“Let the carriage go to the Clarendon,” said Harley to his servant; “I
and Mr. Oran will walk to town. Leonard, I think you would rejoice at an
occasion to serve your old friends, Dr. Riccabocca and his daughter?”
“Serve them! Oh, yes.” And there instantly returned to Leonard the
recollection of Violante’s words when, on leaving his quiet village,
he had sighed to part from all those he loved; and the little dark-eyed
girl had said, proudly, yet consolingly, “But to SERVE those you love!”
He turned to L’Estrange, with beaming, inquisitive eyes.
“I said to our friend,” resumed Harley, “that I would vouch for your
honour as my own. I am about to prove my words, and to confide the
secrets which your penetration has indeed divined,--our friend is not
what he seems.” Harley then briefly related to Leonard the particulars
of the exile’s history, the rank he had held in his native land, the
manner in which, partly through the misrepresentations of a kinsman he
had trusted, partly through the influence of a wife he had loved, he had
been drawn into schemes which he believed bounded to the emancipation
of Italy from a foreign yoke by the united exertions of her best and
bravest sons.
“A noble ambition!” interrupted Leonard, manfully. “And pardon me, my
Lord, I should not have thought that you would speak of it in a tone
that implies blame.”
“The ambition in itself was noble,” answered Harley; “but the cause to
which it was devoted became defiled in its dark channel through
Secret Societies. It is the misfortune of all miscellaneous political
combinations, that with the purest motives of their more generous
members are ever mixed the most sordid interests, and the fiercest
passions of mean confederates. When those combinations act openly, and
in daylight, under the eye of Public Opinion, the healthier elements
usually prevail; where they are shrouded in mystery, where they
are subjected to no censor in the discussion of the impartial and
dispassionate, where chiefs working in the dark exact blind obedience,
and every man who is at war with law is at once admitted as a friend of
freedom, the history of the world tells us that patriotism soon passes
away. Where all is in public, public virtue, by the natural sympathies
of the common mind, and by the wholesome control of shame, is likely to
obtain ascendancy; where all is in private, and shame is but for him who
refuses the abnegation of his conscience, each man seeks the indulgence
of his private vice. And hence in Secret Societies (from which may
yet proceed great danger to all Europe) we find but foul and hateful
Eleusinia, affording pretexts to the ambition of the great, to the
license of the penniless, to the passions of the revengeful, to the
anarchy of the ignorant. In a word, the societies of these Italian
Carbonari did but engender schemes in which the abler chiefs disguised
new forms of despotism, and in which the revolutionary many looked
forward to the overthrow of all the institutions that stand between Law
and Chaos. Naturally, therefore,” added L’Estrange, dryly, “when their
schemes were detected, and the conspiracy foiled, it was for the silly,
honest men entrapped into the league to suffer, the leaders turned
king’s evidence, and the common mercenaries became--banditti.” Harley
then proceeded to state that it was just when the soi-disant Riccabocca
had discovered the true nature and ulterior views of the conspirators
he had joined, and actually withdrawn from their councils, that he was
denounced by the kinsman who had duped him into the enterprise, and who
now profited by his treason. Harley next spoke of the packet despatched
by Riccabocca’s dying wife, as it was supposed, to Mrs. Bertram; and of
the hopes he founded on the contents of that packet, if discovered. He
then referred to the design which had brought Peschiera to England,--a
design which that personage had avowed with such effrontery to his
companions at Vienna, that he had publicly laid wagers on his success.
“But these men can know nothing of England, of the safety of English
laws,” said Leonard, naturally. “We take it for granted that Riccabocca,
if I am still so to call him, refuses his consent to the marriage
between his daughter and his foe. Where, then, the danger? This count,
even if Violante were not under your mother’s roof, could not get an
opportunity to see her. He could not attack the house and carry her off
like a feudal baron in the middle ages.”
“All this is very true,” answered Harley. “Yet I have found through life
that we cannot estimate danger by external circumstances, but by the
character of those from whom it is threatened. This count is a man of
singular audacity, of no mean natural talents,--talents practised in
every art of duplicity and intrigue; one of those men whose boast it is
that they succeed in whatever they undertake; and he is, here, urged on
the one hand by all that can whet the avarice, and on the other, by all
that can give invention to despair. Therefore, though I cannot guess
what plan he may possibly adopt, I never doubt that some plan, formed
with cunning and pursued with daring, will be embraced the moment he
discovers Violante’s retreat,--unless, indeed, we can forestall all
peril by the restoration of her father, and the detection of the fraud
and falsehood to which Peschiera owes the fortune he appropriates. Thus,
while we must prosecute to the utmost our inquiries for the missing
documents, so it should be our care to possess ourselves, if possible,
of such knowledge of the count’s machinations as may enable us to defeat
them. Now, it was with satisfaction that I learned in Germany that
Peschiera’s sister was in London. I knew enough both of his disposition
and of the intimacy between himself and this lady, to make me think it
probable he will seek to make her his instrument and accomplice, should
he require one. Peschiera (as you may suppose by his audacious wager) is
not one of those secret villains who would cut off their right hand if
it could betray the knowledge of what was done by the left,--rather
one of those self-confident vaunting knaves of high animal spirits, and
conscience so obtuse that it clouds their intellect, who must have
some one to whom they can boast of their abilities and confide their
projects. And Peschiera has done all he can to render this poor woman
so wholly dependent on him as to be his slave and his tool. But I
have learned certain traits in her character that show it to be
impressionable to good, and with tendencies to honour. Peschiera had
taken advantage of the admiration she excited, some years ago, in a rich
young Englishman, to entice this admirer into gambling, and sought
to make his sister both a decoy and an instrument in his designs of
plunder. She did not encourage the addresses of our countryman, but she
warned him of the snare laid for him, and entreated him to leave the
place lest her brother should discover and punish her honesty. The
Englishman told me this himself. In fine, my hope of detaching this
lady from Peschiera’s interests, and inducing her to forewarn us of his
purpose, consists but in the innocent, and, I hope, laudable artifice,
of redeeming herself,--of appealing to, and calling into disused
exercise, the better springs of her nature.”
Leonard listened with admiration and some surprise to the singularly
subtle and sagacious insight into character which Harley evinced in
the brief clear strokes by which he had thus depicted Peschiera and
Beatrice, and was struck by the boldness with which Harley rested a
whole system of action upon a few deductions drawn from his reasonings
on human motive and characteristic bias. Leonard had not expected to
find so much practical acuteness in a man who, however accomplished,
usually seemed indifferent, dreamy, and abstracted to the ordinary
things of life. But Harley L’Estrange was one of those whose powers
lie dormant till circumstance applies to them all they need for
activity,--the stimulant of a motive.
Harley resumed: “After a conversation I had with the lady last night,
it occurred to me that in this part of our diplomacy you could render
us essential service. Madame di Negra--such is the sister’s name--has
conceived an admiration for your genius, and a strong desire to know
you personally. I have promised to present you to her; and I shall do
so after a preliminary caution. The lady is very handsome, and very
fascinating. It is possible that your heart and your senses may not be
proof against her attractions.”
“Oh, do not fear that!” exclaimed Leonard, with a tone of conviction so
earnest that Harley smiled.
“Forewarned is not always forearmed against the might of beauty, my dear
Leonard; so I cannot at once accept your assurance. But listen to me!
Watch yourself narrowly, and if you find that you are likely to be
captivated, promise, on your honour, to retreat at once from the field.
I have no right, for the sake of another, to expose you to danger; and
Madame di Negra, whatever may be her good qualities, is the last person
I should wish to see you in love with.”
“In love with her! Impossible!”
“Impossible is a strong word,” returned Harley; “still I own fairly (and
this belief alone warrants me in trusting you to her fascinations), that
I do think, as far as one man can judge of another, that she is not the
woman to attract you; and if filled by one pure and generous object in
your intercourse with her, you will see her with purged eyes. Still I
claim your promise as one of honour.”
“I give it,” said Leonard, positively. “But how can I serve Riccabocca?
How aid in--”
“Thus,” interrupted Harley: “the spell of your writings is, that,
unconsciously to ourselves, they make us better and nobler. And your
writings are but the impressions struck off from your mind. Your
conversation, when you are roused, has the same effect. And as you grow
more familiar with Madame di Negra, I wish you to speak of your boyhood,
your youth. Describe the exile as you have seen him,--so touching
amidst his foibles, so grand amidst the petty privations of his fallen
fortunes, so benevolent while poring over his hateful Machiavelli,
so stingless in his wisdom of the serpent, so playfully astute in his
innocence of the dove--I leave the picture to your knowledge of humour
and pathos. Describe Violante brooding over her Italian Poets, and
filled with dreams of her fatherland; describe her with all the flashes
of her princely nature, shining forth through humble circumstance and
obscure position; waken in your listener compassion, respect, admiration
for her kindred exiles,--and I think our work is done. She will
recognize evidently those whom her brother seeks. She will question
you closely where you met with them, where they now are. Protect that
secret; say at once that it is not your own. Against your descriptions
and the feelings they excite, she will not be guarded as against mine.
And there are other reasons why your influence over this woman of mixed
nature may be more direct and effectual than my own.”
“Nay, I cannot conceive that.”
“Believe it, without asking me to explain,” answered Harley.
For he did not judge it necessary to say to Leonard: “I am high-born and
wealthy, you a peasant’s son, and living by your exertions. This woman
is ambitious and distressed. She might have projects on me that would
counteract mine on her. You she would but listen to, and receive,
through the sentiments of good or of poetical that are in her; you she
would have no interest to subjugate, no motive to ensnare.”
“And now,” said Harley, turning the subject, “I have another object in
view. This foolish sage friend of ours, in his bewilderment and fears,
has sought to save Violante from one rogue by promising her hand to a
man who, unless my instincts deceive me, I suspect much disposed to be
another. Sacrifice such exuberance of life and spirit to that bloodless
heart, to that cold and earthward intellect! By Heaven, it shall not
be!”
“But whom can the exile possibly have seen of birth and fortunes to
render him a fitting spouse for his daughter? Whom, my Lord, except
yourself?”
“Me!” exclaimed Harley, angrily, and changing colour. “I worthy of such
a creature?--I, with my habits! I, silken egotist that I am! And you, a
poet, to form such an estimate of one who might be the queen of a poet’s
dream!”
“My Lord, when we sat the other night round Riccabocca’s hearth, when
I heard her speak, and observed you listen, I said to myself, from such
knowledge of human nature as comes, we know not how, to us poets,--I
said, ‘Harley L’Estrange has looked long and wistfully on the heavens,
and he now hears the murmur of the wings that can waft him towards
them.’ And then I sighed, for I thought how the world rules us all in
spite of ourselves, and I said, ‘What pity for both, that the exile’s
daughter is not the worldly equal of the peer’s son!’ And you too
sighed, as I thus thought; and I fancied that, while you listened to
the music of the wing, you felt the iron of the chain. But the exile’s
daughter is your equal in birth, and you are her equal in heart and in
soul.”
“My poor Leonard, you rave,” answered Harley, calmly. “And if Violante
is not to be some young prince’s bride, she should be some young
poet’s.”
“Poet’s! Oh, no!” said Leonard, with a gentle laugh. “Poets need repose
where they love!”
Harley was struck by the answer, and mused over it in silence. “I
comprehend,” thought he; “it is a new light that dawns on me. What is
needed by the man whose whole life is one strain after glory--whose soul
sinks, in fatigue, to the companionship of earth--is not the love of a
nature like his own. He is right,--it is repose! While I!--it is true;
boy that he is, his intuitions are wiser than all my experience! It is
excitement, energy, elevation, that Love should bestow on me. But I have
chosen; and, at least, with Helen my life will be calm, and my hearth
sacred. Let the rest sleep in the same grave as my youth.”
“But,” said Leonard, wishing kindly to arouse his noble friend from a
revery which he felt was mournful, though he did not divine its true
cause,--“but you have not yet told me the name of the signorina’s
suitor. May I know?”
“Probably one you never heard of. Randal Leslie,--a placeman. You
refused a place; you were right.”
“Randal Leslie? Heaven forbid!” cried Leonard, revealing his surprise at
the name.
“Amen! But what do you know of him?
“Leonard related the story of Burley’s pamphlet.”
Harley seemed delighted to hear his suspicions of Randal confirmed.
“The paltry pretender;--and yet I fancied that he might be formidable!
However, we must dismiss him for the present,--we are approaching Madame
di Negra’s house. Prepare yourself, and remember your promise.”