects with proper respect, Onorato."
"I will respect everything--so long as it leaves me alone," he said
rather crossly. Really dear mamma made every word he spoke the occasion
for a lecture. What would become of him if there were another woman in
the house doing the same? He saluted her abruptly and went away to his
own rooms.
It was a long time before he caught sight of Giannella again. By eight
o'clock the next morning a note was brought to her from Signora Dati,
stating that there was much going on in the house at present, and that
the Excellency had intimated that it would be more convenient for her
to have the work sent across to the Professor's apartment, where the
writer would call in person on Tuesdays and Saturdays to inspect its
progress. Giannella need not come to the piano nobile in future.
So the last door was shut on her prison, doubtless, as she told
herself, through some misdemeanor of her own. Tears welled up in her
eyes. Life meant to be cruel. For the first time a little line marked
itself between her brows and the fresh curves of her mouth closed in
a straight line. Then she dried her eyes angrily and sat down to the
embroidery frame where the silver orange blossoms on Donna Laura's
wedding dress were beginning to cover the material with regal splendor
of bloom.