Marianne and The Masked Prince

by Жюльетта Бенцони

  Marianne ran quickly up the stairs and stepped through the open panel but before she closed it again she took careful note of its inner and outer workings. It was, in fact, possible to open it from either side, by means of a handle on the stair or by pressing a boss on the gilded moulding within the room. Then, seeing that it was nearly time for Agathe to bring her morning tea, she slipped hurriedly out of her dress and sandals and got into bed. The last thing Marianne wanted was for Agathe to find out about this morning's expedition.

  Snuggling down among the pillows, she tried to think calmly but this was not easy. The discovery in quick succession of the secret panel in the wall and then of the temple in the dell, the statue and Matteo's madness was enough to overcome a far more robust nervous system than Marianne's. In addition, there was that curious and highly ominous assignation he had made with his marble mistress. What was the meaning of his strange words? What was it he had not forgotten? What did he mean to do that night in the ruins? Most of all, what was that monument, gutted by fire, on whose ruins the statue stood? A villa? A temple? To what cult had it been dedicated, and was perhaps dedicated still? To what dark ritual of madness did Matteo Damiani mean to offer sacrifice that night?

  Marianne turned all these questions over in her mind without finding the slightest answer. At one moment, she thought of questioning Dona Lavinia again, but she knew that her questions caused the poor woman pain and she would hardly have recovered from the previous night's ordeal. Besides, it was quite possible that she knew nothing, either of the steward's insanity or of the strange goddess to whom he meant to make his secret sacrifice. She wondered whether even the Prince knew how his steward and secretary passed his nights and, if he did, whether he would answer her questions, even supposing that she were able to ask them. Perhaps the best way was still to question Matteo himself, although this would naturally have to be done cautiously. In any case, she had ordered Dona Lavinia the night before to send him to her first thing in the morning.

  'Well, we shall see,' she muttered under her breath.

  Her mind made up, Marianne swallowed the scalding tea which Agathe brought in at that moment, then got up and dressed. The day promised to be as hot as yesterday and she selected a morning dress of sulphur-yellow jaconet embroidered with a design of big, white daisies and a pair of matching slippers. Dressing in light, gay colours seemed to her a good way of combating the unpleasant memories of the night. Then, when Dona Lavinia came in to tell her that the steward was awaiting her pleasure, she made her way to the small sitting room adjoining her bedchamber and rang for him to be admitted.

  She sat at a small desk and watched him enter, doing her best to conceal her dislike of him. The scene in the dell was still too fresh in her mind for her to feel anything but distaste but if she wanted to find out anything it was necessary to control herself. He appeared in no way disconcerted at her summons and anyone seeing him, standing before her in a deferential attitude, would have sworn that he was a model servant and not a man so base that he could steal, like a thief, into the very same woman's bedchamber while she lay helplessly asleep.

  To keep her fingers from trembling, Marianne had picked up a long goose quill from the desk and was fiddling with it absent-mindedly. When she said nothing, Matteo took it on himself to open the conversation.

  'Your highness sent for me?'

  She glanced up indifferently.

  'Yes, Signor Damiani, I sent for you. You are the steward of this estate and I imagine there is very little you do not know about it?'

  He smiled faintly. 'I think I may claim to know it, yes.'

  'Then you will be able to tell me. Yesterday afternoon was so hot that even the gardens were stifling. I sought refuge, and coolness, in the grotto…' She paused, her eyes never wavering from the steward, and thought that she saw his thick lips tighten a little. With a pretence at carelessness, but measuring every word, she went on: 'I noticed that one of the hangings was a little awry and that a draught was coming through. I found that there was an opening behind it. I should not be a woman if I were not inquisitive and I entered the passage, and found the remains of some burnt-out monument.'

  She had deliberately refrained from mentioning the statue but this time she was sure that Matteo had paled under his tan. There was a darkling look in his eyes as he answered:

  'I see. Permit me to tell your highness that the Prince would not be pleased to know that you had discovered the little temple. For him, it is a forbidden subject, and it would be best for your highness —'

  'I am the only judge of what is best for me, Signor Damiani. Naturally, the reason that I have spoken of this to you is because I do not intend to ask – to ask my husband about it, and with all the more reason if the subject is a disagreeable one to him. But you will answer me.'

  'Why should I?' the steward retorted, more insolently than he may have meant.

  'Because I am the Princess Sant'Anna, whether you like it or not.'

  'I did not say —'

  'Have the goodness not to interrupt me. When I ask a question, let me tell you, I expect an answer. All my servants,' she leaned a little on the word, 'know this. You have yet to learn it. Moreover, I fail to see why you should not give me an answer. If the place were not meant to be seen, if its associations for your master are unpleasant, why has the passage not been walled up?'

  'His highness has not ordered —'

  'And you never act without precise instruction, is that it?' Marianne spoke with heavy irony.

  He stiffened but appeared to accept defeat. His eyes met hers, coldly.

  'Very well. I am at your highness's service.'

  Recognizing that she had won, she permitted herself the luxury of a smile.

  'Thank you. Then just tell me about this "little temple" and, more particularly, about the woman whose statue stands among the ruins. It is an astonishing and magnificent piece of work. And do not tell me that it is antique because I shall not believe you.'

  'Why should I not tell the truth? The statue, my lady, is that of Dona Lucinda, our Prince's grandmother.'

  'Surely she is somewhat, er, scantily clothed for a grandmother. They are not commonly found so in France.'

  'No, but the Emperor's sisters are,' he said forcefully. 'Did not the Princess Borghese commission Canova to immortalize her beauty in stone? Dona Lucinda did likewise. You cannot conceive how beautiful she was! It was terrible, beyond bearing. And she knew how to use it, like a devil she knew. I have seen men at her feet, I have seen men go mad and kill themselves for her – even when she was forty-five years old and more! But she was possessed of the devil!'

  Matteo was talking now, the words pouring out of him like a pent-up flood released and Marianne listened, fascinated, her loathing and resentment temporarily forgotten.

  'You knew her?' she murmured softly.

  He nodded and his eyes shifted slightly, as if her intent gaze irked him. Then he went on in a voice thick with anger.

  'I was eighteen when she died – died by fire, burned to death in that temple which, in her folly, she had erected to her own glory. There, she used to entertain her lovers, most of them taken from among the peasantry, or sailors, for her worship of her own beauty was only equalled by her lusts.'

  'But – why from the common people?'

  He rounded on her at that, with sudden violence, his head lowered like a bull about to charge, and Marianne shivered for she heard the fires of hell roaring in his voice and guessed that Lucinda had ignited them.

  'Because she could then dispose of them without awkward questions. There were men of her own rank who gratified her and them she kept, safe in the knowledge that they were her slaves and would not live without her. But how many young men vanished without trace after giving all their youth and ardour to the insatiable she-wolf in one night of love? No one – no one can imagine what that woman was like. She could awaken the basest instincts, the ultimate madness, and she liked to see death as the end of love. Perhaps, after all, the
legend was right —'

  'What legend?'

  'Men said that her deathless beauty was the outcome of a pact with the devil. One night, as she was studying herself anxiously in the mirrors of her bedchamber, a handsome young man dressed in black appeared to her and offered her, in exchange for her soul, thirty years of unfading beauty, thirty years of pleasure and power. They say that she agreed but that time passed and she had made a fool's bargain because before the thirty years were up her servants entered her room one morning to find only a carcass, crawling with worms.'

  Marianne sprang to her feet with a cry of horror but he gave her a contemptuous smile.

  'It is only a legend, my lady. The truth was quite different for, as I told you. Dona Lucinda perished in the fire which ravaged the temple – a fire she lighted with her own hands the night she found a wrinkle at the corner of her mouth. I dare say, Princess, you may be wondering why she should choose so terrible a death. Well, I will tell you. She did not wish that marvellous body which she had cherished with such care to rot slowly in the ground with all the horrors of decay. She preferred to see it consumed by fire! That was a dreadful night. The fire burned so fiercely that the flames were seen far off and the peasants still swear in terror that it was the fires of hell opening for her. I can still hear her screams… like a wild beast howling… But I know that she is not wholly gone. She lives on.'

  'What do you mean?' Marianne cried, struggling to shake off the horror which threatened to overwhelm her.

  Matteo turned glazed eyes on her. He smiled, drawing his lips back over his strong, yellow teeth. His answer came in a voice of mysterious, incantatory power.

  'She still walks in this house – in the gardens – in your chamber, here she used to stand, naked, watching herself in the mirrors, always comparing her beauty to that of the statue which she had placed there. She brought a curse to this place and she is watching over that curse, which is her revenge. You will not stop her!'

  His tone changed abruptly. Almost obsequiously, he asked: 'Is there anything more your highness wishes to know?'

  Marianne wrenched herself out of the spell in which the steward's words had held her enthralled. She coloured violently under the insolent gaze which seemed to be studying her boldly in every detail and, striving to hold her own, she returned his gaze haughtily and answered: 'Yes. Since she had such a predilection for peasants – were you also one of her lovers?'

  He did not hesitate. With triumph in his voice, he answered her.

  'Why, yes, my lady. And believe me, I can never forget the hours I owe her.'

  Unable to control her anger any longer, Marianne merely indicated to him with a gesture that she had no further need of him. But, left alone, she sank down, prostrate, on her chair and remained so for a long time, fighting down the panic terror that filled her. All the beauty of the place where, for a short while, she had found peace and happiness had been destroyed, smirched and defiled by the memory of the she-devil who had left her mark on it. The recollection of the dark figure of the man bestriding Ilderim in the night made her heart ache with pity; it seemed to her that between the Prince and the curse which lay upon him was an unceasing struggle, a battle lost and always recommenced. It took all her resolution not to send for her coach and her baggage at once and fly back to France without a moment's delay. Even the sound of the fountains now seemed charged with menace.

  But she had promised to wait for the cardinal, and there was also the curious promise which Matteo had made to the ghost of Lucinda. Marianne meant to find out the exact nature of the promise and, if need be, to intervene. Could it, perhaps, be the means of exorcising the devil that haunted the house of Sant'Anna at last? Her eye fell on the family crest embroidered on the back of a chair and she was suddenly struck by the powerful symbol which it represented. The snake and the unicorn. The venomous, crawling beast, silent and deadly, and the creature of legend, clothed in white light. This strife must cease before her child was born. She did not mean him to rule a world in Lucinda's image. Her maternal instinct awoke, violently opposed to the slightest shadow on her child's future. She, Marianne, must make an end of the devils. Even if she had to risk her life to do it, she would be present that night to see what those ties were which bound Matteo to the evil dead. Afterwards, she would do as her conscience dictated, even if it meant forcing herself on her unseen husband.

  ***

  Yet, when night returned to cover the villa and its gardens, all Marianne's heroic plans melted away before the most primitive of all terrors, the terror of the unknown perils that lurk in darkness. The thought of going back to that ill-omened glade, and looking again on that devilish statue now that she knew the truth, chilled her to the marrow. Never in all her life had she known such fear, not even in that moment after Francis Cranmere's escape when she feared for her own life. Francis was, after all, only a man, whereas Lucinda belonged to the unseen, immeasurable world of the supernatural.

  In her fear of being obliged to meet the steward again, she had spent the better part of the day shut up in her own rooms. Not until the afternoon, when she had seen him set off in the direction of the main road, did she venture down to the stables and there she spent a long time meticulously examining Ilderim, as if by some sign the beautiful stallion could give her the key to the mystery of his master. She said nothing to Rinaldo who had watched with some surprise the Princess's long colloquy with the thoroughbred.

  Indoors again, she had waited for the night in a state of utter indecision. Curiosity urged her to go back to the ruins of the unholy temple but all that Matteo had told her of Lucinda filled her with an uncontrollable disgust and she feared the sight of that shameless statue almost as much as that of the fanatical servant.

  She partook of a light supper, soon over, and then allowed her women to undress her for the night, but she did not go to bed. Her rich bedchamber, her splendid bed, now filled her with horror. She seemed to see the statue still standing there and hardly dared to turn her eyes to the mirrors for fear of seeing the ghost of the evil Venetian woman reflected there. Although it was still very hot, she had had all the windows tightly closed and the curtains drawn, prompted by an impulse of childish terror of which she was secretly ashamed. She had stared for a long time at the moving panel and ended by piling up a table and some chairs in front of it, reinforced by a few heavy metal objects, such as candlesticks, so that it was quite impossible for anyone to open it from the other side without causing a resounding crash.

  Before sending Agathe and Dona Lavinia away, she had requested the housekeeper to send Gracchus to her. Her idea had been to make her youthful coachman sleep on a mattress in the short passage connecting her room with Agathe's, but Gracchus, unaware of his mistress's terrors, had gone to spend the evening with Rinaldo, with whom he had struck up a great friendship, at the farm-house where he lived on the far side of the estate. Marianne was obliged to deal with her fears alone, fears which a hundred times that day had sent her hand creeping to the bell to send for her coach. Her will had prevailed but now she was obliged to live through a night which seemed fraught with dangers. The few hours that must pass before the sun rose again seemed an eternity.

  The best thing I can do,' she told herself, 'is to go to sleep, fast asleep. Then I shan't be tempted to go back to the glade.'

  With this object, she had asked Dona Lavinia to make her some of the tisane which had worked so well the first night, but on the point of drinking it, she had set it back, untouched, on the table by her bed. Suppose she were to sleep too soundly even to hear the collapse of the barrier she had erected in front of the panel?

  No, even if the night were to be a hideous nightmare, she must endure it all, with all her wits about her.

  With a sigh, she laid both her pistols within reach of her pillow, picked up a book and settled back to try and read. The book was a moving novel by Monsieur de Chateaubriand telling of the love of two young Indians, Chactas and Atala. Marianne had been enjoying it very much but th
at night her mind was not on it. Her thoughts were wandering far away from the banks of the Meschacebe to the glade where some unspeakable ritual was to take place. Gradually, her old curiosity revived, insidious and tormenting. At last she threw aside her book.

  'This is impossible,' she said aloud. 'If this goes on, I shall go mad.'

  She reached out and tugged at the bell which rang in Agathe's room, intending to ask the girl to come in and spend the night with her. With someone else there, she would be better able to combat her fears, and Agathe herself, still in a state of nerves, would be delighted to stay with her mistress. But although she rang again and again, no one came.

  Thinking that the girl might have taken one of Dona Lavinia's potions, she got up and, slipping on a cotton dressing-gown and pushing her feet into a pair of slippers, she made her way to Agathe's room. Light was showing under the door and Marianne tapped softly, then, getting no answer, she turned the handle and went in. The room was empty.

  A lighted candle stood on the bedside table but the bed itself was empty, the sheets lying half on the floor as if they had been dragged there as the maid got out of bed. Worried, Marianne glanced up at the bell communicating with her own room which hung above the bed. An exclamation of surprise and irritation escaped her: the bell had been effectively muffled with a cloth. This was too much. Not content with leaving her room in the middle of the night, Agathe had even had the effrontery to silence the bell. But where had she gone? Whom had she gone to meet? Not Gracchus, he was with Rinaldo, and certainly none of the other servants, for Agathe had little to do with any of them. When she was not with her mistress, she was hardly ever out of sight of Dona Lavinia, the only person in the house she trusted. As for —

  On the point of going back to her own room, Marianne paused and, turning back towards the bed, stood thoughtfully regarding the curious condition of the sheets. That was precisely the way they would have fallen had the girl been lifted bodily out of her bed. No one dragged the bedclothes off like that getting out of bed in the ordinary way, but when a body was lifted, asleep or awake… Marianne's heart almost stopped beating as a terrible idea struck her. The muffled bell, the disordered bedclothes, the candle left burning – and there was a cup, too, on the table by the bed, an empty cup that still smelled faintly and unmistakably of the familiar tisane, and with it another, more subtle odour. Agathe had not gone of her own accord. She had been carried off, and Marianne shrank from guessing by whom.