I MARRY AND GO TO LUCCA
Virginia was pleased to be very mysterious on the subject of our
marriage, keeping me in the Sagrestia for three or four days, visiting
me only to give me food and such news as she cared to impart. She told
me, for instance, that Professor Lanfranchi had undoubtedly arrived in
Florence, and that he was staying with Aurelia at the Villa San Giorgio.
As to our own affair, she said that everything was in good train. She
had found a church and a priest in the Ghetto; she would need a little
money--not very much--and promised, directly the coast was clear, to get
me over to that safe quarter. To be done with this part of my history,
so she did, and was made mine in the church of Sant' Andrea on October
24, 1724, three years, almost to a day, since my arrival in Padua in
1721. I took her back to a mean lodging in that meanest part of
Florence, and spent three days with her there alone. I then wrote to my
father, as I felt bound in duty to do--fully, unreservedly, with candour
and, I hope, modesty. I wrote to Father Carnesecchi, to Professor
Lanfranchi. Such money as I could consider mine by right I converted
into cash; the rest, which I thought to be my father's--being that share
of my monthly allowance which I had received after I had decided to
disobey him--I returned by bills of exchange to his London bankers. I
believe that, on the day of my departure from Florence, I stood up
possessed of some fifty guineas--no great capital upon which a man and
his young wife could begin the world. Nor had I any great idea how I
should increase or husband my little store. But I was young, zealous,
proud. I believed in myself, I loved Virginia. In a word, as always
happened to me, I looked studiously forward, and was happy. As for her,
she hardly touched the ground with her feet when she walked. You never
saw so radiant a creature.
We left the Ghetto at a good hour of the morning, intending for Lucca;
but at the gate of San Frediano a difficulty about post-horses bade fair
to detain us for a day in very unfortunate publicity. The man of whom we
had bespoken them met us there with despair upon his face. He was vexed,
he was harrowed, his nicest feelings of honour were wounded--at least he
said that they were. The horses had been fed and watered; he was about
to put them to, when an order which he dared not disobey had supervened.
No less was this than a precept from the Pratica Segreta that the horses
were to be put at the disposition of the Cavaliere Aquamorta, of whom
the State was most anxious to be rid. Had it been anything under a
Government order, said he, he would have laughed in the bearer's face.
Not even the Grand Duke could make an honest man break his word, &c.
&c.; but I could see he was helpless. I saw nothing so clearly as that I
was. I expostulated, offered more money than I could afford. Virginia
stormed. All to no purpose. I was for walking, and was about to command
Virginia to accompany me, when who should appear but my gentleman
himself, the Cavaliere Aquamorta, inquiring the cause of the uproar. He
presented a truly magnificent appearance in that squalid place.
No sooner was he informed that he was the cause of our distress than he
addressed himself to me with elaborate politeness--all the more singular
as that my appearance and equipage contrasted most unfavourably with
his. My clothes had not been improved by the adventures I had undergone;
my linen was soiled; I had no baggage. Virginia was respectably dressed
and looked beautiful, but had no pretensions to a rank which she did not
possess of herself and which I did not propose to give her. For I had
thought it only honourable in me, as I was dispensing with my father's
injunctions, to dispense also with his money. I had renounced the world
in which I had gained nothing but misery and crime. In this fine
gentleman's eyes, therefore, I must have seemed a simple young artisan,
and Virginia a pretty country girl. However, he begged to be of service
to us. He was himself going to Lucca, he said. If he took our horses it
was only fair we should take seats in his chariot. In fine, we should
hurt him deeply if we did not. All this was put before me with so much
frankness and good humour that I could not well refuse it. I saw,
moreover, that in addition to my horses he had two of his own. I
accepted his offer, therefore, with many thanks. He handed Virginia in
with a bow; he begged me to precede him, which I did, but to the back
seat. He took the place next my wife, and we left Florence.
"If," said this remarkable man, "I lay it down as an indispensable
preliminary to our acquaintance, which I hope may be long and warm, that
you accept me for a gentleman, it is because, as I do not happen to be
one, I have devoted all my energies to demonstrating the exact contrary.
No man can help the accident of his birth. My mother was an actress of
Venice: God knows who was my father, but I tell myself that he was
peculiarly mine. I was educated in the slips of the theatre of San
Moise; at ten I ran away from home, and from the age of twelve made my
fortune my own care. It was then that I found out the advantages of
being what I was not, for I observed that while nobody scrupled to cheat
a gentleman if he could safely do it, nobody (on the other hand)
resented the fact that a gentleman cheated him. At the age of fifteen,
when I served in Zante in the company of the noble Mocenigo, and
received a decoration for gallantry and a commission of lieutenant, I
killed my captain for permitting himself to doubt my gentility. I should
be sorry to have to reckon how many more have gone his way, or for how
many years I have been obliged to shed blood in every new State I have
chosen to inhabit. Those days are past and over; my reputation is made;
this order which I wear was presented to me by the Holy Father, and is
at once my patent and my passport. If I need another, it is here." He
pointed to his sword, which reposed upon a narrow ledge of the chariot,
behind my back.
I then told him a difficulty of my own, which was that, although I was a
gentleman by birth who had waived his rank for reasons unnecessary to be
named, I had no passport into the Republic of Lucca. "I think it right
to inform you, cavaliere," I added, "that I also found it necessary to
shed blood in Florence, and that consequently I have left that city
somewhat abruptly and without a passport. I should be sorry to put you
to any inconvenience on my account, and assure you that you have only to
express a doubt--a hint will be enough--to be relieved of me and my wife
at our first baiting-place."
He clasped my hand, saying, "I like your frankness--it pleases me
vastly. And I see that I can help you. I have a very commodious passport
which will pass your charming lady, yourself and half a dozen children--
if you had been so precocious as to have them. Let us talk of more
pleasant things than my magnanimity, if you please; the subject is
naturally familiar to me."
This Cavaliere Aquamorta--he had the Order of the Golden Spur from his
Holiness--was a tall spare man of a striking, if truculent, presence,
with a high forehead, prominent eyebrows, densely black, cheekbones like
razors, a complexion of walnut, and burning dark eyes. He carried his
head high, and punctuated his vivacious utterances with snorts and free
expectoration. He was, as I had seen at once, very much overdressed; his
jabot was too full, he had three watches, ring-laden fingers, not unduly
clean, and no less than five snuff-boxes, which he used in turn. He had
certain delicate perceptions, however, which I must do him the justice
to record; for if he was overdressed, I (God knows) was not, and yet not
one glance of his penetrating eyes was turned in my direction which was
not of deference and amiability. He treated me in every respect as if I
had been his equal in appearance, address and fortune. His gallantry to
Virginia would have been, I thought, excessive if displayed to any woman
in the world. Before we had gone a league he had hold of her hand, to
illustrate a story he was telling us of an intrigue he had had with the
Princess of Schaffhausen. "I took her Highness' hand--thus," says he,
and took my wife's. "'Madame,' I said, 'upon the honour of Aquamorta,
the affair, having gone so far, must go all lengths. Logic and love
alike demand it.'" The story was long; by the end of it, it was to be
seen that he still held Virginia's hand. Indeed, he held it more or less
until we stopped at Empoli to dine; and when we returned to the
carriage, if I may be believed, this knight of the Spur resumed
possession, and (as if it had been a plaything) nursed, flourished,
flirted, made raps with my wife's hand until we were near the end of the
day and within a few miles of the frontier of Lucca. Then at last he
released it, kissing it first--popped his head out of the window, looked
about and started, gave a prodigious Ha! cleared his throat, spat twice,
and sat down again.
He looked at me pleasantly but with penetration. "We have arrived at the
dreadful field of Altopascio, where Castruccio Castracane cut up the
Florentine legions," says he, "and now, friend, your trials begin. My
dear Signor Francis, believe me that I shall never forget the honour you
and your charming lady have done to the equipage and solitary splendour
of Aquamorta, nor the many marks of confidence and esteem you have both
shown me throughout our delightful journey. Unhappily, so far as you are
concerned, dear sir, it is over for a while. It will be necessary for
you to leave us. My passport"--he produced it--"is made out for the
Cavaliere Aquamorta, his lady, and servants. Your plan, therefore, will
be to mount the box. I would take your place and give you mine, but that
I am too well known to be supposed my own lacquey; nor could my
sensitive honour brook it if I were. I would offer you my cloak, again,
but that I fear it would betray you. It is perhaps a little out of key
with the rest of your apparel. Better, after all, take one of those
rascals'. For the next few hours you are Fritz, remember--Fritz from
Buda Pesth; and I," he cried with a sprightly air, "am the happy, the
indulged possessor of the most lovely of women." Again he kissed
Virginia's hand. Deeply annoyed as I was, there was nothing for it but
to obey; and it was under these by no means dignified circumstances that
I entered the Republic of Lucca for the first time.
Worse was to follow--much worse. The man was without conscience in
exacting from me the uttermost farthing of the bargain. Arrived at the
inn, where, it seemed, he had already bespoken the whole of the first
floor, he led Virginia upstairs with the greatest deference, hat in
hand, past the bowing landlord and all his array of scullions,
maidservants, lacqueys, porters and cooks; and took no more notice of me
than he had done of the horde of beggars at the door. Full of
indignation, I started to follow him, but his body-servant, an assured
rogue if ever there was one, stopped me with a firm grip of my elbow.
"Softly, comrade, softly," says he. "They won't need you yet awhile.
When hot metal is on the anvil my master is accustomed to strike."
"What do you mean, you rascal?" I cried; and he, still holding my arm,
"Why, my fine man," says he, "since you won't take a hint, I must deal
plainly with you." As we were then at the foot of the stairs, he
suddenly wheeled me to the right about, and plunged me into the crowd of
inn-servants. "Landlord," cried he, "take this fellow in and give him
his hire on my master's account. 'Tis a runaway gaolbird by the look of
him for whom we have no sort of use here. A few pauls will be handsome."
He carried out his part with such bounce that he was completely
successful; between him and the landlord and his crew I was hustled into
the kitchens where I found the preparations for the cavaliere's supper
in full blast.