A GREAT EVENT.
About ten days after the conversation recorded in the last chapter,
I was driving down to Victoria station in a four-wheel cab, wearing
the new ulster, the new boots, and holding on my knee a brand-new
travelling-bag. It was a colourless London morning, neither hot nor
cold, but as I looked out with rather dim eyes through the dirty
windows, I experienced no pleasure at the thought of exchanging for
Italian skies this dear, familiar greyness. At my side sat my mother,
silent and pale. Now that we two were alone together--my busy sisters
had been at work some hours ago--we had abandoned the rather strained
and feverish gaiety which had prevailed that morning at breakfast.
"Now, Elsie, keep warm at night; don't forget to eat plenty of Brand's
essence of beef--it's the brown parcel, not the white one--and write
directly you arrive."
Between us we had succeeded in taking my ticket and registering
the luggage, and now my mother stood at the door of the carriage,
exchanging with me those last farewells which always seem so much too
long and so much too short.
It must be owned, this journey of mine bore to us both the aspect of a
great event. We had always been poor, most of our friends were poor,
and we were not familiarized with the easy modern notions of travel,
which make nothing of a visit to the North Pole, or a little trip to
China by way of Peru. And as the train steamed out at last from the
station my heart sank suddenly within me, and I could scarcely see the
black-clothed familiar figure on the platform, for the tears which
sprang to my eyes blinded me.
My first new experience was not a pleasant one, and as I lay moaning
with sickness in a second-class cabin, I wondered how I or any one else
could ever have complained of anything while we stood on _terra firma_.
All past worries and sorrows faded momentarily into nothingness before
this present all-engulfing evil. It seemed an age before we reached
Calais, where, limp, bewildered, and miserable, I was jostled into a
crowded second-class carriage _en route_ for Basle. The train jolted
and shook, and I grew more and more unhappy, mentally and physically,
with every minute. My fellow-passengers, a sorry, battered-looking
assortment of women, produced large untempting supplies of food from
their travelling-bags, and fell to with good appetite. I myself, after
some hesitation, sought consolation in the little tin of Brand's
essence; after which, squeezed in between the window and a perfectly
unclassifiable specimen of Englishwoman, I fell asleep.
When I awoke it was broad daylight, and the train was gliding slowly
into the station at Basle.
I was stiff, cramped, and dishevelled, but yesterday's depression had
given place to a new, delicious feeling of excitement. The porters
hurrying to and fro, and shouting in their guttural Swiss-German, the
people standing on the platform, the unfamiliar advertisements and
announcements posted and painted about the station, all appeared to me
objects of surpassing interest. The glamour of strangeness lay over
all. A keen exhilarating morning breeze blew from the mountains, and
as I stepped on to the platform it seemed as if I trod on air. With a
feeling of adventure, which I firmly believe Columbus himself could
never have experienced more keenly, I made my way into the crowded
refreshment-room, and ordered breakfast. I was very hungry, and
thought that I had never tasted anything better than the coffee and
rolls, the shavings of white butter, and the adulterated honey in its
little glass pot. As I sat there contentedly I found it difficult to
realize that less than twenty-four hours separated me from the familiar
life at Islington. It seemed incredible that so short a space of time
had sufficed to land me on this strange sea of new experiences, into
this dream-like, disorganized life, where night was scarcely divided
from day, and the common incident of a morning meal could induce,
of itself, a dozen new sensations. The rest of that day was unmixed
delight. I scarcely moved my eyes from the window as the train sped
on through the St. Gothard pass into Italy. What a wondrous panorama
unrolled itself before me!
First, the mysterious, silent world of mountains, all black and white,
like a photograph, with here and there the still, green waters of a
mighty lake; the gentler scenes--trees, meadows, villages; last of all,
the wide, blue waters of the Italian lakes, with their fringe of purple
hills, and the little white villas clustered round them, and the red,
red sunset reflected on their surfaces.
The train was late, and I missed the express at Genoa, passing several
desolate hours in the great deserted station. It was not till eleven
o'clock the next morning that a tired, dishevelled, and decidedly
dirty young woman found herself standing on the platform at Pisa, her
travelling rug trailing ignominiously behind her as she held out her
luggage check in dumb entreaty to a succession of unresponsive porters.
The pleasant excitement of yesterday had faded, and I was conscious of
being exceedingly tired and rather forlorn. Here was no exhilarating
mountain air, but a damp breeze, at once chilly and enervating, made me
shiver where I stood.
I succeeded at last, in spite of a complete absence of Italian, in
conveying myself and my luggage into a fly, and in directing the driver
to the Palazzo Brogi. As we jolted along slowly enough, I looked out,
expecting every minute to see the Leaning Tower; but I saw only tall,
grey streets, narrow and often without sidewalks, in which a sparse but
picturesque population was moving to and fro. But I was roused, tired
as I was, to considerable interest as we crossed the bridge, and my eye
took in the full sweep of the river, with the noble curve of palaces
along its bank, the distant mountains, beautiful in the sunshine, and
the clear and delicate light which lay over all.
I had not long, however, to observe these things, for in another minute
the drosky had stopped before a great square house in grey stone, with
massive iron scrolls guarding the lower windows, and the driver, coming
to the door, announced that this was the Palazzo Brogi.
My heart sank as I dismounted, and going up the steps, pulled timidly
at the bell. The great door was standing open, and I could see beyond
into a gloomy and cavernous vista of corridors.
No one answered the bell, but just as I was about to pull for the
second time a gentleman, dressed in a grey morning suit _à l'anglais_,
strolled out inquiringly into the passage. He was rather stout, of
middle height, with black hair parted in the middle, and a pale,
good-looking face. The fact that no one had answered the bell seemed
neither to disconcert nor surprise him; he called out a few words in
Italian, and, advancing towards me, bowed with charming courtesy.
"You are Miss Meredith," he said, speaking in English, slowly, with
difficulty, but in the softest voice in the world; "my mother did
not expect you by the early train." Here his English seemed to break
down suddenly, and he looked at me a moment with his dark and gentle
eyes. There was something reassuring in his serious, simple dignity of
manner; I forgot my fears, forgot also the fact that I was as black as
a coal, and had lost nearly all my hair-pins, and said, composedly, "I
missed the express from Genoa. The train across the St. Gothard was
late."
At this point there emerged from the shadowy region at the back a
servant in livery, who very deliberately, and without explanation of
his tardiness, proceeded to help the driver in carrying my box into the
hall.
The gentleman bowed himself away, and in another moment I was following
the servant up a vast and interminable flight of stone stairs.
The vaulted roof rose high above us, half lost to sight in shadow;
everywhere were glimpses of galleries and corridors, and over
everything hung that indescribable atmosphere of chill stuffiness which
I have since learned to connect with Italian palaces.
Anything less homelike, less suggestive of a place where ordinary human
beings carried on the daily, pleasant avocations of life, it would be
impossible to conceive. A stifling sensation rose in my throat as we
passed through a folding glass-door, across a dim corridor, into a
large room, where my guide left me with a remark which of course I
did not understand. With a sense of unutterable relief I perceived the
room to be empty, and I sat down on a yellow damask sofa, feeling an
ignominious desire to cry. The shutters were closed before the great
windows, but through the gloom I could see that the place was furnished
very stiffly with yellow damask furniture, while enormous and elaborate
chests and writing-tables filled up the corners. A big chandelier
shrouded in yellow muslin hung from the ceiling, which rose to a great
height, and was painted in fresco. There was no fire, and I looked at
the empty gilt stove, which had neither bars nor fire-irons, with a
shiver.
It was not long before an inner door was thrown open to admit two
ladies, who came towards me with greetings in French. The Marchesa
Brogi was a small, vivacious, dried-up woman of middle age, with an
evident sense of her own dignity, looking very cold and carrying a
little muff in her hands.
She curtseyed slightly as we shook hands, then motioned me to a seat
beside her on the sofa. "This is my daughter Bianca," she said, turning
to the girl who had followed her into the room.
I looked anxiously at my pupil, whose aspect was not altogether
reassuring. She was a tall, pale, high-shouldered young person,
elaborately dressed, with a figure so artificially bolstered up that
only by a great stretch of imagination could one realize that she was
probably built on average anatomical lines. Her hair, dressed on the
top of her head and struck through with tortoiseshell combs, produced
by its unnatural neatness the same effect of unreality. She was
decidedly plain withal, and her manners struck me as being inferior to
those of her mother and brother. She took up her seat at some little
distance from the sofa, and whenever I glanced in her direction, I saw
a pair of sharp eyes fixed on my face, with something of the unsparing
criticism of a hostile child in their gaze.
I began to be terribly conscious of my disordered appearance--I am
not one of those people who can afford to affect the tempestuous
petticoat--and grew more and more bewildered in my efforts to follow
the little Marchesa through the mazes of her fluent but curiously
accentuated French.
It was with a feeling of relief that I saw one of the inner doors open,
and a stout, good-tempered looking lady, in a loose morning jacket,
come smiling into the room. She shook hands with me cordially, and
taking a chair opposite the sofa, began to nod and smile in the most
reassuring fashion. She spoke no English and very little French, but
was determined that so slight an obstacle should not stand in the way
of pressing her goodwill towards me.
I began to like this fat, silly lady, who showed her gums so
unbecomingly when she smiled, and to wonder at her position in the
household.
The door opened yet again, and in came my first acquaintance, the
gentleman in the grey suit.
I was growing more and more confused with each fresh arrival, and
dimly wondered how long it would be before I fell off the hard yellow
sofa from sheer weariness. The strange faces surged before me, an
indistinguishable mass; the strange voices reached me, meaningless and
incoherent, through a thick veil.
"She is very tired," some one said in French; and not long after this
I was led across half a dozen rooms to a great bedroom, where, without
taking in any details of my surroundings, I undressed, went to bed, and
fell asleep till the next morning.