which had been turned by one of the false ribs. “But a little higher up
it would have been deep in my heart.--I was wrong, Francesca,” he went
on, remembering the name he had heard little Gina repeat several times;
“I owe her no grudge, do not scold her. The happiness of speaking to you
is well worth the prick of a stiletto. Only show me the way out; I must
get back to the Stopfers’ house. Be easy; I shall tell nothing.”
Francesca, recovering from her astonishment, helped Rodolphe to rise,
and said a few words to Gina, whose eyes filled with tears. The two
girls made him sit down on a bench and take off his coat, his waistcoat
and cravat. Then Gina opened his shirt and sucked the wound strongly.
Francesca, who had left them, returned with a large piece of
sticking-plaster, which she applied to the wound.
“You can now walk as far as your house,” she said.
Each took an arm, and Rodolphe was conducted to a side gate, of which
the key was in Francesca’s apron pocket.
“Does Gina speak French?” said Rodolphe to Francesca.
“No. But do not excite yourself,” replied Francesca with some
impatience.
“Let me look at you,” said Rodolphe pathetically, “for it may be long
before I am able to come again---”
He leaned against one of the gate-posts contemplating the beautiful
Italian, who allowed him to gaze at her for a moment under the sweetest
silence and the sweetest night which ever, perhaps, shone on this lake,
the king of Swiss lakes.
Francesca was quite of the Italian type, and such as imagination
supposes or pictures, or, if you will, dreams, that Italian women
are. What first struck Rodolphe was the grace and elegance of a figure
evidently powerful, though so slender as to appear fragile. An amber
paleness overspread her face, betraying sudden interest, but it did not
dim the voluptuous glance of her liquid eyes of velvety blackness.
A pair of hands as beautiful as ever a Greek sculptor added to the
polished arms of a statue grasped Rodolphe’s arm, and their whiteness
gleamed against his black coat. The rash Frenchman could but just
discern the long, oval shape of her face, and a melancholy mouth showing
brilliant teeth between the parted lips, full, fresh, and brightly
red. The exquisite lines of this face guaranteed to Francesca permanent
beauty; but what most struck Rodolphe was the adorable freedom, the
Italian frankness of this woman, wholly absorbed as she was in her pity
for him.
Francesca said a word to Gina, who gave Rodolphe her arm as far as the
Stopfers’ door, and fled like a swallow as soon as she had rung.
“These patriots do not play at killing!” said Rodolphe to himself as
he felt his sufferings when he found himself in his bed. “‘_Nel lago!’_
Gina would have pitched me into the lake with a stone tied to my neck.”
Next day he sent to Lucerne for the best surgeon there, and when he
came, enjoined on him absolute secrecy, giving him to understand that
his honor depended on it.
Leopold returned from his excursion on the day when his friend first got
out of bed. Rodolphe made up a story, and begged him to go to Lucerne
to fetch their luggage and letters. Leopold brought back the most
fatal, the most dreadful news: Rodolphe’s mother was dead. While the
two friends were on their way from Bale to Lucerne, the fatal letter,
written by Leopold’s father, had reached Lucerne the day they left for
Fluelen.
In spite of Leopold’s utmost precautions, Rodolphe fell ill of a nervous
fever. As soon as Leopold saw his friend out of danger, he set out
for France with a power of attorney, and Rodolphe could thus remain at
Gersau, the only place in the world where his grief could grow calmer.
The young Frenchman’s position, his despair, the circumstances which
made such a loss worse for him than for any other man, were known, and
secured him the pity and interest of every one in Gersau. Every morning
the pretended dumb girl came to see him and bring him news of her
mistress.
As soon as Rodolphe could go out he went to the Bergmanns’ house, to
thank Miss Fanny Lovelace and her father for the interest they had taken
in his sorrow and his illness. For the first time since he had lodged
with the Bergmanns the old Italian admitted a stranger to his room,
where Rodolphe was received with the cordiality due to his misfortunes
and to his being a Frenchman, which excluded all distrust of him.
Francesca looked so lovely by candle-light that first evening that she
shed a ray of brightness on his grieving heart. Her smiles flung the
roses of hope on his woe. She sang, not indeed gay songs, but grave and
solemn melodies suited to the state of Rodolphe’s heart, and he observed
this touching care.
At about eight o’clock the old man left the young people without any
sign of uneasiness, and went to his room. When Francesca was tired of
singing, she led Rodolphe on to the balcony, whence they perceived the
sublime scenery of the lake, and signed to him to be seated by her on a
rustic wooden bench.
“Am I very indiscreet in asking how old you are, cara Francesca?” said
Rodolphe.
“Nineteen,” said she, “well past.”
“If anything in the world could soothe my sorrow,” he went on, “it would
be the hope of winning you from your father, whatever your fortune
may be. So beautiful as you are, you seem to be richer than a prince’s
daughter. And I tremble as I confess to you the feelings with which you
have inspired me; but they are deep--they are eternal.”
“_Zitto_!” said Francesca, laying a finger of her right hand on her
lips. “Say no more; I am not free. I have been married these three
years.”
For a few minutes utter silence reigned. When the Italian girl, alarmed
at Rodolphe’s stillness, went close to him, she found that he had
fainted.
“_Povero_!” she said to herself. “And I thought him cold.”
She fetched him some salts, and revived Rodolphe by making him smell at
them.
“Married!” said Rodolphe, looking at Francesca. And then his tears
flowed freely.
“Child!” said she. “But there is still hope. My husband is--”
“Eighty?” Rodolphe put in.
“No,” said she with a smile, “but sixty-five. He has disguised himself
as much older to mislead the police.”
“Dearest,” said Rodolphe, “a few more shocks of this kind and I shall
die. Only when you have known me twenty years will you understand the
strength and power of my heart, and the nature of its aspirations for
happiness. This plant,” he went on, pointing to the yellow jasmine which
covered the balustrade, “does not climb more eagerly to spread itself
in the sunbeams than I have clung to you for this month past. I love you
with unique passion. That love will be the secret fount of my life--I
may possibly die of it.”
“Oh! Frenchman, Frenchman!” said she, emphasizing her exclamation with a
little incredulous grimace.
“Shall I not be forced to wait, to accept you at the hands of time?”
said he gravely. “But know this: if you are in earnest in what you have
allowed to escape you, I will wait for you faithfully, without suffering
any other attachment to grow up in my heart.”
She looked at him doubtfully.
“None,” said he, “not even a passing fancy. I have my fortune to make;
you must have a splendid one, nature created you a princess----”
At this word Francesca could not repress a faint smile, which gave her
face the most bewildering expression, something subtle, like what the
great Leonardo has so well depicted in the _Gioconda_. This smile made
Rodolphe pause. “Ah yes!” he went on, “you must suffer much from the
destitution to which exile has brought you. Oh, if you would make me
happy above all men, and consecrate my love, you would treat me as a
friend. Ought I not to be your friend?--My poor mother has left sixty
thousand francs of savings; take half.”
Francesca looked steadily at him. This piercing gaze went to the bottom
of Rodolphe’s soul.
“We want nothing; my work amply supplies our luxuries,” she replied in a
grave voice.
“And can I endure that a Francesca should work?” cried he. “One day
you will return to your country and find all you left there.” Again the
Italian girl looked at Rodolphe. “And you will then repay me what you
may have condescended to borrow,” he added, with an expression full of
delicate feeling.
“Let us drop the subject,” said she, with incomparable dignity of
gesture, expression, and attitude. “Make a splendid fortune, be one
of the remarkable men of your country; that is my desire. Fame is a
drawbridge which may serve to cross a deep gulf. Be ambitious if you
must. I believe you have great and powerful talents, but use them rather
for the happiness of mankind than to deserve me; you will be all the
greater in my eyes.”
In the course of this conversation, which lasted two hours, Rodolphe
discovered that Francesca was an enthusiast for Liberal ideas, and
for that worship of liberty which had led to the three revolutions in
Naples, Piemont, and Spain. On leaving, he was shown to the door by
Gina, the so-called mute. At eleven o’clock no one was astir in the
village, there was no fear of listeners; Rodolphe took Gina into a
corner, and asked her in a low voice and bad Italian, “Who are your
master and mistress, child? Tell me, I will give you this fine new gold
piece.”
“Monsieur,” said the girl, taking the coin, “my master is the famous
bookseller Lamporani of Milan, one of the leaders of the revolution, and
the conspirator of all others whom Austria would most like to have in
the Spielberg.”
“A bookseller’s wife! Ah, so much the better,” thought he; “we are on an
equal footing.--And what is her family?” he added, “for she looks like a
queen.”
“All Italian women do,” replied Gina proudly. “Her father’s name is
Colonna.”
Emboldened by Francesca’s modest rank, Rodolphe had an awning fitted to
his boat and cushions in the stern. When this was done, the lover came
to propose to Francesca to come out on the lake. The Italian accepted,
no doubt to carry out her part of a young English Miss in the eyes
of the villagers, but she brought Gina with her. Francesca Colonna’s
lightest actions betrayed a superior education and the highest social
rank. By the way in which she took her place at the end of the boat
Rodolphe felt himself in some sort cut off from her, and, in the face of
a look of pride worthy of an aristocrat, the familiarity he had intended
fell dead. By a glance Francesca made herself a princess, with all the
prerogatives she might have enjoyed in the Middle Ages. She seemed
to have read the thoughts of this vassal who was so audacious as to
constitute himself her protector.
Already, in the furniture of the room where Francesca had received him,
in her dress, and in the various trifles she made use of, Rodolphe had
detected indications of a superior character and a fine fortune. All
these observations now recurred to his mind; he became thoughtful after
having been trampled on, as it were, by Francesca’s dignity. Gina, her
half-grown-up _confidante_, also seemed to have a mocking expression
as she gave a covert or a side glance at Rodolphe. This obvious
disagreement between the Italian lady’s rank and her manners was a fresh
puzzle to Rodolphe, who suspected some further trick like Gina’s assumed
dumbness.
“Where would you go, Signora Lamporani?” he asked.
“Towards Lucerne,” replied Francesca in French.
“Good!” said Rodolphe to himself, “she is not startled by hearing me
speak her name; she had, no doubt, foreseen that I should ask Gina--she
is so cunning.--What is your quarrel with me?” he went on, going at last
to sit down by her side, and asking her by a gesture to give him her
hand, which she withdrew. “You are cold and ceremonious; what, in
colloquial language, we should call _short_.”
“It is true,” she replied with a smile. “I am wrong. It is not good
manners; it is vulgar. In French you would call it inartistic. It is
better to be frank than to harbor cold or hostile feelings towards a
friend, and you have already proved yourself my friend. Perhaps I
have gone too far with you. You must take me to be a very ordinary
woman.”--Rodolphe made many signs of denial.--“Yes,” said the
bookseller’s wife, going on without noticing this pantomime, which,
however, she plainly saw. “I have detected that, and naturally I have
reconsidered my conduct. Well! I will put an end to everything by a few
words of deep truth. Understand this, Rodolphe: I feel in myself the
strength to stifle a feeling if it were not in harmony with my ideas
or anticipation of what true love is. I could love--as we can love
in Italy, but I know my duty. No intoxication can make me forget it.
Married without my consent to that poor old man, I might take advantage
of the liberty he so generously gives me; but three years of married
life imply acceptance of its laws. Hence the most vehement passion would
never make me utter, even involuntarily, a wish to find myself free.
“Emilio knows my character. He knows that without my heart, which is my
own, and which I might give away, I should never allow anyone to take
my hand. That is why I have just refused it to you. I desire to be loved
and waited for with fidelity, nobleness, ardor, while all I can give
is infinite tenderness of which the expression may not overstep the
boundary of the heart, the permitted neutral ground. All this being
thoroughly understood--Oh!” she went on with a girlish gesture, “I will
be as coquettish, as gay, as glad, as a child which knows nothing of the
dangers of familiarity.”
This plain and frank declaration was made in a tone, an accent, and
supported by a look which gave it the deepest stamp of truth.
“A Princess Colonna could not have spoken better,” said Rodolphe,
smiling.
“Is that,” she answered with some haughtiness, “a reflection on the
humbleness of my birth? Must your love flaunt a coat-of-arms? At Milan
the noblest names are written over shop-doors: Sforza, Canova, Visconti,
Trivulzio, Ursini; there are Archintos apothecaries; but, believe me,
though I keep a shop, I have the feelings of a duchess.”
“A reflection? Nay, madame, I meant it for praise.”
“By a comparison?” she said archly.
“Ah, once for all,” said he, “not to torture me if my words should ill
express my feelings, understand that my love is perfect; it carries with
it absolute obedience and respect.”
She bowed as a woman satisfied, and said, “Then monsieur accepts the
treaty?”
“Yes,” said he. “I can understand that in a rich and powerful feminine
nature the faculty of loving ought not to be wasted, and that you, out
of delicacy, wished to restrain it. Ah! Francesca, at my age tenderness
requited, and by so sublime, so royally beautiful a creature as you
are--why, it is the fulfilment of all my wishes. To love you as you
desire to be loved--is not that enough to make a young man guard himself
against every evil folly? Is it not to concentrate all his powers in
a noble passion, of which in the future he may be proud, and which can
leave none but lovely memories? If you could but know with what hues you
have clothed the chain of Pilatus, the Rigi, and this superb lake--”
“I want to know,” said she, with the Italian artlessness which has
always a touch of artfulness.
“Well, this hour will shine on all my life like a diamond on a queen’s
brow.”
Francesca’s only reply was to lay her hand on Rodolphe’s.
“Oh dearest! for ever dearest!--Tell me, have you never loved?”
“Never.”
“And you allow me to love you nobly, looking to heaven for the utmost
fulfilment?” he asked.
She gently bent her head. Two large tears rolled down Rodolphe’s cheeks.
“Why! what is the matter?” she cried, abandoning her imperial manner.
“I have now no mother whom I can tell of my happiness; she left this
earth without seeing what would have mitigated her agony--”
“What?” said she.
“Her tenderness replaced by an equal tenderness----”
“_Povero mio_!” exclaimed the Italian, much touched. “Believe me,” she
went on after a pause, “it is a very sweet thing, and to a woman, a
strong element of fidelity to know that she is all in all on earth to
the man she loves; to find him lonely, with no family, with nothing in
his heart but his love--in short, to have him wholly to herself.”
When two lovers thus understand each other, the heart feels delicious
peace, supreme tranquillity. Certainty is the basis for which human
feelings crave, for it is never lacking to religious sentiment; man is
always certain of being fully repaid by God. Love never believes itself
secure but by this resemblance to divine love. And the raptures of that
moment must have been fully felt to be understood; it is unique in
life; it can never return no more, alas! than the emotions of youth. To
believe in a woman, to make her your human religion, the fount of life,
the secret luminary of all your least thoughts!--is not this a second
birth? And a young man mingles with this love a little of the feeling he
had for his mother.
Rodolphe and Francesca for some time remained in perfect silence,
answering each other by sympathetic glances full of thoughts. They
understood each other in the midst of one of the most beautiful scenes
of Nature, whose glories, interpreted by the glory in their hearts,
helped to stamp on their minds the most fugitive details of that unique
hour. There had not been the slightest shade of frivolity in Francesca’s
conduct. It was noble, large, and without any second thought. This
magnanimity struck Rodolphe greatly, for in it he recognized the
difference between the Italian and the Frenchwoman. The waters, the
land, the sky, the woman, all were grandiose and suave, even their love
in the midst of this picture, so vast in its expanse, so rich in detail,
where the sternness of the snowy peaks and their hard folds standing
clearly out against the blue sky, reminded Rodolphe of the circumstances
which limited his happiness; a lovely country shut in by snows.
This delightful intoxication of soul was destined to be disturbed.
A boat was approaching from Lucerne; Gina, who had been watching it
attentively, gave a joyful start, though faithful to her part as a mute.
The bark came nearer; when at length Francesca could distinguish the
faces on board, she exclaimed, “Tito!” as she perceived a young man.
She stood up, and remained standing at the risk of being drowned. “Tito!
Tito!” cried she, waving her handkerchief.
Tito desired the boatmen to slacken, and the two boats pulled side by
side. The Italian and Tito talked with such extreme rapidity, and in a
dialect unfamiliar to a man who hardly knew even the Italian of
books, that Rodolphe could neither hear nor guess the drift of this
conversation. But Tito’s handsome face, Francesca’s familiarity, and
Gina’s expression of delight, all aggrieved him. And indeed no lover can
help being ill pleased at finding himself neglected for another, whoever
he may be. Tito tossed a little leather bag to Gina, full of gold no
doubt, and a packet of letters to Francesca, who began to read them,
with a farewell wave of the hand to Tito.
“Get quickly back to Gersau,” she said to the boatmen, “I will not let
my poor Emilio pine ten minutes longer than he need.”
“What has happened?” asked Rodolphe, as he saw Francesca finish reading
the last letter.
“_La liberta_!” she exclaimed, with an artist’s enthusiasm.
“_E denaro_!” added Gina, like an echo, for she had found her tongue.
“Yes,” said Francesca, “no more poverty! For more than eleven months
have I been working, and I was beginning to be tired of it. I am
certainly not a literary woman.”
“Who is this Tito?” asked Rodolphe.
“The Secretary of State to the financial department of the humble shop
of the Colonnas, in other words, the son of our _ragionato_. Poor boy!
he could not come by the Saint-Gothard, nor by the Mont-Cenis, nor by
the Simplon; he came by sea, by Marseilles, and had to cross France.
Well, in three weeks we shall be at Geneva, and living at our ease.
Come, Rodolphe,” she added, seeing sadness overspread the Parisian’s
face, “is not the Lake of Geneva quite as good as the Lake of Lucerne?”
“But allow me to bestow a regret on the Bergmanns’ delightful house,”
said Rodolphe, pointing to the little promontory.
“Come and dine with us to add to your associations, _povero mio_,” said
she. “This is a great day; we are out of danger. My mother writes that
within a year there will be an amnesty. Oh! _la cara patria_!”
These three words made Gina weep. “Another winter here,” said she, “and
I should have been dead!”
“Poor little Sicilian kid!” said Francesca, stroking Gina’s head with an
expression and an affection which made Rodolphe long to be so caressed,
even if it were without love.
The boat grounded; Rodolphe sprang on to the sand, offered his hand to
the Italian lady, escorted her to the door of the Bergmanns’ house, and
went to dress and return as soon as possible.
When he joined the librarian and his wife, who were sitting on the
balcony, Rodolphe could scarcely repress an exclamation of surprise at
seeing the prodigious change which the good news had produced in the old
man. He now saw a man of about sixty, extremely well preserved, a lean
Italian, as straight as an I, with hair still black, though thin and
showing a white skull, with bright eyes, a full set of white teeth,
a face like Caesar, and on his diplomatic lips a sardonic smile, the
almost false smile under which a man of good breeding hides his real
feelings.
“Here is my husband under his natural form,” said Francesca gravely.
“He is quite a new acquaintance,” replied Rodolphe, bewildered.
“Quite,” said the librarian; “I have played many a part, and know
well how to make up. Ah! I played one in Paris under the Empire, with
Bourrienne, Madame Murat, Madame d’Abrantis _e tutte quanti_. Everything
we take the trouble to learn in our youth, even the most futile, is of
use. If my wife had not received a man’s education--an unheard-of thing
in Italy--I should have been obliged to chop wood to get my living
here. _Povera_ Francesca! who would have told me that she would some day
maintain me!”
As he listened to this worthy bookseller, so easy, so affable, so hale,
Rodolphe scented some mystification, and preserved the watchful silence
of a man who has been duped.
“_Che avete, signor_?” Francesca asked with simplicity. “Does our
happiness sadden you?”
“Your husband is a young man,” he whispered in her ear.
She broke into such a frank, infectious laugh that Rodolphe was still
more puzzled.
“He is but sixty-five, at your service,” said she; “but I can assure you
that even that is something--to be thankful for!”
“I do not like to hear you jest about an affection so sacred as this, of
which you yourself prescribed the conditions.”
“_Zitto_!” said she, stamping her foot, and looking whether her husband
were listening. “Never disturb the peace of mind of that dear man, as
simple as a child, and with whom I can do what I please. He is under
my protection,” she added. “If you could know with what generosity he
risked his life and fortune because I was a Liberal! for he does not
share my political opinions. Is not that love, Monsieur Frenchman?--But
they are like that in his family. Emilio’s younger brother was deserted
for a handsome youth by the woman he loved. He thrust his sword through
his own heart ten minutes after he had said to his servant, ‘I could of
course kill my rival, but that would grieve the _Diva_ too deeply.’”
This mixture of dignity and banter, of haughtiness and playfulness, made
Francesca at this moment the most fascinating creature in the world. The
dinner and the evening were full of cheerfulness, justified, indeed, by
the relief of the two refugees, but depressing to Rodolphe.
“Can she be fickle?” he asked himself as he returned to the Stopfers’
house. “She sympathized in my sorrow, and I cannot take part in her
joy!”
He blamed himself, justifying this girl-wife.
“She has no taint of hypocrisy, and is carried away by impulse,” thought
he, “and I want her to be like a Parisian woman.”
* * * * *
Next day and the following days, in fact, for twenty days after,
Rodolphe spent all his time at the Bergmanns’, watching Francesca
without having determined to watch her. In some souls admiration is not
independent of a certain penetration. The young Frenchman discerned in
Francesca the imprudence of girlhood, the true nature of a woman as yet
unbroken, sometimes struggling against her love, and at other moments
yielding and carried away by it. The old man certainly behaved to her as
a father to his daughter, and Francesca treated him with a deeply felt
gratitude which roused her instinctive nobleness. The situation and the
woman were to Rodolphe an impenetrable enigma, of which the solution
attracted him more and more.