The most extraordinary exhilaration came over Sophy from the moment that
the little Channel steamer cast off, and she heard the surge of the sea
about her and felt the keen tang of its breath upon her face: a sort of
light-hearted sense of adventure, of the romance of a lonely setting
forth for strange countries. Oddly enough she had never been either to
France or to Italy. Now she was going to both those famous lands, and
alone--her own courier--her own mistress. She felt what she had once
heard an excited child call "journey-proud." And the sense that Cecil
was in safe hands, was going of his own accord to a place where cure was
certain, left her conscience-free to revel in this sense of delicious
detachment. It was as if she had been reborn into some lighter, more
tenuous body. She felt as one does in those dreams when, by only holding
one's breath and springing upward, one floats delicately free of the law
of gravitation--casting off all heaviness of mind and body.
She stayed on deck. Bobby and the two maids were below in a cabin. It
was very calm. The sea spread flat and silken under a high moon. She did
not feel lonely. This solitude of the sufficient self was ecstasy, after
the long, feverish contact with others.
When they landed at Calais, the gay _pizzicato_ of the French tongue
gave her such pleasure that she wanted to laugh out like a child
suddenly tickled by light fingers. It was so fitting--so deliciously
appropriate. Here was she reborn to a new heaven and a new earth. Of
course there must be also a new language. How glad she was that her old
governess had been French! It seemed that a kindly Fate had been long
ago preparing her for this gay moment, as well as this moment for her.
She spoke pretty, clear French--had spoken it since babyhood. It was a
fresh magic to find herself so well understood. That the day was
overcast, as they went rushing on to Paris, through the wide, fenceless,
hedgeless fields, did not damp her joyous mood. This greyness was so
different from that of England--as different as moonstones from onyx----
She looked at the frail pallor of the sky, and thought of the moonstones
of Ceylon, in whose watery silver there is a gleam of blue. She did not
care if the sun of France veiled itself; so that Italy burst on her in
floods of golden light she was content. She could not bear the thought
of seeing Italy, for the first time, demure and grey. On the bright
horizon of her fancy it floated like a magic island wrought of golden
glass and lapis-lazuli--colonnaded with pale marble--hung round about
with gardens like ancient Babylon--crowned with lilies like its own
Florence--and with violets like Athens. The "blunt-nosed" bees of
Theocritus hummed about it. Song-birds like living jewels flew above it.
Alas! She did not know that the inhabitants of her fairyland devour
their song-birds.
But though she dreamed of the Italy of poets and painters, she had to go
direct to practical Milan. Bellamy thought it important that a certain
Dr. Johnson who lived there should see Bobby before she took him to Lago
Maggiore for the remainder of the summer.
She found the town so hot and dusty that she decided not to go out until
evening. The doctor was to see Bobby next day. She had a light dinner in
her own room, then went downstairs to order an open cab. The night was
lovely after the scorching day. She thought a drive about the streets
would be amusing. Her gay, care-free mood was still upon her. This was
Italy--Italy--and day after to-morrow she would be on one of its
beautiful lakes. With this thought came the thought of Amaldi. She ought
really to let him know that she was in Italy, was going to his own
beloved lake. How pleasant it would be to see him again. How surprised
he would be. Then, too, to meet his mother--that would be a new
pleasure.
She stepped from the marble stairway into the hall of the hotel,
remembering all at once that she did not have Amaldi's address. But then
"Marchese Amaldi, Lago Maggiore" ought to be enough. Still, yes, it
would be better to ask at the office of the hotel. They would doubtless
be able to give it to her.
The head-clerk smiled affably as she asked, and made a sweeping gesture
with his left arm.
"But, Madame, there is the Marchese himself," said he.
Sophy turned quickly.
Amaldi, who had just entered, was lighting a cigarette, his back turned
towards her. Then he turned suddenly just as she had done, and saw her.
The next moment she had given him her hand and was explaining how she
happened to be in Milan in the dead of summer. Her explanations were a
vague murmur to Amaldi. He was thinking that nothing less than Fate had
ordered it. It was "meant" that she should come to Italy and that he
should be holding her hand in his--after so many bitter dreams. Fate had
brought her back into his life--the one woman he had ever desired with
his whole being.
He had only a few moments with her, however, before the friend for whom
he had called came downstairs. His mother was waiting outside in her
carriage. Might she call on Mrs. Chesney next day? Sophy said that she
had just been thinking what a pleasure it would be to meet the Marchesa.
She smiled at him as she said this and gave him her hand again. Amaldi,
who was rather pale, bent and kissed it. Then he joined his mother's
guest and they went out together.
Sophy wished that he could have driven with her that evening. He was
even nicer than she remembered him.
"I wonder if he is like his mother?" she thought as she got into the
little _carozza_ for her lonely outing. "I'm sure to like her if she is
anything like him." And all during the drive she kept wishing that
Amaldi could have come with her.
Next afternoon the Marchesa called. She was a tall, finely made woman of
the Juno type, with beautiful, light brown, sparkling eyes under jet
black eyebrows, and a fluff of silken, fox-grey hair that must have been
gold-red when she was young. But then, as it was, youth unquenchable
laughed from those shrewd, brilliant eyes, though she was sixty. Her
little bonnet of white camellias with its big, black bow, that so became
her, was all Paris in a hat-frame. She evidently had a "sweet-tooth" for
confections in dress, just as some people have for actual bonbons.
She had not talked in her natural, easy, laughing way for ten minutes
before Sophy thought her the most delightful woman she had ever known.
She asked almost at once to see Bobby--won his heart immediately. Told
Sophy that she needn't worry in the least about doctors on the
Lake--that there was an excellent one, an old friend of hers, at
Stresa--Cesare Camenis.
"Eh!--the _tousin_ (little fellow) has adopted me for his Nonna!" she
added, laughing again the next instant, as Bobby hauled himself up by
her fan-chain and tried to pull off her bonnet, saying:
"Take off! Tay wiv Bobby!"
As for Sophy, if she had not fallen in love with Amaldi, she had
certainly fallen in love with his mother. The feeling was mutual. The
Marchesa had had two sons but no daughter. She had always longed for a
little girl. Now she thought that she would like to have had a daughter
as much like Sophy as possible. And, as this thought came to her, it
brought another less agreeable.
The sad destiny of her Marco made the Marchesa very lenient in facing
certain problems, though she was essentially a woman of broad, indulgent
views. Since twenty-six (he was now thirty-one) he had lived like a
widower whom some mistaken vow has cut off from re-marrying. Not that
the Marchesa deceived herself with the credulity of the average
Anglo-Saxon mother in such cases. She did not for one moment think that
her son had led the life of an ascetic during this enforced widowhood.
Light _liaisons_ she knew well there had been; but Marco was not a
sensualist. Such flitting fires could never really warm or console him.
And as she looked now at Sophy, thinking how pleasant it would be to
have such a daughter, she also realised that this lovely, tall girl,
with her spellbound looking grey eyes, and sensitive, romantic mouth,
was the very type of woman to appeal to Marco with the threefold lure of
spirit, mind, and flesh. Though he had spoken much of Sophy to his
mother, since his return from England, with frank admiration and
compassion for her sad fate in being married to such a man as Chesney,
he had not given the slightest impression of being _amoureux d'elle_.
But there came over the Marchesa a strong prescience of danger--of
something to be guarded against. Should Marco see too much of Mrs.
Chesney, should he become "in love" with her, why, then there was here
no passing _liaison_ to be considered, but something of the nature of
tragedy. Not only was Marco bound by his disastrous marriage, but here
was a woman doubly bound--not only by marriage, but by motherhood. A bad
mother may make an enchanting mistress, but a bad mother will never make
a true wife. The Marchesa knew her Marco well. She knew that, should he
love a woman of Sophy's type, he would not want her for a mistress, but
for a wife. That was what love--the one big, crowning love--would mean
to Marco. Now if in future he should love this woman and she him, and
should give up her son for him--she would not be what his love had
imagined. If she should not give up her son--his love must burn out in
bitterness.
Yes, she must watch; she must be wise as many serpents and harmless as a
flock of doves; but she must also be prepared, at the first sign of real
danger, to give Marco a word of serious warning. This action on her part
would have all the more weight with him as she rarely, almost never,
interfered in his personal affairs.
And all the time that she was thus reflecting, she smoked Sophy's
gold-tipped cigarettes and chatted pleasantly.
Sophy heard with delight that the Marchesa was returning to the Lake the
next afternoon by the same train on which she also was going.
* * * * *
She was early at the station. It thrilled her to read the placards with
such lovely, well-known names on them. _Como!_--They passed that sign on
their way to the carriages bound for Lago Maggiore. It seemed very odd
to see that name of romance written upon a railway carriage.
Amaldi and his mother joined her shortly. As they settled down
comfortably in the queer little carriage, Amaldi bought copies of the
leading Milan papers and handed them in through the window. To Sophy's
surprise, when he entered the carriage a few minutes later, he laid a
fresh copy of _Harper's_ on the seat beside her, smiling at her
astonished look.
"We're very 'up to date,' as you say, in Milan," he laughed.
But Sophy could not read. She was too excited. She sat in a lazy, happy
trance gazing from the window.
The Marchesa dozed frankly. Bobby was sound as a top. Sophy had never
felt more keenly, vividly awake in her life. She began to day-dream.
And as she sat there, now glancing out of window, now watching the
pleasant smile which sleep had drawn on the Marchesa's face, now the
soles of Bobby's sturdy shoes protruding from under the arm of the seat
as he lay with his red curls on Miller's lap, now noticing how sharp-cut
was Amaldi's dark, irregular profile against the flashing green outside,
she found herself suddenly thinking:
"Suppose this dear, charming woman were my mother-in-law instead of Lady
Wychcote--suppose _he_ were my husband--suppose I were Sophy Amaldi
instead of Sophy Chesney--going for a happy summer to the Villa
Amaldi--sure of kindness, sure of sympathy, sure of love----"
This fancy did not form itself into regular phrases such as these, but
came in a flashing, involuntary impression. She started with dismay and
glanced around nervously. Amaldi was looking at her. She bent forward,
lifting up one of the papers that had fallen to the floor. Her hand
touched the Marchesa's foot. That lady started wide awake.
"Oh, _Dio_!" she exclaimed, glancing out. "We're nearly there! Marco, my
umbrella, please--and Mrs. Chesney's. You'd better tell the maids to get
ready."
She looked tenderly at Bobby. "What a shame to wake the _tousin_!" she
said.
Now they were rattling round a great haunch of mountain--the southern
flank of the Sasso di Ferro. They had reached Laveno. Lago Maggiore lay
before them. The lake spread milkily iridescent. The sky was the colour
of periwinkle, with towards the zenith a flight of silver cloud wings.
The glimpse of Alps beyond Baveno was a hush of violet. It was one of
those delicately veiled afternoons when the Lake is at its best. It
looked mysterious, promising, like the tempered beauty of a woman
beneath a gauzy _yashmak_.
Amaldi saw the maids and luggage safely on the little steamer that was
waiting at the _imbarcadero_. Sophy and Bobby were to go with the
Marchesa in the steam-launch.
As into a mirage the little launch shot forth across the Lake. Sophy sat
with Bobby in her arms.
But there was something wistful, faintly sorrowful in this aerial
beauty. There was a soul in it, a yearning as in all souls. She put down
her cheek on Bobby's head, and, thus unseen, the tears came stealing.
"Poor child," thought the Marchesa, who divined those tears she could
not see, "poor child ... but I must speak to-night--I must--I really
must."
When they reached Baveno, the Marchesa insisted on getting out and going
up to the hotel with Sophy to see that she was given nice rooms.
Something about the young woman, all alone with her little son, went to
her heart. The Marchesa herself had not been very happy in her marriage.
Her fullest life had been lived as the mother of her two boys. Thus
Sophy and Bobby touched her very nearly.
"She seems quite worn out all of a sudden, poor child," said she, as she
rejoined Amaldi. Without apparently looking at her son, she saw the
quick change that came over his face when she said that Sophy seemed
worn out. He made the _Meccanico_ sit in the bow, and himself steered
the little _Fretta_ all the way to "Le Vigne." He talked very little on
the way home, chiefly about the farm and the weather. He was afraid it
might be going to rain to-morrow. There were clouds slowly rising behind
the Sasso.
"Then you'll have to put off your villa-hunt with Mrs. Chesney," he
said. He said this very naturally, pronouncing the name without the
least self-consciousness. The Marchesa felt that her task was going to
be very difficult indeed. She, too, lapsed into silence, now watching
the lovely sky, now glancing at her son's dark, nervous hands as they
turned the little wheel slightly from time to time. Passionate hands
they were. The Marchesa had been a passionate nature herself. She could
feel with Marco as well as for him.
Le Vigne, or the Castello Amaldi, as it was sometimes called, lay on the
Lombard shore of the Lake not far from Angera. It had been one of the
old hunting lodges of the Amaldi, in more sumptuous days. It was really
no more a castle than the Castello di Frino, on the hills above the
village of Ghiffa; though it had, what Frino had not, a massive
reconnoitring tower at one corner of the quadrangle of buildings that
formed a court behind the house itself. It made a delightful summer
home, standing close to the lake shore and surrounded by a farm of some
two thousand acres. It was of white stucco with thick, ancient walls. A
terrace along the front led by long, shallow steps to the lawns and
gardens, which reached to the water. Behind, in the buildings enclosing
the court, were kitchens, laundry, carpenter shop, stables, _et
cetera_. Big arched ways led from the cortile into the kitchen garden
and the open country beyond.
When the Marchesa had come to Le Vigne as a bride forty years ago, she
had regretted that it did not lie in the mountainous portion of the
Lake. Now she had grown to love this wistful, reedy shore more than any
other part of Lago Maggiore.
She stepped out in the big _darsena_ with a sigh of pleasure, and walked
across the lawn, stopping to put a spray of white oleander in her belt.
Marco and his mother dined on the terrace, at a little table set with
old Lodi ware. There was a bowl of white oleander--the Marchesa's
favourite flower--in the centre. Its fragile blossoms gave off a perfume
strangely heady and spiritual at the same time--a faint, sweet perfume
as of blossomed peach-kernels.
The dusk came on gradually, spangled with stars and fireflies. All the
clouds had melted from the sky. It spread above them like an endless
expanse of violet smoke, glittering with vari-coloured sparks.
"No rain for to-morrow, _caro mio_," said the Marchesa, as she and
Amaldi sat smoking companionably after dinner, each in a long willow
chair. "I can go villa-hunting with your charming friend to-morrow,
beyond a doubt."
"Yes. That's good," said Amaldi.
The Marchesa glanced at him. He was smoking contentedly, with a very
tranquil expression on his face. It was still light enough to see even
the colours of flowers quite plainly. The Marchesa put her own cigarette
back between her lips. Then she took it out and looked at it, smiling.
"You haven't noticed my new _splendore_, Marco," she said, waving the
gold-tipped cigarette towards him.
"Eh?" he said, as though rousing suddenly.
"These 'gilded luxuries,'" said his mother, indicating the cigarette
between her big, handsome fingers.
"Why, Baldi! What swagger!" he laughed, taking in the cigarette. This
name of "Baldi," by which both her sons sometimes addressed her, had
arisen from the fact that as a bride she had arrived in Italy with a
severe cold in her head, and had pronounced her new name "Abaldi." Her
husband had begun to call her "Baldi" for fun, in the honeymoon days.
Later on the children had taken it up. She associated it more with her
boys than with her husband, and liked them to call her so. Only when
very serious did they say "Maman."
"Yes. Don't you wonder how I came by such gorgeousness?" she now asked.
"I do indeed. I thought you scorned such vanities."
"I do, as a rule, but that dear thing pressed them on me so prettily
that I hadn't the heart to refuse. Mrs. Chesney I mean. She _is_ a dear
thing, Marco."
Her son's voice at once became on guard.
"Yes. I thought you would like her," he said. "You know I told you so."
"You didn't tell me half, my dear. She is a very unusual woman
indeed--girl, I feel like saying. Really she seems amazingly girlish to
have been through such bitter experiences. That terrible dinner you told
me of----"
"Yes. That does strike one."
The Marchesa smoked for a few moments.
"Does she seem very _eprise_ with her husband?" she asked at last.
"I haven't seen them together more than twice--I couldn't say. I haven't
seen much of Mrs. Chesney herself, you know."
"I didn't know," reflected the Marchesa; but matters seemed to her all
the more serious because of that statement. If she, his mother, could
see in a few hours the strong influence that Sophy had upon him, and if
this influence had resulted from such a slight acquaintance, then it was
more necessary than ever that she should speak.
She threw away her cigarette, and leaned back.
"_Caro Marco_," she said, "I'm going to do a thing that I've rarely
done. I'm going to do it because I think I ought to, though I dislike
doing it very much. And I want you to be indulgent to Baldi--eh? Will
you?"
Now Amaldi was more than ever on guard. Something seemed actually to
click in his breast. It was the lock of his heart snapping home. It is a
way that some heart-locks have of doing at the least touch.
His voice was very gentle and courteous as he said:
"Dear Baldi, you know very well that you can speak to me in any way
whatever that you wish."
"_Aie!_" thought the Marchesa. "He's gone under the boat like a sulking
_lusc_ (pike). What a dear, fine, provoking boy to be sure!
"Well, then, Marco, I'll come to the point at once," she said in a
frank, practical voice. "But first I must ask you if you don't really
think that I've trespassed very little on private ground with you, since
you've been grown? Even when your marriage was in question, I said
nothing after giving you my honest opinion, when you asked for it. Isn't
this so?"
"Yes, Maman; it is perfectly true," said Amaldi.
This "Maman" fixed the Marchesa in her opinion that Marco was going to
make things as difficult as possible for her. She was no longer his
intimate "Baldi," she was the revered "Maman."
"_Ebbene, Caro_, I'm glad you admit that so frankly," she continued,
taking her courage in both hands; "because it makes me feel that you
will be lenient if what I'm about to say jars on you very much. It's
this, _figlio mio_-- I want you to be very, very careful about your
attitude towards this lovely, unhappy woman. I see real danger for you
there, Marco--unless you are on your guard every moment of the time you
are with her. A woman feels such things intuitively--and intuition is a
very sure force, no matter what sceptics may say of it. I want you to
open your 'mind's eye' wide, my dear boy, and look this possibility
squarely in the face. Will you?"
Amaldi sat perfectly still. The only sign that he was moved in any way
was the cigarette which went out between his fingers, and which he put
to his lips now and then as if unaware that it was out. His mother
waited, rather nervous. Then he said quietly:
"I was just trying to see exactly what you meant, Maman. Do you mean
that you fear I may compromise Mrs. Chesney by undue attentions?"
The Marchesa felt discouraged, but her will upheld her.
"Not that alone, Marco," she said firmly, "though that might be one of
the consequences of what I fear for you. What I meant, in plain
language, since you force me to it, is that you may come to care too
much for her. There would be no issue to such a thing, Marco. You must
see that for yourself. I do you the honour," she added quickly, "of
supposing that your feeling for such a woman would be a serious one."
"_Grazie_," said Amaldi. His tone was perfectly respectful, but there
was a crisp note in it that hurt his mother. He was in truth deeply
indignant, not with her, but with himself, at the idea that his love for
Sophy was so transparently evident to observing eyes, when he had
thought it hidden in the utmost depths of his being. It was
excruciatingly painful and mortifying to him that even his mother should
touch on such a subject.
The Marchesa, in the meanwhile, was thinking very hard indeed. She was
years in advance of her day in many respects. For instance, she believed
that a serious union between a man and woman devotedly loving each
other, and determined to be true to that love, is as sacred and worthy a
thing, as really and wholly a "marriage," as any union made by priest or
law. The law of one's highest being she considered the highest law of
all. To the marriage of true hearts and bodies, as well as that of true
minds, she would not admit impediment. But--she realised that for the
man and woman of her day to enter upon such a marriage was also to enter
upon a _Via Crucis_. The massive, sometimes crushing, weight of such a
yoke was not to be accepted in any light, joyous spirit of newly kindled
passion. Over the gateway of that stern temple of love was written the
implacable, well-nigh impossible mandate of the Delphian Oracle, "Know
thyself."
Moreover, in her view of the question, the man and woman who would
enter on such an engagement must be quite free from certain
ties--pre-eminently the tie binding a mother to her children. The
Marchesa admitted the forsaking of all in the world for a great
love--except the child that a woman had borne into the world.
Marco, despite his luckless marriage, from which as an Italian he could
not with dignity escape--(both he and she scorned the idea of his
becoming naturalised in another country in order to obtain a divorce
there)--Marco she considered free to form a new and serious relationship
if he so desired. Therefore, it was not the question of the possible
irregularity of his future relations with Sophy that dismayed her; it
was that she did not consider Sophy free. She had her son. Never would
she receive as Marco's wife the woman who had deserted her child for
him. But then, merely glimpsing Sophy as she had done, she felt
instinctively that she was incapable of such an act.
Remained then only the possibility of a dark tragedy of unavailing love,
and the odious quagmire of scandal.
And thinking as she did, and knowing that her son was well aware of her
opinions, this "_Grazie_" ("Thanks") of Marco's hurt her deeply. It
seemed to say: "I am glad that at least you do me that much justice."
It was she, however, who broke the silence that followed.
"I shall not allude to this subject again," she said, rising. "This once
I felt that I had to speak--no matter how much I hurt or offended
you--only this once----"
"_Prego, prego, Maman!_" he murmured in a colourless voice.
"Yes, that I had to do," continued his mother firmly; "for, as I said,
there is no issue. Mrs. Chesney has her son. Should you ever care for
her--should she ever care for you--her son stands between you. If she
were to desert her boy for you--she would not deserve your love. If you
wanted her to desert him--you would not deserve hers----"
"_Maman! Te ne scongiuro!_" cried Amaldi, springing to his feet. She
could see his face white as silver in the heavy dusk. His brows made a
straight line across it.
"I have finished, my son," she said, with dignity. "You will never hear
me allude to this again."
And she left him.