CHAPTER I
Signor Fortini receives the Signora Steno in his Studio
It was the end of the first week in Lent; and all Ravenna was stillbusily engaged in talking, thinking, and speculating on the mysteriouscrime that had been committed on Ash Wednesday morning in the Pineta.The excitement on the subject, indeed, was greater now than it had beenimmediately after the event. For, by this time, everybody in Ravennaknew all that anybody knew on the subject; the manner, time, and placeof the murder, and the different competing theories which had beenstarted to account for it, and with the conflicting probabilities ofwhich the judicial authorities were known to be occupying themselves.
These, as the reader knows, were three; based, in each case, on the factthat the suspected person was known, or was supposed to be known, tohave been at, or near, to the spot where the crime was committed at thetime when it had been committed.
The Marchese Ludovico was indisputably known; on his own confession, tohave been in the immediate neighbourhood of the spot at the time whenthe murder must have been done.
Paolina Foscarelli was equally indubitably, and by her own confession,not far off from the neighbourhood of the spot at the same time.
Of the Conte Leandro Lombardoni it was known only that he had passed outof the city gate leading in the same direction, at a time which mighthave enabled him to be present where the deed was done, at the hour whenit must have been done. The evidence as to propinquity to the place wasless strong in his case than in that of either of the others; but it wassupplemented by the unaccountable strangeness of his passing out of thePorta Nuova towards the Pineta at such an hour, and on that particularmorning.
The Marchese Ludovico stated that he went thither for the purpose ofshowing the Pineta to the prima donna, who had never seen it. And therewas nothing incredible or greatly improbable in the statement.
Paolina declared that she had gone to St. Apollinare in pursuit of herprofessional business. And the declaration was not only very probable initself, but could be shown by evidence to be true. Only, while itaccounted for her presence in the church of St. Apollinare, it left herdeparture from the church with her face turned, not towards the city,but towards the Pineta, unaccounted for.
In the case of the Conte Leandro, it was difficult to imagine the motivethat could have induced him to leave the city at that hour, in themanner in which he was proved, by the testimony of the men at the gate,to have done. And he gave no assistance himself towards arriving at anysatisfactory explanation of so strange a circumstance. He was unable, orunwilling, to account in any way for his conduct on that Ash Wednesdaymorning.
"He had thought it pleasanter to take a walk that fine morning, than togo to bed after the ball."
Nothing could be more unlike the usual known habits and tastes of theConte Leandro, than such a freak. But supposing such a whim to haveoccurred to him, would he have set out on his walk evidently intendingto be disguised--with a cloak wrapped round the fantastic costume inwhich he had been at the ball? Was such a supposition in any wisecredible, or admissible?
In each of the three cases there seemed also to be a motive for the deedthat might be deemed sufficient to have led to it; and from whichneither of the parties suspected could show that they were free.
In the case of the Marchese Ludovico, it was the terrible temptation ofdelivering his family name from ridicule and disgrace, and himself fromthe prospect of absolute beggary.
In the case of Paolina, it was the madness of woman's jealousy, wroughtto a pitch of desperation by circumstances similar to such as had erenow produced many a similar tragedy.
In the case of the Conte Leandro, it was the cruel mortification of aman whose monstrous vanity was notorious to the whole city.
These were the three hypotheses between which the possibilities of thecase seemed to lie to those whose position or means of information gavethem any real knowledge of the facts. But there was a section of theoutside public which had set up for itself and preferred yet a fourththeory--namely, that the prima donna had committed suicide. The holdersof this opinion were mainly women; and at the head of them; was theSignora Orsola Steno. In an agony of grief, indignation, and despair atthe accusation brought against her adopted child, and the arrest bywhich it had been followed up, she loudly maintained her own convictionthat the evil and wicked woman had brought her career to a fitting closeby putting herself to death.
"Likely enough she may have endeavoured to entrap the Marchese Lamberto;but not very likely," old Orsola thought, "that that exemplary noblemanshould have been caught by her wiles. Likely enough she may have plottedto play her last card, by giving the Marchese Ludovico to understand,that the only way to avoid the ruin which would fall upon him by herbecoming his uncle's wife, was to take her himself. How any suchovertures would be received by the noble Marchese Ludovico, all Ravennaought to know; and at all events she, Orsola Steno, knew surely enough.And upon that rebuff, and utter failure of her last hope despair hadcome upon the wretched creature, as well it might, and she had put anend to herself."
To her, Orsola Steno, the case was clear: and she only wondered thatanybody could be so blind as not to see it.
But what if such a supposition were simply inconsistent with the knownfacts? What if it were simply impossible that any person should inflicton themselves such an injury as that which it was evident the murderedwoman had sustained; and more impossible still that they should havebeen able to adopt the means for concealing the wound which the assassinhad adopted? What if such was the perfectly unhesitating judgment anddeclaration of the medical authorities? Such people as Orsola Steno, andthose who shared her opinion, are ordinarily impervious to any suchreasoning. It is remarkable that, in any case of doubt or circumstancesof suspicion, the popular mind--or, at all events, the Italian popularmind--is specially disposed to mistrust the medical profession. Theysuspect error exactly where scientific certainty is the most perfect,and deception precisely in those who have the least possible imaginablemotive for deceiving. Probably it may be because the grounds and meansof the knowledge they mistrust are more wholly, than in any other case,beyond the sphere of their own conceptions.
When old Orsola Steno was told that the doctors declared that it was notwithin the bounds of possibility that La Bianca should have put herselfto death in the manner in which she had been put to death, nothing couldexceed the profundity of the contempt with which she sneered in reply:
"Ah! they'll say anything to make out that they know more than otherfolks, and, maybe, they often know a deal less. Don't tell me. Howshould they know what a woman will do when she is driven? I know whatwomen are, and I know what them doctors are; and you may believe that anold woman, who has been a young one, knows more what such an one as thatBianca can do, when she has no hope before her, than all the doctors."
"But it is impossible--physically impossible that she could have doneit."
"Ta, ta, ta, ta! Physic, indeed; what's physic got to do with it? Ishould like to physic them that try to throw suspicion on a poorinnocent girl all to make out their own cleverness."
So Signora Orsola victoriously, and to the great increase of herconfidence in her own powers of insight, continued to hold her ownopinion, and it was shared by many other similarly-constituted minds.
The old Venetian woman had lived a very quiet life in the strange cityto which fate had brought her, making but few acquaintances, and holdingbut little intercourse with those few; but now, under the terriblemisfortune which had happened, she was stirred up to activity in everyway in which activity was possible to her. She went to the PalazzoCastelmare and endeavoured to see the Marchese Lamberto in vain. She wastold that the Marchese was ill, and could not see any one.
She went to the Contessa Violante, of whose acquaintanceship withPaolina she was aware, though she had never before seen her, and, oddlyenough, the Contessa Violante was disposed to share, or to become aconvert to, her own opinion respecting the mode of Bianca's death. Theyoung Contessa was, doub
tless as ignorant of all such matters as oldOrsola could be. Her education had been entirely conventual, and thosewho dwell in the inner sanctums and fortresses of the Church have acuriously instinctive aversion to the certainties and investigations ofmedical--especially of surgical--science; and the Contessa Violante was,perhaps, hence prepared to vilipend and set at naught the dicta of thescientific authorities.
It was likely that her mind was also warped by the conceptions of whatwere probable, likely to be providential, and even suitable, in the caseof such a person as the deceased singer. Of course, the whole life ofsuch an one was, to the Contessa Violante, a thing abominable andaccursed in the eyes of Heaven. It was more strange that all others, wholed similar lives, and were engaged in such a profession, should notmake an evil end of themselves than that one such should do so.
The Contessa Violante, therefore, was disposed to share the convictionof her visitor, as she most sincerely and cordially sympathised with herin her affliction. To her, also, it was wholly impossible to believethat Paolina had done this thing; nor was it credible to her thatLudovico should be guilty of such a deed. Of the three persons accusedshe would have found it more possible to believe in the guilt of theConte Leandro; but, on the whole, she preferred to avoid the necessityof assuming that either of the accused were guilty by admitting thehypothesis of Signora Orsola.
"And if you will take my advice, Signora, I think that the best thingyou could do would be to go to Signor Fortini, the lawyer, who isinterested in the matter on account of being the lawyer of theCastelmare family. I have always heard him spoken of as an upright andrespectable man. I have heard my uncle speak well of him. If I were youI would go and talk to him; you will very easily find out where hisstudio is. Go and tell him who you are, and what your interest in thematter is, and I have no doubt but that he will receive you kindly andlisten to what you have to say."
And Signora Orsola took the Contessa Violante's advice, and wentdirectly to the lawyer's studio in the little cloister under the wallsof the cathedral, on leaving her adviser. As Violante had said, she hadno difficulty whatever in finding it.
The lawyer was at home, and Signora Orsola was at once ushered into theinner studio, which has been described in a former chapter.
Signor Fortini was, to all appearances, entirely unoccupied; but it isprobable that his mind was fully employed in striving to see his waythrough some portion of the difficulties that hedged about on all sidesthe subject on which, more or less, all Ravenna was intent. He wassitting before his table, thickly covered with papers; but had thrownhimself back in his leather-covered arm-chair, and was grasping hisstubbly chin with one hand, the elbow belonging to which rested on thearm of his chair, while the dark eyes, shining out beneath hiscontracted forehead, were fixed on the ceiling of the little room.
"Signora Orsola Steno," he said, as he half rose, and courteouslyoffered his visitor a seat by the side of the table, so placed as to befronting his own, while the sitter in it was exactly in a line betweenhim and the window.
"Sua Signoria mi conosce. Your lordship knows me, then," said the oldwoman, whose surprise at finding herself thus recognized sufficed to putaltogether out of her head all the carefully arranged opening of herinterview with the lawyer which she had taken much pains to prepare.
Signor Fortini had, in truth, never seen the old woman, and had scarcelyever heard of her before the terrible event, which was now bringing herinto his presence. But her name, the nature of her connection withPaolina, and very many other particulars concerning her had become knownto the lawyer in the course of the investigations which that event hadimposed upon him.
"Sufficiently, Signora, though I never had the pleasure of speaking toyou before, to be aware of the nature of the business which has inducedyou to favour me with this visit," replied the lawyer, with gravecourtesy.
"Well, then, Signor Dottore, I hope you will excuse--"
"There is not the smallest need for any apology, Signora. Anzi--I amvery glad that you should have thought it well to call on me; I shall bemost happy to hear anything that you may wish to say to me."
"You are very polite, Signor Dottore, I am sure," said the old woman,hesitatingly; for she was alarmed at the idea, which the lawyer'scourtesy had suggested to her cautious mind, that she might be supposedto be engaging his professional services, and might thus find herself,before she was aware of it, involved in expenses which she had no meansof meeting, and no intention of incurring; "you are extremely polite,but--you see, Signor, it is best to speak plainly--I am a very poorwoman; and I have not the means--and I am sure--perhaps I ought not tohave troubled sua Signoria; but it was the Contessa Violante who advisedme to come to you."
"Indeed; I am beholden to the Signora Contessa Violante. As you say mostjudiciously, Signora, it is best to speak quite plainly. With regard toany professional services, which it might be otherwise in my power torender you, it is necessary to say at once that I am engaged in thismost unhappy business on the behalf of my old client and friend theMarchese Ludovico di Castelmare. There can be no question, therefore, ofany professional remuneration to me in the matter from any otherquarter. Anything that may pass between us," he continued, perceivingthat his visitor had not fully comprehended what he sought to convey toher, "must be of the nature of private conversation, and will not entailon you," he added, yet more plainly with a good-humoured smile, andputting his hand on her sleeve as he spoke, "any possible expensewhatever."
"Thank you kindly, sir; and, truth to say, it is not so much that Iwanted to ask you to say or to do anything, as only just not to say whata many people in this city are wicked enough to say and to think," saidold Orsola, much re-assured, and persuaded that she was approaching thebusiness in hand in the most cautious and clever manner imaginable.
"I hope, Signora, that I shall not say anything which it is wicked tosay; but what is it that people are wicked enough to say?" rejoined thelawyer, who knew now perfectly well what the wicked saying was.
"Why they say, Signor Dottore--some of them--some of them are wickedenough to say that that dear blessed child has--it is enough to blisterone's tongue to say it--has done that dreadful thing; Santa Maria abbiamisericordia--that murder in the forest. O Dio mio! Why--"
"Is she any relative of yours, Signora, the Signorina PaolinaFoscarelli?" asked the lawyer, quietly.
"No relative by blood, Signor; but she is the same to me as a daughter.I took her when she was left an orphan--"
"And she has lived with you ever since?"
"Ever since she has lived with me as if she was my own, Signor; and ifanybody in the world ever knew another, I know her; and, bless yourheart, she isn't capable of lifting her hand against a fly, let alone aChristian. There never was such wicked nonsense talked in this worldsince world it was; and I'm told, Signor Dottore, that you have saidthat she had been the one as did this deed; and--"
"Stop, stop, my good Signora Orsola! Are you aware that you are accusingme of being guilty of punishable defamation and slander? I say that theSignorina Paolina Foscarelli committed murder? Who on earth could everhave told you so monstrous an untruth? Allow me to assure you that Inever said anything of the kind."
"Oh, Signor Dottore, I am so glad to hear you say so. What lies peopledo tell, to be sure; I am sure it was a very good thought of theContessa Violante to tell me to come to you; and since you say that thepoor child is innocent, as innocent she is, as the child unborn--"
"Stay, Signora, stay; you go too fast--somewhat too fast. Unhappily, Iam by no means in a condition to say that your young friend is innocentof this crime; appearances, it must be admitted, are very much againsther; we must hope that they can be explained. I accuse no one; it is notmy province to do so."
"But you don't think the judges will believe that my child could havedone such a thing? If they only knew her! You don't think that, do you,Signor Dottore?" said the poor woman, with a voice and manner of piteousappeal.
"They will judge according to the evidence and the proba
bilities of thecase. It is impossible to say as yet to what conclusion these may seemto point. The Marchese Ludovico is an acquaintance of yours and of theSignorina Paolina, is he not?"
"An acquaintance? why they are engaged to be married," almost shriekedpoor Signora Orsola; "has not your lordship heard that they are engagedto be married?"
"Indeed! and you are acquainted with the Contessa Violante too. Do youknow whether her ladyship is aware of the engagement you speak of? Iask, because she is an old friend of the Marchese Ludovico."
"To be sure she is aware of it. She and Paolina have often talked itover together. Altro che, aware of it."
"Humph," said the lawyer thoughtfully; and then remained silent for aminute or two, while old Orsola looked at him wistfully.
"It must be very terrible to you then, Signora, to think that theMarchese should be suspected of this shocking crime, since you have suchreason to feel an interest in him," said he at last, looking up suddenlyat his companion.
"Lord bless your heart," exclaimed the old woman in reply; "the Marchesenever did nothing of the sort, no more than my poor innocent lamb didit. Nothing of the kind."
"Perhaps, then, you would not mind saying who did do it," said thelawyer; "since you seem to know all about it."
"Why she did it herself to be sure. It is a wonder anybody should doubtit. And a like enough end for such a baggage to come to," said SignoraOrsola, with much bitterness.
"You do not seem to have been among the admirers of the Signora Bianca,"said the lawyer, with a furtively shrewd look at the old woman.
"Admirers, indeed! She had too many admirers, I am thinking. Agood-for-nothing, impudent, brazen--well, she has gone to her account,so I won't be the one to speak ill of her."
"You seem to have had considerable opportunities of becoming acquaintedwith her character, Signora Orsola. Had you much acquaintance with her?"
"I never saw her but once in my life, and that was at the theatre on thelast Sunday night of Carnival. The Marchese had given us a box."
"And it was upon that occasion then, that she impressed you sounfavourably. The Signorina Paolina I suppose was with you at thetheatre?"
"Of course she was. Would it be likely, I ask you, Signor Dottore, thatthe Marchese took the box for me?"
"And no doubt the Signorina Foscarelli was impressed by the actress inthe same manner that you yourself were."
"Of course she was, as any other decent young woman would have been; letalone being, as Paolina is, engaged to be married to the Marchese."
"I have no doubt, Signora, that your remarks are perfectly just. If themanners and conduct of the young women now-a-days were regulated alittle more in conformity with the ideas of such persons of discretionas yourself, the world would be all the better for it. But I don't quitesee how the behaviour of the prima donna on the stage could have hadanything to do with the circumstance of the Marchese Ludovico'sengagement to the Signorina Foscarelli," said the lawyer, with the mostdemure innocence of manner.
"You don't see it, Signor Dottore. Perhaps you were not in the theatrethat night. If you had been you would have seen it fast enough. The wayshe went on, when the Marchese Ludovico was a-giving her a lovelynosegay of flowers--hothouse flowers, if you please--as big pretty nearas this table; not just a-throwing them on to the stage the way I'veseen 'em do it many a time at the Fenice; but putting them into herhand; and she, the minx a coming up to the box to take 'em before allthe people as bold as brass."
"Ah, I see? The Signorina Foscarelli naturally did not quite like that,"said the lawyer, encouragingly.
"Like it! Who would have liked it in her place, I ask you? And thatpainted hussy a-going on they way she did; making such eyes at him, andsmiling and a-pressing her hand to her bosom, that was just as naked asmy face; and looking for all the world if she could have jumped rightinto the box, and eaten him up. Like it, indeed!"
"No doubt it was provoking enough. And your adopted daughter, SignoraSteno, would not be the right-minded and well-brought-up girl I take herto be, if she did not express to you her disgust at such goings on,"said the sympathizing lawyer.
"You may say that. She expressed it plain enough and not to me only, butto the Marchese himself well, when she saw him afterwards. She let himknow what she thought of the painted huzzy. And she told him, too, somemore of the truth. She told him that the creature knew well enough whatshe was doing, or trying to do. The way she looked straight up at mypoor child in the box, where we were, was enough to make the bloodcurdle in your veins. If ever I saw a face look hatred, it was the faceof that woman when she looked up at our box. She looked at the poorchild as if she could have taken her heart's blood. She did. Ah! blessyour heart, she knew all about it. Talk of the old Marchese, indeed.Yes; the creature had set her mind upon being Marchesa di Castelmare.Not a doubt of it; but it was the nephew she wanted, not the uncle; andshe knew that my Paolina stood in the way of her scheming; and Paolinaknew that she knew it."
Old Orsola paused, out of breath with the length and vehemence of thetirade, which her feelings had prompted her to utter with crescendoviolence. She was verbose; but the lawyer had listened with the mostperfect patience and unflagging attention to every word she had uttered.
"It is, indeed, clear enough," he said, shaking his head, "that betweentwo women so situated with reference to each other, there could havebeen no very kindly feeling. And it must be confessed that thisunfortunate Bianca Lalli was, by all accounts, just the sort of womanthat was likely to be a very dangerous rival."
"She; a common, impudent, low-lived, brazen-faced, worn-out Jezebel. No;not where my Paolina stood on the other side. She couldn't take theMarchese away from her with all her arts. And that's why she went andput an end to herself. But she's gone--she's gone, where her paintedface and her lures won't be of any more service to her. And so I won'tsay any evil of her. Not I. It's a good rule that tells us to speak wellof the dead. Ave, Maria gratia plena, ora pro nobis, nunc et in horamortis nostrae," said the old woman, crossing herself and casting up hereyes in attestation of the Christian nature of her sentiments.
"Amen!" said the lawyer, piously, while he waited to see if theexuberance of his visitor's feelings would lead her to throw any furtherlight on the state of feeling that had existed between PaolinaFoscarelli and the murdered woman.
"I always say and think, for my part," continued the old woman,perceiving that her companion sat silent, as if expecting her tocontinue the conversation; "I always think that the blessed Virgin knowswhat's best for us. Maybe it's just as well that that poor miserablecreature did as she did. For we all know what men are, Signore Dottore;and there's no saying what hold she might have got upon the Marchese."
"And no doubt that is the feeling of our young friend SignorinaFoscarelli?" said the sympathetic lawyer.
"To be sure,--to be sure it is," said the old woman, meaning to creditPaolina with the piety she had understood herself to have expressed;"she did take a mortal aversion and dislike to the woman, and smallblame to her. But now she is gone, Paolina is no more likely to sayanything against her than I am myself."
"Quite so, quite so. And I hope the magistrates may take the same viewof the circumstances, that you have so judiciously expressed, Signora,"said the lawyer, who was abundantly contented with the result of hisinterview with the Signora Steno, as it stood, and did not see anyfurther necessity for prolonging it. "You may tell the ContessaViolante, if you should see her, that I am much obliged to her forhaving sent you to me," he added, as he rose to open the door of hissanctum for the old lady; "Beppo, open the door for the Signora Steno.Farewell, Signora, we shall meet again."