*CHAPTER XVIII*
That same evening had witnessed, in the dower Casa Caprona, the abortivefinish to a venture long contemplated by its mistress, and at length, ina moment of desperation, dared. She had wrought herself, or beenwrought at this last, into privately communicating to the little SaintMagistrate of Milan, how she had certain information where the ring lay,which if he would learn, he must follow the messenger to her house. Shehad claimed his utmost confidence and secrecy, and, on thatunderstanding alone, had procured herself an interview. And Bernardohad come, and he had gone--how, her tumbled hair, her self-bruisedbosom, her abandonment to the utter shame and fury of her defeat, wereeloquent witnesses.
She had not been able to realise her own impotence to disarm anantagonist already half-demoralised, as she believed this one to be.For, before ever she had precipitated this end, gossip had been busywhispering to her how the saint was beginning to melt in the sun ofadulation, to confess the man in the angel, to inform with a more thanfilial devotion his attitude towards Bona. To have to cherish yet hatethat thought had been her torture; to anticipate its consummation herfrenzy. She had known him first; he was hers by right. Long wasting inthe passion of her desire, she had conceived of its fruition a savourout of all proportion with her experiences. She must conquer him ordie. He was hers, not Bona's.
She had disciplined herself, in order to propitiate his prejudices, intothe enduring of a decent period of retirement. It must end at last.She never knew when Ludovico might exact from her that security, held byher conditionally only, against her ruin by him. For the present indeedshe retained the ring, but any moment might see it claimed from her.Now, if she could only once lure, and overcome by its means, the objectof her passion, the question of its restoration to, or use by anotheragainst, its owner, must necessarily cease of being an acute one witheither her or Bernardo.
With him, at least--with him, at least. And as for herself?
Turning where she lay, she had seen her own insolent smile reflectedfrom a mirror.
'He said,' she had whispered, pondering some words of Ludovico's, '_Moreimpossible things might happen_.'
Then, taking the ring from her bosom, and apostrophising its greensparkle softly:--
'A little star--a little bribe, to win me both love and a throne!' shehad said, and so had sunk back, closing her eyes, and murmuring:--
'Let it only prove its power here, and it and the heads of thatconspiracy shall be all Ludovico's. He will not claim the latter, Ithink, until their purpose is accomplished. And then----'
And then Messer Ludovico himself had been announced. He visited her notinfrequently in these days, though never, it seemed, with any purpose offoreclosing on that little mortgage of the ring. He came in the fashionof a confidential gossip, to enlighten her as to the doings of the worldoutside. They were very pleasant and intimate together, with a hint, nomore, of closer relations to come. The lion rolled in a silken net, andaffected his subjugation, as the lady affected not to notice thestealthy claws of her capture. It was a pretty little comedy, whichengaged the sympathies of both, each according to its temperament. Butit ended in tragedy.
Ludovico had, indeed, no interest in dissuading his beautiful gossip'smind from its tormenting suspicions as to the Messer Saint's gradualcorruption by Bona; a scandal to which, no doubt--the wish in him beingfather to the thought--he himself gave ready credence. The reportsuited him in every way, both as to his policy and its instruments; andhe only awaited its certain substantiation to let fly the bolt which wasto involve three fortunes in one ruin--under warrant of the ring, ifpossible, but timely in any event.
And in the meanwhile it afforded him, whether from jealousy or pure loveof mischief, some wicked gratification to nip and sting this alreadytormented lady in sensitive places, and to do it all under anaffectation of the softest sympathy.
Yet, while for his own purpose he hugged and fostered the slander, whosegrowth and justification he most desired, the slander itself, for someinexplicable reason, did not grow, but even began to exhibit signs, fora time almost imperceptible, of attenuating. Ludovico could notacknowledge this fact to himself, or even consider it. It is difficult,no doubt, while we are calculating our probable gains, to admit thepossibility of a blight in the harvest of our hopes. A fervid prospectblinds us to the road between; and this prince, for all his far-seeing,because of it rather, may have been less open to immediate impressionsthan some others about him.
Yet to souls less acute, there _were_ the signs: the first little shadowof a smut on the ear--a hitch, just the faintest, in the ecstaticprogramme of Nature. Was it that Tassino, the mean worldling, was atrue prophet of his parts, and that the reaction from a starvedcontinence was already actually threatening? Whispers there certainlywere of a growing impatience of restrictions in the castello; of schismsfrom the pure creed of its little priest; of hankerings, even on thepart of the highest, after the old fleshpots. They rose, and died down,and rose again. There was no melting a certain snow-child, it was said,into anything but ice water. The Duchess, who had somehow expected togather flowers from frost, went about white and smiling, and chafing herhands as if they were numb. She had once stopped before a new youngcourtier, who bore some resemblance to a past favourite, and, whilespeaking to him kindly, had been seen to flush as though her cheeks hadcaught the sudden warmth of a distant fire. Madam Caterina, it wascertain, waxing bold in impishness, had commisserated her mother on thebad cold she had caught. 'Madre mia,' she had said, 'you have wanderedtoo much in the chill woods, and would be the better for a hot brick toyour bed.'
For such tittle-tattle was this after season of the sowing responsible,when, against all expectations, tares began to appear amidst the crops.Messer Ludovico, for his part, would recognise no sinister note in thelaughter. It was just the rocking and babbling of empty vessels. Itsjustification in fact would not have suited his book at all; and so hecontinued in confidence to plant his little shafts in madam's rawplaces.
Monna Cat'rina, he had told her on the occasion of this particularvisit, had been very saucy to her mother the evening before, advisingher, this cold weather, to make herself a coverlet of angel down.'Whereat,' said he, 'Madam our Duchess slapped the chit's pink knuckles,answering, "Shall I wish him, then, to die of cold for me?" to whichCatherine replied: "No; for to die of love is not to die of cold"'; andthe other had blushed and laughed, and turned away.
And it had been this sting, thrust into the place of a longinflammation, which had finally goaded Beatrice into writing and sendingher letter.
VENUS AND ADONIS
The days were beginning to darken early. It was the season when exoticflowers of passion luxuriate under glass, in that close coverture whichis the very opposite to the law's understanding of the term.
Beatrice, like all tropical things, loved this time; basked in the glowof tapers; hugged her own warm sweetness in the confidence of asanctuary for ever besieged by, and for ever impervious to, the forcesof cold and gloom. To fancy herself the desired of night, unattainablethrough all its storming, was a commanding ecstasy. She liked to hearthe hail on the roof, trampling and threshing for an opening, andflinging away baffled. The muffled slam of the thunder was her lullaby;while the candles shivered in it, she closed her eyes and dreamed. Thethought of wrenched clouds, of crying human shapes, of torn beasts andbirds sobbing and circling without the closed curtains of her shrine,served her imagination like a hymn. She measured her content againstthe strength of such hopeless appeals, like a very nun of incontinence,shut from the rigour of the world within the scented oratory of her ownworship. She was Venus Anno Domini, the Paphian goddess yetundethroned, and yet justified of her influence over man and Nature.
'_About her carven palace walls a thousand blossoming lilies brake;_ _Within, a thousand years of love had wrought, for utter beauty's sake,_ _Triumphs of art for her blue eyes, and for her feet rich
stained floors,_ _And ever in her ears sweet moan of music down dim corridors?_
Agapemone was her temple, and its inmost chamber her shrine. Here,under stained glass windows, ran a frieze in relievo of warmterra-cotta, thronged with little goat-faced satyrs pursuing nymphsthrough groves of pregnant vines. Here, supporting the frieze, werepilasters of blood-red porphyry, which burst high up into fronds ofgold; while, screening the interspaces on the walls, were panels ofglowing tapestry relating the legend of Adonis, from his first buddingon the enchanted tree to his final shrouding under the winter of love'sgrief. Here, also, the faces of dead Capronas, past lords of this HouseBeautiful, winked and gloated out of shadowy corners, whenever a log,toppling over on the hearth, sent up a shower of sparks. Prominent inone place was a tall massive clock, copper and brass, a_chef-d'[oe]uvre_ of Dondi the horologist, which thudded the hoursmelodiously, like a chime of distant bells, and made the swooning sensesin love with time. Couches there were everywhere, soft and wooing tothe soul of languor; thick rugs and skins upon the marble floor; tableswith clawed legs, of chalcedony or jasper, on which were scattered inlovely wantonness a hundred toys of Elysium. Lutes, sweets, and gobletsof rich repousse; wine in green flasks, and delicate long-stemmedglasses; an ivory and silver crucifix, half-hidden under a pile ofraisins; two love-birds in a gilded cage, and a golden salver containingan aspic of larks' tongues, tilted upon a volume of some French Romaunttouching the knightly adventures of Messer Roland a troubadour--theseand their like, varied or repeated, returned, in a thousandfold interestof colour and sparkle, the soft investment of the tapers--enough, butnot too many--in their beauty. One velvet cloth had been swept from itsplace, spilling upon a rug, where it sprawled unregarded, its costlyburden of a begemmed chalice, a pair of perfumed gloves, and anilluminated volume of sonnets in a jewelled cover, dedicated to thegoddess herself, and celebrating, in letters of gold and silver onvellum, her incomparable seductions. She had pulled them over, nodoubt, when she reached for the orange which now, untasted, filled herhand, soft and covetous as a child's.
The warmth and drowsy stillness of the room penetrated her as she layholding it. Gradually her lids closed, her bare arm drooped from itssleeve, and the orange rolled on the floor. Her thoughts andexpectations had been already busy for an hour with, 'Will he come?Will he come? Will he come?' It had been like counting sheep trottingthrough a hedge--one, two, three, four--up to a hundred--and now herdrugged brain confused the tally, and she seemed to herself to swerveall in a moment into a luminous mist.
He entered like a pale scented flower into her dream--a soft and shapelything, melting into its ecstasy, fulfilling its enchantment. She heldhim, and whispered to him: 'The hour, sweet love! Is it mine atlast?'--and, so murmuring, stirred and opened her eyes.
He was there, close by her, looking down upon her as she lay. How palewas his face, and how wistful. His walk through the icy dark had butjust tinted it, as when November flaws blow the snow from the rose'sdead cheek. He looked dispirited and tired. The childlike pathos ofhis eyes moved her heart-strings no less than did the red, combativeswelling of his lips. She longed to master him in order to be mastered.Her hedonism's highest moral attainment was always in pleasing herselfby surrendering herself to the pleasure of another; and how, knowingherself, could she doubt the irresistible persuasiveness of her faith?
She did not speak for a little, the wine of slumber in her brainemboldening her in the meanwhile to dare this vision with her beauty, toseek her response in its eyes. Her cheeks, her half-closed lids, were,like a baby's, flushed with sleep. Suddenly she stirred, and, smilingand murmuring, held out white arms to it:--
'The hour thou sang'st to me! Bernardo, hast thou come to make thatmine?'
He stood as if stricken--white, dumfoundered. She stretched hershoulders a little, and, raising her hands, put their rosy knuckles toher eyes; and so relaxed all, and drooped.
'I was dreaming,' she murmured. 'I thought thou camest to me and said:"Beatrice, I will forego that heaven for thy sake. Give me the hour, tokiss and shame." She stole a glance at him, and dropped her claspedhands to her lap, and hung her head. 'And I answered,' she whispered,'"Take it, and make one woman happy."'
He gave a little cry. And then, suddenly, before he could move orspeak, she had sat up swiftly, and whipped her arms about his neck, andpulled him to the couch beside her.
'Listen,' she urged--'nay, thou shalt not go. I hold thy weakness in avice. Struggle, and I will tighten it. Listen, child, while I tell theea child's tale. It is about a huntsman that followed a voice; and hepushed into a thicket, and lo! enchantment seized him beyond. And hewhispered amazed, "What is this?" and the voice answered, "Love--the endto all thy hunting." O! little huntsman of Nature, be content. Thouhast traced the voice of thy long longing to its home.'
She repaid his struggles with kisses, his wild protests with honeyedwords. He set his pretty teeth at her, and she pouted her mouth tothem; he hurled insult at her head, and she bore the sweet ache of itfor the sake of the lips that bruised. When he desisted, exhausted, shewould get in her soft pleas, rebuking him with a tearful meekness:--
'Ay, scourge me, set thy teeth in me, only hate me not. Shalt find mebut the tenderer, being whipped. Talk on of Nature. Is it not naturalto want to be loved; and, for a woman, in a woman's way?'
'Forbear!--O, wicked! O, thou harlot!' he panted, still fighting withher.
'Lie still! So a sick infant quarrels with its food,' she answered. 'Olove--dear love, will you not hear reason?'
'Reason!' he stormed. 'O, thou siren! to beguile me here on that lyingpretext, and thus shame me for my trust!'
'No lie,' she pleaded. 'Thou shalt have the ring indeed.'
'At thy price? I will die first.'
'Bernardo!'
'_Thou_ to talk of natural love! False to it; false to thy lord; falseeven to thy stained bed! Unhand me! Why, I loathe thee.'
'Not yet.'
Her eyes were hot waters, all misted over with passion. 'Thou canst notindeed, so pitiful to the worst. I cry to thee in my need. I knew theefirst. Bernardo! will you forsake your friend?'
'Friend!'
'Ay. Only tell me what you would do with the ring?'
'What but return it to her that trusted me with it,'
'And for what reward?--Nay, strive not.'
'My conscience's peace--just that. Unclasp thy hands.'
'See there! Her gratitude would kill it in thee for ever. As would behers to thee, so be thine to me. Art thou for a fall? Fall soft, then,on my love. She will not let thee down so kindly, who hath a lord andduchy to consider.'
He made a supreme effort--her robe tore in his hand--and, breaking fromher, stood panting and disordered. She made no effort to recapture him,but, flinging herself to abandonment, sobbed and sighed.
'O, I am undone! Wilt thou forsake me? Kill me first! Nay, I will notlet thee go!'
She sprang to her feet. He leapt away from her.
'Beast!' he cried, 'that foulest our garden! I will have thee whippedout of Milan with a bow-string.'
Scorn and hatred flashed into her face. She was no longer Venus, butAshtoreth, the goddess of unclean frenzy.
'Thou wilt?' she hissed. 'I thank thee for that warning. Go, sir, andclaim thy doxy to thy vengeance. She will leap, I promise thee, to thatchance. Only, wouldst thou view the sport'--she struck her naked bosomrelentlessly--'by this I advise thee--O, I advise thee like alover!--hide well in her skirts--hide well. They will need to be thickand close to screen thee from a woman scorned. Wilt thou not go? Ihave the ring, I tell thee--_I_, myself, no other. Let her know.She'll bid thee pay the price perchance--too late. A fatal ring tothee. Why art thou lingering? I would not spare thee now, though thouknelt'st and prayed to me with tears of blood.'
She stood up rigid, her hands clenched, as, without another word,Bernardo turned, and, stalking with high head and glittering eyes,passed out of the room.
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br /> But, the moment the door had closed upon him, she flung herself facedownwards on the couch, writhing and choking and clutching at herthroat.
'I must kill him,' she moaned; 'I must kill my love!'
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