[Marianne 4] - Marianne and the Rebels

by Juliette Benzoni

  Ever since their parting from the patrol, the young Venetian had been oddly silent. He had walked ahead of Marianne, his hands dug deeply into the pockets of his rather frayed blue canvas trousers, pushing up folds of the still-damp shirt of yellow wool which came down nearly to his knees. There was a stiffness in his attitude which suggested that he was not altogether happy about something.

  'Is it true,' he asked, in a small, hard voice, 'that you are lady's maid to that Baroness… thingummy?… Close to Bonaparte's sister?'

  'Of course. Does it worry you?'

  'A bit. It means that you must be for Bonaparte too. The soldier know that, he—'

  Doubt and disappointment were written so clearly on the round brown face that Marianne forbore to add to his trouble.

  'My mistress is for – Bonaparte, naturally,' she said gently. 'But for myself, I have no interest in politics. I serve my mistress, that's all.'

  'Then where are you from? Not from here, at any rate. You don't know the city and you haven't the accent.'

  Marianne's hesitation was scarcely perceptible. It was true that she did not speak with the Venetian accent but her Italian was a pure Tuscan which made her answer come quite naturally.

  'I am from Lucca,' she said. It was, after all, not altogether a lie.

  The result more than rewarded her. Zani's worried little face broke into a dazzling smile and his hand crept back into Marianne's.

  'Oh, that's all right then! You can come to our house. But it's some way yet. You're not too tired?' he added anxiously.

  'A bit,' Marianne confessed, conscious that her legs were numb with fatigue. 'Is it much farther?'

  'A bit.'

  A sleepy ferryman took them across the canal, which was almost deserted at this hour of the morning. It promised to be an exceptionally lovely day. The sky was a soft blue, washed clean by the night's storm, streaked across with flocks of pigeons. The wind off the sea was cool and smelled of salt and seaweed, and Marianne took deep rapturous breaths as they moved slowly on to where la Salute on its point hung like a gigantic seashell in the clear morning air. It was a day made for happiness, and Marianne dared not look ahead to what it might hold for her.

  Once on the far side, there were more alleys, more little flying bridges, more half-glimpsed wonders and more prowling cats. The sun rose in a glory of gold and she was reeling with exhaustion by the time they came to a point where two canals met. The wider of the two, lined with tall pink houses with washing drying at their windows, flowed directly into the waters of the harbour. It was spanned by a slender bridge.

  'There!' Zani said proudly. That's where I live. San Trovaso! The squero of San Trovaso is the hospital for sick gondolas.'

  He was pointing across the water to where, beyond the orange peel and rotting vegetables, lay a number of brown wooden sheds with a dozen or so gondolas drawn up before them, lying on their sides like wounded sharks.

  'You live there?'

  'No, over there. The last house on the corner of the quay, right at the top.'

  A masthead sticking up beyond the corner of the house showed where a tall ship lay at anchor. Marianne could not help herself. Her weariness was forgotten as she picked up her skirts and ran with the bewildered Zani hard on her heels. She could not wait to see if Jason was there waiting for her.

  It had already occurred to her that he might be late for their meeting and this was the real reason why she had followed Zani so far.

  Friendless and penniless, she had nowhere else to go if Jason had not come. Now, suddenly, the possibility seemed to have receded. She was sure he must be there.

  She emerged, panting, on to the quay. Sunshine was all about her and there, all at once, on all sides, was a forest of masts. Ships were everywhere: serried ranks of slender prows on one hand and a solid mass of sterncastles with gleaming lanterns on the other. A whole fleet was there, connected to the shore by long dipping planks on which the porters moved up and down under their heavy loads as nimbly as acrobats. There were so many ships that Marianne felt dazed. Her brain reeled.

  Orders rang out, mingling with the shrilling of bosuns' whistles and the striking of ships' bells. Music hung in the air, played by an unseen mandoline, and the tune was taken up by a barefoot girl in a striped petticoat carrying a shimmering basketful of fish on her head. The rose-coloured quayside was alive with people going about their business, as noisy and colourful as characters in a Goldoni play, while on board the moored vessels men stripped to the waist were swabbing down the decks with big buckets of clean water.

  'What are you doing?' Zani's voice reproached her. 'You've gone past the house. Come in and rest.'

  But the impatience of love was stronger than fatigue. At the sight of all those ships, Marianne felt the fever of anticipation stir in her again. Jason was there – not far away! She was certain, she could feel it! So how could she possibly think of going to sleep? Suddenly, all her earlier doubts and hesitations fell away, like so much dead skin. The only thing that mattered was to see him, feel him and touch him.

  Resisting all Zani's efforts to detain her, she thrust her way through the busy crowd on the quay, gazing up at the vessels at their moorings, studying the faces of the men and peering at the silhouetted figure of a captain pacing the poop, but nowhere did she see the one she was looking for.

  Then, quite suddenly, she saw it. The Sea Witch was there, right out on the Giudecca, several cables' length away from the vessels ranged along the quayside. She was veering gracefully on the calm waters while out ahead the men in the longboats bent manfully to the oars and barefoot sailors swarmed in the shrouds.

  Marianne had a brief glimpse of the siren figure at the prow, twin sister to herself.

  The sun gleamed on her brasswork and Marianne gazed, fascinated, at the lovely ship, scanning the moving figures on the deck for one she knew would be unmistakable. But the Sea Witch was putting on sail, as a gull spreads its wings, she was swinging round by the head, lifting to the wind, moving out to sea…

  Understanding burst on Marianne. A wild cry broke from her:

  'No!…No! Don't!…Jason!'

  She began to run along the quay, screaming and shouting like a lunatic, hurling herself blindly through the crowd regardless of the knocks she received or of the stares that followed her. Dock hands, market women, sailors and fishermen turned to look after the dishevelled, tear-stained woman running with outstretched arms and uttering heartbroken cries, apparently on the point of casting herself into the sea.

  Marianne herself was aware of nothing, she saw and heard nothing, only that the ship was going away from her. The thought was torture. It was as though an invisible thread, woven from her own flesh, had been drawn between her and the American vessel, stretching tighter and tighter, agonizingly, until it tore the heart out of her breast and drowned it in the sea.

  A single sentence repeated itself endlessly in her brain, with cruel insistence, like an ironic refrain:

  'He didn't wait for me… He didn't wait…'

  Jason had sailed across two seas and an ocean for this meeting, yet his patience and his love had not endured beyond five days. He had not sensed that she, whom he claimed to love, was there, close at hand; he had not heard her desperate cries. Now he was going away, sailing out to sea, to the sea that was his other mistress, this time, perhaps, for ever. How could she reach him now, how call him back?

  She was gasping for breath and her heart was knocking painfully in her chest, but she ran on, her eyes, blinded with tears, fixed on the ever-widening dazzle of sunlight between ship and shore. It danced before her like an ultimate sign of hope, drawing her like a lover. A few more steps and she would plunge into it…

  A strong hand grasped her just as she reached the very end of the quay.

  She was on the point of casting herself, borne on an irresistible impulse, straight into the water, when she found herself pulled up short and overborne. She looked up and found herself face to face with Lieutenant Benielli, who was
staring at her as if he had seen a ghost.

  'You?' he ejaculated, as he recognized the frenzied woman whom he had just saved from suicide. 'Is it you? .. It's unbelievable!'

  But Marianne had reached the point where the sight of Napoleon himself could not have surprised her. She did not even recognize who was holding her, seeing him only as an obstruction to be circumvented. She struggled furiously in his arms, fighting desperately to escape.

  'Let me go!' she screamed. 'Let me go!'

  Fortunately the Corsican lieutenant had a firm grip, but his patience was short. It came to an end abruptly and he gave his prisoner a smart shaking in an effort to silence the screams which were attracting everyone on the quay. Some of those who approached were looking quite ugly, seeing only that a member of the 'occupying' forces was molesting a young woman. Conscious that he was in a minority, Benielli opened his mouth and yelled:

  'Dragoons! To me!'

  Marianne herself did not see the arrival of Benielli's reinforcements. She continued to scream and struggle until the exasperated lieutenant silenced her with a neatly delivered blow from his fist. Instead of into the waters of the harbour, Marianne plunged into merciful unconsciousness.

  When she came round from the effects of this involuntary swoon, under the influence of a compress of aromatic vinegar held under her nose, it was to find herself looking at the lower half of a black and yellow striped dressing-gown and a pair of embroidered slippers which seemed somehow familiar. She had worked that design of roses on a black background with her own hands.

  She raised her head, reviving the pain in her injured jaw, and almost bit the pad which a kneeling chambermaid was holding under her nose. She thrust the girl away automatically and gave a cry of joy.

  'Arcadius!'

  It was he indeed. Swathed in the striped gown, his feet thrust into the slippers, and his hair standing on end in two comical tufts which made him look more like a mouse than ever, the Vicomte de Jolival was earnestly supervising the restorative treatment.

  'She's come round, my lord,' the chambermaid announced, with remarkable perspicacity, as the invalid sat up.

  'Splendid. You may leave us now.'

  Almost before the girl had got to her feet and made room for him to sit down on the edge of the sofa, Marianne had flung herself into his arms.

  The return of consciousness had brought with it the recollection of her woes and she fell on his chest and wept, too much distressed to utter a single word.

  Deeply pitying, but also deeply experienced, Jolival allowed the storm to wear itself out and confined himself to gently stroking the still-damp hair of the girl he regarded in the light of an adopted daughter. Gradually, the sobs diminished and in a lost, little-girl voice, Marianne murmured into her old friend's ear:

  'Jason!… He's gone!'

  Arcadius laughed and raising Marianne's tear-blotched face from his shoulder, he drew a handkerchief from his dressing-gown pocket and wiped her red and swollen eyes.

  'And is that why you were trying to throw yourself into the harbour? Yes, he's gone – all the way to Chioggia to take on fresh water and a cargo of smoked sturgeon. He'll be back tomorrow. In fact, it was for that very reason that Benielli was watching the harbour. I told him to be there as soon as the Sea Witch put to sea and I was to relieve him later on myself in case you should arrive while the ship was away, as indeed you did.'

  A wonderful sense of relief stole over Marianne. She was torn between the desire to laugh and a strong impulse to cry again and she looked at Jolival with a good deal of respect.

  'You knew I'd come?'

  The urbane vicomte's smile faded and the girl saw that he had aged in her absence. There was a little more silver about his temples and lines of anxiety were deeply carved between his brows and at the corners of his mouth. Very tenderly, she kissed away the signs of worry.

  'It was our one chance of finding you,' he said, sighing. 'I knew that if you were still alive, you would do your utmost to be here in time to meet Jason. And in spite of all our efforts, even the efforts of the Grand Duchess herself, who set her own police to work on the case, we could find no other clue. Agathe said something about a letter from Madame Cenami which might have had something to do with it, because you had gone out in a hurry, and plainly dressed, as though to avoid notice. But Madame Cenami had sent no letter, of course – and you failed to leave the slightest hint.' The last words were uttered in a mildly reproachful tone.

  'Zoe's letter begged for secrecy. I supposed she must be in some trouble. I never thought… but if you only knew how I've regretted it!'

  'Poor child. Love, friendship and prudence do not generally live easily together, especially where you are concerned. Naturally, both Arrighi and myself thought at once of your husband, that he had lost patience.'

  'The Prince is dead,' Marianne said soberly. 'Murdered.'

  'Hm.' It was Jolival's turn now to study his friend's face. How much she had endured was written dearly in its pallor and the haunted look in her eyes. He guessed that she had lived through some terrible experience and that it was, perhaps, still too soon to talk about it. So, postponing the inevitable questions, Jolival said merely:

  'You shall tell me about it later. Obviously, that explains a good deal. But when you vanished, we were half out of our minds. Gracchus was threatening to set fire to the villa at Lucca and Agathe cried all day long and kept on insisting that the devil of the Sant'Annas had carried you off. The coolest person, as might have been expected, was the Duke of Padua. He went in person to the Villa dei Cavalli, with a strong escort, but found none there but servants, and no more of them than served to keep the place up. No one could tell him where the Prince was to be found. It seems that he is – or rather was – in the habit of going away suddenly, often for long periods, telling no one when he meant to return.

  'We went back to Florence feeling thoroughly hopeless and wretched, because we no longer had the smallest clue. We were still very far from convinced that Prince Sant'Anna had no hand in your disappearance but we knew virtually nothing about his other estates, or where to begin the search. In what direction, even! The Grand-Ducal police were equally baffled. It was then I thought of coming here, for the reason I have told you, although I must say, ever since Beaufort arrived five days ago, my hopes have been dwindling hourly. I thought—'

  Jolival's voice broke and he turned his head away to hide his feelings.

  'You thought I was dead, didn't you? Oh, my poor friend, forgive me for the distress I've caused you. I wish I could have spared you. But did he – did Jason think that I—'

  'No! He never had a moment's doubt. He absolutely refused to even consider it. He rejected the very idea. "If she were no longer in this world," he kept saying, "then I should feel it. I should feel as though I'd lost a limb, I'd bleed, or my heart would cease to beat, but I should know!"

  'Indeed, that was why he went this morning: so as to be ready to weigh anchor the moment you appeared. Although I suspect the waiting was preying on his nerves, though he would have had his tongue cut out before he admitted it. He was like a man possessed, never easy unless he was on the move, doing something. But where were you, Marianne? Do you feel able to tell me yet, or is it still too painful?'

  'Dear Jolival! You have been through hell on my account and now you're dying to know… And yet you've waited all this time to ask because you were afraid to awake unpleasant recollections! I have been here, my dear.'

  'Here?'

  'Yes. In Venice. At the Palazzo Soranzo, which once belonged to the Prince's grandmother, the notorious Dona Lucinda.'

  'So we were right! It was your husband—'

  'No. Matteo Damiani, the steward. It was he who killed my husband.'

  And Marianne told Jolival all that had taken place since she had gone out, supposedly to meet Zoe Cenami, in the church of Or San Michele: her abduction, the journey and her degrading captivity. The telling of it was long and difficult because, greatly as she loved and truste
d her old friend, she was obliged to recall too many things that did violence to her pride and modesty. It was hard for a woman both beautiful and much admired to have to confess that for weeks she had been treated no better than an animal, or a slave bought in the open market. But it was necessary that Arcadius should know the whole extent of her moral wreck, since he was probably the only person who could help her – perhaps even the only one who could understand.

  He heard her out with a mixture of imperturbable calm and fierce agitation. Now and then, at the most painful moments, he got up and strode about the room, his hands behind his back and his head thrust forward, struggling to take in the extraordinary tale which, coming from anyone but Marianne, he would have found almost beyond belief. When it was over and Marianne fell back exhausted on the sofa cushions and closed her eyes, he went quickly to a marquetry side-table, poured himself a drink from a flask, and drank it off at a gulp.

  'Would you like some?' he offered. 'It's the best cordial I know, and you probably need it more than I do.'

  Marianne shook her head.

  'Forgive me for inflicting all this on you, Arcadius, but I had to tell you everything. You don't know how badly I needed to!'

  'I think I do. Anyone who had been through what you have suffered would feel the need to get some of it off their chest, at least. And you know that my chief function on earth is to serve you. As for forgiveness – my dear child, what have I to forgive you for? You could not have given me a greater proof of your confidence than this tissue of horrors. What we have to decide is what to do next. This villain and his accomplices are all dead, you say?'

  'Yes. Killed. I don't know who by.'

  'Personally I am inclined to think that executed would be a better word. As for who was the executioner…'

  'Some prowler, perhaps. The palace is full of treasures.'

  Jolival shook his head doubtfully.

  'No. There are those rusty chains you found on the steward's body. That suggests vengeance as a motive, or some kind of rough justice! Damiani must have had enemies. Perhaps one of them learned of your plight and set you free… remember that you found the clothes that had been taken from you lying ready to hand! It's certainly a most peculiar story, don't you think?'