Five years after Giovanni Severi had left Rome to join the ill-fated
expedition in Africa, his brother Ugo obtained his captaincy and at
the same time was placed in charge of the powder magazine at
Monteverde, which Sister Giovanna could see in the distance from her
latticed window. The post was of considerable importance, but was not
coveted because it required the officer who held it to live at a
considerable distance from the city, with no means of getting into
town which he could not provide for himself; for there is no tramway
leading down the right bank of the Tiber. The magazine was actually
guarded by a small detachment of artillery under two subalterns who
took the night duty by turns, and both officers and men were relieved
at regular intervals by others; but the captain in command held his
post permanently and lived in a little house by himself, a stone's
throw from the gate of the large walled enclosure in which the low
buildings stood. For some time it had been intended to build a small
residence for the officer in charge, but this had not been begun at
the date from which I now take up my story.
The neighbourhood is a lonely one, but there are farm-houses scattered
about at varying distances from the high-road which follows the river,
mostly in the neighbourhood of the hill that bears the name of
Monteverde and seems to have been the site of a villa in which Julius
Cæsar entertained Cleopatra.
As every one will understand, Ugo Severi's duties consisted in keeping
an account of the ammunition and explosives deposited in the vaults of
the magazine and in exercising the utmost vigilance against fire and
other accidents. The rule against smoking, for instance, did not apply
outside the enclosure, but Ugo gave up cigarettes, even in his own
house, as soon as he was appointed to the post, and took care that
every one should know that he had done so.
He was a hard-working, hard-reading, rather melancholic man who had
never cared much for society and preferred solitude to a club; a fair
man, with the face of a student and not over robust, but nevertheless
energetic and determined where his duty was concerned. He lived alone
in the little house, with his orderly, a clever Sicilian, who cooked
for him; a peasant woman from a neighbouring farm-house came every
morning to sweep the rooms, make the two beds, and scrub the two stone
steps before the door and clean the kitchen.
The house was like hundreds of other little houses in the Campagna. On
the ground floor there was a cross-vaulted hall where the Captain
transacted business and received the reports of the watch; there was a
tiny kitchen also, a stable at the back for two horses, and a narrow
chamber adjoining it, in which Pica, the orderly, slept. Upstairs
there was only one story, consisting of a large room with a loggia
looking across the river towards San Paolo, a bedroom of moderate
dimensions, and a dressing-room.
The place was more luxuriously furnished than might have been
expected, for though Captain Ugo was not a rich man, he was by no
means dependent on his pay. General Severi had lived to retrieve a
part of his fortune, and had died rather suddenly of heart-failure
after a bad attack of influenza, leaving his property to be divided
equally between his two surviving sons and their sister. The latter
had married away from Rome, and Ugo's younger brother was in the navy,
so that he was now the only member of his family left in Rome.
He was a man of taste and reading, who had entered the army to please
his father and would have left it on the latter's death if he had not
been persuaded by his superiors that he had a brilliant career before
him and might be a general at fifty, if he stuck to the service. He
had answered that he would do so if he might have some post of trust
in which he would have time for study; the command of the magazine at
Monteverde was vacant just then, and as no more influential person
wanted to live in such a dull place, he got it.
Yet his house was not much more than a mile from the gate, by a good
high-road; whence it is clear that his solitude was a matter of choice
and not of necessity. He had few friends, however, and none who showed
any inclination to come and see him, though his acquaintances were
numerous; for he had been rather popular in society when a young
subaltern, and had been welcome wherever his elder brother Giovanni
took him.
Giovanni had been very reticent about his affairs, even with his own
family, and during that last winter in Rome, when he had fallen in
love with Angela Chiaromonte, Ugo had been stationed in Pavia and had
known nothing of the affair. Ugo had a vague recollection that
Giovanni was supposed to have been unduly devoted to the gay Marchesa
del Prato when he had been a mere stripling of a sub-lieutenant, fresh
from the Military Academy and barely twenty, though the Marchesa had
been well over thirty, even then. Ugo had been introduced to her long
afterwards, when she was the Princess Chiaromonte, and she had shown
that she liked him, and had asked him to a dance, to which he had not
gone simply because he had given up dancing.
The Princess, however, had misunderstood his reason for not accepting
her invitation and had supposed that he kept away because he had known
Angela's story and resented, for his brother's sake, the treatment the
girl had received. In an hour of idleness, it now occurred to her that
she might find out whether she had been mistaken in this.
For some one had spoken of Giovanni on the previous evening, in
connection with a report that had lately reached Rome to the effect
that an Italian officer, hitherto supposed to have been among the dead
after the battle of Dogali, had been heard of and was living in
slavery somewhere in the interior of Africa. A newspaper had made a
good story of the matter, out of next to nothing, and it had been a
subject of conversation during two or three days. The lady who told it
to the Princess Chiaromonte had been one of her most assiduous and
intimate enemies for years, and, in order to make her uncomfortable,
advanced the theory that the officer in question was no other than
Giovanni Severi himself.
The Princess was not so easily disturbed, however, and smiled in her
designing friend's face. The poor man was dead and buried, she said, and
every one knew it. The report rested on nothing more substantial than a
letter said to have been written by an English traveller and lion-hunter
to one of the secretaries at the British Embassy in Washington, who was
said, again, to have mentioned the fact to an Italian colleague, who had
repeated it in writing to his sister, who lived somewhere in Piedmont
and had spoken of it to some one else; and so on, till the story had
reached the ears of a newspaper paragraph-writer who was hard up for a
'stick' of 'copy.' All this the Princess knew, or invented, and she ran
off her explanation with a fluency that disconcerted her assailant.
The immediate result was that she bethought her of Ugo Severi, whom
she had passed lately in her motor as he was riding leisurely along
the road beyond Monteverde. She had noticed him because her chauffeur
had slackened speed a little, and she had nodded to him, though it was
not likely that he should recognise her face through her veil. She had
thought no more about him at the time, but she now telephoned to a
friend at headquarters to find out where he was living, and she soon
learned that he was in charge of the magazine.
After a little reflection, she wrote him a note, recalling their
acquaintance and the fact that she had known his poor brother very
well. She had never seen a powder magazine, she said; would he show
the one at Monteverde to her and two or three friends, next Wednesday?
Ugo answered politely that this was quite impossible without a special
permission from the Commander-in-Chief or the War Office, and that he
greatly regretted his inability to comply with her request. As he was
a punctilious man, though he lived almost like a hermit, he took the
trouble to send his orderly into the city on the following afternoon
with a couple of cards to be left at the Palazzo Chiaromonte for the
Prince and Princess, in accordance with Roman social custom.
A few days later a smart 'limousine' drew up to the door of Ugo's
little house and a footman rang the old-fashioned bell, which went on
tinkling in the distance for a long time after the rusty chain had
been pulled. Ugo's Sicilian orderly opened the door at last in a
leisurely way and appeared on the threshold in grey linen fatigue
dress; on seeing the car and the Princess he straightened himself and
saluted.
His master was riding, he said, and would not come home for an hour.
The Princess wrote a message on a card, asking if Ugo would come and
see her any day after five o'clock, and she wrote down the number of
her telephone. She gave the card to the man, and by way of impressing
its importance on him, added that she was a very old friend of the
family and had known the Captain's mother as well as the brother who
had been lost in Africa. She also smiled sweetly, for the Sicilian was
a handsome young man; she had a way of smiling at handsome men when
she was speaking to them, especially if she wished them to remember
what she said.
When the car was gone, Salvatore Pica, the orderly, shut the door and
went into the hall where the telephone was. He looked at the visiting
card before leaving it on the brass salver on the table, where letters
and reports were placed for the Captain whenever he was out; and being
an intelligent man and considerably impressed by what the Princess had
told him, he promptly wrote the name, address, and telephone number in
the address-book which hung by a string beside the instrument. For Ugo
never telephoned himself if he could help it, and was careless about
addresses, which it was Pica's business to copy and have at hand when
needed.
Moreover, the Princess had represented herself as being a very old
friend of the Captain's family, and Pica mentally noted the fact,
because he had often wondered that his master should apparently have
no intimate friends at all, though he was evidently respected and
liked by his brother-officers.
When Ugo came home and dismounted at the door, Pica at once told him
of the Princess's visit, repeating her message without a mistake, and
adding that he had copied her name and address in the telephone-book.
The Captain nodded gravely and looked at the card before he went
upstairs, but said nothing to his man. Being very careful and
punctilious in such matters, as I have said, he wrote a line that
evening, thanking the Princess for her kind invitation and saying that
he hoped to avail himself of it some day, but that he was very busy
just at present. This was true, in a sense, for he had just received
an important new book in two thick volumes, which he was anxious to
read without delay. The fact that it was an exhaustive history of
Confucianism, and could not be considered as bearing on his
professional duties, was not likely to interest the Princess.
She was not used to such rebuffs, however, and before long she made
another attempt. This time she herself called up Pica and asked him at
what hour the Captain could see her on a matter of importance. When
the orderly delivered the message, Severi was at first inclined to
make an excuse; but the Princess's persistency in trying to see him
was obvious, and as he thought it possible that she might wish to ask
him some question relating to Giovanni, he bade Pica answer that he
would stay at home that afternoon, if it suited her convenience to
come. She replied that she would appear about four o'clock.
Ugo was buried in the history of Confucianism when his man came to
tell him this, and he merely nodded, but looked up quickly when Pica
turned to the door.
'Shave and dress,' he said laconically, and at once began to read
again.
It was the order he gave when he expected the visit of a superior
officer, for as a rule Pica only shaved twice a week, and never put on
a cloth tunic except when he had leave for the afternoon and evening.
The little house at Monteverde was a lonely place and the soldier did
no military duty, living the life of an ordinary house servant. It was
a good place, for the Captain was generous.
With an affectation of extreme punctuality, the Princess's footman
rang the bell at four o'clock precisely, and almost before the distant
tinkle was heard Pica opened the door wide and saluted the visitor,
flattening himself against the door-post to give her plenty of room.
He looked very smart in his best uniform, and she smiled and glanced
at his handsome Saracen face as she passed in. He shut the door at
once, leaving the footman outside.
At the same moment Captain Severi was descending the short flight of
stone steps to meet her. He was not very like Giovanni, but in the
half-light the Princess saw a resemblance that made her start. Ugo was
less energetically built, but he wore his uniform well and there was
much in his gait and the outline of his figure that recalled his
brother.
The Princess took his hand almost affectionately and held it in
silence for a moment while she looked into his mild blue eyes. Pica
noticed her manner, which certainly confirmed what she had said about
being a friend of the family.
The mere suggestion of a delicate and exotic perfume had floated into
the house with her. At first it faintly recalled Indian river grass,
but presently Ugo thought it reminded him of muscatel grapes, and then
again of dried rose leaves and violets. She smiled as she withdrew her
hand, and spoke.
'You did not guess that a woman could be so persistent, did you?'
Ugo also smiled, but without cordiality, and then led the way
upstairs. On reaching the large room, the Princess looked about her,
judged the man, and at once expressed her admiration for his good
sense in leading a student's life, instead of squandering his time in
the futilities of society.
The Captain did not ask her what she wanted of him, but offered to
make tea for her, and she saw that a little table had been set for the
purpose. Everything was very simple, but looked so serviceable that
she accepted, judging that she ran no risk of being poisoned. In Italy
it is only society that drinks tea. It was a little early for it, but
that did not matter. The water was boiling in a small copper kettle
shaped like a flat sponge-cake, the tea-caddy was Japanese, and the
teapot was of plain brown earthenware, but the two cups were of rare
old Capodimonte and the spoons were evidently English. She noticed
also that the sugar was of the 'crystallised' kind, and was in a
curiously chiselled silver bowl. The Princess had a good eye for
details.
'You seem to have made yourself very comfortable in your remote little
house,' she laughed, with approval.
'I only hope that you may be, as long as you please to stay,' he
answered, making the tea scientifically.
It was very good, and she chatted idly while she slowly drank it and
nibbled a thin, crisp biscuit. When she had finished he took her cup
and offered to refill it, but she declined and leaned back comfortably
in the big red leather easy-chair.
'I daresay you heard that story about an officer who is reported to be
living in slavery in Africa?' she said, her tone changing and becoming
very grave.
Ugo had read of it in the newspapers.
'Did it occur to you, as it did to me, that he might be Giovanni?' she
asked.
It had occurred to him and he had made inquiries at the War Office,
but had been told that the story had no foundation. He had expected no
other answer. The Princess was silent for a moment.
'One grasps at straws,' she said presently, in a low voice.
He understood that she had really cared for his brother, and looked at
her with more interest than he had hitherto shown.
'I am afraid that there is not the slightest possibility of his being
alive,' he said, with a sadness in which there was also some sympathy
for her.
She had hoped for an indiscreet question, which would allow her to say
something more. It was of no real importance to her to know whether he
bore her any grudge or not, but since she had taken so much trouble to
see him she did not mean to go away without knowing the truth, and
though her curiosity was a mere caprice, it was perhaps not a very
unreasonable one.
'Had you seen much of him during the last months before he went to
Africa?' she asked. 'I did not know you till long after that, you
know. I think you were always away?'
'I was stationed in Pavia,' the Captain answered. 'Giovanni joined the
expedition at short notice and I was not able to see him before he
started. I have always regretted it, for we had not met for eighteen
months.'
'You were never very intimate, I suppose?' suggested the Princess.
'We were always very good friends, but after he was appointed to the
Staff we saw little of each other.'
The Princess mused in silence for a few moments.
'I was very fond of him,' she said at last. 'Did he ever talk about me
to you?'
'No,' Ugo answered. 'Not that I can remember.'
Their eyes met and she saw that he was telling the truth, as, in fact,
he always did.
'I suppose you have heard that he was in love with my poor niece, who
went into a convent after he was lost?' she said tentatively, and
watching his face.
'Indeed?' He showed more interest. 'I never heard of that. Were they
engaged to be married?'
'No. At least, there was no formal engagement. My brother-in-law was
killed in a motor accident just at that time. Then Giovanni went to
Massowah, and you know the rest. But they were very much in love with
each other, and Angela was broken-hearted.'
She now knew what she had come to find out, and she did not care to
rouse his curiosity as to her own share in the story, since no gossip
had taken the trouble to enlighten him.
'Has she taken permanent vows?' he asked.
'Yes. Three years ago, and now it is said that she means to go out to
the Rangoon Leper Hospital. I daresay you have heard that a good many
nuns do that. It is almost certain death and we all feel very badly
about Angela.'
'Poor girl!' exclaimed Ugo. 'She must have cared for him so much that
she is tired of living. Very few of those Sisters ever come back, I
believe.'
'None,' said the Princess Chiaromonte in a tone that would certainly
have arrested his attention if he had known everything. 'It is the
saddest thing in the world,' she went on quickly, fearing that her
hatred had betrayed itself. 'To think that year after year those good
women voluntarily go to certain death! And not even to save life, for
lepers cannot be cured, you know. The most that can be done is to
alleviate their suffering!'
She said this very well, though the words were hackneyed.
'It is heroic,' said Captain Ugo quietly.
She stayed some time longer, and he showed her the finest of his books
and a number of old engravings and etchings; and these really
impressed her because she knew something of their current value, which
was her only standard in judging works of art. At last she showed that
she was thinking of going. Women of the world generally give warning
of their approaching departure, as an ocean steamer blows its horn at
intervals before it starts. The Princess's voice was suddenly
colourless and what she said became more and more general, till she
observed that it was really a lovely day. She looked down at her skirt
critically and then glanced quickly at the walls, one after another.
When you do not know what a woman is looking for in an unfamiliar
drawing-room, it is a mirror to see whether her hat is straight. The
Princess saw none and rose gracefully out of the deep easy-chair.
'It has been such a great pleasure to see you!' she said, the
cordiality returning to her tone as soon as she was on her feet.
'I am very much obliged for your visit,' Ugo answered politely,
because nothing else occurred to him to say, and he clapped his heels
together with a jingle of his spurs as he took her proffered hand.
He was neither shy nor dull of comprehension where women were
concerned, and he understood quite well that she had not come with the
intention of making an impression on him, nor out of mere curiosity to
see what Giovanni's brother was like. He knew what her reputation had
been, but he did not know whether she had retired from the lists at
last or still kept the field; and he cared very little, though he had
sometimes reflected that whereas Balzac had written of the Woman of
Thirty, the 'woman of forty' was still to be studied by a clever
novelist; unless, indeed, Sophocles had made an end of her for ever
when Jocasta hanged herself. One thing, however, was clear: the
Princess had not sought him out with any idea of casting upon him the
spell of a flirtation to make him a sort of posthumous substitute for
his brother. She had faced the light boldly several times in the
course of her visit, so that he had seen the fine lines of middle age
about her mouth and eyes very distinctly, and she had not made any
attempt to show herself off before him, nor to lead him on with
subdued confidences concerning the human affections as she had known
them. He believed that she had come to find out whether he thought
that Giovanni might possibly be alive or not, and he rather liked her
for what seemed to him her frankness and courage, and was
unconsciously flattered, as the best men may be, by her trusting him
so simply.
No doubt it might be true that since the world had put up with her
rather reckless behaviour for over fifteen years, her reputation would
not be lost at this late date by her spending an hour at the rooms of
an officer who was quartered out of town. No doubt, too, that same
reputation was a coat of many colours, on which one small stain more
would scarcely show at all, but she had never been in the habit of
risking spots for nothing. Moreover, it is a curious fact that men are
better pleased at being trusted by a clever woman who has had many
adventures than when an angel of virtue places her good name under
their protection: there is less irksome responsibility in playing
confidant to Lady Jezebel than in being guardian to the impeccable
Lucretia.
If nothing more had happened, the Princess's visit would have had
little or no importance in this story; but as things turned out, the
incident was one of the links in a chain of events which led to a
singularly unexpected and dramatic conclusion, as will before long
clearly appear.
Fate often behaves like a big old lion, when he opens his sleepy eyes
and catches a first sight of you as he lies alone, far out on the
plain. He lifts his tawny head and gazes at you quietly for several
seconds and then lowers it as if not caring what you do. You creep
nearer, cautiously, noiselessly, and holding your breath, till some
faint noise you make rouses his attention again and he takes another
look at you, longer this time and much less lazy, while you stand
motionless. Nevertheless, you are only a man, and not worth killing;
if he is an old lion, he may have eaten a score like you, white and
black, but he is not hungry just now and wants to sleep. Down goes his
head again, and his eyes shut themselves for another nap. On you go,
stealthily, nearer and nearer, your rifle ready in both hands. But a
dry stalk of grass cracks under your foot, and almost before you can
stand still he is up and glaring at you, his long tufted tail showing
upright against the sky. If you move, even to lift your gun to your
shoulder, he will charge; and sooner or later, move you must. Then,
suddenly, he is bounding forward, by leap after leap, hurling his huge
strength through the air, straight at you, and as the distance lessens
you see his burning eyes with frightful distinctness. Two more such
bounds as the last will do it. Take care, for within ten seconds
either you or he will be dead. There is no other end possible.
Fate does not always kill, it is true; but you have not that one
chance against her which your weapon gives you against the lion, and
she may maul you badly before she has done with you, even worse than
the biggest cat would.
It was not Ugo Severi's fate that was waking, and that began to look
towards Monteverde when Princess Chiaromonte paid him a visit. It was
not even the Princess's own.
When she was gone, he went back to his history of Confucianism, and
Pica got into his grey linen fatigue suit again, and carefully brushed
his smart uniform before folding it and putting it away in the chest.
Then he washed the tea-things, rubbed the two silver spoons with a
special leather he kept for them, and shut up everything in the
cupboard. After that, he opened the front door and sat down on the
brick seat that ran along the front of the house. He would have liked
to smoke a pipe, but Captain Ugo was very particular about that, so he
took out half of a villainous-looking 'napoletano' cigar, bit off
three-quarters of an inch of it, and returned the small remainder to
his pocket; and after a few minutes he concluded, as usual, that a
chew was far cheaper than a smoke and lasted much longer.
As the sun sank he looked across the yellow river towards Saint
Paul's, and because he had been bred in sight of the sea it struck him
that the distant belfry tower was very like a lighthouse, and he
smiled at the thought, which has occurred to men of more cultivation
than he had.
His eyes wandered to his left, and the sunset glow was on the low city
walls, not a mile away, reddening the upper story of an ancient
convent beyond. His sharp eyes counted the windows mechanically, and
one of them belonged to the cell of Sister Giovanna, the Dominican
nun, though he did not know it; and much less did he guess that before
very long he himself, and his master, and the fine lady who had come
in a motor that afternoon, were all to play their parts in the nun's
life. If he had known that, he would have tried to guess which window
was hers.
The first bitter tang of the vile tobacco was gone out of it, and Pica
thoughtfully rolled the quid over his tongue to the other side of his
mouth. At that moment he was aware of a man in a little brown hat and
shabby clothes who must have come round the house very quietly, from
the direction of the magazine, for he was already standing still near
the corner, looking at him.
'What do you want?' Pica asked rather sharply.
The man looked like a bad character, but raised his hat as he answered
with a North Italian accent.
'I am a stranger,' he said. 'Can you tell me how to reach the nearest
gate?'
'There is the road,' the soldier replied, pointing to it, 'and there
is Rome, and the nearest gate is Porta Portese.'
'Thank you,' the man said, and went on his way.