Nino was thoroughly frightened, for he knew that discovery portended
the loss of everything most dear to him. No more lessons with Hedwig,
no more parties to the Pantheon, no more peace, no more anything. He
wrung his fingers together and breathed hard.
"Ah, signora!" he found voice to exclaim, "I am sure you cannot
believe it possible--"
"Why not, Signor Cardegna?" asked the baroness, looking up at him from
under her half-closed lids with a mocking glance. "Why not? Did you
not tell me where you lived? And does not the whole neighbourhood know
that you are no other than Giovanni Cardegna, commonly called Nino,
who is to make his _début_ in the Carnival season?"
"Dio mio!" ejaculated Nino in a hoarse voice, realising that he was
entirely found out, and that nothing could save him. He paced the room
in an agony of despair, and his square face was as white as a sheet.
The baroness sat watching him with a smile on her lips, amused at the
tempest she had created, and pretending to know much more than she
did. She thought it not impossible that Nino, who was certainly poor,
might be supporting himself by teaching Italian while studying for the
stage, and she inwardly admired his sense and twofold talent if that
were really the case. But she was willing to torment him a little,
seeing that she had the power.
"Signor Cardegna"--she called him in her soft voice. He turned
quickly, and stood facing her, his arms crossed.
"You look like Napoleon at Waterloo, when you stand like that," she
laughed. He made no answer, waiting to see what she would do with her
victory. "It seems that you are sorry I have discovered you," she
added presently, looking down at her hands.
"Is that all?" he said, with a bitter sneer on his pale young face.
"Then, since you are sorry, you must have a reason for concealment,"
she went on, as though reflecting on the situation. It was deftly
done, and Nino took heart.
"Signora," he said, in a trembling voice, "it is natural that a man
should wish to live. I give lessons now, until I have appeared in
public, to support myself."
"Ah, I begin to understand," said the baroness. In reality she began
to doubt, reflecting that if this were the whole truth Nino would be
too proud--or any other Italian--to say it so plainly. She was subtle,
the baroness!
"And do you suppose," he continued, "that if once the Conte de Lira
had an idea that I was to be a public singer he would employ me as a
teacher for his daughter?"
"No, but others might," she objected.
"But not the count--" Nino bit his lip, fearing he had betrayed
himself.
"Nor the contessina," laughed the baroness, completing the sentence.
He saw at a glance what she suspected, and instead of keeping cool
grew angry.
"I came here, Signora Baronessa, not to be cross-examined, but to
teach you Italian. Since you do not desire to study, I will say
good-morning." He took his hat and moved proudly to the door.
"Come here," she said, not raising her voice, but still commanding. He
turned, hesitated, and came back. He thought her voice was changed.
She rose and swept her silken morning-gown between the chairs and
tables till she reached a deep divan on the other side of the room.
There she sat down.
"Come and sit beside me," she said, kindly, and he obeyed in silence.
"Do you know what would have happened," she continued, when he was
seated, "if you had left me just now? I would have gone to the Graf
von Lira and told him that you were not a fit person to teach his
daughter; that you are a singer, and not a professor at all; and that
you have assumed this disguise for the sake of seeing his daughter."
But I do not believe that she would have done it.
"That would have been a betrayal," said Nino fiercely, looking away
from her. She laughed lightly.
"Is it not natural," she asked, "that I should make inquiries about my
Italian teacher before I begin lessons with him? And if I find he is
not what he pretends to be should I not warn my intimate friends?" She
spoke so reasonably that he was fain to acknowledge that she was
right.
"It is just," he said, sullenly. "But you have been very quick to make
your inquiries, as you call them."
"The time was short, since you were to come this morning."
"That is true," he answered. He moved uneasily. "And now, signora,
will you be kind enough to tell me what you intend to do with me!"
"Certainly, since you are more reasonable. You see I treat you
altogether as an artist, and not at all as an Italian master. A great
artist may idle away a morning in a woman's boudoir; a simple teacher
of languages must be more industrious."
"But I am not a great artist," said Nino, whose vanity--we all have
it--began to flutter a little.
"You will be one before long, and one of the greatest. You are a boy
yet, my little tenor," said she, looking at him with her dark eyes,
"and I might almost be your mother. How old are you, Signor Nino?"
"I was twenty on my last birthday," he answered, blushing.
"You see! I am thirty--at least," she added, with a short laugh.
"Well, signora, what of that?" said Nino, half amused. "I wish I were
thirty myself."
"I am glad you are not," said she. "Now listen. You are completely in
my power, do you understand? Yes. And you are apparently very much in
love with my young friend, the Contessina di Lira"--Nino sprang to his
feet, his face white again, but with rage this time.
"Signora," he cried, "this is too much! It is insufferable!
Good-morning," and he made as though he would go.
"Very well," said the baroness; "then I will go to the Graf and
explain who you are. Ah--you are calm again in a moment? Sit down. Now
I have discovered you, and I have a right to you, do you see? It is
fortunate for you that I like you."
"You! You like me? In truth, you act as though you did! Besides, you
are a stranger, Signora Baronessa, and a great lady. I never saw you
till yesterday." But he resumed his seat.
"Good," said she. "Is not the Signorina Edvigia a great lady, and was
there never a day when she was a stranger too?"
"I do not understand your caprices, signora. In fine, what do you want
of me?"
"It is not necessary that you should understand me," answered the
dark-eyed baroness. "Do you think I would hurt you--or rather your
voice?"
"I do not know."
"You know very well that I would not; and as for my caprices, as you
call them, do you think it is a caprice to love music? No, of course
not. And who loves music loves musicians; at least," she added, with a
most enchanting smile, "enough to wish to have them near one. That is
all. I want you to come here often and sing to me. Will you come and
sing to me, my little tenor?"
Nino would not have been human had he not felt the flattery through
the sting. And I always say that singers are the vainest kind of
people.
"It is very like singing in a cage," he said, in protest. Nevertheless,
he knew he must submit; for, however narrow his experience might be,
this woman's smile and winning grace, even when she said the hardest
things, told him that she would have her own way. He had the sense to
understand, too, that whatever her plans might be, their object was to
bring him near to herself, a reflection which was extremely soothing
to his vanity.
"If you will come and sing to me--only to me, of course, for I would
not ask you to compromise your _début_--but if you will come and sing
to me, we shall be very good friends. Does it seem to you such a
terrible penance to sing to me in my solitude?"
"It is never a penance to sing," said Nino simply. A shade of
annoyance crossed the baroness' face.
"Provided," she said, "it entails nothing. Well, we will not talk
about the terms."
They say women sometimes fall in love with a voice: _vox et proeterea
nihil_, as the poet has it. I do not know whether that is what
happened to the baroness at first, but it has always seemed strange to
me that she should have given herself so much trouble to secure Nino,
unless she had a very strong fancy for him. I, for my part, think that
when a lady of her condition takes such a sudden caprice into her
head, she thinks it necessary to maltreat the poor man a little at
first, just to satisfy her conscience, and to be able to say later
that she did not encourage him. I have had some experience, as
everybody is aware, and so I may speak boldly. On the other hand, a
man like Nino, when he is in love, is absolutely blind to other women.
There is only one idea in his soul that has any life, and everyone
outside that idea is only so much landscape; they are no better for
him--the other women--than a museum of wax dolls.
The baroness, as you have seen, had Nino in her power, and there was
nothing for it but submission; he came and went at her bidding, and
often she would send for him when he least expected it. He would do as
she commanded, somewhat sullenly and with a bad grace, but obediently,
for all that; she had his destiny in her hands, and could in a moment
frustrate all his hopes. But, of course, she knew that if she betrayed
him to the count, Nino would be lost to her also, since he came to her
only in order to maintain his relations with Hedwig.
Meanwhile the blue-eyed maiden of the North waxed fitful. Sometimes
two or three lessons would pass in severe study. Nino, who always took
care to know the passages they were reading, so that he might look at
her instead of at his book, had instituted an arrangement by which
they sat opposite each other at a small table. He would watch her
every movement and look, and carry away a series of photographs of
her,--a whole row, like the little books of Roman views they sell in
the streets, strung together on a strip of paper,--and these views of
her lasted with him for two whole days, until he saw her again. But
sometimes he would catch a glimpse of her in the interval driving with
her father.
There were other days when Hedwig could not be induced to study, but
would overwhelm Nino with questions about his wonderful cousin who
sang, so that he longed with his whole soul to tell her it was he
himself who had sung. She saw his reluctance to speak about it, and
she blushed when she mentioned the night at the Pantheon; but for her
life she could not help talking of the pleasure she had had. Her
blushes seemed like the promise of spring roses to her lover, who
drank of the air of her presence till that subtle ether ran like fire
through his veins. He was nothing to her, he could see; but the singer
of the Pantheon engrossed her thoughts and brought the hot blood to
her cheek. The beam of moonlight had pierced the soft virgin darkness
of her sleeping soul, and found a heart so cold and spotless that even
a moon ray was warm by comparison. And the voice that sang "Spirto
gentil dei sogni miei" had itself become by memory the gentle spirit
of her own dreams. She is so full of imagination, this statue of
Nino's, that she heard the notes echoing after her by day and night,
till she thought she must go mad unless she could hear the reality
again. As the great solemn statue of Egyptian Memnon murmurs sweet,
soft sounds to its mighty self at sunrise, a musical whisper in the
desert, so the pure white marble of Nino's living statue vibrated with
strange harmonies all the day long.
One night, as Nino walked homeward with De Pretis, who had come to
supper with us, he induced the maestro to go out of his way at least
half a mile, to pass the Palazzo Carmandola. It was a still night,
not over-cold for December, and there were neither stars nor moon.
As they passed the great house Nino saw a light in Hedwig's
sitting-room--the room where he gave her the lessons. It was late,
and she must be alone. On a sudden he stopped.
"What is the matter?" asked De Pretis.
For all answer, Nino, standing in the dark street below, lifted up his
voice and sang the first notes of the air he always associated with
his beautiful contessina. Before he had sung a dozen bars the window
opened, and the girl's figure could be seen, black against the light
within. He went on for a few notes, and then ceased suddenly.
"Let us go," he said in a low voice to Ercole; and they went away,
leaving the contessina listening in the stillness to the echo of their
feet. A Roman girl would not have done that; she would have sat
quietly inside, and never have shown herself. But foreigners are so
impulsive!
Nino never heard the last of those few notes, any more than the
contessina, literally speaking, ever heard the end of the song.
"Your cousin, about whom you make so much mystery, passed under my
window last night," said the young lady the next day, with the usual
display of carnation in her cheeks at the mention of him.
"Indeed, signorina?" said Nino, calmly, for he expected the remark.
"And since you have never seen him, pray how did you know it was he?"
"How should one know?" she asked, scornfully. "There are not two such
voices as his in Italy. He sang."
"He sang?" cried Nino, with an affectation of alarm. "I must tell the
maestro not to let him sing in the open air; he will lose his voice."
"Who is his master?" asked Hedwig, suddenly.
"I cannot remember the name just now," said Nino, looking away. "But
I will find out, if you wish." He was afraid of putting De Pretis to
any inconvenience by saying that the young singer was his pupil.
"However," he continued, "you will hear him sing as often as you
please, after he makes his _début_ next month." He sighed when he
thought that it would all so soon be over. For how could he disguise
himself any longer, when he should be singing in public every night?
But Hedwig clapped her hands.
"So soon?" she cried. "Then there will be an end of the mystery."
"Yes," said Nino, gravely "there will be an end of the mystery."
"At least you can tell me his name, now that we shall all know it."
"Oh, his name--his name is Cardegna, like mine. He is my cousin, you
know." And they went on with the lesson. But something of the kind
occurred almost every time he came, so that he felt quite sure that,
however indifferent he might be in her eyes, the singer, the Nino of
whom she knew nothing, interested her deeply.
Meanwhile he was obliged to go very often to the baroness' scented
boudoir, which smelled of incense and other Eastern perfumes, whenever
it did not smell of cigarettes; and there he sang little songs, and
submitted patiently to her demands for more and more music. She would
sit by the piano and watch him as he sang, wondering whether he were
handsome or ugly, with his square face and broad throat and the black
circles round his eyes. He had a fascination for her, as being
something utterly new to her.
One day she stood and looked over the music as he sang, almost
touching him, and his hair was so curly and soft to look at that she
was seized with a desire to stroke it, as Mariuccia strokes the old
gray cat for hours together. The action was quite involuntary, and her
fingers rested only a moment on his head.
"It is so curly," she said, half playfully, half apologetically. But
Nino started as though he had been stung, and his dark face grew pale.
A girl could not have seemed more hurt at a strange man's touch.
"Signora!" he cried, springing to his feet. The baroness, who is as
dark as he, blushed almost red, partly because she was angry, and
partly because she was ashamed.
"What a boy you are!" she said, carelessly enough, and turned away to
the window, pushing back one heavy curtain with her delicate hand, as
if she would look out.
"Pardon me, signora, I am not a boy," said Nino, speaking to the back
of her head as he stood behind her. "It is time we understood each
other better. I love like a man and I hate like a man. I love someone
very, much."
"Fortunate contessina!" laughed the baroness, mockingly, without
turning round.
"It does not concern you, signora, to know whom I love, nor, if you
know, to speak of her. I ask you a simple question. If you loved a man
with your whole soul and heart, would you allow another man to stand
beside you and stroke your hair, and say it was curly?" The baroness
burst out laughing. "Do not laugh," he continued. "Remember that I am
in your power only so long as it pleases me to submit to you. Do not
abuse your advantage, or I will be capable of creating for myself
situations quite as satisfactory as that of Italian master to the
Signorina di Lira."
"What do you mean?" she asked, turning suddenly upon him. "I suppose
you would tell me that you will make advantages for yourself which
you will abuse against me? What do you mean?"
"I do not mean that. I mean only that I may not wish to give lessons
to the contessina much longer." By this time the baroness had
recovered her equanimity; and as she would have been sorry to lose
Nino, who was a source of infinite pleasure and amusement to her, she
decided to pacify him instead of teasing him any more.
"Is it not very foolish for us to quarrel about your curly hair?" said
she. "We have been such good friends always." It might have been three
weeks, her "always."
"I think it is," answered Nino, gravely. "But do not stroke my hair
again, Signora Baronessa, or I shall be angry." He was quite serious,
if you believe it, though he was only twenty. He forthwith sat down to
the piano again and sang on. The baroness sat very silent and scarcely
looked at him; but she held her hands clasped on her knee, and seemed
to be thinking. After a time Nino stopped singing and sat silent also,
absently turning over the sheets of music. It was warm in the room,
and the sounds from the street were muffled and far away.
"Signor Nino," said the lady at last, in a different voice, "I am
married."
"Yes, signora," he replied, wondering what would come next.
"It would be very foolish of me to care for you."
"It would also be very wicked," he said, calmly; for he is well
grounded in religion. The baroness stared at him in some surprise, but
seeing he was perfectly serious, she went on.
"Precisely, as you say, very wicked. That being the case, I have
decided not to care for you any more--I mean not to care for you at
all. I have made up my mind to be your friend."
"I am much obliged to your ladyship," he answered, without moving a
muscle. For you see, he did not believe her.
"Now tell me, then, Signor Nino, are you in earnest in what you are
doing? Do you really set your heart on doing this thing?"
"What?" asked Nino, annoyed at the persistence of the woman.
"Why need you be afraid to understand me? Can you not forgive me? Can
you not believe in me that I will be your friend? I have always
dreamed of being the friend of a great artist. Let me be yours, and
believe me, the thing you have in your heart shall be done."
"I would like to hope so," he said. But he smiled incredulously. "I
can only say that if you can accomplish what it is in my heart to do,
I will go through fire and water at your bidding; and if you are not
mocking me, I am very grateful for the offer. But if you please,
signora, we will not speak any more of this at present. I may be a
great artist some day. Sometimes I feel sure that I shall. But now I
am simply Giovanni Cardegna, teacher of literature; and the highest
favour you can confer on me is not to deprive me of my means of
support by revealing to the Conte di Lira my other occupation. I may
fail hopelessly at the outset of my artistic career, and in that case
I shall certainly remain a teacher of language."
"Very well," said the baroness, in a subdued voice; for, in spite of
her will and wilfulness, this square-faced boy of mine was more than a
match for her. "Very well, you will believe me another day, and now I
will ask you to go, for I am tired."
I cannot be interrupted by your silly questions about the exact way in
which things happened. I must tell this story in my own way or not at
all; and I am sacrificing a great deal to your taste in cutting out
all the little things that I really most enjoy telling. Whether you
are astonished at the conduct of the baroness, after a three weeks'
acquaintance, or not, I care not a fig. It is just the way it
happened, and I daresay she was really madly in love with Nino. If I
had been Nino I should have been in love with her. But I would like
you to admire my boy's audacity, and to review the situation, before I
go on to speak of that important event in his life, his first
appearance on the boards of the opera. At the time of his _début_ he
was still disguised as a teacher of Italian to the young contessina.
She thought him interesting and intelligent, but that was all. Her
thoughts were entirely, though secretly, engrossed by the mysterious
singer whom she had heard twice but had not seen as far as she knew.
Nino, on the other hand, loved her to desperation, and would have
acted like a madman had he been deprived of his privilege of speaking
to her three times a week. He loved her with the same earnest
determination to win her that he had shown for years in the study of
his art, and with all the rest of his nature besides, which is saying
much--not to mention his soul, of which he thinks a great deal more
than I do.
Besides this, the baroness had apparently fallen in love with him, had
made him her intimate, and flattered him in a way to turn his head.
Then she seemed to have thought better of her passion, and had
promised him her friendship,--a promise which he himself considered of
no importance whatever. As for the old Conte de Lira, he read the
German newspapers, and cared for none of these things. De Pretis took
an extra pinch of his good snuff, when he thought that his liberal
ideas might yet be realised, and a man from the people marry a great
lady by fairly winning her. Do not, after this, complain that I have
left you in the dark, or that you do not know how it happened. It is
as clear as water, and it was about four months from the time Nino saw
Hedwig in St. Peter's to the time when he first sang in public.
Christmas passed by,--thank heaven the municipality has driven away
those most detestable pifferari who played on their discordant
bagpipes at every corner for a fortnight, and nearly drove me
crazy,--and the Befana, as we call the Epiphany in Rome, was gone,
with its gay racket, and the night fair in the Piazza Navona, and the
days for Nino's first appearance drew near. I never knew anything
about the business arrangements for the _début_, since De Pretis
settled all that with Jacovacci, the impresario; but I know that there
were many rehearsals, and that I was obliged to stand security to the
theatrical tailor, together with De Pretis, in order that Nino might
have his dress made. As for the cowl in the last act, De Pretis has a
brother who is a monk, and between them they put together a very
decent friar's costume; and Mariuccia had a good piece of rope which
Nino used for a girdle.
"What does it matter?" he said, with much good sense. "For if I sing
well, they will not look at my monk's hood; and if I sing badly, I may
be dressed like the Holy Father and they will hiss me just the same.
But in the beginning I must look like a courtier, and be dressed like
one."
"I suppose so," said I; "but I wish you had taken to philosophy."