Complete Works of F Marion Crawford

by F. Marion Crawford

  “What difference will it make, if we are married immediately?”

  “She will never marry you. I am convinced of that.”

  “How can you know? Has she spoken to you about it?”

  “I am the last person to whom she would come.”

  “Her own father—”

  “With limitations. Besides, I had the misfortune to deprive her of the chosen companion of her life, and at a critical moment. She has not forgotten that.”

  “No she has not,” answered Orsino gloomily. The memory of Aranjuez was a sore point. “Why did you kill him?” he asked, suddenly.

  “Because he was an adventurer, a liar and a thief — three excellent reasons for killing any man, if one can. Moreover he struck her once — with that silver paper cutter which she insists on using — and I saw it from a distance. Then I killed him. Unluckily I was very angry and made a little mistake, so that he lived twelve hours, and she had time to get a priest and marry him. She always pretends that he struck her in play, by accident, as he was showing her something about fencing. I was in the next room and the door was open — it did not look like play. And she still thinks that he was the paragon of all virtues. He was a handsome devil — something like you, but shorter, with a bad eye. I am glad I killed him.”

  Spicca had looked steadily at Orsino while speaking. When he ceased, he began to walk about the small room with something of his old energy. Orsino roused himself. He had almost begun to forget his own position in the interest of listening to the count’s short story.

  “So much for Aranjuez,” said Spicca. “Let us hear no more of him. As for this mad plan of yours, you are convinced, I suppose, and you will give it up. Go home and decide in the morning. For my part, I tell you it is useless. She will not marry you. Therefore leave her alone and do nothing which can injure her.”

  “I am not convinced,” answered Orsino doggedly.

  “Then you are not your father’s son. No Saracinesca that I ever knew would do what you mean to do — would wantonly tarnish the good name of a woman — of a woman who loves him too — and whose only fault is that she cannot marry him.”

  “That she will not.”

  “That she cannot.”

  “Do you give me your word that she cannot?”

  “She is legally free to marry whom she pleases, with or without my consent.”

  “That is all I want to know. The rest is nothing to me—”

  “The rest is a great deal. I beg you to consider all I have said, and I am sure that you will, quite sure. There are very good reasons for not telling you or any one else all the details I know in this story — so good that I would rather go to the length of a quarrel with you than give them all. I am an old man, Orsino, and what is left of life does not mean much to me. I will sacrifice it to prevent your opening this door unless you tell me that you give up the idea of leaving Rome to-night.”

  As he spoke he placed himself before the closed door and faced the young man. He was old, emaciated, physically broken down, and his hands were empty. Orsino was in his first youth, tall, lean, active and very strong, and no coward. He was moreover in an ugly humour and inclined to be violent on much smaller provocation than he had received. But Spicca imposed upon him, nevertheless, for he saw that he was in earnest. Orsino was never afterwards able to recall exactly what passed through his mind at that moment. He was physically able to thrust Spicca aside and to open the door, without so much as hurting him. He did not believe that, even in that case, the old man would have insisted upon the satisfaction of arms, nor would he have been afraid to meet him if a duel had been required. He knew that what withheld him from an act of violence was neither fear nor respect for his adversary’s weakness and age. Yet he was quite unable to define the influence which at last broke down his resolution. It was in all probability only the resultant of the argument Spicca had brought to bear and which Maria Consuelo had herself used in the first instance, and of Spicca’s calm, undaunted personality.

  The crisis did not last long. The two men faced each other for ten seconds and then Orsino turned away with an impatient movement of the shoulders.

  “Very well,” he said. “I will not go with her.”

  “It is best so,” answered Spicca, leaving the door and returning to his seat.

  “I suppose that she will let you know where she is, will she not?” asked Orsino.

  “Yes. She will write to me.”

  “Good-night, then.”

  “Good-night.”

  Without shaking hands, and almost without a glance at the old man, Orsino left the room.

  CHAPTER XXIV.

  ORSINO WALKED SLOWLY homeward, trying to collect his thoughts and to reach some distinct determination with regard to the future. He was oppressed by the sense of failure and disappointment and felt inclined to despise himself for his weakness in yielding so easily. To all intents and purposes he had lost Maria Consuelo, and if he had not lost her through his own fault, he had at least tamely abandoned what had seemed like a last chance of winning her back. As he thought of all that had happened he tried to fix some point in the past, at which he might have acted differently, and from which another act of consequence might have begun. But that was not easy. Events had followed each other with a certain inevitable logic, which only looked unreasonable because he suspected the existence of facts beyond his certain knowledge. His great mistake had been in going to Spicca, but nothing could have been more natural, under the circumstances, than his appeal to Maria Consuelo’s father, nothing more unexpected than the latter’s determined refusal to help him. That there was weight in the argument used by both Spicca and Maria Consuelo herself, he could not deny; but he failed to see why the marriage was so utterly impossible as they both declared it to be. There must be much more behind the visible circumstances than he could guess.

  He tried to comfort himself with the assurance that he could leave Rome on the following day, and that Spicca would not refuse to give him Maria Consuelo’s address in Paris. But the consolation he derived from the idea was small. He found himself wondering at the recklessness shown by the woman he loved in escaping from him. His practical Italian mind could hardly understand how she could have changed all her plans in a moment, abandoning her half-furnished apartment without a word of notice even to the workmen, throwing over her intention of spending the winter in Rome as though she had not already spent many thousands in preparing her dwelling, and going away, probably, without as much as leaving a representative to wind up her accounts. It may seem strange that a man as much in love as Orsino was should think of such details at such a moment. Perhaps he looked upon them rather as proofs that she meant to come back after all; in any case he thought of them seriously, and even calculated roughly the sum she would be sacrificing if she stayed away.

  Beyond all he felt the dismal loneliness which a man can only feel when he is suddenly and effectually parted from the woman he dearly loves, and which is not like any other sensation of which the human heart is capable.

  More than once, up to the last possible moment, he was tempted to drive to the station and leave with Maria Consuelo after all, but he would not break the promise he had given Spicca, no matter how weak he had been in giving it.

  On reaching his home he was informed, to his great surprise, that San Giacinto was waiting to see him. He could not remember that his cousin had ever before honoured him with a visit and he wondered what could have brought him now and induced him to wait, just at the hour when most people were at dinner.

  The giant was reading the evening paper, with the help of a particularly strong cigar.

  “I am glad you have come home,” he said, rising and taking the young man’s outstretched hand. “I should have waited until you did.”

  “Has anything happened?” asked Orsino nervously. It struck him that San Giacinto might be the bearer of some bad news about his people, and the grave expression on the strongly marked face helped the idea.

  “A
great deal is happening. The crash has begun. You must get out of your business in less than three days if you can.”

  Orsino drew a breath of relief at first, and then grew grave in his turn, realising that unless matters were very serious such a man as San Giacinto would not put himself to the inconvenience of coming. San Giacinto was little given to offering advice unasked, still less to interfering in the affairs of others.

  “I understand,” said Orsino. “You think that everything is going to pieces. I see.”

  The big man looked at his young cousin with something like pity.

  “If I only suspected, or thought — as you put it — that there was to be a collapse of business, I should not have taken the trouble to warn you. The crash has actually begun. If you can save yourself, do so at once.”

  “I think I can,” answered the young man, bravely. But he did not at all see how his salvation was to be accomplished. “Can you tell me a little more definitely what is the matter? Have there been any more failures to-day?”

  “My brother-in-law Montevarchi is on the point of stopping payment,” said San Giacinto calmly.

  “Montevarchi!”

  Orsino did not conceal his astonishment.

  “Yes. Do not speak of it. And he is in precisely the same position, so far as I can judge of your affairs, as you yourself, though of course he has dealt with sums ten times as great. He will make enormous sacrifices and will pay, I suppose, after all. But he will be quite ruined. He also has worked with Del Fence’s bank.”

  “And the bank refuses to discount any more of his paper?”

  “Precisely. Since this afternoon.”

  “Then it will refuse to discount mine to-morrow.”

  “Have you acceptances due to-morrow?”

  “Yes — not much, but enough to make the trouble. It will be Saturday, too, and we must have money for the workmen.”

  “Have you not even enough in reserve for that?”

  “Perhaps. I cannot tell. Besides, if the bank refuses to renew I cannot draw a cheque.”

  “I am sorry for you. If I had known yesterday how near the end was, I would have warned you.”

  “Thanks. I am grateful as it is. Can you give me any advice?”

  Orsino had a vague idea that his rich cousin would generously propose to help him out of his difficulties. He was not quite sure whether he could bring himself to accept such assistance, but he more than half expected that it would be offered. In this, however, he was completely mistaken. San Giacinto had not the smallest intention of offering anything more substantial than his opinion. Considering that his wife’s brother’s liabilities amounted to something like five and twenty millions, this was not surprising. The giant bit his cigar and folded his long arms over his enormous chest, leaning back in the easy chair which creaked under his weight.

  “You have tried yourself in business by this time, Orsino,” he said, “and you know as well as I what there is to be done. You have three modes of action open to you. You can fail. It is a simple affair enough. The bank will take your buildings for what they will be worth a few months hence, on the day of liquidation. There will be a big deficit, which your father will pay for you and deduct from your share of the division at his death. That is one plan, and seems to me the best. It is perfectly honourable, and you lose by it. Secondly, you can go to your father to-morrow and ask him to lend you money to meet your acceptances and to continue the work until the houses are finished and can be sold. They will ultimately go for a quarter of their value, if you can sell them at all within the year, and you will be in your father’s debt, exactly as in the other case. You would avoid the publicity of a failure, but it would cost you more, because the houses will not be worth much more when they are finished than they are now.”

  “And the third plan — what is it?” inquired Orsino.

  “The third way is this. You can go to Del Ferice, and if you are a diplomatist you may persuade him that it is in his interest not to let you fail. I do not think you will succeed, but you can try. If he agrees it will be because he counts on your father to pay in the end, but it is questionable whether Del Ferice’s bank can afford to let out any more cash at the present moment. Money is going to be very tight, as they say.”

  Orsino smoked in silence, pondering over the situation. San Giacinto rose.

  “You are warned, at all events,” he said. “You will find a great change for the worse in the general aspect of things to-morrow.”

  “I am much obliged for the warning,” answered Orsino. “I suppose I can always find you if I need your advice — and you will advise me?”

  “You are welcome to my advice, such as it is, my dear boy. But as for me, I am going towards Naples to-night on business, and I may not be back again for a day or two. If you get into serious trouble before I am here again, you should go to your father at once. He knows nothing of business, and has been sensible enough to keep out of it. The consequence is that he is as rich as ever, and he would sacrifice a great deal rather than see your name dragged into the publicity of a failure. Good-night, and good luck to you.”

  Thereupon the Titan shook Orsino’s hand in his mighty grip and went away. As a matter of fact he was going down to look over one of Montevarchi’s biggest estates with a view to buying it in the coming cataclysm, but it would not have been like him to communicate the smallest of his intentions to Orsino, or to any one, not excepting his wife and his lawyer.

  Orsino was left to his own devices and meditations. A servant came in and inquired whether he wished to dine at home, and he ordered strong coffee by way of a meal. He was at the age when a man expects to find a way out of his difficulties in an artificial excitement of the nerves.

  Indeed, he had enough to disturb him, for it seemed as though all possible misfortunes had fallen upon him at once. He had suffered on the same day the greatest shock to his heart, and the greatest blow to his vanity which he could conceive possible. Maria Consuelo was gone and the failure of his business was apparently inevitable. When he tried to review the three plans which San Giacinto had suggested, he found himself suddenly thinking of the woman he loved and making schemes for following her; but so soon as he had transported himself in imagination to her side and was beginning to hope that he might win her back, he was torn away and plunged again into the whirlpool of business at home, struggling with unheard of difficulties and sinking deeper at every stroke.

  A hundred times he rose from his chair and paced the floor impatiently, and a hundred times he threw himself down again, overcome by the hopelessness of the situation. Occasionally he found a little comfort in the reflexion that the night could not last for ever. When the day came he would be driven to act, in one way or another, and he would be obliged to consult his partner, Contini. Then at last his mind would be able to follow one connected train of thought for a time, and he would get rest of some kind.

  Little by little, however, and long before the day dawned, the dominating influence asserted itself above the secondary one and he was thinking only of Maria Consuelo. Throughout all that night she was travelling, as she would perhaps travel throughout all the next day and the second night succeeding that. For she was strong and having once determined upon the journey would very probably go to the end of it without stopping to rest. He wondered whether she too were waking through all those long hours, thinking of what she had left behind, or whether she had closed her eyes and found the peace of sleep for which he longed in vain. He thought of her face, softly lighted by the dim lamp of the railway carriage, and fancied he could actually see it with the delicate shadows, the subdued richness of colour, the settled look of sadness. When the picture grew dim, he recalled it by a strong effort, though he knew that each time it rose before his eyes he must feel the same sharp thrust of pain, followed by the same dull wave of hopeless misery which had ebbed and flowed again so many times since he had parted from her.

  At last he roused himself, looked about him as though he were in a strange pl
ace, lighted a candle and betook himself to his own quarters. It was very late, and he was more tired than he knew, for in spite of all his troubles he fell asleep and did not awake till the sun was streaming into the room.

  Some one knocked at the door, and a servant announced that Signor Contini was waiting to see Don Orsino. The man’s face expressed a sort of servile surprise when he saw that Orsino had not undressed for the night and had been sleeping on the divan. He began to busy himself with the toilet things as though expecting Orsino to take some thought for his appearance. But the latter was anxious to see Contini at once, and sent for him.

  The architect was evidently very much disturbed. He was as pale as though he had just recovered from a long illness and he seemed to have grown suddenly emaciated during the night. He spoke in a low, excited tone.

  In substance he told Orsino what San Giacinto had said on the previous evening. Things looked very black indeed, and Del Ferice’s bank had refused to discount any more of Prince Montevarchi’s paper.

  “And we must have money to-day,” Contini concluded.

  When he had finished speaking his excitement disappeared and he relapsed into the utmost dejection. Orsino remained silent for some time and then lit a cigarette.

  “You need not be so down-hearted, Contini,” he said at last. “I shall not have any difficulty in getting money — you know that. What I feel most is the moral failure.”

  “What is the moral failure to me?” asked Contini gloomily. “It is all very well to talk of getting money. The bank will shut its tills like a steel trap and to-day is Saturday, and there are the workmen and others to be paid, and several bills due into the bargain. Of course your family can give you millions — in time. But we need cash to-day. That is the trouble.”

  “I suppose the state telegraph is not destroyed because Prince Montevarchi cannot meet his acceptances,” observed Orsino. “And I imagine that our steward here in the house has enough cash for our needs, and will not hesitate to hand it to me if he receives a telegram from my father ordering him to do so. Whether he has enough to take up the bills or not, I do not know; but as to-day is Saturday we have all day to-morrow to make arrangements. I could even go out to Saracinesca and be back on Monday morning when the bank opens.”