Complete Works of F Marion Crawford

by F. Marion Crawford

  At first he fought against every new inclination, and cursed his folly in advance; and sometimes he conquered, but not always. If once the fatal point were passed there was no salvation, for then he deceived himself and the deception was complete. It was no wonder people thought so differently about him. He had been known to do brave and generous things, and things that showed the utmost delicacy of feeling and courtesy of temper; and he had been known to act with a sheer, massive, selfish disregard of other people, that made cynics look grave and mild-eyed society idiots stare with horror. The fact was that Julius Batiscombe in love was one person, and Julius Batiscombe out of love, repentant and trying to make up to the world for the mischief he had done, was quite another; and he knew it himself. He was perfectly conscious of his own duality, and liked the one state, — the state of no love, — and he loathed and detested the other both before and after.

  And now he sat over his coffee, and the prophetic warning of his soul told him that he was in danger, so that he was angry at himself and feared the future. He had known Miss Carnethy, as has been said, for some time, and had danced with her and sat beside her at dinner more than once, without giving her a thought; he therefore had found it perfectly natural to call when he discovered that she was at Sorrento. But his impression after his visit was very different. The Marchesa Carantoni was not Miss Carnethy at all.

  She had looked so magnificent as she sat in the evening sunshine, and he had gazed contentedly at her with a sense of artistic satisfaction, thinking no evil. But now he could think of nothing else. The sun seemed to rise again out of the dark sea, turning back on its course till it was just above the horizon, with a warm golden light; by his side sat the figure of a woman with glorious red hair, and he was speaking to her; the whole scene was present to him as he sat there, and he knew very well what it was that he felt. Why had he not known it at first? He would surely have had the sense not to propose such a thing as a day together. “A day together” had so often entailed so much misery.

  Nevertheless he would not invent an excuse, nor go away suddenly. It would be quite possible, he knew, and perhaps also he knew in his heart that it would be altogether right. But it seemed so uncourteous, he was really anxious to see the launch of the great ship and — and — he would not be such a fool as to fancy he could not look at a woman without falling in love with her on the spot. At his age! Five and thirty — he seemed so old when he thought of all he had done in that time. No. He would not only go with them, but he would be as agreeable as he could, if only to show himself that he was at last above that kind of thing.

  Some human hearts are like a great ship that has no anchor, nor any means of making fast to moorings. The brave vessel sails through the stormy ocean, straining and struggling fiercely, till she lies at last within a fair harbour. But she has no anchor, and by and by the soft, smooth tide washes her out to sea, so gently and cruelly, out among the crests and the squalls and the rushing currents, and she must fain beat to windward again or perish on the grim lee shore.

  Julius Batiscombe went to bed that night knowing that he was adrift, and yet denying it to himself; knowing that in a month, a week perhaps, he should be in trouble — in love — pah! how he hated the idea!

  CHAPTER VI.

  DURING THE TIME that elapsed between Mr. Batiscombe’s visit and the expedition to see the launch, Leonora had an access of the religious humour. The little scene with her husband had made a deep impression on her mind, and as was usual when she received impressions, she tried to explain it and understand it and reason about it, until there was little of it left. That is generally the way with those people who make a study of themselves; when they have a good thought or a good impulse, they dissect the life out of it and crow over the empty shell.

  It was clear, thought Leonora, that the sudden outburst of affection which made her tell her husband that she wanted “all of him” was the result of some sensation of dissatisfaction, of some unfulfilled necessity for a greater sympathy. But, if at the very beginning she had not the key to his heart, if he did not wholly love her now, it was clear that he never would at all. Why was it clear? Oh! never mind the “why,” — it was quite clear. Moreover, if he could never love her wholly as she wished and desired, she was manifestly a misunderstood woman, a most unhappy wife, a condemned existence, — loving and not being loved in return. And he, the heartless wretch, was anxious about the cook! Good heavens! the cook — when his wife’s happiness was in danger! In this frame of mind there was evidently nothing more appropriate for her to do than to take a prayer-book and to hide her face in a veil, and slip away to the little church on the road, a hundred yards from the house. For a wrecked existence, thought Leonora, there is no refuge like the Church. She was not a Catholic, but that made no difference; in great distress like this, she could very well be comforted by any kind of religion short of her father’s, which latter, to her exalted view, consisted of four walls and a bucket of whitewash, seasoned with pious discourses and an occasional psalm-tune.

  What she could not see, what was really at the bottom of the small tempest she rashly whirled up in her over-sensitive soul, was her own disillusionment. She had deceived herself into believing that she loved her husband, and the deception had cost her an effort. She was beginning to realise that the time was at hand when she might strive in vain to believe in her own sincerity, when her heart would not submit to any further equivocation, and when she should know in earnest what hollowness and weariness meant. As yet this was half unconscious, for it seemed so easy to make herself the injured party.

  Poor Marcantonio was not to blame. He was the happiest of mortals, and went calmly on his way, doubting nothing and thinking that he was of all mortal men the most supremely fortunate.

  Meanwhile Leonora kneeled in the rough little church, solacing herself with the catalogue of those ills she thought she was suffering. The stones were hard; there was a wretched little knot of country people, squalid and ill-savoured, who stared at the great lady for a moment, and then went on with their rosaries. A dirty little boy with a cane twenty feet long was poking a taper about and lighting lamps, and he dropped some of the wax on Leonora’s gown. But she never shrank nor looked annoyed.

  “All these things are very delightful,” she said to herself, “if you only consider them as mortifications of the flesh.”

  She remembered how often just such little annoyances had sent her out of other churches disgusted and declaring that religion was a vain and hollow thing; and now, because she could bear with them and was not angry, she felt quite sure it was genuine.

  “Yes,” said she piously, as, an hour later, she picked her way home through the dusty road, “yes, the Church is a great refuge. I will go there every day.”

  Indeed, she was so resigned and subdued that evening at dinner, that Marcantonio asked whether she had a headache.

  “Oh no,” she answered, “I am perfectly well, thank you.”

  “Because if you are indisposed, ma bien-aimée,” continued her husband with some anxiety, “we will not go to Castellamare to-morrow.”

  “I will certainly go,” she said. “I would go if I had twenty headaches,” she might have added, for it would have been true.

  “The occasion will be so much the more brilliant, ma très chère,” remarked Marcantonio gallantly, as they went out into the garden under the stars.

  “It is a hollow sham,” said Leonora to herself. “He does not mean it.”

  But whether it was the effect of the morning, or the magic influence of Mr. Batiscombe’s personality, is not certain; at all events when that gentleman appeared at the appointed hour to announce that his boat was in readiness, Leonora looked as though she had never known what care meant. She doubtless still remembered all she had thought on the previous afternoon, and she was still quite sure that her existence was a wreck and a misery, — but then, she argued, why should we poor misunderstood women not take such innocent pleasures as come in our way? It would be very
wrong not to accept humbly the little crumbs of happiness, — and so on. So they went to Castellamare.

  It is not far, but the wind seldom serves in the morning, and it was an hour and a half before the six stout men in white clothes and straw hats pulled the boat round the breakwater of the arsenal. Everything was ready for the ceremony. Half a dozen Italian ironclads lay in the harbour, decked from stem to stern with flags; the royal personages had arrived, and were boring each other to death in a great temporary balcony, gaudily decorated with red and gold, which had been reared on the shore within reach of the nose of the new ship. The ship herself, a huge, ungainly thing, painted red and bearing three enormous national flags, lay like a stranded monster in the cradle, looking for all the world like a prehistoric boiled lobster with its claws taken off. The small water room opposite the arsenal was crowded with every kind of craft, and little steamers arrived every few minutes from Naples to swell the throng. The July sun beat fiercely down and there was not a breath of air. The boatmen were all wrangling in a dozen southern dialects, and no one seemed to know why the ceremony was delayed any longer. Nevertheless, as is usual in such cases, there was half an hour to wait before the thing could be done.

  “I am afraid you will find this a dreadful bore,” said Batiscombe to Leonora in English, while Marcantonio was busy trying to make out some of his friends on shore through a field-glass. Batiscombe had sat in the stern-sheets to steer during the trip, and having Leonora on one side of him and her husband on the other, had gone through an endless series of polite platitudes. If it had not been that Leonora attracted him so much he must himself have been bored to extinction. But then in that case he would probably not have put himself in such a position at all.

  “Oh, nothing of this kind bores me,” said Leonora cheerfully.

  “You say that as though there were many kinds of things that did, though,” observed Batiscombe, looking at her. It was a natural remark, without any intention.

  “Dear me, yes!” exclaimed Leonora. “Life is not all roses, you know.” She therewith assumed a thoughtful expression and looked away.

  “I should not have supposed there were many thorns in your path, Marchesa. Would it be indiscreet to inquire of what nature they may be?”

  Leonora was silent, and put up her glass to examine the proceedings on shore.

  Batiscombe, who had come out that day with the sworn determination not to say or do anything to increase the interest he felt in the Marchesa, found himself wondering whether she were unhappy. The first and most natural conclusion was that she had been married to Marcantonio by designing parents, and that she did not care for him. Society said it had been a love-match, but what will society not say? “Poor thing,” he thought, “I suppose she is miserable!”

  “Forgive me,” he said, in a low voice. “I did not know you were in earnest.”

  Leonora blushed faintly and glanced quickly at him. He had the faculty of saying little things to women that attracted their attention.

  “What lots of poetry one might make about a launch,” he said laughing, — for it was necessary to change the subject,— “ship — dip; ocean — motion; keel — feel; the rhymes are perfectly endless.”

  “Yes,” said Leonora; “you might make a sonnet on the spot. Besides, there is a great deal of sentiment about the launching of a great man-of-war. The voyage of life — and that sort of thing — don’t you know? How hot it is!”

  “I will have another awning up in a minute,” and he directed the sailors, helping to do the work himself. He stood upon the gunwale to do it.

  “I am sure you will fall,” said Leonora, nervously. “Do sit down!”

  “If I had a millstone round my neck there would be some object in falling,” said Batiscombe. “As it is, I should not even have the satisfaction of drowning.”

  “What an idea! Should you like to be drowned?” she said, looking up to him.

  “Sometimes,” he answered, still busy with the awning. Then he sat down again.

  “You should not say that sort of thing,” said Leonora. “Besides, it is rude to say you should like to be drowned when I am your guest.”

  “Great truths are not always pretty. But how could any man die better than at your feet?” He laughed a little, and yet his voice had an earnest ring to it. He had judged rightly when he foresaw that he must fall in love with Leonora.

  Marcantonio, who did not understand English, was watching the proceedings on shore.

  “Ah! it is magnificent!” he cried, with great enthusiasm. The royal personage who was to christen the ship had just broken the bottle of wine, and the little crowd of courtiers, officers, and maids of honour clapped their hands and grinned. They all looked hot and miserable and exhausted, but they grinned right nobly, like so many Cheshire cats. There was a sound of knocking and hammering, a final shout of warning from the dock officers, a slight trembling of the great hull, and then the ship began to move, slowly at first, and ever more quickly, till with a mighty rush and a plunge and a swirl she was out in the water. The people yelled till they were hoarse, the boatmen cursed each other by all the maledictions ever invented to meet the exigencies of a lost humanity, the royal personages stood together on their platform looking like a troupe of marionettes in a toy theatre, and congratulating each other furiously as though they had done it all themselves; everything was noise and sunshine and tepid water; Marcantonio was flourishing his hat, and Leonora waved a little lace handkerchief, while Batiscombe sat looking at her and wondering why he had never thought her beautiful before. Indeed, she was superb in her simple, raw silk gown, with fresh-cut roses at her waist.

  “It seems to me, Marchese, that you are very enthusiastic,” said Batiscombe to Marcantonio.

  “Mon Dieu!” exclaimed the other, shrugging his shoulders, “one cheers these things as one would cheer fireworks, or a race. It signifies nothing.”

  “Oh, of course,” said Leonora; “and besides, it is so pretty.”

  “I think it is horrible,” said Batiscombe, suddenly.

  “Why — what?”

  “To see a nation squandering money in this way, when the taxes on land are at sixty per cent. and more, and the people emigrating by the shipload because they cannot live in their own homes.”

  “Oh, for that matter, you are right,” said Marcantonio, turning grave in a moment. “I could tell you a story about taxes.”

  “What is it?” asked Leonora. “Those things are so interesting.”

  “Last autumn I was in the Sabines; I have a place up there, altogether ancient and dilapidated — a mere ruin. I own some of the land, and the peasants own little vineyards. One day I saw by the roadside a poor old man, a sort of village crétin, whom every one knew quite well. We used to call him Cupido; he was half idiotic and quite old. He was weeping bitterly, poor wretch, and I asked him what was the matter. He pointed to a little plot of land by the road, inclosed by a stone wall, and said the tax-gatherer had taken it from him. And then he cried again, and I could not get anything more out of him.”

  “Poor creature!” exclaimed Leonora, sympathetically.

  “Well,” continued Marcantonio, “I made inquiries, and I found that he had owned the little plot, and that the tax-gatherer had first seized the wretched crop of maize — perhaps a bushel basket full — to pay the tax; and then, as that did not cover his demands, he seized the land itself and sold it or offered it for sale.”

  “Infamous!” cried Leonora, and the tears were in her eyes.

  “A cheerful state of things,” remarked Batiscombe, “when the whole crop does not suffice to pay the taxes on the soil!”

  “N’est-ce pas?” said Marcantonio. “Well, I provided for the poor old man, but he died in the winter. It broke his heart.”

  “I love the Italians,” said Batiscombe; “but their ideas of economy are peculiar. I suppose that without much metaphor or exaggeration one might say that the poor crétin’s bushel of corn is gone into that ridiculous ironclad over there.
”

  “But of course it is,” said Marcantonio. “The whole thing probably paid for one rivet. You, who write books, Monsieur Batiscombe, put that into a book and render it very pathetic.”

  “It needs little rendering to make it that,” said Batiscombe, and he looked at Leonora’s eyes that were not yet dry.

  By this time the royal marionettes had been bundled off to their boats, and the crowd of small craft on the water began to disperse. Batiscombe’s six men fell to their oars and the boat shot out from the breakwater. Presently they hoisted the bright lateen sails to the breeze. Batiscombe perched himself on the weather rail, and took the tiller, as the brave little craft heeled over and began to cut the water. The wind fanned Leonora’s cheek, and she said it was delightful.

  Batiscombe suggested that they should run into one of the great green caves that honeycomb the cliffs near Sorrento, and make it their dining-room. So away they went, rejoicing to be out of the heat and the noise. It was twelve o’clock, and far up among the orange groves the little church bells rang out their midday chime, laughing together in the white belfries for joy of the sunshine and the fair summer’s day.

  “I should like to be always sailing,” said Leonora, who had now quite forgotten her woes and enjoyed the change.

  “Ma chère,” said her husband, “there is nothing simpler.”

  “You always say that,” she answered rather reproachfully; “but this is the very first time I have been on the water since we came.”