"Does your reverence really think that the princess will reconsider my dismissal?" asked Sor Beppe, as Don Agostino did not speak. "You can understand," he continued, "that it is a hard thing for me. I am not an old man, that is true; but I am too old to be transplanted. Besides, we Fontana have served Casa Acorari for four generations or more, and it is a bitter thing to be turned away by a foreign woman and an imbroglione of a priest."
Don Agostino nodded sympathetically. "It is a hard thing, certainly," he replied, "and it is also, so far as I can see, an unjust thing. As to whether the princess will reconsider the matter, that I cannot tell you. You must remember that, as I think I have told you before, I have never seen the princess. But her rule will not last forever; and when Donna Bianca has the management of her own affairs, things may be very different. She is not a foreigner, and is not at all likely to be influenced by priests, I should say. Probably she will reward those who have been loyal to her, and her own people will come before strangers, unless I am very much mistaken."
Sor Beppe looked at him shrewdly. "I thought you said you did not know the principessina?" he said.
"Neither do I," answered Don Agostino, "but I know something about her."
"Perhaps you know her lover – oh, I do not mean that Belgian goat, but the other one?"
"Yes – I know him."
"Ah! And he is worthy of the principessina?"
"I feel convinced that he is thoroughly worthy."
"Then what is the objection? He has no money, perhaps?"
"He is not noble."
"Diamine! and what does that matter if he is worthy in other ways? I do not suppose he is a contadino."
"No," replied Don Agostino, smiling, "he is an engineer, and some day he will be a great man, I believe. His father is a great man already, the famous Senator Rossano. You have perhaps heard of him?"
"Altro! So it is he whom the principessina is in love with! Well, reverendo, is it not better than marrying that old baron with ink-pots under his eyes?"
Don Agostino laughed. "Certainly!" he replied. "But the baron and the Abbé Roux think otherwise. That is the difficulty; and what they think, the princess thinks."
"Si capisce!"
"Signor Fontana," said Don Agostino, suddenly, "you said just now that you would do anything for Donna Bianca. Were you in earnest?"
"And why not, reverendo?"
"Bene! You have the opportunity of proving your loyalty."
He rose from his chair, and, taking Silvio's packet from the writing-table, placed it in Sor Beppe's hands. "I have promised Signor Rossano, Donna Bianca's affianced husband, that this should reach her without delay. She has been waiting for it for weeks. Will you undertake that it shall be given into her hands, and into her hands only?"
Sor Beppe's eyes flashed. "I swear it!" he said. "Concetta shall give it to her this very night."
"Concetta? But is she to be trusted?"
"As much as I am to be trusted, reverendo. Concetta would do anything to serve the principessina. You need not be afraid. Donna Bianca shall have her lover's letter this very night. You can guess how?"
"Of course. But will she not be terrified at seeing your daughter enter her room in such a manner? Remember that the princess sleeps next door to her."
"Concetta will know what to do," returned Sor Beppe.
"Good. But there must be no failure – no risk of the packet falling into other hands, or its delivery being suspected."
"There will be none."
Don Agostino held out his hand. "You will not regret what you have undertaken," he said, "and you may be sure that the principessina will not forget it, either. We must save her from a great unhappiness, my friend, and perhaps from, worse than that. Now, I must be inhospitable and ask you to go; for it is late, and you have to arrange matters with Concetta, who by this time is probably asleep. Who knows what led you to visit me this evening? I had been turning over in my mind every means I could imagine to insure that packet reaching Donna Bianca safely. It is certainly very strange."
Sor Beppe buttoned up the little parcel securely in the corner pocket of his coat. "To-morrow I will come again," he said, "and who knows that I shall not bring with me an acknowledgment from the principessina that she has received the packet safely? Then you can write to her lover and tell him so. All the same, if I were that young man, I would come to Montefiano and take Donna Bianca away with me – even if I had to slit the throats of the baron and the Abbé Roux in the doing of it." And muttering a string of expletives under his breath, Sor Beppe passed out into the garden. Don Agostino let him out through the door, opening to the piazza in front of the church; and then, after standing for a few moments to watch his tall figure striding away down the white road towards the castle, he went slowly back into his house, bidding Ernana, whose curiosity as to Sor Beppe's visit had brought her out to the threshold, lock up the door and go to bed.
XXIV
Monsieur d'Antin's visit to Rome was not of long duration. He returned to Montefiano two days after the evening when he had dined at the Castello di Costantino, in close proximity to Professor Rossano and his little party. That evening had certainly been an entertaining one to him, for many reasons. He had, of course, instantly recognized Silvio and Giacinta Rossano, while his host and companion, Peretti, had as quickly identified the professor. Except for the brief glimpse Monsieur d'Antin had caught of Silvio on the staircase of Palazzo Acorari, he had never had an opportunity of watching him with any attention; yet the boy's form and features were well impressed on his memory, and he would in any case have known he must be Giacinta Rossano's brother by the strong likeness existing between the two.
It had been his ill-disguised interest in him, and the marked manner in which he stared, that had nearly provoked Silvio into openly resenting this liberty on the part of a stranger; and probably Monsieur d'Antin had very little idea that he had narrowly escaped bringing about a scene which he might afterwards have had cause to regret. His glance and attitude had been so insolent, indeed, that for a moment or two Silvio had wondered whether he did not intend to provoke a public quarrel, which could have had but one result – a meeting with pistols or swords in some secluded villa garden, where the police were not likely to interfere. Had Giacinta, confident from her brother's face that a storm was brewing, and knowing that though storms were rare with Silvio they were apt to be violent if they burst, not taken Monsieur Lelli's advice and hurried him and her father away from the terrace, there was no saying what complication might not have arisen still further to increase the difficulties of the general situation.
As a matter of fact, Monsieur d'Antin's vanity had received a violent shock. He had known that Silvio Rossano was extremely good-looking, for he had gathered as much when he had seen him ascending the staircase at Palazzo Acorari. But he had not realized it as fully as he did that evening at the Castello di Costantino. The discovery annoyed him exceedingly, for obvious reasons. He had, up to that moment, felt no particular personal antipathy towards a presumptuous young man of the bourgeois class, who had ventured to consider himself a fitting husband for Bianca Acorari. On the contrary, Monsieur d'Antin had felt most grateful to him for having, by his presumption and want of knowledge of the ways of good society, placed Bianca in an equivocal position, and at the mercy of anybody who might choose to set a scandal abroad concerning her.
But that night, as he looked across the restaurant at the table where Silvio was sitting, he hated him for his youth, for his tall, well-knit form, for his good-looking face; and perhaps, more than all, for a certain indefinable air of high-breeding and easy grace, which Monsieur d'Antin angrily told himself a person of the middle class had no right to possess. Nothing escaped him. He watched Silvio's manner, his mode of eating and drinking, his dress, everything, in short, which could betray the cloven hoof he was longing to discover. He could overhear, too, snatches of the conversation from Professor Rossano's table, and he was disagreeably surprised by what he heard. There was none of the loud, vulgar intonation of the voices usually the accompaniment of any gathering together of Romans of the middle and lower orders, and none of the two eternal topics of conversation – food and money – from which the Roman of the middle classes can with difficulty be persuaded to tear himself away.
Monsieur d'Antin could not but confess that, so far, at any rate, as appearance and manner were concerned, Silvio was a great deal more of a gentleman than very many of the young men of rank and fashion he was accustomed to meet in the drawing-rooms of la haute societé in Rome; and that he had another advantage that these, as a rule, did not possess – he looked intelligent and manly.
The reflection was not pleasing. He would have far preferred to be able to detect some trace of vulgarity in Bianca's presumptuous lover, and he could discover none. He was disagreeably conscious, too, of his own disadvantages as he looked at Silvio – of his years, of his figure, and of other details beside these.
But if the Rossano family, and especially Silvio, had occupied his attention and interest that evening, Monsieur d'Antin had been hardly less concerned with the personality of Monsignor Lelli. His companion had immediately detected the latter's presence and had pointed him out, at the same time rapidly explaining who he was and his past history at the Vatican.
The commendatore– he was commendatore of the papal Order of St. Gregory – made it his business to know as much as he could find out about everybody in Rome, and his information – when it happened to be of sufficient interest, personal, political, or religious – having been for some time placed at the disposal of his patron at the Vatican, the cardinal secretary of state, had been duly paid for by the bestowal of a clerical order of chivalry. It was rumored that he had been the instrument of making more than one wealthy English and American convert to Catholicism among the fair sex; which, as he was not ill-looking, and occupied some of his spare time by giving Italian lessons in eligible quarters, was not improbable. At any rate, the commendatore knew all about Monsignor Lelli and the history of his falling into disgrace at the Vatican, though he was very careful only to give Monsieur d'Antin the official version of the affair. The story did not interest Monsieur d'Antin very much. Moreover, as it turned upon political and financial matters, in which clerics and their money were concerned, he did not believe more than a very small proportion of what he was told. What interested him far more, was the fact that Monsignor Lelli had been sent to work out his repentance at Montefiano; and that he was undoubtedly on intimate terms with the Rossano family.
The departure from the restaurant of the Rossanos and the priest had not escaped the quick eye of the commendatore.
"He does not want it known that he is in Rome," he had whispered to Monsieur d'Antin, as Don Agostino disappeared from the terrace.
Monsieur d'Antin did not reply. He thought it far more probable that Monsignor Lelli did not wish to be seen in Silvio's society by anybody connected with the Montefiano household. He kept his own counsel, however, and allowed his companion to think that it was his appearance on the scene that had frightened the priest away. The time had not yet arrived for letting the outside world into the secret of Bianca Acorari's indiscretion.
"I shall certainly let them know at the Vatican that Lelli is in Rome," Peretti said to Monsieur d'Antin. "Who knows why he is here, instead of attending to his duties at Montefiano? I am almost sure it was to Montefiano he was sent, but I will make certain to-morrow, when I shall see the cardinal."
"Why did they choose Montefiano?" asked Monsieur d'Antin. "It is a dreary place; and whenever I have driven through the town, I have seen nothing but pigs and old women – very ugly old women."
Peretti laughed. "That is why he was sent there," he replied. "The Holy Father concluded that he was better fitted to deal with pigs and old women than with finance."
"How long will he be kept there?"
The other lifted his eyebrows. "Mah!" he said. "Who knows?"
It had not suited Monsieur d'Antin's purpose to discuss Monsignor Lelli any further with the host that evening. He reflected that whatever Peretti might know about him, the Abbé Roux would know also, and possibly considerably more. He wondered that the abbé had never mentioned the fact that the parish priest at Montefiano had once been a member of the papal court, or alluded to him in any way. It did not surprise him that Monsignor Lelli should never have presented himself at the castle, for he quite understood that the Abbé Roux would not allow any opportunity of poaching over his ground on the part of a brother cleric. Besides, there was a chapel in the castle, and mass, and the Abbé Roux said the mass; at which latter thought Monsieur d'Antin smiled, as if it afforded him some amusement.
And so he returned, the next day but one, to Montefiano, resolved to lose no time in acquainting the Abbé Roux with the news that he had seen Monsignor Lelli dining at a Roman restaurant in the company of the Rossano family, and apparently on terms of intimate friendship both with the Senator Rossano and with his son. There could be no kind of doubt that this intimacy, so providentially discovered, might seriously compromise the ultimate success of the scheme which had been so carefully devised for compelling Bianca to give up all thoughts of young Rossano, and accept what was offered to her in the place of his presumptuous attachment. Nothing but a separation from her lover, which should be complete in every detail, could accomplish this object; and if Silvio Rossano had a friend at Montefiano, and that friend the parroco, there could be no saying what means might not be resorted to for the purpose of establishing the very communications between him and Bianca which it was so imperative to render absolutely impracticable.
It was nearly mid-day before Monsieur d'Antin, who had taken the early morning train from Rome to Attigliano, arrived at Montefiano, and he had barely time to wash, and change his dusty clothes, before joining his sister at breakfast. A glance at the princess's face showed him that something had certainly occurred during his absence to upset her. The Abbé Roux, who was also at the table, looked both preoccupied and cross. Only Bianca appeared serene, and, to Monsieur d'Antin's surprise, altogether contented. There was a light in her eyes and an expression of scarcely suppressed happiness on her face that he never remembered to have seen there, certainly not since he had been at Montefiano. It reminded him of the look she had worn on the afternoon of his visit to the Villa Acorari, when he had found her alone in the Marble Hall, fresh from her stolen interview with her lover.
Expression and demeanor changed, however, as Monsieur d'Antin greeted Bianca with an airy compliment on her appearance. His salutation was scarcely replied to, and every subsequent attempt to draw her into conversation failed ignominiously. The meal was decidedly not a cheerful one, and it had scarcely concluded when Bianca got up from her chair, and, making a slight courtesy to her step-mother, left the room without a word. The Abbé Roux lifted his eyes to the ceiling with a sigh, and the princess looked pained and uncomfortable. The men-servants were already bringing in the coffee, and Monsieur d'Antin was constrained to wait until they had served and retired before seeking for an explanation of the state of the social atmosphere in which he found himself.
The princess drank a few mouthfuls of her coffee, and left the table almost as soon as the door had closed upon the servants.
"If you will excuse me, Philippe," she said to her brother, "I am going to my room. I am nervous – unwell. That unhappy child – " Her voice trembled, and it was evident that Princess Montefiano was very near to tears. "Monsieur l'Abbé will explain to you," she continued; "he is entirely in my confidence. You can talk together over your cigars, and we will meet afterwards, when I am calmer."
She left the room hastily, and Monsieur d'Antin looked across the table to the abbé.
"Que diable!" he exclaimed. "Might one ask what has happened?"
The Abbé Roux cleared his throat. "Let us go into the next room," he said. "We can talk quietly there without being overheard by the servants" – and he led the way into the apartment specially devoted to his use.
"Ah, my dear monsieur," he said, as soon as they had shut the double doors behind them, "it is not to be wondered at if Madame la Princesse is upset! Since you have been away, Donna Bianca has made a scene – a veritable scene, you understand. It appears that she has asserted her fixed determination to marry this impossible young man, and has announced that she will wait till she is her own mistress, if – "
"If what?" asked Monsieur d'Antin, as he paused.
"Parbleu! If her lover does not choose that she should marry him before – the religious marriage, of course."
Monsieur d'Antin lit a cigarette.
"A girl's enthusiasm," he observed. "It will pass."
The abbé glanced at him. "I think not," he replied. "I have known Donna Bianca since she was a child. When she has made up her mind to do or not to do a thing, it is not easy to make her alter it. She is undisciplined – completely undisciplined," he added, almost angrily.
"No doubt. It is all the more reason that she should learn what discipline means. She will make a better wife for knowing it," and Monsieur d'Antin chuckled softly.
"Ah, as to that, monsieur, there can be, I suppose, no question. But what I have already told you is not all. The princess, perhaps, would not have taken Donna Bianca's refusal to submit her will to the direction of those who are her lawful guardians so deeply to heart, if that had been all. She would have trusted to time and – and to Donna Bianca's conscience, to make her step-daughter see reason and realize that obedience is the first of all duties."
Monsieur d'Antin fidgeted uneasily in his chair. "I think, Monsieur l'Abbé," he said, dryly, "that you and I can afford to dispense with moralities, can we not?"
The abbé looked angry for an instant. Then he smiled. "Perhaps," he replied. "After all, we have to regard Donna Bianca's position from a business point of view."
"Precisely, my dear friend, from a business point of view. Let us confine it to that, if you please. Let us assume, for example, that you are – a layman. It will simplify matters very much."
The abbé looked at him suspiciously, and his black eyebrows contracted disagreeably. He was never quite sure whether he were managing Monsieur d'Antin or whether Monsieur d'Antin were managing him.
"It would appear," he observed, presently, "from what Donna Bianca has said to Madame la Princesse, that you have introduced – what shall I say! – a little too much sentiment into your business point of view."
Monsieur d'Antin smiled complacently.
"What would you have, my dear abbé?" he replied. "You know my little secret. If I remember rightly, I confessed to you, and you gave me absolution – is it not so? Yes. I admit that I have perhaps been a little indiscreet, a little premature. But one cannot always control one's feelings. The soutane is one thing, and the pantalons are another. You must make allowance for those who do not wear the soutane."
"The question is," said the Abbé Roux, a little irritably, "that Donna Bianca will have none of it."
"None of which, my dear friend?" asked Monsieur d'Antin, imperturbably. "Of the soutane, or – "
The abbé laughed in spite of himself. "You have frightened her," he said. "She understands; and she has told the princess – oh, told her very plainly! It was a mistake. You should have waited – a month – six months. Moreover, she has found out that it was you who saw her and young Rossano together at the Villa Acorari; and now she feels that you have deceived her throughout the whole business. She will never forgive that. It would have been better to have told her that it was through you the affair became known, that you had felt bound to warn Madame la Princesse of what you believed to be a great peril threatening her step-daughter. Now, Donna Bianca has said that even if she is kept here for three years it will make no difference; that she will not be made love to by you; and that you are a liar and a coward."
Monsieur d'Antin started up from his chair.
"Monsieur l'Abbé!" he exclaimed, furiously.
"Oh, I am quoting Donna Bianca's words. You cannot be surprised that madame your sister should be upset. It is now three days ago – that little scene – and the girl has scarcely spoken a word to the princess since. She is hard – hard as a piece of stone when she chooses to be so. Now, I ask you, what is to be done? She will wait three years, six years, if necessary, or she will find some means of running away with her lover – who knows? But she will never allow you to approach her, Monsieur le Baron; of that I am convinced."
Monsieur d'Antin swore, softly. "She must give way!" he exclaimed. "It is a mere question of time. The girl has a spirit, that I do not deny, but it can be broken. Bah! it is not worth while de se faire de la bîle about a girl's sentimental passion for a good-looking young man who has once kissed her, and whom she will never see again. We have only to remain firm, and all will turn out as we propose. It will take time, perhaps, but from a business point of view – always from a business point of view, my dear Monsieur l'Abbé – time is exactly what we wish to gain, is it not? I admit that, from the other point of view – mine, you understand – delay is not so satisfactory."
The abbé looked up quickly. "Ah, certainly," he said, eagerly, "you are perfectly right; to gain time is everything! And if Donna Bianca does not mind waiting for her lover, well, from a business point of view, delay will be very advantageous."
Monsieur d'Antin lit another cigarette.
"To you," he said, quietly. "To you, dear Monsieur l'Abbé; but, as I said before, to me not quite so much so. There is my part of the bargain to be considered, is there not? And if I am not to marry Donna Bianca Acorari, I confess that I do not particularly care whether she marries young Rossano or goes into a convent. All the same, I do not imagine that she will go into a convent."
Monsieur d'Antin paused, and looked steadily at his companion. His voice and manner were suaveness itself; nevertheless, the abbé was conscious that his words implied something very like a threat.
"Of course," he replied, "there is your part of the question to be considered. I do not forget it. But what you want is not so easy to obtain. I fear that Donna Bianca, even were she finally to renounce all hopes of Rossano, would never be induced to listen to your proposal to take his place. Besides, I very much doubt if Madame la Princesse would go so far as to attempt to force upon her step-daughter an alliance apparently so distasteful to her. No, Monsieur le Baron, I speak frankly. Donna Bianca's sudden assertion of the course she intends to adopt has materially altered the situation. Who has any influence over her? Certainly not the princess, certainly not myself, to whom she never addresses a word if she can avoid doing so. The only person who, until recently, seemed to have gained her confidence, was yourself. What has caused her to declare, as she has declared, that she will not allow you to approach her, you must know better than I. In the mean time, the field is as clear to you as it was before, and we will hope that this little outburst on the part of Donna Bianca may not be of much importance. At least, you must admit that I have done my best to further your object. You owe it entirely to me if the princess, against her own inclinations, was persuaded to countenance that object."
"But, my dear Monsieur l'Abbé," returned Monsieur d'Antin, airily, "I fully realize the efforts you have made on my behalf. Why not? As to Donna Bianca having taken me en grippe, well, I assure you that I rather enjoy it. I like a woman to show some fight. I shall do my best to remove the bad impression I have made. Apparently, she enjoys it also. I never saw her look so animated as she did to-day. The little scene with my sister, that you tell me of, must have acted as a tonic – and no doubt she will be the better for it, and more amenable to reason. Do not let us talk any more about it for the present. Apropos, how do your little matters of business progress? I think you told me before I left that my sister had some trouble with the agent here, and that you had advised her to dismiss him?"
The abbé frowned. "Yes," he said, curtly, "the man is dismissed, and I have another fattore ready to take his place. But there is some little difficulty. It appears that the people are angry at his dismissal. I am told it has created great ill-feeling in Montefiano. There is a meddlesome parroco here – "
"Diable!" exclaimed Monsieur d'Antin; "I had quite forgotten about him."
"What? You know him?"
"No, my dear friend, no. But I happened to see him two or three evenings ago in Rome, and in whose company do you suppose he was? You will never guess. Well, he was dining at a restaurant with Professor Rossano and his son and daughter."
The Abbé Roux gave an exclamation of surprise.
"Lelli! Dining with the Rossanos? Are you sure that it was he?"
"Absolutely sure. I was dining with Peretti – you know whom I mean? – and Peretti knew Monsignor Lelli perfectly well. He left the restaurant very soon after he saw us."
"Lelli!" repeated the Abbé Roux, with a scowl. "Yes, he is the priest at Montefiano. Peretti will have told you his story. He fell into disgrace at the Vatican – in fact, he embezzled money, and rather than have a public scandal, he was sent here to get him out of the way. What was he doing with the Rossanos?"
"Eating his dinner," replied Monsieur d'Antin, tranquilly; "at least, if you call such a thing a dinner. Ciel!what filth one eats in a Roman restaurant, even in the best of them. Oh, la, la! Yes, your parroco was dining with the Rossano family. It would appear that he is an intimate friend."
"No doubt," observed the abbé, with a sneer. "Lelli was always hand and glove with all the canaille in Rome of the literary and scientific world. He is simply a free-thinker – nothing more nor less. It does not at all surprise me that he should be a friend of Professor Rossano."
"But it is a little unfortunate that a friend of the Rossanos should be curé at Montefiano, is it not?" asked Monsieur d'Antin.
The abbé started. "Assuredly," he said. "You are right. It is a danger. For the moment I did not think of it. Yes, it might be a grave danger. Moreover, the man is mischievous. He is always siding with the peasants. Only yesterday I heard that he had declared Fontana's – the agent's – dismissal to be an injustice. We do not want men of that sort. They spoil the people and make them discontented."
"It is clear that he is very intimate with Professor Rossano and his son," returned Monsieur d'Antin, "and in his position here at Montefiano as parish priest, what is to prevent him from inducing one of the people about to deliver some letter or some message to Donna Bianca? And once she realizes that she can receive communications from the outside world, all our precautions will be useless. The knowledge that she could do so would make her more obstinate than ever in her determination not to give up young Rossano."
The abbé frowned. "Leave it to me, monsieur," he replied. "Lelli will not succeed in entering the castle of Montefiano, however much he may be the village priest. I put a stop to any idea of the kind long ago. Indeed, it was necessary to warn the princess against him. She had never heard his history, and I discovered – oh, two or three years ago – that he was getting money out of her for the poor; and, moreover, that he was always urging Fontana to appeal for a reduction in the rents. Of course, directly the princess realized that he had been sent to Montefiano in disgrace, and heard all the scandal concerning his removal from the Vatican, she ceased to allow him to interfere between the people and the administration of the estates. No, I do not think we need fear Monsignor Lelli."
"At least it will do no harm to be on our guard," insisted Monsieur d'Antin.
"Oh, as to that, of course! Moreover, should there be any cause to suspect that he was helping young Rossano, it would not be difficult to obtain his removal. There are many hill villages which are even more isolated than Montefiano – in the Abruzzi, for instance. And I do not imagine that the Holy Father cares where Lelli is, so long as he is safely out of the way until it pleases Providence to remove him altogether." And the Abbé Roux laughed harshly.
Monsieur d'Antin yawned. "I shall go to my room," he said, throwing away his cigarette and rising from his chair. "Travelling on one of these horrible Italian railways is bad enough at any time, with the dirt and the unpunctuality, but in hot weather it is doubly fatiguing. Then it appears to me, my dear friend," he added, "that notwithstanding Donna Bianca's charming display of petulancy, we remain as before. A little stricter discipline, perhaps – a little more precaution against any possible interference on the part of this monsignore, is it not so?"
"Precisely, monsieur – and patience, always patience!"
"Ah!" observed Monsieur d'Antin. "It is an admirable quality – but the exercising of it is apt to become monotonous."