CHAPTER FIFTY FOUR.
THE EVENING AND THE MORNING.
Romola had a purpose in her mind as she was hastening away; a purposewhich had been growing through the afternoon hours like a side-stream,rising higher and higher along with the main current. It was less aresolve than a necessity of her feeling. Heedless of the darkeningstreets, and not caring to call for Maso's slow escort, she hurriedacross the bridge where the river showed itself black before the distantdying red, and took the most direct way to the Old Palace. She mightencounter her husband there. No matter. She could not weighprobabilities; she must discharge her heart. She did not know what shepassed in the pillared court or up the wide stairs; she only knew thatshe asked an usher for the Gonfaloniere, giving her name, and begging tobe shown into a private room.
She was not left long alone with the frescoed figures and the newly-littapers. Soon the door opened, and Bernardo del Nero entered, stillcarrying his white head erect above his silk lucco.
"Romola, my child, what is this?" he said, in a tone of anxious surpriseas he closed the door.
She had uncovered her head and went towards him without speaking. Helaid his hand on her shoulder, and held her a little way from him thathe might see her better. Her face was haggard from fatigue and longagitation, her hair had rolled down in disorder; but there was anexcitement in her eyes that seemed to have triumphed over the bodilyconsciousness.
"What has he done?" said Bernardo, abruptly. "Tell me everything,child; throw away pride. I am your father."
"It is not about myself--nothing about myself," said Romola, hastily."Dearest godfather, it is about you. I have heard things--some I cannottell you. But you are in danger in the palace; you are in dangereverywhere. There are fanatical men who would harm you, and--and thereare traitors. Trust nobody. If you trust, you will be betrayed."
Bernardo smiled.
"Have you worked yourself up into this agitation, my poor child," hesaid, raising his hand to her head and patting it gently, "to tell suchold truth as that to an old man like me?"
"Oh no, no! they are not old truths that I mean," said Romola, pressingher clasped hands painfully together, as if that action would help herto suppress what must not be told. "They are fresh things that I know,but cannot tell. Dearest godfather, you know I am not foolish. I wouldnot come to you without reason. Is it too late to warn you against anyone, _every_ one who seems to be working on your side? Is it too lateto say, `Go to your villa and keep away in the country when these threemore days of office are over?' Oh God! perhaps it is too late! and ifany harm comes to you, it will be as if I had done it!"
The last words had burst from Romola involuntarily: a long-stifledfeeling had found spasmodic utterance. But she herself was startled andarrested.
"I mean," she added, hesitatingly, "I know nothing positive. I onlyknow what fills me with fears."
"Poor child!" said Bernardo, looking at her with quiet penetration for amoment or two. Then he said: "Go, Romola--go home and rest. Thesefears may be only big ugly shadows of something very little andharmless. Even traitors must see their interest in betraying; the ratswill run where they smell the cheese, and there is no knowing yet whichway the scent will come."
He paused, and turned away his eyes from her with an air of abstraction,till, with a slow shrug, he added--
"As for warnings, they are of no use to me, child. I enter into noplots, but I never forsake my colours. If I march abreast withobstinate men, who will rush on guns and pikes, I must share theconsequences. Let us say no more about that. I have not many yearsleft at the bottom of my sack for them to rob me of. Go, child; go homeand rest."
He put his hand on her head again caressingly, and she could not helpclinging to his arm, and pressing her brow against his shoulder. Hergodfather's caress seemed the last thing that was left to her out ofthat young filial life, which now looked so happy to her even in itstroubles, for they were troubles untainted by anything hateful.
"Is silence best, my Romola?" said the old man.
"Yes, now; but I cannot tell whether it always will be," she answered,hesitatingly, raising her head with an appealing look.
"Well, you have a father's ear while I am above ground,"--he lifted theblack drapery and folded it round her head, adding--"and a father'shome; remember that," Then opening the door, he said: "There, hastenaway. You are like a black ghost; you will be safe enough."
When Romola fell asleep that night, she slept deep. Agitation hadreached its limits; she must gather strength before she could suffermore; and, in spite of rigid habit, she slept on far beyond sunrise.
When she awoke, it was to the sound of guns. Piero de' Medici, withthirteen hundred men at his back, was before the gate that looks towardsRome.
So much Romola learned from Maso, with many circumstantial additions ofdubious quality. A countryman had come in and alarmed the Signoriabefore it was light, else the city would have been taken by surprise.His master was not in the house, having been summoned to the Palazzolong ago. She sent out the old man again, that he might gather news,while she went up to the loggia from time to time to try and discern anysigns of the dreaded entrance having been made, or of its having beeneffectively repelled. Maso brought her word that the great Piazza wasfull of armed men, and that many of the chief citizens suspected asfriends of the Medici had been summoned to the palace and detainedthere. Some of the people seemed not to mind whether Piero got in ornot, and some said the Signoria itself had invited him; but however thatmight be, they were giving him an ugly welcome; and the soldiers fromPisa were coming against him.
In her memory of those morning hours, there were not many things thatRomola could distinguish as actual external experiences standingmarkedly out above the tumultuous waves of retrospect and anticipation.She knew that she had really walked to the Badia by the appointed timein spite of street alarms; she knew that she had waited there in vain.And the scene she had witnessed when she came out of the church, andstood watching on the steps while the doors were being closed behind herfor the afternoon interval, always came back to her like a rememberedwaking.
There was a change in the faces and tones of the people, armed andunarmed, who were pausing or hurrying along the streets. The guns werefiring again, but the sound only provoked laughter. She soon knew thecause of the change. Piero de' Medici and his horsemen had turned theirbacks on Florence, and were galloping as fast as they could along theSiena road. She learned this from a substantial shop-keeping Piagnone,who had not yet laid down his pike.
"It is true," he ended, with a certain bitterness in his emphasis."Piero is gone, but there are those left behind who were in the secretof his coming--we all know that; and if the new Signoria does its dutywe shall soon know who they are."
The words darted through Romola like a sharp spasm; but the evil theyforeshadowed was not yet close upon her, and as she entered her homeagain, her most pressing anxiety was the possibility that she had lostsight for a long while of Baldassarre.