Donna Adele Savelli was ill. There was no denying the fact, though her
husband had ignored it as long as possible, and was very much annoyed to
find that he could not continue to do so until the usual time for moving
to the country arrived. As has been said already, the world attributed
her ill-health to some unexpected awakening of the family skeleton, and
when the Savelli couple suddenly retired to Gerano, it was sure that
Francesco had lost money and that they had gone for economy. But there
was no lack of funds in Casa Savelli. That ancient and excellent house
had, as a family, a keen appreciation of values great and small, and
continued to put away more of its income in safe investments than any
one knew of. Nor was there any other trouble to account for Adele's
illness, so far as any member of the household could judge. Every one
else was well, including the children. Everybody was prosperous. It was
not conceivable that Adele should have taken Herbert Arden's death to
heart in a way to endanger her own health. She might, perhaps, feel some
remorse for having spoken of him as she had--for Savelli had discovered
that something, at least, of the gossip could be traced to her--but she
could not be supposed to care so much as to fall ill. What she suffered
from was evidently some one of those mysterious nervous diseases which,
in Francesco's opinion, modern medical science had invented expressly in
order that it might deal with them. Unfortunately, the particular man of
learning who could cure Adele was not forthcoming. The doctors who were
consulted said that something was preying on her mind, and when she
assured them that this was not the case, they shrugged their shoulders
and prescribed soothing medicines, country air, and exercise. She
particularly dreaded the night, and could not bear to be left alone for
a moment after dark. She said she saw things; when asked what things she
saw, she seemed to draw upon her imagination. Francesco began to fear
that she might go mad, though there was no insanity in the Braccio
family. The prospect was not pleasing, and he would have greatly
preferred that she should die and leave him at liberty to marry Laura
Arden. He never dreamed that the latter would refuse to wed the heir of
all the Savelli, if he were free to ask her hand, and in his cautious,
unenterprising fashion he loved her still, while remaining religiously
faithful to his wife--and not, on the whole, treating her unkindly. The
consequence of all this was that he made her try the simple cure
suggested by the doctors, and accompanied her to Gerano in the early
spring.
The hereditary stronghold from which the head of the Braccio family took
his principal title was a vast and gloomy fortress in the lower range of
the Sabine mountains, situated in a beautiful country, and overlooking
the broad Campagna that lay between it and the distant sea. The great
dark walls were flanked by round towers, and were in some places ten and
twelve feet thick, so that the deep embrasures of the windows were in
themselves like little rooms opening off the great halls behind. The
furniture was almost all old, and was well in keeping with the vaulted
ceilings, the frescoed friezes, and the dark marble door-posts. Donna
Adele's sleeping-chamber was as large as most of the drawing-rooms in
the Palazzo Braccio, and her dressing-room was almost of the same size.
To reach the hall in which she and her husband dined, it was necessary
to traverse five other rooms and a vaulted passage fifty or sixty yards
long, in which the steps of any one who passed echoed and rang on the
stone pavement, and echoed again during some seconds afterwards in a
rather uncanny fashion. The sitting-room was next to the dining-hall,
and consequently also at a great distance from the bedrooms. There was
more of comfort in it than elsewhere, for the walls were hung with
tapestries, and there was a carpet on the floor, whereas in the other
apartments there were only rugs thrown down here and there, where they
were most needed; here, too, the doors had heavy curtains. But, on the
whole, a more ghostly and gloomy place than the castle of Gerano could
hardly be imagined, especially at dusk when the blackness deepened in
the remote corners and recesses of the huge chambers, and the sculptured
corbels of grey stone, high up at the spring of each arch, grew shadowy
and alive with hideous grimaces in the gathering dimness.
Adele had never been subject to any fear of the supernatural, and the
old place was so familiar to her from childhood, that she had looked
forward with pleasure to seeing it again. She was attached to almost
everything connected with it, to the walls themselves, to her own rooms,
to the ugly corbels, to the lame old warder, Giacomo, and to his wife
who helped him to take care of the rooms. She was a woman quite capable
of that sort of feeling, and capable, indeed, of much more, had it
fallen in her path. She could not have hated as she did, if she had not
had some power to love also. Circumstances, however, had developed the
one far more than the other, for her first great passion had been
jealousy.
She and Francesco reached the castle in the afternoon of the day
following their visit to Laura Arden. The weather was fine and the
westering sun streamed through the broad windows and lent everything a
passing air of life and almost of gaiety. During the first hours, Adele
felt that she must soon be better, and that she could find some rest at
last in the atmosphere which recalled her childish days and all her
peaceful girlhood.
But when the sun was low and the golden light turned to purple and then
to fainter hues, and died away into twilight, she shivered as she sat in
the deep window-seat, and she called to her husband, telling him to
order the lamps.
"You used to like the dusk," he observed, as he tugged at the
old-fashioned bell-rope. "I cannot imagine what makes you so afraid of
being in the dark."
"Nor I," she said nervously. "It must be part of my illness. Please have
as much light as possible, and lamps in the passage and in our rooms as
well."
"I suppose candles will do," answered Savelli. "I do not believe there
are more than half a dozen lamps out here. Your people always bring them
when they come."
"Oh, candles, then--anything! Only let me have plenty of light. If there
were no night, I should get well."
"Unfortunately, nature has not provided that form of cure for
invalids," said Savelli, with a laugh. "But we will do our best," he
added, always willing to humour his wife in anything reasonable.
The servants' quarters were very far away, and several minutes elapsed
before a man appeared, and Francesco could give the necessary orders.
The gloom deepened, and Adele came from her place at the window,
evidently in some sort of distress. She sat down close to her
husband--almost cowering at his side. He could not see her face clearly,
but he understood that she was frightened.
"I wish you would tell me what it is you see in the dark," he said, with
a sort of good-natured impatience.
"Oh, please do not talk about it!" she cried. "Talk to me of something
else--talk, for Heaven's sake, talk, until they bring the lamps! I
sometimes think I shall go mad when there is no light."
It is not a particularly easy affair to comply, at short notice, with
such a request for voluble conversation, especially when there is no
extraordinary sympathy between two people, nor any close community of
ideas. But it chanced that Savelli had been reading the papers he had
brought with him, and he began to tell Adele the news he had read, so
that he managed to keep up a fairly continuous series of sentences until
the first lamp was placed on the table.
"Thank you, Carissimo," she said. "No shade!" she exclaimed quickly, as
the man was about to slip one over the light.
"Do you feel better now?" inquired Francesco, with some amusement.
"Yes--much better," she answered, drawing a long breath, and seating
herself by the table in the full glare of the unshaded lamp. "I only ask
one thing," she continued: "Do not leave me if you can help it, and go
with me when we go to our room. I am ashamed of it, but I am so nervous
that I am positively afraid to be alone."
"Would it not be better to have a nurse out, to stay with you all the
time?" inquired Francesco, who had an eye to his own liberty and
comfort, and had no idea of spending several weeks in perpetual
attendance on his wife. "And there is your maid, too. She might help."
"I have taken such a dislike to that woman that I hate the sight of
her."
"I suppose that is a part of your illness," answered her husband
philosophically.
On that first evening he scrupulously fulfilled her wishes, and followed
her closely when she went from room to room. He was in a certain degree
anxious, for her allusion to possible madness coincided with his own
preconceived opinion of her case, and he dreaded such a termination very
greatly. He saw that what she said was quite true, and that she was
unaffectedly frightened if he left her side for a moment. On the
following day he sent a messenger to the city to procure a nurse, for he
saw that he could not otherwise count on an hour's freedom. Being a
careful man, he wished that Adele might have been contented to be
followed about by her maid and a woman from the place, but she refused
altogether to agree to such an arrangement. In her nervous condition,
she could not bear the constant presence of a person for whom she felt
an unreasoning repulsion. Moreover, she had almost decided to send Lucia
away and to get some one more congenial in her place.
Several days passed in this way, and if she was no better she was not
worse. She drove and walked in the spring sunshine, and felt refreshed
by the clear air of the country, but the nights were as unbearable as
ever,--endless, ghostly, full of imaginary horrors, although the lamps
burned brightly in her room till sunrise, and the patient nurse sat by
her bedside reading to herself, and sometimes reading aloud when Adele
desired it. Occasionally, and more often towards morning, snatches of
broken sleep interrupted the monotony of the long-drawn-out suffering.
Adele had implored the doctor who had charge of her case to give her
opiates, or at least chloral; but he had felt great hope that the change
to a country life would produce an immediate good effect, and had
represented to her in terms almost exaggerated the danger of taking such
remedies. The habit once formed, he said, soon became a slavery, and in
nervous organisations like hers was very hard to break. People who took
chloral often ended by taking morphia, and Donna Adele had doubtless
heard enough about the consequences of employing this drug to dread it,
as all sensible persons did. Adele was very far from being persuaded,
but as she could not procure what she wanted without a doctor's order,
which she could not obtain, she was obliged to fall back on the
sulphonal which Ghisleri had recommended to her. She took it in large
quantities, but it had almost ceased to produce any effect, though she
attributed the little rest she got to its influence. The doctor was to
come out and see her at the end of a week, unless sent for especially.
Before the seven days were out, however, a crisis occurred, brought
about by a slight accident, which made his presence imperatively
necessary.
One evening, immediately after dinner, Adele had seated herself in a low
chair by the table in the drawing-room, and had taken up a novel. For a
wonder, it had interested her when she had begun it in the afternoon,
and she returned to it with unwonted delight, looking forward to the
prospect of losing herself in the story during a few hours before going
to bed. Not far from her Savelli sat with that day's papers, gleaning
the news of the day in an idle fashion, and smoking a cigarette. He
rarely smoked anything else, but for some reason or other, he had, on
this particular night, discovered that only a cigar would satisfy him.
Many men are familiar with that craving, but the satisfaction of it
rarely leads to distinct and important results. Francesco rose from his
seat, laid down his paper, and went in search of what he wanted, well
knowing that he could get it much faster than by a servant, and
forgetting that he must leave his wife alone for a few minutes in order
to go to his dressing-room where he kept the box. As has been said, the
drawing-room was carpeted, and his step made very little noise. Adele,
intensely interested in what she was reading, paid less attention to his
movements than usual, and indeed supposed that he had only risen to get
something from another table. The heavily curtained door which opened
upon the great vaulted passage before mentioned was behind her as she
sat, and she did not realise that Francesco was gone until she heard his
echoing footsteps on the stone pavement outside. Then she started, and
almost dropped her book. She held her breath for a moment and then
called him. But he walked quickly, and was already out of hearing. Only
the booming echo reached her through the curtains, reverberated, and
died away. There was nothing to be done but to wait, for she had not the
courage to face the dim passage alone and run after him. She clutched
her book tightly and tried to read again, pronouncing almost aloud the
words she saw. A minute or two passed, and then she heard the echo
again. Francesco was returning. No, it was not his walk. She turned very
pale as she listened. It was the step of a very lame man, irregular and
painful. The novel fell to the ground, and she grasped the arms of her
chair. It was exactly like Arden's step; she had heard it before, in the
gallery at her father's palace, where the floor was of marble. Nearer
and nearer it came, in a sort of triple measure--two shorts and a long,
like an anapæst--and the sharp click of the stick between. She tried to
look behind her, but her blood froze in her veins, and she could not
move. Every instant increased her agony of fear. A moment more and
Herbert Arden would be upon her. Suddenly a second echo, that of
Francesco Savelli's firm, quick step reached her ears. Then she heard
voices, and as the curtain was lifted she recognised the tones of old
Giacomo, the lame warder, who had met her husband in the passage, and
was asking for the orders to be given to the carter who started for
Rome every other night and brought back such provisions as could not be
obtained in Gerano.
Adele sank back in her chair, almost fainting, in her sudden relief from
her ghostly fears. Savelli talked some time with Giacomo. With a great
effort at self-command, Adele took up her novel again and held it before
her eyes, while her heart beat with terrible violence after having
almost stood still while the fright had lasted. Then Francesco came in,
with a lighted cigar between his teeth.
"Do you wish to send anything to Rome--any message?" he asked. "Nothing
else, Giacomo," he said, as he saw that she shook her head.
"Good rest, Excellency," she heard Giacomo say. Then the curtain
dropped, the door was closed from without, and she listened once more to
the lame man's retreating footsteps--terribly like Herbert Arden's walk,
though she was not frightened now.
"I asked you not to leave me alone," she said, as Savelli resumed his
seat and took up the paper again.
"It was only for a minute," he answered indifferently. "I wanted a
cigar. I hope you were not frightened this time."
"No. But I might have been. Another time, please ring for what you
want."
Savelli, who was already deep in the local news about Rome, made an
inarticulate reply intended for assent, and nothing more was said. Adele
took up her book again and did her best to read, but without
understanding a word as she followed the lines.
That night, in despair, she swallowed a larger dose of sulphonal than
she had ever taken before. The consequence was that towards two o'clock
she fell asleep and seemed more quiet than usual, as the nurse watched
her. An hour passed without her waking, then another, and then the dawn
stole through the panes of the deep windows, and daylight came at last.
The room was quite light, and Adele was generally awake at that hour.
But this morning she slept on. The nurse was accustomed to take away
the lamps as soon as Adele needed them no longer, not extinguishing them
in the room on account of the disagreeable smell they made. It chanced
on this occasion--or fate had decreed it--that one of these gave signs
of going out. The nurse rose very softly and took it away, moving
noiselessly in her felt slippers, passing through the open door of the
dressing-room in order to reach the corridor in which the lamps were
left to be taken and cleaned at a later hour. She set the one she
carried upon a deal table which stood there, and tried to put it out, so
as to leave no part of the wick still smouldering, lest it should smoke.
She was a very careful and methodical woman, and took pains to be neat
in doing the smallest things. Just now, too, she was in no hurry, for it
was broad daylight, and Adele would not be nervous if she awoke and
found herself alone.
And Adele was awake. She opened her eyes wearily, realised that there
was no one beside her, and sat up staring at the bright window. Being
nervous, restless, and never at any time languid, she got up, threw a
wrapper over her, and went to the door of the dressing-room, meaning to
look at the rising sun, which was visible from the window on the other
side, the dressing-room itself being at one of the angles of the castle,
with a door leading from the corner of it into the tower.
Adele paused on the threshold, started, stared at something, turned, and
uttered a piercing scream of terror. A moment later she fell in a heap
upon the floor. She had distinctly seen Herbert Arden's figure standing
at one of the windows, his head and hands alone concealed by the inner
shutter which, by an accident, was not wide open, but was turned about
half-way towards the panes. He was dressed in dark blue serge, as she
had often seen him in life, with rather wide trousers almost concealing
the feet, and a round jacket. She had even seen how the cloth was
stretched at the place where his shoulder was most crooked, and how it
hung loosely about his thin figure below that point. He was standing
close to the window, with his back almost quite turned towards her,
apparently looking out, though the shutter hid his face. The whole
attitude was precisely as she had often noticed it when he was alive,
and chanced to be looking at something in the street--the misshapen,
protruding shoulder, the right leg bent in more than the other, not a
detail was missing as she came upon the vision suddenly in the cold
morning light.
The nurse was at her side almost instantly, bending over her and raising
her as well as she could. A moment later the maid rushed in,--she slept
on the other side of the corridor where the nurse had left the
lamp,--and then Francesco Savelli himself, who temporarily occupied a
room next to Adele's and who appeared, robed in a wide dressing-gown of
dark brown velvet, and showing signs of considerable anxiety. He reached
the door before which his wife had fainted and lifted her in his arms.
As he regained his upright position, his eyes naturally fell upon the
figure standing at the window. His sight was not remarkably good, and
from the fact of the shutter being half closed the dressing-room was
darker than the sleeping-chamber. The impression he had was strong and
distinct.
"Who is that man?" he asked, staring at what he saw, while he held
Adele's unconscious form in his arms.
The nurse and the maid both started and looked round. The latter laughed
a little, involuntarily.
"It is not a man, Excellency," she said. "It is Donna Adele's serge
driving cloak. I hung it there last night because there are not enough
hooks in the dressing-room for all her Excellency's things."
She went to the window and took the mantle, which had been hung upon the
knob of the old-fashioned bolt by the two tapes sewn under the shoulders
for the purpose. The folds of the lower part had taken the precise shape
of a man's wide trousers, and the cape, falling half way only, hung
exactly like a jacket, the fulness caused by gathering the upper
portion together at one point, giving the appearance of a hump on a
man's back.
"That was what frightened her," said Savelli, as he turned away with his
burden. "I do not wonder--the thing looked just as Lord Herbert did when
he used to stand at the window."
Adele came to herself in a state of the utmost prostration. Her husband
explained to her carefully what had happened, and tried to persuade her
that she had been the victim of an optical illusion, but though she did
not deny this, he could see that the occurrence had produced a very deep
impression on her mind, and had perhaps had an even more serious effect
on her nerves. He despatched a messenger to Rome for the doctor, and
after doing all he could left her to the care of her nurse and maid and
went out for a walk in the hills, glad to be free for a while from the
irksome task imposed upon him when he remained at home.
While making the most desperate attempts to control herself, Adele was
in a state of the wildest and most conflicting emotion. Her strength
returned, indeed, in a certain measure after a few hours, but her
distress seemed rather to increase than to diminish, when she was able
to walk about the room and submit to being dressed. Her maid irritated
her unaccountably, too, and at last, giving way to the impulse she had
felt so long, she told her that she must go at the end of the month.
The maid, Lucia by name, had for some time expected that her days in
Casa Savelli were numbered, for Adele had shown her dislike very plainly
of late, so that the woman did not show much surprise, and accepted her
dismissal respectfully and quietly, promising herself to tell tales in
her next place concerning Adele's toilette which, though without the
slightest foundation, would be repeated and believed all over Rome.
Later in the day Adele shut herself up in her room, at the time when the
sunshine was streaming in and making everything look bright and
cheerful. She stayed there a long time, and the thoughtful Lucia,
watching her through the keyhole, saw with surprise that her mistress
spent almost an hour upon her knees before the dark old crucifix which
hung above the prayer-stool opposite to the door of the dressing-room.
She noticed that Adele from time to time beat her breast, and then
buried her face in her hands for many minutes. The nurse was asleep far
away and Lucia was quite safe. At last Adele rose, and as though acting
under an irresistible impulse sat down at a table on which she kept her
own writing materials, and began to write rapidly. For a long time she
kept her seat, and her hand moved quickly over the paper. Then, when she
seemed to have finished, she took up the sheets as though she meant to
read them over, and did in fact read a few lines. She dropped the paper
suddenly, and Lucia saw the look of horror that was in her white face.
She seemed to hesitate, rose, turned, and made two steps towards the
crucifix, then returned, and hastily folded up the lengthy letter and
slipped it into a large envelope, on which she wrote an address before
she left the table a second time. When she opened the door of the
dressing-room to call Lucia, the maid was quietly seated by a window
with a piece of needle-work, and rose respectfully as her mistress
entered.
"Send me Giacomo," said Adele, holding the letter in her hand, but as
Lucia went towards the door, she stopped her. "No," she said suddenly.
"Take this to him yourself; tell him to have it registered at once, and
to bring me back the receipt from the post-office. Tell him to be
careful, as it is very important. I am going to lie down. Come to me
some time before sunset."
Lucia took the letter and went out into the corridor. Adele listened a
moment, then went back into her room, bolting the door behind her, as
well as turning the key in the lock. Since her fright in the morning,
she instinctively barricaded herself on that side. But at present the
sunshine was so bright and the place was so cheerful that her fears
seemed almost groundless.
She lay down and closed her eyes. In spite of all the emotions of terror
she had suffered on the previous evening and to-day, and although the
writing of any letter so long as the one she had just finished must
necessarily be very tiring, she felt better than she had been for a long
time, and would perhaps have fallen asleep if the doctor had not arrived
from Rome soon afterwards.
On learning all that had happened, he yielded at last to necessity, and
gave her chloral to take in small doses, showing her how to use it. It
was evident that unless she slept she must break down altogether before
long, and it was no longer safe to let nature have her own way. He had
brought the medicine with him, and gave it into Francesco's keeping,
cautioning him not to let her use it in larger quantities than he had
prescribed. After giving various pieces of good advice he returned to
the city.
Lucia gave her mistress the receipt for the registered letter, and Adele
put it away in the small jewel-case she had brought with her to the
country. That night she took the chloral, and fell asleep peacefully
before half-past eleven o'clock, not to awake until nearly nine on the
following morning. She felt so much better for the one night's rest that
she went for a long walk with her husband, ate well for the first time
in many weeks, and went to bed again almost without having felt a
sensation of fear all day nor during the evening. Once more the chloral
had the desired effect, and on the second morning she began to imagine
that she was recovering. The world looked bright and cheerful, the
swallows wheeled and darted before her windows, and the thrushes and
blackbirds sang far down among the fruit-trees. Even Francesco was less
tiresome and unsympathetic than usual. She was in such a good humour
that she almost repented of having dismissed Lucia.
Then the blow came. The post brought her a letter addressed in a small,
even handwriting, very plain and entirely without flourish or
ornament--such a hand as learned men and theologians often write. The
contents read as follows:
"MOST EXCELLENT PRINCESS, I have to inform you that I have just
received, registered, and evidently addressed by your most excellent
hand, an envelope bearing the Gerano postmark, but containing only
four blank sheets of ordinary writing paper. As I cannot suppose
that your Excellency has designed to make me the object of a jest,
and as it is to be feared that the blank paper has been substituted
for a writing of importance, by some malicious person, I have
immediately informed your Excellency of what has occurred. Awaiting
any instruction or enlightenment with regard to this subject which
it may please you, most Excellent Princess, to communicate, I write
myself
"Your Excellency's most humble, obedient servant,
"BONAVENTURA, R.R. P.P.O. Min."
Now Padre Bonaventura of the Minor Order of St. Francis was Adele's
confessor in Rome. After the long struggle which Lucia had watched
through the door, Adele's conscience had got the upper hand, aided by
the belief that in following its dictates she would be doing the best
she could towards recovering her peace of mind. Not being willing to go
to the parish priest of Gerano, who had known her and all her family
from her childhood, and who was by no means a man able to give very wise
advice in difficult cases, and being, moreover, afraid of rousing her
husband's suspicions if she insisted upon going to Rome merely to
confess, she had written out a most careful confession of those sins of
which she accused herself, and, as is allowable in extreme cases, had
sent it by post to Padre Bonaventura.
The news that such a document had never reached its destination would
have been enough to disturb most people.