Clementina

  CHAPTER XXIII

  But his thoughts had been busy during that half-hour, and as soon as hehad come out from the mouth of the alley, he ran to Gaydon's lodging.Gaydon, however, was not in. O'Toole lodged in the same house, and Woganmounted to his apartments, hoping there to find news of Gaydon'swhereabouts. But O'Toole was taking the air, too, but Wogan foundO'Toole's servant.

  "Where will I find Captain O'Toole?" asked Wogan.

  "You will find his Excellency," said the servant, with a reproachfulemphasis upon the title, "at the little bookseller's in the Piazza."

  Wogan sprang down the stairs and hurried to the Piazza, wondering whatin the world O'Toole was doing at a bookseller's. O'Toole was bendingover the counter, which was spread with open books, and Wogan hailed himfrom the doorway. O'Toole turned and blushed a deep crimson. He came tothe door as if to prevent Wogan's entrance into the shop. Wogan,however, had but one thought in his head.

  "Where shall I find Gaydon?" he asked.

  "He went towards the Via San Vitale," replied O'Toole.

  Wogan set off again, and in an hour came upon Gaydon. He had lost anhour of his fortnight; with the half-hour during which he had saunteredin the garden, an hour and a half.

  "You went to Rome in the spring," said he. "There you saw the King. Didyou see anyone else by any chance whilst you were in Rome?"

  "Edgar," replied Gaydon, with a glance from the tail of his eye whichWogan did not fail to remark.

  "Aha!" said he. "Edgar, to be sure, since you saw the King. But besidesEdgar, did you see anyone else?"

  "Whittington," said Gaydon.

  "Oho!" said Wogan, thoughtfully. "So you saw my friend Harry Whittingtonat Rome. Did you see him with the King?"

  Gaydon was becoming manifestly uncomfortable.

  "He was waiting for the King," he replied.

  "Indeed. And whereabouts was he waiting for the King?"

  "Oh, outside a house in Rome," said Gaydon, as though he barelyremembered the incident. "It was no business of mine, that I could see."

  "None whatever, to be sure," answered Wogan, cordially. "But why in theworld should Whittington be waiting for the King outside a house inRome?"

  "It was night-time. He carried a lantern."

  "Of course, if it was night-time," exclaimed Wogan, in his mostunsuspicious accent, "and the King wished to pay a visit to a house inRome, he would take an attendant with a lantern. A servant, though, onewould have thought, unless, of course, it was a private sort of visit--"

  "It was no business of mine," Gaydon interrupted; "and so I made noinquiries of Whittington."

  "But Whittington did not wait for inquiries, eh?" said Wogan, shrewdly."You are hiding something from me, my friend,--something which that goodhonest simpleton of a Whittington blurted out to you without the leastthought of making any disclosure. Oh, I know my Whittington. And I knowyou, too, Dick. I do not blame you. For when the King goes a-visitingthe Princess Caprara privately at night-time while the girl to whom heis betrothed suffers in prison for her courageous loyalty to him, andhis best friends are risking their heads to set her free, why, there'sknowledge a man would be glad to keep even out of his own hearing. Soyou see I know more than you credit me with. So tell me the rest! Don'tfob me off. Don't plead it is none of your business, for, upon my soul,it is." Gaydon suddenly changed his manner. He spoke with no lessearnestness than Wogan,--

  "You are in the right. It is my business, and why? Because it touchesyou, Charles Wogan, and you are my friend."

  "Therefore you will tell me," cried Wogan.

  "Therefore I will not tell you," answered Gaydon. He had a very keenrecollection of certain pages of poetry he had seen on the table atSchlestadt, of certain conversations in the berlin when he had feignedto sleep.

  Wogan caught him by the arm.

  "I must know. Here have I lost two hours out of one poor fortnight. Imust know."

  "Why?"

  Gaydon stood quite unmoved, and with a remarkable sternness ofexpression. Wogan understood that only the truth would unlock his lips,and he cried,--

  "Because unless I do, in a fortnight her Highness will refuse to marrythe King." And he recounted to him the walk he had taken and theconversation he had held with Clementina that morning. Gaydon listenedwith an unfeigned surprise. The story put Wogan in quite a differentlight, and moreover it was told with so much sincerity of voice and soclear a simplicity of language, Gaydon could not doubt one syllable.

  "I am afraid, my friend," said he, "my thoughts have done you somewrong--"

  "Leave me out of them," cried Wogan, impatiently. He had no notion andno desire to hear what Gaydon meant. "Tell me from first to last whatyou saw in Rome."

  Gaydon told him thereupon of that secret passage from the Chevalier'shouse into the back street, and of that promenade to the Princess'shouse which he had spied upon. Wogan listened without any remark, andyet without any attempt to quicken his informant. But as soon as he hadthe story, he set off at a run towards the Cardinal's palace. "So thePrincess," he thought, "had more than a rumour to go upon, though howshe came by her knowledge the devil only knows." At the palace he wastold that the Cardinal was gone to the Archiginnasio.

  "I will wait," said Wogan; and he waited in the library for anhour,--another priceless hour of that swiftly passing fortnight, and hewas not a whit nearer to his end! He made it his business, however, toshow a composed face to his Eminence, and since his Eminence's dinnerwas ready, to make a pretence of sharing the meal. The Cardinal was in amood of great contentment.

  "It is your presence, Mr. Wogan, puts me in a good humour," he waspleased to say.

  "Or a certain letter your Eminence received from Spain to-day?" askedWogan.

  "True, the letter was one to cause all the King's friends satisfaction."

  "And some few of them, perhaps, relief," said Wogan.

  The Cardinal glanced at Wogan, but with a quite impassive countenance.He took a pinch of snuff and inhaled it delicately. Then he glanced atWogan again.

  "I have a hope, Mr. Wogan," said he, with a great cordiality. "You shalltell me if it is to fall. I see much of you of late, and I have a hopethat you are thinking of the priesthood. We should welcome you verygladly, you may be sure. Who knows but what there is a Cardinal's hathung up in the anteroom of the future for you to take down from itspeg?"

  The suggestion was sufficiently startling to Wogan, who had thought ofnothing less than of entering into orders. But he was not to be divertedby this piece of ingenuity.

  "Your Eminence," said he, "although I hold myself unworthy of priestlyvows, I am here in truth in the character of a catechist."

  "Catechise, then, my friend," said the Cardinal, with a smile.

  "First, then, I would ask your Eminence how many of the King's followershave had the honour of being presented to the Princess Clementina?"

  "Very few."

  "Might I know the names?"

  "To be sure."

  Cardinal Origo repeated three or four names. They were the names of menknown to Wogan for irreproachable loyalty. Not one of them would havegone about the Princess with slanders upon his master; he would havegone bail for them all,--at least, a month ago he would, he reflected,though now indeed he hardly knew where to put his trust.

  "Her Highness lives, as you know, a very suitable, secluded life,"continued Origo.

  "But might not others have had access to her at the Pilgrim Inn?"

  "Nay, she was there but the one night,--the night of her arrival. I donot think it likely. For if you remember, I myself went to her early thenext morning, and by a stroke of good luck I had already come upon thelittle house in the garden which was offered to me by a friend of yoursfor her Highness's service."

  "On the evening of our arrival? A friend of mine offered you the house,"said Wogan, puzzling over who that friend could be.

  "Yes. Harry Whittington."

  Wogan started to his feet. So, after all, Whittington was at the bottomof the trouble. Wogan wondered
whether he had done wisely not to publishthe fellow's treachery. But he could not,--no, he had to make hisaccount with the man alone. There were reasons.

  "It was Harry Whittington who offered the house for her Highness's use?"Wogan exclaimed.

  "It was an offer most apt and kind."

  "And made on the evening of our arrival?"

  "Not an hour after you left me. But you are surprised?"

  Wogan was reflecting that on the evening of his arrival, and indeed justbefore Whittington made his offer to Origo, he had seen Whittington'sface by the torchlight in the square. That face lived very plainly inWogan's thoughts. It was certainly not for Clementina's service thatWhittington had offered the house. Wogan resumed his seat, sayingcarelessly,--

  "I was surprised, for I had a notion that Whittington lodged oppositethe Torre Garisenda, and not at the house."

  "Nor did he. He hired it for a friend who has now left Bologna."

  "Man or woman?" asked Wogan, remembering that visitor who had drawn backinto the alley one early morning of last autumn. The man might verylikely have been Whittington.

  "I did not trouble to inquire," said the Cardinal. "But, Mr. Wogan, whydo you ask me these questions?"

  "I have not come yet to the end of them," answered Wogan. "There is onemore."

  "Ask it!" said his Eminence, crossing his legs.

  "Will your Eminence oblige me with a history of the affection of MariaVittoria, Mlle. de Caprara, for the King?"

  The Cardinal uncrossed his legs and bounced in his chair.

  "Here is a question indeed!" he stuttered.

  "And a history of the King's response to it," continued Wogan,implacably, "with a particular account of why the King lingers in Spainafter the Cadiz expedition has put out to sea."

  Origo was now quite still. His face was pale, and he had lost in aninstant that air of affectation which so contrasted with his broadfeatures.

  "This is very dangerous talk," said he, solemnly.

  "Not so dangerous as silence."

  "Some foolish slanderer has been busy at your ears."

  "Not at my ears," returned Wogan.

  The Cardinal took his meaning. "Is it so, indeed?" said he,thoughtfully, once or twice. Then he reached out his hand towards anescritoire. "But here's the King's letter come this morning."

  "It is not enough," said Wogan, "for the King lingers in Spain, and theportrait of Maria Vittoria glows on the walls of the Caprara Palace,whither I was bidden to escort her Highness this morning."

  The Cardinal walked thoughtfully to and fro about the room, but made uphis mind in the end.

  "I will tell you the truth of the matter, Mr. Wogan. The King saw Mlle.de Caprara for the first time while you were searching Europe for a wifefor him. He saw her here one morning at Mass in the Church of theCrucifixion, and came away most silent. Of their acquaintance I need notspeak. The King just for one month became an ardent youth. He appealedto the Pope for his consent to marry Mlle. de Caprara, and the Popeconsented. The King was just sending off a message to bid you cease yoursearch when you came back with the news that her Highness the PrincessClementina had accepted the King's hand and would shortly set out forBologna. Sir, the King was in despair, though he showed to you asmiling, grateful face. Mlle. de Caprara went to Rome; the King stayedhere awaiting his betrothed. There came the news of her imprisonment.The King, after all, is a man. If his heart leaped a little at the news,who shall blame him? Do you remember how you came privately one nightto the King's cabinet and found me there in the King's company?"

  "But," stammered Wogan, "I do remember that evening. I remember that theKing was pale, discouraged--"

  "And why?" said Origo. "Because her Highness's journey had beeninterrupted, because the marriage now seemed impossible? No, but becauseMr. Charles Wogan was back in Bologna, because Mr. Charles Wogan hadsought for a private interview, because the King had no more doubt thanI as to what Mr. Charles Wogan intended to propose, and because the Kingknew that what Mr. Wogan set his hand to was as good as done. Youremember I threw such hindrances as I could in your way, and made muchof the risks you must run, and the impossibility of your task. Now youknow why."

  Never was a man more confused than Wogan at this story of theCardinal's. "It makes me out a mere meddlesome fool," he cried, and satstunned.

  "It is an unprofitable question at this time of day," said the Cardinal,with a smile. "Matters have gone so far that they can no longer beremedied. This marriage must take place."

  "True," said Wogan.

  "The King, indeed, is firmly inclined to it."

  "Yet he lingers in Spain."

  "That I cannot explain to you, but he has been most loyal. That you musttake my word for, so must your Princess."

  "Yet this winter when I was at Schlestadt preparing the expedition toInnspruck," Wogan said with a certain timidity, for he no longer feltthat it was within his right to make reproaches, "the King was in Romevisiting Mlle. de Caprara."

  The Cardinal flushed with some anger at Wogan's persistence.

  "Come, sir," said he, "what has soured you with suspicions? Upon myword, here is a man sitting with me who bears your name, but few ofthose good qualities the name is linked with in my memories. Your Kingsaw Mlle. de Caprara once in Rome, once only. Major Gaydon had come atyour request to Rome to fetch a letter in the King's hand, bidding herHighness entrust herself to you. Up to that moment the issue of yourexploit was in the balance. But your request was to the King a verycertain sign that you would indeed succeed. So the night before he wrotethe letter he went to the Caprara Palace and took his farewell of thewoman he loved. So much may be pardoned to any man, even by you, who, itseems, stand pinnacled above these earthly affections."

  The blood rushed into Wogan's face at the sneer, but he bowed his headto it, being much humbled by Origo's disclosures.

  "This story I have told you," continued the Cardinal, "I will make boldto tell to-morrow to her Highness."

  "But you must also explain why the King lingers in Spain," Woganobjected. "I am very certain of it. The Princess has her pride; shewill not marry a reluctant man."

  "Well, that I cannot do," cried the Cardinal, now fairly exasperated."Pride! She has her pride! Is it to ruin a cause, this pride of hers? Isit to wreck a policy?"

  "No," cried Wogan, starting up. "I have a fortnight. I beg your Eminencenot to speak one word to her Highness until this fortnight is gone,until the eve of the marriage in Bologna. Give me till then. I have ahope there will be no need for us to speak at all."

  The Cardinal shrugged his shoulders.

  "You must do more than hope. Will you pledge your word to it?"

  Here it seemed to Wogan was an occasion when a man must dare.

  "Yes," he said, and so went out of the house. He had spoken under asudden inspiration; the Cardinal's words had shown him a way which withcareful treading might lead to his desired result. He went first to hislodging, and ordered his servant Marnier to saddle his black horse. Thenhe hurried again to O'Toole's lodging, and found his friend back fromthe bookseller's indeed, but breathing very hard of a book which he slidbehind his back.

  "I am to go on a journey," said Wogan, "and there's a delicate sort ofwork I would trust to you."

  O'Toole looked distantly at Wogan.

  "_Opus_," said he, in a far-away voice.

  "I want you to keep an eye on the little house in the garden--"

  O'Toole nodded. "_Hortus, hortus, hortum_," said he, "_horti--hortus_,"and he fingered the book at his back, "no, _horti, horto, horto_. Do youknow, my friend, that the difference between the second and fourthdeclensions was solely invented by the grammarians for their own profit.It is of no manner of use, and the most plaguy business that ever Iheard of."

  "O'Toole," cried Wogan, with a bang of his fist, "you are no morelistening to me than this table."

  At once O'Toole's face brightened, and with a shout of pride he reeledout, "_Mensa, mensa, mensam, mensae, mensae, mensa_." Wogan sprang up ina rage. br />
  "Don't _mensa, mensam_ me when I am talking most seriously to you! Whatis it you are after? What's that book you are hiding? Let me look atit!" O'Toole blushed on every visible inch of him and handed the book toWogan.

  "It's a Latin grammar, my friend," said he, meekly.

  "And what in the world do you want to be addling your brains with aLatin grammar for, when there's other need for your eyes?"

  "Aren't we to be enrolled at the Capitol in June as Roman Senators withall the ancient honours, _cum titubis_--it is so--_cum titubis_, whichare psalters or pshawms?"

  "Well, what then?"

  "You don't understand, Charles, the difficulty of my position. You haveLatin at your finger-ends. Sure, I have often admired you for yourextraordinary comprehension of Latin, but never more than I do now. Itwill be no trouble in the world for you to trip off a neat littlespeech, thanking the Senators kindly for the great honour they are doingthemselves in electing us into their noble body. But it will not be easyfor me," said O'Toole, with a sigh. "How can I get enough Latin throughmy skull by June not to disgrace myself?" He looked so utterly miserableand distressed that Wogan never felt less inclined to laugh. "I sit upat nights with a lamp, but the most unaccountable thing happens. I maycome in here as lively as any cricket, but the moment I take this bookin my hands I am overpowered with sleep--"

  "Oh, listen to me," cried Wogan. "I have only a fortnight--"

  "And I have only till June," sighed O'Toole. "But there! I am listening.I have no doubt, my friend, your business is more important than mine,"he said with the simplicity of which not one of his friends could resistthe appeal. Wogan could not now.

  "My business," he said, "is only more important because you have no needof your Latin grammar at all. There's a special deputy, a learnedprofessor, appointed on these occasions to make a speech for us, and allwe have to do is to sit still and nod our heads wisely when he lookstowards us."

  "Is that all?" cried O'Toole, jumping up. "Swear it!"

  "I do," said Wogan; and "Here's to the devil with the Latin grammar!"exclaimed O'Toole. He flung open his window and hurled the book outacross the street with the full force of his prodigious arm. Therefollowed a crash and then the tinkle of falling glass. O'Toole beamedcontentedly and shut the window.

  "Now what will I do for you in return for this?" he asked.

  "Keep a watch on the little house and the garden. I will tell you whywhen I return. Observe who goes in to visit the Princess, but hinder noone. Only remember who they are and let me know." And Wogan got back tohis lodging and mounted his black horse. He could trust O'Toole to playwatchdog in his absence. If the mysterious visitor who had bestowed uponClementina with so liberal a hand so much innuendo and such an artfulcombination of truth and falsity, were to come again to the little houseto confirm the slanders, Wogan in the end would not fail to discover thevisitor's identity.

  He dismissed the matter from his mind and rode out from Bologna. Fourdays afterwards he presented himself at the door of the Caprara Palace.