Gerald Fitzgerald, the Chevalier: A Novel

by Charles James Lever

  CHAPTER XVII. A LOVER'S QUARREL

  When Gerald found himself once more in his little room at the PortaRosa, it was past midnight. He opened his window and sat down at it togaze out upon the starry sky and drink in the refreshing night air, but,more than even these, to calm down the excitement of his feelings, andendeavour to persuade himself that what he had passed through was not adream. It is not easy for those who have access to every grade they wishin life--who, perhaps, confer honour where they go--to fashion to theirminds the strange, wild conflict that raged within the youth's heart atthis moment. Little as he had seen of the great poet, he could not helpcomparing him with Gabriel, his acquaintance at the Tana. They wereboth proud, cold, stern men--strong in conscious power, self-reliant anddaring. Are all men of genius of that stamp, thought Gerald. Are theywho diffuse through existence its most elevating influences, its mostsoftening emotions--are they hard of mould and stern in character?Does the force with which they move the world require this impulse oftemperament, as rivers that traverse great continents come down, atfirst, from lofty mountains? And if it be so, is not this a heavy pricefor which to buy even fame? Then, again, he bethought him, what a noblegift to bestow must be the affection of such men--how proud must bethey who owned their love or shared their friendship! While he was thusmusing a round, warm arm clasped his neck, and Marietta sat down besidehim. She had waited hours for his return, and now stole gently to hisroom to meet him.

  'I could not sleep till I had seen you, _caro_,' said she fondly. 'Itseemed as if in these few hours years had separated us.'

  'And if they had, Marietta, they could scarcely have brought aboutanything stranger. Guess where I have been--with whom I have passed thisentire evening?'

  'How can I? Was he a prince?'

  'Greater than any prince.'

  'That must mean a king, then.'

  'Kings die, and a few lines chronicle them; but I speak of one whosememory will be graven in his language, and whose noble sentiments willbe texts to future generations. What think you of Alfieri?'

  'Alfieri!'

  'Himself. He was the Count who rescued us from the mob, and with himI have passed the hours since I saw you. Not that I ever knew norsuspected it, Marietta: if I had, I had never dared to speak as I didabout ourselves and our wayward lives in such a presence. I had feltthese themes ignoble.'

  'How so?' cried she eagerly. 'You have ever told me that art was anennobling and a glorious thing; that after those whose genius embodiedgrand conceptions, came he who gave them utterance. How often have yousaid, the poet lives but half in men's hearts whose verses have notfound some meet interpreter; with words like these have you stimulatedme to study, and now----'

  'And now,' said he, sighing drearily, 'I wake to feel what a meremockery it is:

  '"Tra l'ombra e bella L'istessa stella Che in faccia del sole Non si miro."

  Ah, _Marietta mia_, he who creates is alone an artist!'

  The girl bent her head upon her bosom, and while her long waving curlsfell loosely over him, she sobbed bitterly. Gerald clasped her closer tohis heart, but never spoke a syllable.

  'I ever thought it would be so,' murmured she at last: 'I felt thatin this sense of birth and blood you boasted of, would one day come afeeling of shame to be the companion of such as me. It is not from artitself you turn away, it is the company of the strolling actor that youshun.'

  'And who or what am I that I should do so?' said Gerald boldly. 'When,or where, have I known such happiness as with you, Marietta? Bethink youof the hours we have passed together, poring over these dear old booksthere, enriching our hearts with noble thoughts, and making the poet theinterpreter between us? Telling, too, in the fervour we spoke his lines,how tenderly we felt them; as Metastasio says:

  '"And as we lisped the verse along, Learning to love."'

  'And now it is over,' said she, with a sigh of deep despondency.

  'Why so? Shall I, in learning to know the great and the illustrious--tofeel how their own high thoughts sway and rule them--be less worthy ofyour love? The poet told me, to-night, that I declaimed his lines well;but who taught me to feel them, _Marietta mia!_' And he kissed hercheek, bathed as it was and seamed with, hot tears. Again he tried tobring back the dream of the past, and their oft-projected schemeof life; but he urged the theme no longer as of old; and even whendescribing the world they were about to fly from, his words trembledwith the emotion that swelled in his heart. In the midst of all thesewould he break off suddenly with some recollection of Alfieri, whofilled every avenue of his thoughts: his proud but graceful demeanour,his low, deep-toned voice, his smile so kind and yet so sad withal; agentleness, too, in his manner that invited confidence, seemed to dwellin Gerald's memory, and shed, as it were, a soft and pleasing light overall that had passed.

  'And I am to see him again to-morrow, Marietta,' continued he proudly;'he is to take me with him to the Galleries. I am to see the Pitti andthe Offizzi, where in the Tribune the great triumphs of Raffael areplaced, and the statue of Venus, too: he is to show me these, and theportraits of all the illustrious men who have made Italy glorious.How eager I am to know how they looked in life, and if their featuresrevealed the consciousness of the fame they were to inherit! And when Icome back at night to thee, Marietta, how full shall I be of all these,and how overjoyed if I can pour into your heart the pleasures that swellin my own! Is it not good, dearest, that I should go forth thus to bringback to you the glad tidings of so many beautiful things--will you notbe happier for _yourself_, prouder in _me_? Will it not be better tohave the love of one whose mind is daily expanding, straining to greaterefforts, growing in knowledge and gaining in cultivation? Shall I not bemore worthy of _you_ if I win praise from others? And I am resolved todo this, Marietta. I will not be satisfied to be ever the mean, ignoblething I now am.'

  'Our life did not seem so unworthy in your eyes a day or two ago,'said she sighing. 'You told me, as we came up the Val d'Arno, that ourwandering, wayward existence had a poetry of its own that you loveddearly. That to you ambition could never offer a path equal to thatwayside rambling life, over whose little accidents the softeninginfluences of divine verse shed their mild light, so that the idealworld dominated the actual.'

  'All these will I realise, but in a higher sphere, Marietta. The greatAlfieri himself told me that a life without labour is an ignominy and ashame. That he who strains his faculties to attain a goal is nobler farthan one whose higher gifts lie rusting in disuse. Man lives not forhimself, but for his fellows, said he, nor is there such incarnateselfishness as indolence.'

  'And where, and how, and when is this wondrous life of exertion to bebegun?' said she half-scornfully. 'Can the great poet pour into yourheart out of the fulness of his own, and make you as he is? Or are yousuddenly become rich and great, like _him_?'

  The youth started, and an angry flush covered his face, and even hisforehead, as he arose and walked the room.

  'I see well what is working within you,' said the girl. 'The contrastfrom that splendour to this misery--these poor bleak walls, where nopictures are hanging, no gilding glitters--is too great for you. It isthe same shock to your nature as from the beautiful princess in whosepresence you stood to that humble bench beside _me_.'

  'No, by Heaven! Marietta,' cried he passionately, 'I have not anambition in my heart wherein your share is not allotted. It is that youmay walk with me to the goal----'

  A scornful gesture of disbelief, one of those movements which, withItalians, have a significance no words ever convey, interrupted hisprotestation.

  'This is too bad!' he cried; 'nor had you ever conceived such distrustof me if your own heart did not give the prompting. There, there,' criedhe, as he pointed his finger at her, while her eyes flashed and sparkledwith a wild and lustrous expression, 'your very looks betray you.'

  'Betray me! this is no betrayal,' said she haughtily. 'I have no shamein declaring that I too covet fame, even as you do. Were some mightypatron to condescend to favour
_me_--to fancy that _I_ resembled, I knownot what great personage--to imagine that in _my_ traits of look andvoice theirs were reflected, it is just as likely I should thank fortunefor the accident, and bid adieu to _you_, as you intend, to-morrow ornext day, to take leave of _me_.'

  She spoke boldly and defiantly, her large, full eyes gazing at his witha steadfast and unflinching look, while Gerald held down his head insorrow and in shame.

  Nor was it alone with himself that Gerald was at war, for Marietta hadshocked and startled him by qualities he had never suspected in her.In her passion she had declared that her heart was set upon ambitionsdaring as his own; and, even granting that much of what she said wasprompted by wounded pride, there was in her wildly excited glancesand her trembling lips the sign of a temperament that knew littleof forgiveness. If he was then amazed by discovering Marietta to bedifferent from all he had ever seen her, he was more in love with herthan ever.

  She had opened the window, and, with her face between her hands, gazedout upon the silent street. Gerald took his place at her side, and thusthey remained for some time without a word. A low, faint sigh at lastcame from the girl, and, placing his arm around her, Gerald drew hergently to him, murmuring softly in her ear:

  'L'onda che mormora, Tra sponda e sponda; L'aura che tremola, Tra fronda e fronda. E meno instabile, Del vostro cor.'

  She never spoke, but, averting her head still farther from him, screenedherself from his view. At last a low, soft murmuring broke from herlips, and she sang, in accents scarcely above her breath, one of thoselittle native songs she was so fond of. It was a wild but plaintive air,sounding like the wayward cadences of one who left her fancy free togive music to the verse, each stanza ending with the words:

  'Non ho piu remi, Non ho piu vele, E al silo talento Mi porta il mar.'

  With a touching tenderness that thrilled through Gerald's heart shesung, with many a faltering accent, and in a tremulous tone, the simplewords:

  'In a lone, frail hark, forsaken, I float on a nameless sea, Nor care to what morrow I waken; I drift where the waves bear me.

  'I look not up to the starry sky, For I have no course to run, Nor eagerly wait, as the dawn draws nigh, To watch for the rising sun.

  'For noon is drear as the night to me, To-day is as dark as to-morrow: Forsaken, I float on the nameless sea, To think and weep over my sorrow.*

  'Oh, Marietta, if thou wouldst not wring my heart, do not sing that sadair,' cried Gerald, pressing her tenderly to him. 'I bore it ill in ourhappiest hours, when all went well and hopefully with us.'

  'It bettor suits the present, then,' said she calmly; then added, with asudden energy--'at all events, it suits my humour!'

  'Thou wouldst break with me, then, Marietta?' said Gerald, relaxing hishold on her, and turning his eyes fully upon her face.

  'Look down there,' cried she, pointing with her finger: 'that streetbeneath us is narrow enough, but it has two exits: why shouldn't _you_take one road, and _I_ the other?'

  'Agreed: so be it, then!' said Gerald passionately, 'only remember,this project never came from _me_.'

  'If there be blame for it, I accept it all,' said she calmly. 'Thesethings come ever of caprice, and they go as they come. As your own poethas it:

  '"Si sente che diletta Ma non si sa perche."'

  And with a cold smile and a light motion of the hand, as in adieu, sheturned away and left the room. Gerald buried his face between hishands and sobbed as though his heart was breaking. Alternately accusingMarietta and himself of cruelty and injustice, his mind was racked by aconflict, to which nothing offered consolation.

  He tried to compose himself to sleep: he lay down on his bed, andendeavoured in many ways to induce that calm spirit which leads toslumber; he even murmured to himself the long-forgotten litanies he hadlearned, as a student, in the college; but the fever that raged withindefied all these attempts, and, foiled in his efforts, he arose and leftthe house. The day was just dawning, and a pinkish streak of sky couldbe seen over the mountains of Vail' Ombrosa, while all the vale of theArno and Florence itself lay in deep shadow, the great 'Duomo' and thetall tower at its side not yet catching the first gleam of the risingsun.

  Gerald left the gates of the city, and strode on manfully till he gainedthe crest of the 'Bello Sguardo,' whence the view of the city and itsenvirons is peculiarly fine. Here he sat down to gaze on the scenebeneath him; that wondrous map, whose history contains records ofmingled greatness, crime, genius, noble patriotism, and of treachery sobase that all Europe cannot show its equal; and thus gazing, and thusmusing, he sank into deep sleep.