I wonder why I dreamed last night of Zabetta. It is years since she made
her brief little transit through my life, and passed out of it utterly.
It is years since the very recollection of her—which for years, like
an accusing spirit, had haunted me too often—like a spirit was laid.
It is long enough, in all conscience, since I have even thought of her,
casually, for an instant. And then, last night, after a perfectly usual
London day and evening, I went to bed and dreamed of her vividly. What
had happened to bring her to my mind? Or is it simply that the god of
dreams is a capricious god?
The influence of my dream, at any rate,—the bittersweet savour of
it,—has pursued me through my waking hours. All day long to-day
Zabetta has been my phantom guest. She has walked with me in the
streets; she has waited at my elbow while I wrote or talked or read.
Now, at tea-time, she is present with me by my study fireside, in the
twilight. Her voice sounds faintly, plaintively, in my ears; her eyes
gaze at me sadly from a pale reproachful face.... She bids me to the
theatre of memory, where my youth is rehearsed before me in mimic show.
There was one—no, there were two little scenes in which Zabetta played
the part of leading lady. II
I do not care to specify the year in which it happened; it happened
a terrible number of years ago; it happened when I was twenty. I had
passed the winter in Naples,—oh, it had been a golden winter!—and
now April had come, and my last Neapolitan day. Tomorrow I was to take
ship for Marseilles, on the way to join my mother in Paris.
It was in the afternoon; and I was climbing one of those crooked
staircase alleys that scale the hillsides behind the town, the
salita—is there, in Naples, a Salita Santa Margherita? I had lunched
(for the last time!) at the Café d’.urope, and had then set forth
upon a last haphazard ramble through the streets. It was tremulous
spring weather, with blue skies, soft breezes, and a tender sun; the
sort of weather that kindles perilous ardours even in the blood of
middle age, and turns the blood of youth to wildfire.
Women sat combing their hair, and singing, and gossiping, before
the doorways of their pink and yellow houses; children sprawled, and
laughed, and quarrelled in the dirt. Pifferari, in sheep-skins and
sandals, followed by prowling, gaunt-limbed dogs, droned monotonous
nasal melodies from their bagpipes. Priests picked their way gingerly
over the muddy cobble stones, sleek, black-a-vised priests, with
exaggerated hats, like Don Basilio’s in the Barbiere. Now and then one
passed a fat brown monk; or a soldier; or a white-robed penitent, whose
eyes glimmered uncannily from the peep-holes of the hood that hid
his face; or a comely contadina, in her smart costume, with a
pomegranate-blossom flaming behind her ear, and red lips that curved
defiantly as she met the covetous glances wildfire-and-twenty no doubt
bestowed upon her—whereat, perhaps, wildfire-and-twenty halted and
hesitated for an instant, debating whether to accept the challenge and
turn and follow her. A flock of milk-purveying goats jangled their bells
a few yards below me. Hawkers screamed their merchandise, fish,
and vegetables, and early fruit—apricots, figs, green almonds.
Brown-skinned, barelegged boys shouted at long-suffering donkeys,
and whacked their flanks with sticks. And everybody, more or less,
importuned you for coppers. “Mossou, mossou! Un piccolo soldo, per
l’amor di Dio!” The air was vibrant with Southern human noises
and dense with Southern human smells—amongst which, here and there,
wandered strangely a lost waft of perfume from some neighbouring garden,
a scent of jasmine or of orange flowers.
And then, suddenly, the salita took a turn, and broadened into a small
piazza. At one hand there was a sheer terrace, dropping to tiled roofs
twenty feet below; and hence one got a splendid view, over the town, of
the blue bay, with its shipping, and of Capri, all rose and purple in
the distance, and of Vesuvius with its silver wreath of smoke. At the
other hand loomed a vast, discoloured, pink-stuccoed palace, with grated
windows, and a porte-cochère black as the mouth of a cavern; and the
upper stories of the palace were in ruins, and out of one corner of
their crumbling walls a palm-tree grew. The third side of the piazza
was inevitably occupied by a church, a little pearl-grey rococo edifice,
with a bell, no deeper toned than a common dinner-bell, which was now
frantically ringing. About the doors of the church countless written
notices were pasted, advertising indulgences; beggars clung to the
steps, like monster snails; and the greasy leathern portière was
constantly being drawn aside, to let some one enter or come out. III
It was here that I met Zabetta.
The heavy portière swung open, and a young girl stepped from the
darkness behind it into the sunshine.
I saw a soft face, with brown eyes; a plain black frock, with a little
green nosegay stuck in its belt; and a small round scarlet hat.
A hideous old beggar woman stretched a claw towards this apparition,
mumbling something. The apparition smiled, and sought in its pocket, and
made the beggar woman the richer by a soldo.
I was twenty, and the April wind was magical. I thought I had never seen
so beautiful a smile, a smile so radiant, so tender.
I watched the young girl as she tripped down the church steps, and
crossed the piazza, coming towards me. Her smile lingered, fading
slowly, slowly, from her face.
As she neared me, her eyes met mine. For a second we looked straight
into each other’s eyes....
Oh, there was nothing bold, nothing sophisticated or immodest, in
the momentary gaze she gave me. It was a natural, spontaneous gaze
of perfectly frank, of perfectly innocent and impulsive interest, in
exchange for mine of open admiration. But it touched the wildfire in my
veins, and made it leap tumultuously. IV
Happiness often passes close to us without our suspecting it, the
proverb says.
The young girl moved on; and I stood still, feeling dimly that something
precious had passed close to me. I had not turned back to follow any
of the brazenly provocative contadine. But now I could not help it.
Something precious had passed within arm’s reach of me. I must not let
it go, without at least a semblance of pursuing it. If I waited there
passive till she was out of sight, my regrets would be embittered by the
recollection that I had not even tried.
I followed her eagerly, but vaguely, in a tremor or unformulated
hopes and fears. I had no definite intentions, no designs. Presently,
doubtless, she would come to her journey’s end—she would disappear
in a house or shop—and I should have my labour for my pains.
Nevertheless, I followed. What would you? She was young, she was pretty,
she was neatly dressed. She had big bright brown eyes, and a slender
waist, and a little round scarlet hat set jauntily upon a mass of waving
soft brown hair. And she walked gracefully, with delicious undulations,
as if to music, lifting her skirts up from the pavement, and so
disclosing the daintiest of feet, in trim buttoned boots of glazed
leather, with high Italian heels. And her smile was lovely—and I was
twenty—and it was April. I must not let her escape me, without at
least a semblance of pursuit.
She led me down the salita that I had just ascended. She could scarcely
know that she was being followed, for she had not once glanced behind
her. V
At first I followed meekly, unperceived, and contented to remain so.
But little by little a desire for more aggressive measures grew within
me. I said, “Why not—instead of following meekly—why not overtake
and outdistance her, then turn round, and come face to face with her
again? And if again her eyes should meet mine as frankly as they met
them in the piazza....”
The mere imagination of their doing so made my heart stop beating.
I quickened my pace. I drew nearer and nearer to her. I came abreast of
her—oh, how the wildfire trembled! I pressed on for a bit, and then,
true to my resolution, turned back.
Her eyes did meet mine again quite frankly. What was more, they
brightened with a little light of surprise, I might almost have fancied
a little light of pleasure.
If the mere imagination of the thing had made my heart stop beating, the
thing itself set it to pounding, racing, uncontrollably, so that I felt
all but suffocated, and had to catch my breath.
She knew now that the young man she had passed in the piazza had
followed her of set purpose; and she was surprised, but, seemingly,
not displeased. They were wonderfully gentle, wonderfully winning eyes,
those eyes she raised so frankly to my desirous ones; and innocent,
innocent, with all the unsuspecting innocence of childhood. In years she
might be seventeen, older perhaps; but there was a child’s fearless
unconsciousness of evil in her wide brown eyes. She had not yet been
taught (or, anyhow, she clearly didn’t believe) that it is dangerous
and unbecoming to exchange glances with a stranger in the streets.
She was as good as smiling on me. Might I dare the utmost? Might I
venture to speak to her?... My heart was throbbing too violently. I
could not have found an articulate human word, nor a shred of voice, nor
a pennyweight of self-assurance, in my body. .
So, thrilling with excitement, quailing in panic, I passed her again.
I passed her, and kept on up the narrow alley for half a dozen steps,
when again I turned.
She was standing where I had left her, looking after me. There was the
expression of unabashed disappointment in her dark eyes now, which, in a
minute, melted to an expression of appeal.
“Oh, aren’t you going to speak to me, after all?” they pleaded.
Wooed by those soft monitors, I plucked up a sort of desperate courage.
Hot coals burned in my cheeks, something flattered terribly in my
breast; I was literally quaking in every limb. My spirit was exultant,
but my flesh was faint. Her eyes drew me, drew me.... I fancy myself
awkwardly raising my hat; I hear myself accomplish a half-smothered
salutation.
“Buon’ giorno, Signorina.”
Her face lit up with that celestial smile of hers; and in a voice
that was like ivory and white velvet, she returned, “Buon’ giorno,
Signorino.” VI
And then I don’t know how long we stood together in silence.
This would never do, I recognised. I must not stand before her in
silence, like a guilty schoolboy. I must feign composure. I must carry
off the situation lightly, like a man of the world, a man of experience.
I groped anxiously in the confusion ot my wits for something that might
pass for an apposite remark.
At last I had a flash or inspiration. “What—what fine weather,” I
gasped. “Che bel tempo!”
“Oh, molto bello,” she responded. It was like a cadenza on a flute.
“You—you are going into the town?” I questioned.
“Yes,” said she.
“May I—may I have the pleasure———” I faltered.
“But yes,” she consented, with an inflection that wondered. “What
else have you spoken to me for?”