“How you take that for granted!”
“Is it not perfectly clear? Do not talk to me of like and dislike when your dreadful parties have anything to do with either! Besides, if I had any sympathy with either side it would be for the whites. But the whole thing is absurd, complicated, mediaeval, feudal — anything you like except sensible. Your intolerance is — intolerable.”
“True tolerance should tolerate even intolerance,” observed Orsino smartly.
“That sounds like one of the puzzles of pronunciation like ‘in un piatto poco cupo poco pepe pisto cape,’” laughed Maria Consuelo. “Tolerably tolerable tolerance tolerates tolerable tolerance intolerably—”
“You speak Italian?” asked Orsino, surprised by her glib enunciation of the difficult sentence she had quoted. “Why are we talking a foreign language?”
“I cannot really speak Italian. I have an Italian maid, who speaks French. But she taught me that puzzle.”
“It is odd — your maid is a Piedmontese and you have a good accent.”
“Have I? I am very glad. But tell me, is it not absurd that you should hate these people as you do — you cannot deny it — merely because they are whites?”
“Everything in life is absurd if you take the opposite point of view. Lunatics find endless amusement in watching sane people.”
“And of course, you are the sane people,” observed Maria Consuelo.
“Of course.”
“What becomes of me? I suppose I do not exist? You would not be rude enough to class me with the lunatics.”
“Certainly not. You will of course choose to be a black.”
“In order to be discontented, as you are?”
“Discontented?”
“Yes. Are you not utterly out of sympathy with your surroundings? Are you not hampered at every step by a network of traditions which have no meaning to your intelligence, but which are laid on you like a harness upon a horse, and in which you are driven your daily little round of tiresome amusement — or dissipation? Do you not hate the Corso as an omnibus horse hates it? Do you not really hate the very faces of all those people who effectually prevent you from using your own intelligence, your own strength — your own heart? One sees it in your face. You are too young to be tired of life. No, I am not going to call you a boy, though I am older than you, Don Orsino. You will find people enough in your own surroundings to call you a boy — because you are not yet so utterly tamed and wearied as they are, and for no other reason. You are a man. I do not know your age, but you do not talk as boys do. You are a man — then be a man altogether, be independent — use your hands for something better than throwing mud at other people’s houses merely because they are new!”
Orsino looked at her in astonishment. This was certainly not the sort of conversation he had anticipated when he had entered the room.
“You are surprised because I speak like this,” she said after a short pause. “You are a Saracinesca and I am — a stranger, here to-day and gone to-morrow, whom you will probably never see again. It is amusing, is it not? Why do you not laugh?”
Maria Consuelo smiled and as usual her strong red lips closed as soon as she had finished speaking, a habit which lent the smile something unusual, half-mysterious, and self-contained.
“I see nothing to laugh at,” answered Orsino. “Did the mythological personage whose name I have forgotten laugh when the sphynx proposed the riddle to him?”
“That is the third time within the last few days that I have been compared to a sphynx by you or Gouache. It lacks originality in the end.”
“I was not thinking of being original. I was too much interested. Your riddle is the problem of my life.”
“The resemblance ceases there. I cannot eat you up if you do not guess the answer — or if you do not take my advice. I am not prepared to go so far as that.”
“Was it advice? It sounded more like a question.”
“I would not ask one when I am sure of getting no answer. Besides, I do not like being laughed at.”
“What has that to do with the matter? Why imagine anything so impossible?”
“After all — perhaps it is more foolish to say, ‘I advise you to do so and so,’ than to ask, ‘Why do you not do so and so?’ Advice is always disagreeable and the adviser is always more or less ridiculous. Advice brings its own punishment.”
“Is that not cynical?” asked Orsino.
“No. Why? What is the worst thing you can do to your social enemy? Prevail upon him to give you his counsel, act upon it — it will of course turn out badly — then say, “I feared this would happen, but as you advised me I did not like—” and so on! That is simple and always effectual. Try it.”
“Not for worlds!”
“I did not mean with me,” answered Maria Consuelo with a laugh.
“No. I am afraid there are other reasons which will prevent me from making a career for myself,” said Orsino thoughtfully.
Maria Consuelo saw by his face that the subject was a serious one with him, as she had already guessed that it must be, and one which would always interest him. She therefore let it drop, keeping it in reserve in case the conversation flagged.
“I am going to see Madame Del Ferice to-morrow,” she observed, changing the subject.
“Do you think that is necessary?”
“Since I wish it! I have not your reasons for avoiding her.”
“I offended you the other day, Madame, did I not? You remember — when I offered my services in a social way.”
“No — you amused me,” answered Maria Consuelo coolly, and watching to see how he would take the rebuke.
But, young as Orsino was, he was a match for her in self-possession.
“I am very glad,” he answered without a trace of annoyance. “I feared you were displeased.”
Maria Consuelo smiled again, and her momentary coldness vanished. The answer delighted her, and did more to interest her in Orsino than fifty clever sayings could have done. She resolved to push the question a little further.
“I will be frank,” she said.
“It is always best,” answered Orsino, beginning to suspect that something very tortuous was coming. His disbelief in phrases of the kind, though originally artificial, was becoming profound.
“Yes, I will be quite frank,” she repeated. “You do not wish me to know the Del Ferice and their set, and you do wish me to know the people you like.”
“Evidently.”
“Why should I not do as I please?”
She was clearly trying to entrap him into a foolish answer, and he grew more and more wary.
“It would be very strange if you did not,” answered Orsino without hesitation.
“Why, again?”
“Because you are absolutely free to make your own choice.”
“And if my choice does not meet with your approval?” she asked.
“What can I say, Madame? I and my friends will be the losers, not you.”
Orsino had kept his temper admirably, and he did not suffer a hasty word to escape his lips nor a shadow of irritation to appear in his face. Yet she had pressed him in a way which was little short of rude. She was silent for a few seconds, during which Orsino watched her face as she turned it slightly away from him and from the lamp. In reality he was wondering why she was not more communicative about herself, and speculating as to whether her silence in that quarter proceeded from the consciousness of a perfectly assured position in the world, or from the fact that she had something to conceal; and this idea led him to congratulate himself upon not having been obliged to act immediately upon his first proposal by bringing about an acquaintance between Madame d’Aranjuez and his mother. This uncertainty lent a spice of interest to the acquaintance. He knew enough of the world already to be sure that Maria Consuelo was born and bred in that state of life to which it has pleased Providence to call the social elect. But the peculiar people sometimes do strange things and afterwards establish themselves in foreign citi
es where their doings are not likely to be known for some time. Not that Orsino cared what this particular stranger’s past might have been. But he knew that his mother would care very much indeed, if Orsino wished her to know the mysterious lady, and would sift the matter very thoroughly before asking her to the Palazzo Saracinesca. Donna Tullia, on the other hand, had committed herself to the acquaintance on her own responsibility, evidently taking it for granted that if Orsino knew Madame d’Aranjuez, the latter must be socially irreproachable. It amused Orsino to imagine the fat countess’s rage if she turned out to have made a mistake.
“I shall be the loser too,” said Maria Consuelo, in a different tone, “if I make a bad choice. But I cannot draw back. I took her to her house in my carriage. She seemed to take a fancy to me—” she laughed a little.
Orsino smiled as though to imply that the circumstance did not surprise him.
“And she said she would come to see me. As a stranger I could not do less than insist upon making the first visit, and I named the day — or rather she did. I am going to-morrow.”
“To-morrow? Tuesday is her day. You will meet all her friends.”
“Do you mean to say that people still have days in Rome?” Maria Consuelo did not look pleased.
“Some people do — very few. Most people prefer to be at home one evening in the week.”
“What sort of people are Madame Del Ferice’s friends?”
“Excellent people.”
“Why are you so cautious?”
“Because you are about to be one of them, Madame.”
“Am I? No, I will not begin another catechism! You are too clever — I shall never get a direct answer from you.”
“Not in that way,” answered Orsino with a frankness that made his companion smile.
“How then?”
“I think you would know how,” he replied gravely, and he fixed his young black eyes on her with an expression that made her half close her own.
“I should think you would make a good actor,” she said softly.
“Provided that I might be allowed to be sincere between the acts.”
“That sounds well. A little ambiguous perhaps. Your sincerity might or might not take the same direction as the part you had been acting.”
“That would depend entirely upon yourself, Madame.”
This time Maria Consuelo opened her eyes instead of closing them.
“You do not lack — what shall I say? A certain assurance — you do not waste time!”
She laughed merrily, and Orsino laughed with her.
“We are between the acts now,” he said. “The curtain goes up to-morrow, and you join the enemy.”
“Come with me, then.”
“In your carriage? I shall be enchanted.”
“No. You know I do not mean that. Come with me to the enemy’s camp. It will be very amusing.”
Orsino shook his head.
“I would rather die — if possible at your feet, Madame.”
“Are you afraid to call upon Madame Del Ferice?”
“More than of death itself.”
“How can you say that?”
“The conditions of the life to come are doubtful — there might be a chance for me. There is no doubt at all as to what would happen if I went to see Madame Del Ferice.”
“Is your father so severe with you?” asked Maria Consuelo with a little scorn.
“Alas, Madame, I am not sensitive to ridicule,” answered Orsino, quite unmoved. “I grant that there is something wanting in my character.”
Maria Consuelo had hoped to find a weak point, and had failed, though indeed there were many in the young man’s armour. She was a little annoyed, both at her own lack of judgment and because it would have amused her to see Orsino in an element so unfamiliar to him as that in which Donna Tullia lived.
“And there is nothing which would induce you to go there?” she asked.
“At present — nothing,” Orsino answered coldly.
“At present — but in the future of all possible possibilities?”
“I shall undoubtedly go there. It is only the unforeseen which invariably happens.”
“I think so too.”
“Of course. I will illustrate the proverb by bidding you good evening,” said Orsino, laughing as he rose. “By this time the conviction must have formed itself in your mind that I was never going. The unforeseen happens. I go.”
Maria Consuelo would have been glad if he had stayed even longer, for he amused her and interested her, and she did not look forward with pleasure to the lonely evening she was to spend in the hotel.
“I am generally at home at this hour,” she said, giving him her hand.
“Then, if you will allow me? Thanks. Good evening, Madame.”
Their eyes met for a moment, and then Orsino left the room. As he lit his cigarette in the porch of the hotel, he said to himself that he had not wasted his hour, and he was pleasantly conscious of tha inward and spiritual satisfaction which every very young man feels when he is aware of having appeared at his best in the society of a woman alone. Youth without vanity is only premature old age after all.
“She is certainly more than pretty,” he said to himself, affecting to be critical when he was indeed convinced. “Her mouth is fabulous, but it is well shaped and the rest is perfect — no, the nose is insignificant, and one of those yellow eyes wanders a little. These are not perfections. But what does it matter? The whole is charming, whatever the parts may be. I wish she would not go to that horrible fat woman’s tea to-morrow.”
Such were the observations which Orsino thought fit to make to himself, but which by no means represented all that he felt, for they took no notice whatever of that extreme satisfaction at having talked well with Maria Consuelo, which in reality dominated every other sensation just then. He was well enough accustomed to consideration, though his only taste of society had been enjoyed during the winter vacations of the last two years. He was not the greatest match in the Roman matrimonial market for nothing, and he was perfectly well aware of his advantages in this respect. He possessed that keen, business-like appreciation of his value as a marriageable man which seems to characterise the young generation of to-day, and he was not mistaken in his estimate. It was made sufficiently clear to him at every turn that he had but to ask in order to receive. But he had not the slightest intention of marrying at one and twenty as several of his old school-fellows were doing, and he was sensible enough to foresee that his position as a desirable son-in-law would soon cause him more annoyance than amusement.
Madame d’Aranjuez was doubtless aware that she could not marry him if she wished to do so. She was several years older than he — he admitted the fact rather reluctantly — she was a widow, and she seemed to have no particular social position. These were excellent reasons against matrimony, but they were also equally excellent reasons for being pleased with himself at having produced a favourable impression on her.
He walked rapidly along the crowded street, glancing carelessly at the people who passed and at the brilliantly lighted windows of the shops. He passed the door of the club, where he was already becoming known for rather reckless play, and he quite forgot that a number of men were probably spending an hour at the tables before dinner, a fact which would hardly have escaped his memory if he had not been more than usually occupied with pleasant thoughts. He did not need the excitement of baccarat nor the stimulus of brandy and soda, for his brain was already both excited and stimulated, though he was not at once aware of it. But it became clear to him when he suddenly found himself standing before the steps of the Capitol in the gloomy square of the Ara Coeli, wondering what in the world had brought him so far out of his way.
“What a fool I am!” he exclaimed impatiently, as he turned back and walked in the direction of his home. “And yet she told me that I would make a good actor. They say that an actor should never be carried away by his part.”
At dinner that evening he was alternate
ly talkative and very silent.
“Where have you been to-day, Orsino?” asked his father, looking at him curiously.
“I spent half an hour with Madame d’Aranjuez, and then went for a walk,” answered Orsino with sudden indifference.
“What is she like?” asked Corona.
“Clever — at least in Rome.” There was an odd, nervous sharpness about the answer.
Old Saracinesca raised his keen eyes without lifting his head and looked hard at his grandson. He was a little bent in his great old age.
“The boy is in love!” he exclaimed abruptly, and a laugh that was still deep and ringing followed the words. Orsino recovered his self-possession and smiled carelessly.
Corona was thoughtful during the remainder of the meal.
CHAPTER VII.
THE PRINCESS SANT’ Ilario’s early life had been deeply stirred by the great makers of human character, sorrow and happiness. She had suffered profoundly, she had borne her trials with a rare courage, and her reward, if one may call it so, had been very great. She had seen the world and known it well, and the knowledge had not been forgotten in the peaceful prosperity of later years. Gifted with a beauty not equalled, perhaps, in those times, endowed with a strong and passionate nature under a singularly cold and calm outward manner, she had been saved from many dangers by the rarest of commonplace qualities, common sense. She had never passed for an intellectual person, she had never been very brilliant in conversation, she had even been thought old-fashioned in her prejudices concerning the books she read. But her judgment had rarely failed her at critical moments. Once only, she remembered having committed a great mistake, of which the sudden and unexpected consequences had almost wrecked her life. But in that case she had suffered her heart to lead her, an innocent girl’s good name had been at stake, and she had rashly taken a responsibility too heavy for love itself to bear. Those days were long past now; twenty years separated Corona, the mother of four tall sons, from the Corona who had risked all to save poor little Faustina Montevarchi.
But even she knew that a state of such perpetual and unclouded happiness could hardly last a lifetime, and she had forced herself, almost laughing at the thought, to look forward to the day when Orsino must cease to be a boy and must face the world of strong loves and hates through which most men have to pass, and which all men must have known in order to be men indeed.
Complete Works of F Marion Crawford Page 540