CHAPTER II.
CHAPTER III.
CHAPTER IV.
CHAPTER V.
CHAPTER VI.
CHAPTER VII.
CHAPTER VIII.
CHAPTER IX.
CHAPTER X.
CHAPTER XI.
CHAPTER XII.
CHAPTER XIII.
CHAPTER XIV.
CHAPTER XV.
CHAPTER XVI.
CHAPTER XVII.
CHAPTER XVIII.
CHAPTER XIX.
CHAPTER XX.
CHAPTER XXI.
CHAPTER XXII.
CHAPTER XXIII.
CHAPTER XXIV.
CHAPTER XXV.
CHAPTER XXVI.
CHAPTER XXVII.
CHAPTER XXVIII.
CHAPTER XXIX.
CHAPTER XXX.
CHAPTER XXXI.
CHAPTER XXXII.
CHAPTER XXXIII.
CHAPTER XXXIV.
CHAPTER XXXV.
CHAPTER XXXVI.
CHAPTER XXXVII.
PREFACE
Lest those who read the following pages should deem this story at all
improbable, it is perhaps necessary to say that its chief incidents are
founded on an actual occurrence which took place in Naples during the
last scathing visitation of the cholera in 1884. We know well enough,
by the chronicle of daily journalism, that the infidelity of wives is,
most unhappily, becoming common—far too common for the peace and good
repute of society. Not so common is an outraged husband’s vengeance—not
often dare he take the law into his own hands—for in England, at least,
such boldness on his part would doubtless be deemed a worse crime than
that by which he personally is doomed to suffer. But in Italy things
are on a different footing—the verbosity and red-tape of the law, and
the hesitating verdict of special juries, are not there considered
sufficiently efficacious to soothe a man’s damaged honor and ruined
name. And thus—whether right or wrong—it often happens that strange and
awful deeds are perpetrated—deeds of which the world in general hears
nothing, and which, when brought to light at last, are received with
surprise and incredulity. Yet the romances planned by the brain of the
novelist or dramatist are poor in comparison with the romances of real
life—life wrongly termed commonplace, but which, in fact, teems with
tragedies as great and dark and soul-torturing as any devised by
Sophocles or Shakespeare. Nothing is more strange than truth—nothing,
at times, more terrible!
_Marie Corelli_.
August, 1886.
VENDETTA!
CHAPTER I.
I, who write this, am a dead man. Dead legally—dead by absolute
proofs—dead and buried! Ask for me in my native city and they will tell
you I was one of the victims of the cholera that ravaged Naples in
1884, and that my mortal remains lie moldering in the funeral vault of
my ancestors. Yet—I live! I feel the warm blood coursing through my
veins—the blood of thirty summers—the prime of early manhood
invigorates me, and makes these eyes of mine keen and bright—these
muscles strong as iron—this hand powerful of grip—this well-knit form
erect and proud of bearing. Yes!—I am alive, though declared to be
dead; alive in the fullness of manly force—and even sorrow has left few
distinguishing marks upon me, save one. My hair, once ebony-black, is
white as a wreath of Alpine snow, though its clustering curls are thick
as ever.
“A constitutional inheritance?” asks one physician, observing my
frosted locks.
“A sudden shock?” suggests another.
“Exposure to intense heat?” hints a third.
I answer none of them. I did so once. I told my story to a man I met by
chance—one renowned for medical skill and kindliness. He heard me to
the end in evident incredulity and alarm, and hinted at the possibility
of madness. Since then I have never spoken.
But now I write. I am far from all persecution—I can set down the truth
fearlessly. I can dip the pen in my own blood if I choose, and none
shall gainsay me! For the green silence of a vast South American forest
encompasses me—the grand and stately silence of a virginal nature,
almost unbroken by the ruthless step of man’s civilization—a haven of
perfect calm, delicately disturbed by the fluttering wings and soft
voices of birds, and the gentle or stormy murmur of the freeborn winds
of heaven. Within this charmed circle of rest I dwell—here I lift up my
overburdened heart like a brimming chalice, and empty it on the ground,
to the last drop of gall contained therein. The world shall know my
history.
Dead, and yet living! How can that be?—you ask. Ah, my friends! If you
seek to be rid of your dead relations for a certainty, you should have
their bodies cremated. Otherwise there is no knowing what may happen!
Cremation is the best way—the only way. It is clean, and _safe_. Why
should there be any prejudice against it? Surely it is better to give
the remains of what we loved (or pretended to love) to cleansing fire
and pure air than to lay them in a cold vault of stone, or down, down
in the wet and clinging earth. For loathly things are hidden deep in
the mold—things, foul and all unnameable—long worms—slimy creatures
with blind eyes and useless wings—abortions and deformities of the
insect tribe born of poisonous vapor—creatures the very sight of which
would drive you, oh, delicate woman, into a fit of hysteria, and would
provoke even you, oh, strong man, to a shudder of repulsion! But there
is a worse thing than these merely physical horrors which come of
so-called Christian burial—that is, the terrible _uncertainty_. What,
if after we have lowered the narrow strong box containing our dear
deceased relation into its vault or hollow in the ground—what, if after
we have worn a seemly garb of woe, and tortured our faces into the
fitting expression of gentle and patient melancholy—what, I say, if
after all the reasonable precautions taken to insure safety, they
should actually prove insufficient? What—if the prison to which we have
consigned the deeply regretted one should not have such close doors as
we fondly imagined? What, if the stout coffin should be wrenched apart
by fierce and frenzied fingers—what, if our late dear friend should
_not_ be dead, but should, like Lazarus of old, come forth to challenge
our affection anew? Should we not grieve sorely that we had failed to
avail ourselves of the secure and classical method of cremation?
Especially if we had benefited by worldly goods or money left to us by
the so deservedly lamented! For we are self-deceiving hypocrites—few of
us are really sorry for the dead—few of us remember them with any real
tenderness or affection. And yet God knows! they may need more pity
than we dream of!
But let me to my task. I, Fabio Romani, lately deceased, am about to
chronicle the events of one short year—a year in which was compressed
the agony of a long and tortured life-time! One little year!—one sharp
thrust from the dagger of Time! It pierced my heart—the wound still
gapes and bleeds, and every drop of blood is tainted as it falls!
One suffering, common to many, I have never known—that is—poverty. I
was born rich. When my father, Count Filippo Romani, died, leaving me,
then a lad of seventeen, sole heir to his enormous possessions—sole
head of his powerful house—there were many candid friends who, with
their usual kindness, prophesied the worst things of my future. Nay,
there were even some who looked forward to my physical and mental
destruction with a certain degree of malignant expectation—and they
were estimable persons too. They were respectably connected—their words
carried weight—and for a time I was an object of their maliciously
pious fears. I was destined, according to their calculations, to be a
gambler, a spendthrift, a drunkard, an incurable roue of the most
abandoned character. Yet, strange to say, I became none of these
things. Though a Neapolitan, with all the fiery passions and hot blood
of my race, I had an innate scorn for the contemptible vices and low
desires of the unthinking vulgar. Gambling seemed to me a delirious
folly—drink, a destroyer of health and reason—and licentious
extravagance an outrage on the poor. I chose my own way of life—a
middle course between simplicity and luxury—a judicious mingling of
home-like peace with the gayety of sympathetic social intercourse—an
even tenor of intelligent existence which neither exhausted the mind
nor injured the body.
I dwelt in my father’s villa—a miniature palace of white marble,
situated on a wooded height overlooking the Bay of Naples. My
pleasure-grounds were fringed with fragrant groves of orange and
myrtle, where hundreds of full-voiced nightingales warbled their
love-melodies to the golden moon. Sparkling fountains rose and fell in
huge stone basins carved with many a quaint design, and their cool
murmurous splash refreshed the burning silence of the hottest summer
air. In this retreat I lived at peace for some happy years, surrounded
by books and pictures, and visited frequently by friends—young men
whose tastes were more or less like my own, and who were capable of
equally appreciating the merits of an antique volume, or the flavor of
a rare vintage.
Of women I saw little or nothing. Truth to tell, I instinctively
avoided them. Parents with marriageable daughters invited me frequently
to their houses, but these invitations I generally refused. My best
books warned me against feminine society—and I believed and accepted
the warning. This tendency of mine exposed me to the ridicule of those
among my companions who were amorously inclined, but their gay jests at
what they termed my “weakness” never affected me. I trusted in
friendship rather than love, and I had a friend—one for whom at that
time I would gladly have laid down my life—one who inspired me with the
most profound attachment. He, Guido Ferrari, also joined occasionally
with others in the good-natured mockery I brought down upon myself by
my shrinking dislike of women.
“Fie on thee, Fabio!” he would cry. “Thou wilt not taste life till thou
hast sipped the nectar from a pair of rose-red lips—thou shalt not
guess the riddle of the stars till thou hast gazed deep down into the
fathomless glory of a maiden’s eyes—thou canst not know delight till
thou hast clasped eager arms round a coy waist and heard the beating of
a passionate heart against thine own! A truce to thy musty volumes!
Believe it, those ancient and sorrowful philosophers had no manhood in
them—their blood was water—and their slanders against women were but
the pettish utterances of their own deserved disappointments. Those who
miss the chief prize of life would fain persuade others that it is not
worth having. What, man! Thou, with a ready wit, a glancing eye, a gay
smile, a supple form, thou wilt not enter the lists of love? What says
Voltaire of the blind god?
“‘Qui que tu sois voilà ton maître,
Il fût—il est—ou il doit être!’”
When my friend spoke thus I smiled, but answered nothing. His arguments
failed to convince me. Yet I loved to hear him talk—his voice was
mellow as the note of a thrush, and his eyes had an eloquence greater
than all speech. I loved him—God knows! unselfishly, sincerely—with
that rare tenderness sometimes felt by schoolboys for one another, but
seldom experienced by grown men. I was happy in his society, as he,
indeed, appeared to be in mine. We passed most of our time together,
he, like myself, having been bereaved of his parents in early youth,
and therefore left to shape out his own course of life as suited his
particular fancy. He chose art as a profession, and, though a fairly
successful painter, was as poor as I was rich. I remedied this neglect
of fortune for him in various ways with due forethought and
delicacy—and gave him as many commissions as I possibly could without
rousing his suspicion or wounding his pride. For he possessed a strong
attraction for me—we had much the same tastes, we shared the same
sympathies, in short, I desired nothing better than his confidence and
companionship.
In this world no one, however harmless, is allowed to continue happy.
Fate—or caprice—cannot endure to see us monotonously at rest. Something
perfectly trivial—a look, a word, a touch, and lo! a long chain of old
associations is broken asunder, and the peace we deemed so deep and
lasting is finally interrupted. This change came to me, as surely as it
comes to all. One day—how well I remember it!—one sultry evening toward
the end of May, 1881, I was in Naples. I had passed the afternoon in my
yacht, idly and slowly sailing over the bay, availing myself of what
little wind there was. Guido’s absence (he had gone to Rome on a visit
of some weeks’ duration) rendered me somewhat of a solitary, and as my
light craft ran into harbor, I found myself in a pensive,
half-uncertain mood, which brought with it its own depression. The few
sailors who manned my vessel dispersed right and left as soon as they
were landed—each to his own favorite haunts of pleasure or
dissipation—but I was in no humor to be easily amused. Though I had
plenty of acquaintance in the city, I cared little for such
entertainment as they could offer me. As I strolled along through one
of the principal streets, considering whether or not I should return on
foot to my own dwelling on the heights, I heard a sound of singing, and
perceived in the distance a glimmer of white robes. It was the Month of
Mary, and I at once concluded that this must be an approaching
Procession of the Virgin. Half in idleness, half in curiosity, I stood
still and waited. The singing voices came nearer and nearer—I saw the
priests, the acolytes, the swinging gold censers heavy with fragrance,
the flaring candles, the snowy veils of children and girls—and then all
suddenly the picturesque beauty of the scene danced before my eyes in a
whirling blur of brilliancy and color from which looked forth—one face!
One face beaming out like a star from a cloud of amber tresses—one face
of rose-tinted, childlike loveliness—a loveliness absolutely perfect,
lighted up by two luminous eyes, large and black as night—one face in
which the small, curved mouth smiled half provokingly, half sweetly! I
gazed and gazed again, dazzled and excited, beauty makes such fools of
us all! This was a woman—one of the sex I mistrusted and avoided—a
woman in the earliest spring of her youth, a girl of fifteen or sixteen
at the utmost. Her veil had been thrown back by accident or design, and
for one brief moment I drank in that soul-tempting glance, that
witch-like smile! The procession passed—the vision faded—but in that
breath of time one epoch of my life had closed forever, and another had
begun!
Of course I married her. We Neapolitans lose no time in such matters.
We are not prudent. Unlike the calm blood of Englishmen, ours rushes
swiftly through our veins—it is warm as wine and sunlight, and needs no
fictitious stimulant. We love, we desire, we possess; and then? We
tire, you say? These southern races are so fickle! All wrong—we are
less tired than you deem. And do not Englishmen tire? Have they no
secret ennui at times when sitting in the chimney nook of “home, sweet
home,” with their fat wives and ever-spreading families? Truly, yes!
But they are too cautious to say so.
I need not relate the story of my courtship—it was brief and sweet as a
song sung perfectly. There were no obstacles. The girl I sought was the
only daughter of a ruined Florentine noble of dissolute character, who
gained a bare subsistence by frequenting the gaming-tables. His child
had been brought up in a convent renowned for strict discipline—she
knew nothing of the world. She was, he assured me, with maudlin tears
in his eyes, “as innocent as a flower on the altar of the Madonna.” I
believed him—for what could this lovely, youthful, low-voiced maiden
know of even the shadow of evil? I was eager to gather so fair a lily
for my own proud wearing—and her father gladly gave her to me, no doubt
inwardly congratulating himself on the wealthy match that had fallen to
the lot of his dowerless daughter.
We were married at the end of June, and Guido Ferrari graced our bridal
with his handsome and gallant presence.
“By the body of Bacchus!” he exclaimed to me when the nuptial ceremony
was over, “thou hast profited by my teaching, Fabio! A quiet rogue is
often most cunning! Thou hast rifled the casket of Venus, and stolen
her fairest jewel—thou hast secured the loveliest maiden in the two
Sicilies!”
I pressed his hand, and a touch of remorse stole over me, for he was no
longer first in my affection. Almost I regretted it—yes, on my very
wedding-morn I looked back to the old days—old now though so recent—and
sighed to think they were ended. I glanced at Nina, my wife. It was
enough! Her beauty dazzled and overcame me. The melting languor of her
large limpid eyes stole into my veins—I forgot all but her. I was in
that high delirium of passion in which love, and love only, seems the
keynote of creation. I touched the topmost peak of the height of
joy—the days were feasts of fairy-land, the nights dreams of rapture!
No; I never tired! My wife’s beauty never palled upon me; she grew
fairer with each day of possession. I never saw her otherwise than
attractive, and within a few months she had probed all the depths of my
nature. She discovered how certain sweet looks of hers could draw me to
her side, a willing and devoted slave; she measured my weakness with
her own power; she knew—what did she not know? I torture myself with
these foolish memories. All men past the age of twenty have learned
somewhat of the tricks of women—the pretty playful nothings that weaken
the will and sap the force of the strongest hero. She loved me? Oh,
yes, I suppose so! Looking back on those days, I can frankly say I
believe she loved me—as nine hundred wives out of a thousand love their
husbands, namely—for what they can get. And I grudged her nothing. If I
chose to idolize her, and raise her to the stature of an angel when she
was but on the low level of mere womanhood, that was my folly, not her
fault.
We kept open house. Our villa was a place of rendezvous for the leading
members of the best society in and around Naples. My wife was
universally admired; her lovely face and graceful manners were themes
of conversation throughout the whole neighborhood. Guido Ferrari, my
friend, was one of those who were loudest in her praise, and the
chivalrous homage he displayed toward her doubly endeared him to me. I
trusted him as a brother; he came and went as pleased him; he brought
Nina gifts of flowers and fanciful trifles adapted to her taste, and
treated her with fraternal and delicate kindness. I deemed my happiness
perfect—with love, wealth, and friendship, what more could a man
desire?
Yet another drop of honey was added to my cup of sweetness. On the
first morning of May, 1882, our child was born—a girl-babe, fair as one
of the white anemones which at that season grew thickly in the woods
surrounding our home. They brought the little one to me in the shaded
veranda where I sat at breakfast with Guido—a tiny, almost shapeless
bundle, wrapped in soft cashmere and old lace. I took the fragile thing
in my arms with a tender reverence; it opened its eyes; they were large
and dark like Nina’s, and the light of a recent heaven seemed still to
linger in their pure depths. I kissed the little face; Guido did the
same; and those clear, quiet eyes regarded us both with a strange
half-inquiring solemnity. A bird perched on a bough of jasmine broke
into a low, sweet song, the soft wind blew and scattered the petals of
a white rose at our feet. I gave the infant back to the nurse, who
waited to receive it, and said, with a smile, “Tell my wife we have
welcomed her May-blossom.”
Guido laid his hand on my shoulder as the servant retired; his face was
unusually pale.
“Thou art a good fellow, Fabio!” he said, abruptly.
“Indeed! How so?” I asked, half laughingly; “I am no better than other
men.”
“You are less suspicious than the majority,” he returned, turning away
from me and playing idly with a spray of clematis that trailed on one
of the pillars of the veranda.
I glanced at him in surprise. “What do you mean, _amico_? Have I reason
to suspect any one?”
He laughed and resumed his seat at the breakfast-table.
“Why, no!” he answered, with a frank look. “But in Naples the air is
pregnant with suspicion—jealousy’s dagger is ever ready to strike,
justly or unjustly—the very children are learned in the ways of vice.
Penitents confess to priests who are worse than penitents, and by
Heaven! in such a state of society, where conjugal fidelity is a
farce”—he paused a moment, and then went on—“is it not wonderful to
know a man like you, Fabio? A man happy in home affections, without a
cloud on the sky of his confidence?”
“I have no cause for distrust,” I said. “Nina is as innocent as the
little child of whom she is to-day the mother.”
“True!” exclaimed Ferrari. “Perfectly true!” and he looked me full in
the eyes, with a smile. “White as the virgin snow on the summit of Mont
Blanc—purer than the flawless diamond—and unapproachable as the
furthest star! Is it not so?”
I assented with a certain gravity; something in his manner puzzled me.
Our conversation soon turned on different topics, and I thought no more
of the matter. But a time came—and that speedily—when I had stern
reason to remember every word he had uttered.