When Don Matteo was in the street again, he stood still and passed his hand over his eyes, trying to collect his thoughts. His bishop’s ring touched his forehead, and he realized that it was all true. He had not been half an hour in the archbishop’s palace, and when he reached his own door, he had not been absent an hour from the house.
He found Don Teodoro in the same room and still in the same chair, into which he had dropped exhausted when Don Matteo had gone out, his head sunk on his breast, his hands clasped despairingly on his knees. As the door opened, he looked up with scared eyes, and rose.
“Courage!” exclaimed Don Matteo, patting his shoulder just as he had done before going out. “I have seen his Eminence.”
Don Teodoro looked at him in mute and resigned expectation, and wondered at his cheerful face. But his friend made him sit down again, and told him all that had taken place, and then, before Don Teodoro could recover his astonishment and emotion, he found himself kneeling on the floor and heard the words of absolution spoken softly over him. A moment later he felt upon his head the laying of hands and heard those still more solemn words pronounced over him, which, he had never hoped to hear said for himself.
When he rose to his feet at last, he saw Don Matteo wrapping up the bishop’s cross and chain and ring in the same piece of clean white paper in which he kept the old stole.
But Don Teodoro went to his little room, which was ready for him as usual, and he was not seen again on that day. Several times Don Matteo went softly to the door. Once he heard the old man sobbing within as though his heart would break, all alone; and once again he heard his voice saying Latin prayers in a low tone; and the third time all was very still, and Don Matteo knew that the worst was past.
On the next morning very early Don Teodoro came out of his room. Neither of the two spoke of what had happened, but the clear light was in the old priest’s eyes again, clearer and happier than before, and little by little the lines smoothed themselves from his singular face until there were no more there than there had been for years. All that day they talked together of books and of Don Teodoro’s great history of the Church. But they were both thoughtful and subject to moments of absence of mind.
It was not until the evening of the third day that Don Teodoro asked his friend a question.
“What do you advise me to say to the princess?” he inquired, when they were alone together.
“Tell her that you have consulted an ecclesiastical authority and that there was an irregularity about the marriage with Don Gianluca so that you must solemnly marry them again before they can consider themselves man and wife. And tell the Baron of Guardia that the same authority is sure that he was not married to the princess, but is a free man. It is very simple, and there can be no possible mistake, now.”
“Yes,” said Don Teodoro. “It is very simple.”
And so it was, for Cardinal Campodonico deserved the reputation he enjoyed of being, in ecclesiastical affairs, a man equal to the most difficult emergencies, in character, in keen discernment, and in prompt action.
But Don Teodoro sighed softly when he had spoken, for he thought of Taquisara and of what that brave and silent man would suffer when he was forced to stand by Gianluca’s side and see the rings exchanged and the hands joined, and hear the words spoken which must cut him off forever from all hope. But Taquisara, at least, in his suffering, would have the consolation of having been honest and true and loyal from first to last. He would never have to bear the consequences of having been a coward at a great moment. It could not be so very hard for him, after all, thought Don Teodoro.
And he saw no reason for curtailing his stay in Naples, since there was time until the first of January. On the contrary, he grew glad of those long days, in which he could meditate on the past and think of the future, and be supremely and humbly thankful for the great change that had come into his life.
CHAPTER XXIX.
DON TEODORO WROTE a few words to Taquisara, embodying what Don. Matteo had advised him to say. He added also that matters had not turned out as he had expected and that he should return to Muro as usual on the twentieth of the month. The Sicilian, read the letter twice and then burned it carefully. He was neither surprised nor disappointed by its contents, though he had expected that there would be much more difficulty in undoing what had been done. There was clearly nothing more to be said, as there was most certainly nothing more to hope. Don Teodoro had undoubtedly consulted the archbishop of Naples, thought Taquisara, and such a decision was final and authoritative.
He had succeeded in forcing himself into a sort of mechanical regularity of life which helped him through the day. Gianluca needed him still, though less than formerly, and as long as he could be of use, and could control his face and voice, he would stay in Muro. Since Veronica had fixed the first of January as a limit, he could hardly find an excuse for going away during the last three weeks of the time, when he could still be of infinite service to his friend on the journey to Naples.
On the whole, he considered himself very little. It was easier to do his utmost, and to invent more than his utmost to be done, than it would be to live an idle life anywhere else.
Again, as in the early days, he avoided Veronica when he could do so, without attracting Gianluca’s attention, and Veronica herself kept out of his way as much as she could. Without words they had a tacit understanding that they would never be left alone together, even for an instant.
One day, by chance, going in opposite directions through the house, they opened opposite doors of the same room and faced each other unexpectedly. For a single instant both paused, and then came forward to pass each other. Veronica held her head high and looked straight before her, for they had met already on that day, and there was no reason why she should speak to him. But Taquisara could not help looking into her face, and he saw how hard it tried to be and yet how, in spite of herself, it softened almost before she had passed him. He turned and glanced at her retreating figure, and her head was bent low, and her right hand, hanging by her side, opened and shut twice convulsively, in his sight.
He had not dared to suggest to himself until then that she might possibly love him, but in the flash of that quick passing he almost knew it. Then, before he had closed the door behind him and entered the next room, the knowledge was gone, and he cursed himself for the thought, as though it had been an insult to her. If he should have to pass her alone again, he would rather cut off his right hand than turn and look at her. But that one moment, past and gone, had life in it to torment him night and day.
Gianluca was no better, and no worse. He wheeled himself about the great rooms, and on fine mornings Veronica took him to drive. She read to him, played bésique with him, fenced with Taquisara to amuse him; she devoted herself to him in every way; but as day followed day, she invented all sorts of occupations and games which should take the place of conversation. Anything was better than talking with him, now; anything was better than to hear him say that he loved her, expecting her to pronounce the words.
He himself lost heart suddenly.
“I shall never walk again,” he said, one afternoon, as they sat together in the big room.
The days were very short, for it was mid-December, and the lamps had been brought. They had been out in the carriage, and when Taquisara had lifted him from his seat, he had made a desperate attempt to move his legs, a sudden effort into which he had thrown all the concentrated hope and will that were still in him. But there had been neither motion nor sensation, and all at once he had felt that it was all over, forever.
Veronica looked at him quickly, and he was watching her face. He saw no contradiction there of what he had said, but only a little surprise that he should have said it.
“You may not be able to walk as soon as we thought,” she answered gently. “But that is no reason why you should never walk at all.”
“I am afraid it is,” he said.
She stroked his hand, as she often did, and her eyes wandered f
rom his face to the other side of the room, and back again.
“I have been trying very hard to get well,” he continued presently.
“Harder than any one knows.”
“I know,” Veronica answered. “You are so brave!”
“Brave? No. I am desperate. Do you think I do not know what it must be to you, to be tied to a hopeless cripple like me?”
“Tied? I?” She spoke bravely, for it would have been a deadly cruelty not to contradict him. “It is for you,” she went on. “You must not think of me as tied to you, dear, as you call it! I did it gladly, of my own free will, and I knew what I was doing.”
“Ah no!” he answered sadly. “You could not have known what you were doing, then. Your whole life has only saved half of mine.”
A chill of fear shot through Veronica’s heart.
“Dear,” she said anxiously and nervously. “Have I done anything to make you talk like this?”
“Yes, love, you have done much,” he answered, with a tender, regretful look. “No — do not start! I am sorry that you did not understand. It is because you do so much, because you give your whole life for my wretched existence, because I know what my hours of happiness cost you now and will cost you hereafter. That is why I say these things. It would have been so much easier and simpler if I had died with my hand in yours, that day, when Don Teodoro married us. Veronica — tell me — did he say all the words? I fainted, I think.”
“Yes,” answered Veronica, still pale. “He said all the words.”
“And did he give us the benediction?”
“Yes, he gave us the benediction.”
Gianluca sighed.
“Then it cannot be undone, dear,” he said softly. “You must forgive me.”
“I would not have it undone, Gianluca.”
And before that great unselfishness, Veronica bowed her head down, until her lips kissed his hands. But as she touched them, she heard the door open, and instantly she was erect again, and trying to smile. Taquisara came in.
Veronica rose, for she felt that she could not sit still by Gianluca’s side, with his words in her ear, her own scarcely cold upon her lips, and the man for whom she would have given her soul’s salvation, who would have died ten deaths for her, standing quietly there, looking on. She walked nervously up and down the room.
“Should you like to fence?” asked Taquisara. “We have not touched a foil to-day.”
Anything seemed good which could pass the time without talking. But to her it seemed heartless just then.
“No,” she answered, almost curtly. “It seems to me that we are always fencing.”
But Gianluca understood why she refused. And to him, perhaps, anything was better than thinking.
“Please do!” he said. “I enjoy it so much!”
Mechanically and without a word, she went to the corner where the foils and other things were kept in a great carved chest.
Taquisara moved a large table out of the way, pushing it slowly before him.
“Do you think you can see? Or shall we have more lamps?” asked Veronica.
“I can see very well — as well as one can, by lamp-light,” answered Taquisara, as he placed the lamps together upon the table, so that the light should fall sideways upon them when they fenced.
Veronica was glad to slip her mask over her face, just then. She was conscious of the fact when she had done it, though she hardly knew what she was doing as she took a foil from the long chest and stepped out into the room to meet Taquisara. Then, as he raised his arm to engage and she still held her foil down, her habitual interest in the amusement momentarily asserted itself.
“Shall we try that feint of yours that you were doing the other day?” she asked. “You know, you touched me with it. I think I can meet it now, for I have been thinking about it.”
“Yes, try it!” said Gianluca, from his chair.
“Certainly,” answered Taquisara.
Instantly, both fell into position and engaged. Barely crossing foils, Taquisara executed the feint in question at once, and lunged his fullest length. But Veronica had thought out the right parry and answer, and was quicker than he.
His weapon ran past her head without touching her, and as he recovered himself, hers shot out after him. He uttered an exclamation as it ran under his arm, with a little soft resistance.
“Touched!” cried Veronica, at the same instant.
He said nothing. Then, a second later, she uttered a sharp cry of horror, dropped her foil upon the floor and raising her mask stared at him with wild, white face. Not heeding what she did, she had taken the sharp foil by mistake. It was dark in the corner where the chest stood.
“It is nothing,” he said. “It is nothing, I assure you.”
“What is the matter?” asked Gianluca, in astonishment, for he could not see that the foil had no button.
But Veronica did not answer him. She was close to Taquisara now, clutching his arm with both hands and staring at the wire mask which covered his face.
“You are hurt! I know you are hurt!” she said, in a voice faint with fear.
“Oh no!” he answered, with a short laugh. “I was a little surprised.
Take another foil. It is nothing, I assure you.”
“I know you are hurt,” she repeated. “Oh God! I might have killed you—”
She felt dizzy, and sick with horror, and she clung to his arm, now, for support.
“Do you mean to say that you had the sharp foil?” asked Gianluca, beginning to understand.
“It is nothing at all,” said Taquisara. “It ran through my jacket, just under the arm. It did not touch me.”
“It might have run through you,” said Gianluca, gravely. “It might have killed you.”
“Oh — please — please—” cried Veronica, still clinging to Taquisara’s arm and turning her pale face to Gianluca.
He looked on, and his face changed. There was something in her attitude, just for a few seconds, in her ghastly pallor, in the tones of her voice, that went through Gianluca like a knife. The dreadful instinctive certainty that she loved the man she had so nearly killed, took possession of him in a dark prevision of terror. Veronica was strong and brave, but it would have been strange indeed if she had shown nothing of what she felt.
It did not last long, and perhaps she knew what she had shown, for she dropped Taquisara’s arm, and the colour rushed to her face as she stooped and picked up the foil with the green hilt. The hilts of the others were blue, like those of many Neapolitan foils, and in the lamp-light she could hardly distinguish the difference.
With sudden anger Veronica set her foot upon the steel and bent it up, trying to break it. She could not, for it was of soft temper, but she bent it out of all shape, so as to be useless.
She forced herself to take another, and they fenced again for a few minutes. Gianluca watched them at first, but soon his head fell back, and he stared at the ceiling. Death had entered into his soul. He had guessed half the truth. But in the state in which he was on that evening, and after what had passed between him and Veronica, the suspicion alone would have been enough. Nothing could have saved him from it, since it was indeed the truth. Such passionate, strong love could only hide itself so long as it lived in the even, unchanging light of monotonous days. In the flash of a danger, a terror, a violent chance, its shape stood out for an instant and was not to be mistaken.
Gianluca scarcely spoke again on that evening. The next morning, before he left his own room, Taquisara was with him, walking up and down and smoking while Gianluca drank his coffee. They had been discussing the accident of the previous evening, and Taquisara had laughed over it. But Gianluca was sad and grave.
“I wish to ask you a question,” he said, after a short silence. “When I fainted, that day — did Don Teodoro pronounce all the proper words? You must have heard him. Was it a real marriage, without any defect of form?”
Taquisara stopped in his walk and hesitated. After all, since Don Teodor
o had written to him that the marriage must be performed again, it was much better that Gianluca should be prepared for it, since he himself had put the question.
“Since you ask me,” answered Taquisara, after a moment’s thought, “I may as well tell you what I know. After it was done, both Don Teodoro and I had doubts as to whether the marriage were perfectly valid, and he determined to consult a bishop. I suppose that he has done so, for he has written to me about it. He says that the ecclesiastical authority before whom the matter was laid declares that there were informalities, and that you must be married again. You see, in the first place, there were no banns published in church, and there was no permission from the bishop to omit publishing them. But, of course, that might be set aside. I fancy that the real trouble may have been that you were unconscious. At all events, it is a very simple matter to be married again.”
“In other words, it is no marriage at all. I thought so — I thought so.”
Gianluca repeated the words slowly and sadly.
“What does it matter?” asked Taquisara, turning away and walking again. “It is a question of five minutes. I should think that you would be glad—”
“Yes — perhaps I am glad,” said Gianluca, so low that the words were scarcely an interruption.
“Because you can be married in your full senses,” continued Taquisara, bravely, “with your father and mother beside you, and all the rest of it.”
Gianluca said nothing to this, and again there was a short silence. Just as Taquisara came to the table in his walk, Gianluca spoke again.
“Stop a moment,” he said. “Look at me, Taquisara. If you were in my place, what would you do?”
Their eyes met, and Gianluca saw the quick effort of the other’s features, controlling themselves, as though he had been struck unawares.
Complete Works of F Marion Crawford Page 860