*CHAPTER IX.*
On his arrival at Florence Inglesant found himself at once feted andcaressed, though the nature of his mission to Umbria, antagonistic ashis supposed influence had been to the interests of the ducal party,might naturally have procured for him a far different reception.Trained as he had been in courts, the caprices of princes' favour didnot seem strange to him, and were taken at their true worth.Unsuspicious, therefore, of any special danger, relieved from theintolerable strain which the position at Umbria had exerted upon hisconscience, delighted with the society of his recovered mistress, andflattered by the attentions of the Duchess and of the whole Court, hegave himself up freely to the enjoyments of the hour. Plentifullysupplied with money from his own resources, from the kindness of theaged Duke, and from the subsidies of his patrons at Rome, he engagedfreely in the parties formed for the performance of masques andinterludes, in which the Court delighted, and became conspicuous for theexcellence of his acting and invention.
But it was not the purpose of the demon that followed on his footstepsto give him longer repose than might lull his senses, and weaken hispowers of resisting evil. Day after day devoted to pleasure paved theway for the final catastrophe, until the night arrived when the plot wasfully ripe. Supper was over, and the Court sat down again to play.Inglesant remembered afterwards, though at the time it did not attracthis attention, that several gentlemen, all of them friends of Guardino,paid him particular attention, and insisted on drinking with him,calling for different kinds of wine, and recommending them to hisnotice. The saloons were crowded and very hot, and when Inglesant leftthe supper room and came into the brilliant marble hall lighted withgreat lustres, where the Court was at play, he was more excited than washis wont. The Court was gathered at different tables,--a very large onein the centre of the hall, and other smaller ones around. The brilliantdresses, the jewels, the beautiful women, the reflections in thenumberless mirrors, made a dazzling and mystifying impression on hisbrain. The play was very high, and at the table to which Inglesant satdown especially so. He lost heavily, and this did not tend to calm hisnerves; he doubled his stake, with all the money he had with him, andlost again. As he rose from the table a page touched his elbow andhanded him a small note carefully sealed and delicately perfumed. Itwas addressed to him by his new title, "Il Cavaliere di San Georgio,"and scarcely knowing what he did, he opened it. It was from Lauretta.
"Cavaliere,
Will you come to me in the Duchess's lodgings before the Court risesfrom play? I need your help. L."
Inglesant turned to look for the boy, who, he expected, was waiting forhim. He was not far off, and Inglesant followed him without a word.They passed through many corridors and rooms richly furnished until theyreached the lodgings of the Grand Duchess. The night was sultry, andthrough the open windows above the gardens the strange odours that areborn of darkness and of night entered the palace. In the dark arcadesthe nightingales were singing, preferring gloom and mystery to the lightin which all other creatures rejoice; and in the stillness the murmur ofbrooks and the splash of the fountains oppressed the ear with anunearthly and unaccustomed sound. Around the casements festoons ofharmless and familiar flowers and leaves assumed wild and repulsiveshapes, as if transformed into malicious demons who made men theirsport. Inglesant thought involuntarily of those plants that are atenmity with man, which are used for enchantments and for poisoning, andwhose very scent is death; such saturnine and fatal flowers seemed moreat home in the lovely Italian night than the innocent plants whichwitness to lovers' vows, and upon which divines moralize and preach.The rooms of the Duchess were full of perfume of the kind that enervatesand lulls the sense. It seemed to Inglesant as though he were treadingthe intricate pathways of a dream, careless as to what befell him, yetwith a passionate longing which urged him forward, heedless of arestraining voice which he was even then half-conscious that at othertimes he should have heard. The part of the palace where he was seemeddeserted, and the page led him through more than one anteroom withoutmeeting any one, until they reached a curtained door, which the boyopened, and directed Inglesant to enter. He did so, and found himself atonce in the presence of Lauretta, who was lying upon a low seat at theopen window. The room was lighted by several small lamps in differentpositions, giving an ample, yet at the same time a soft and dreamylight. Lauretta was carelessly dressed, yet, in the soft light, and inher negligent attitude, there was something that made her beauty themore attractive, and her manner to Inglesant was unrestrained andclinging. Her growing affection, the urgency of her need, and thecircumstances of the hour, caused her innocently to speak and act in away the most fitted to promote her brother's atrocious purposes.
"Cavaliere," she said, "I have sent for you because I have no friend butyou. I have sent for you to help me against my own family--my ownbrother--my father even, whom I love--whom I loved--more than all theworld beside. They are determined to marry me to a man whom I hate; tothe man whom you hate; to that Signor Malvolti, who, though they denyit, is, I am fully persuaded, the murderer of your brother; to thatwretch whom Italy even refuses to receive; who, but for his usefulcrimes, would be condemned to a death of torment. My brother tells methat he will be here to-morrow to see me and demand my consent. Hebrings an authorization from my father, and insists upon the contractbeing made without delay. I would die rather than submit to such afate, but it is not necessary to die. I must, however, leave the Courtand escape from my brother's wardship. If I can reach some place ofsafety, where I can gain time to see my father, I am certain that Ishall be able to move him. It cannot be that he will condemn me to sucha fate,--me! the pride and pleasure of his life. He must be deceivedand misled by some of these wicked intrigues and manoeuvres which ruinthe happiness and peace of men."
"I am wholly yours," said Inglesant; "whatever you desire shall be done.Have you spoken to the Duchess?"
"The Duchess advises me to fly," replied Lauretta; "she says the Dukewill not interfere between a father and his child; especially now, whenall Italy hangs in suspense concerning the Papacy, and men are carefulwhom they offend. She advises me to go to the convent of St. Catherineof Pistoia, where I lodged not many years ago while my father was inFrance. The Abbess is a cousin of my father's; she is a kind woman, andI can persuade her to keep me for a short time at least. I wish to goto-night. Will you take me?"
She had never looked so lovely in Inglesant's eyes as she did while shespoke. The pleading look of her dark eyes, and the excitement of hermanner, usually so reserved and calm, added charms to her person ofwhich he had previously been unconscious. In that country of formalrestraint and suspicion, of hurried, furtive interviews, a zest wasgiven to accidental freedom of intercourse such as the more unrestrictedlife of France and England knew little of. In spite of a suspicion oftreachery, which in that country was never absent, Inglesant felt hisframe aglow with devotion to this lovely creature, who thus threwherself unreservedly into his keeping. He threw himself upon a cushionat Lauretta's feet, and encircled her with his arms. She spoke of youthand life and pleasure,--of youth that was passing away so rapidly; oflife that had been to her dreary and dull enough; of herjealously-guarded Italian home, of her convent cell, of her weak andhelpless father, of her tyrannous brother; of pleasure, of which she haddreamed as a girl, but which seemed to fly before her as she advanced;finally of himself, whom, from the first day she had seen him in herfather's room, she had loved, whom absence had only endeared, her firstand only friend.
He spoke of love, of protection, of help and succour for the rest oflife; of happy days to come at San Georgio, when all these troublesshould have passed away, when at last he should escape from intrigue andState policy, and they could make their home as joyous and free fromcare as that house of a Cardinal, on a little hilly bank near Veletri,whence you can see the sea, and which is called Monte Joiosa. He spokeof an Idyllic dream which could not long have satisfied either ofthem,--himself especially, but wh
ich pleased them at that moment, withan innocent and delicate fancy which calmed and purified their excitedthoughts. Then, as the hour passed by, he rose from her embrace,promising to provide horses, and when the palace was quiet, to meet herat the end of one of the long avenues that crossed the park; for theCourt was not at the Pitti Palace, but at the Poggia Imperiale withoutthe walls of Florence.
The soft night air played upon Inglesant's forehead as he led his horsesto the end of a long avenue, and waited for the lady to join him. Hedid not wait long; she came gliding past the fountains, by the long rowsof orange and cypress hedges, and across the streaks of moonlight amongthe trees that closed the gardens and the park. As he lifted her intothe saddle, her glance was partly scared and partly trustful; he felt asthough he were moving in a delicious dream.
As they rode out of the park she told him that she had received amessage from the Duchess, recommending her to stop at a pavilion on theborders of the great chase, beyond the Achaiano Palace, half-way toPistoia, which the Duchess used sometimes when the Duke was divertinghimself in the chase. She had sent a messenger to prepare the peoplewho kept the pavilion for their coming. There was something strange inthis message, Lauretta said, which was brought, not by one of theDuchess's usual pages, but by a boy who had not been long at the palace,and who scarcely waited to give his message, so great was his hurry. Itseemed of little moment to Inglesant who brought the message, or whetherany treachery were at work or no; he was only conscious of a delicioussense of coming pleasure which made him reckless of all beside. Alongthe first few miles of their road they passed nothing but the long linesof elms, planted between ridges of corn, upon which the vines wereclimbing in already luxuriant wreaths. Presently, however, after theyhad passed the Achaiano Palace, the country changed, and they camewithin the confines of the Duke's chase, thirty miles in compass,planted with cork trees and ilex, with underwood of myrtle thickets.Through these shades, lovely indeed by day, but weird and unhealthy bynight, they rode silently, startled every now and then by strange soundsthat issued from the forest depths. The ground was fenny and uneven,and moist exhalations rose out of the soil and floated across the path.
"The Duchess never sleeps at the pavilion," said Lauretta at lastsuddenly; "it is dangerous to sleep in the forest."
"It will be as well to stop an hour or so, however," said Inglesant,"else we shall be at Pistoia before they open the gates."
Presently, in the brilliant moonlight, they saw the pointed roofs of thepavilion on a little rising-ground, with the forest trees coming upclosely to the walls. The moon was now high in the heavens, and it wasas light as day. The upper windows of the pavilion were open, andwithin it lights were burning. The door was opened to them before theyknocked, and the keeper of the pavilion came to meet them, accompaniedby a boy who took the horses. The man showed no surprise at theircoming, only saying some servants of the Duchess had been there a fewhours previously, and had prepared a repast in the dining-room,forewarning him that he should expect visitors. He accompanied themupstairs, for they saw nothing of the other inmates of the place. Therooms were arranged with a sort of rustic luxury, and were evidentlyintended for repose during the heat of the day. A plentiful anddelicate collation was spread on one of the tables, with abundance offruit and wine. The place looked like the magic creation of anenchanter's wand, raised for purposes of evil from the unhealthy marsh,and ready to sink again, when that malific purpose was fulfilled, intothe weird depths from which it rose.
The old man showed them the other rooms of the apartment and left them.At the door he turned back and said,--
"I should not advise the lady to sleep here; the miasma from the forestis very fatal to such as are not used to it."
Inglesant looked at him, but could not perceive that he intended hisword to have any deeper meaning than the obvious one. He said,--
"We shall stay only an hour or two; let the horses be ready to go on."
The man left them, and they sat down at the table.
The repast was served in Faience ware of a strange delicate blue, andconsisted of most of the delicacies of the season with a profusion ofwine.
"This was not ordered by the Duchess," said Lauretta.
"We are safe from poison, Mignone," said Inglesant; "to destroy you aswell as me would defeat all purposes. Not that I believe the Cavalierewould wish me dead. He rather hopes that I may be of use to him. Letus drink to him."
And he filled a glass for Lauretta of the Monte-pulciano, the "King ofWines," and drank himself.
Lauretta was evidently frightened, yet she followed his example anddrank. The night air was heavy and close, not a breath of wind stirredthe lights, though every window was thrown open, and the shutters thatclosed the loggia outside were drawn back. In the brilliant moonlightevery leaf of the great forest shone with an unnatural distinctness,which, set in a perfect silence, became terrible to see. The sylvanarcades seemed like a painted scene-piece upon a Satanic stage,supernaturally alight to further deeds of sin, and silent and unpeopled,lest the wrong should be interrupted or checked. To Inglesant's excitedfancy evil beings thronged its shadowy paths, present to the spiritualsense, though concealed of set purpose from the feeble human sight. Thetwo found their eyes drawn with a kind of fascination to this strangesight, and Inglesant arose and closed the shutters before the nearestcasement.
They felt more at ease when the mysterious forest was shut out. ButLauretta was silent and troubled, and Inglesant's efforts to cheer andenliven her were not successful. The delicious wines to which heresorted to remove his own uneasiness and to cure his companion'smelancholy, failed of their effect. At last she refused to drink, andrising up suddenly, she exclaimed,--
"Oh, it is terribly hot. I cannot bear it. I wish we had not come!"
She wandered from the room in which they sat, through the curtaineddoorway into the next, which was furnished with couches, and sank downon one of them. Inglesant followed her, and, as if the heat feltstifling also to him, went out upon the open verandah, and looked uponthe forest once more.
Excited by the revels of the past few days, heated with wine, with thenight ride, and with the overpowering closeness of the air, thetemptation came upon him with a force which he had neither power nordesire to resist. He listened, but no sound met his ear, no breathstirred, no living being moved, no disturbance need be dreaded from anyside. From the people in the pavilion he looked for no interference,from the object of his desires he had probably no need to anticipate anydisinclination but what might easily be soothed away. The universalcustom of the country in which he was now almost naturalized sanctionedsuch acts. The hour was admirably chosen, the place perfectly adaptedin every way, as if the result not of happy chance but deeply concertedplan.
Why then did he hesitate? Did he still partly hope that some miraclewould happen? or some equally miraculous change take place in his mindand will to save him from himself? It is true the place and thetemptation were not of his own seeking, so far he was free from blame;but he had not come wholly unharmed out of the fiery trial at Umbria,and, by a careless walk since he came to Florence, he had prepared theway for the tempter, and this night even he had disregarded the warningvoice and drifted recklessly onward. We walk of our own free will,heated and inflamed by wine, down the flowery path which we haveourselves decorated with garlands, and we murmur because we reach thefatal goal.
He gazed another moment over the illumined forest, which seemedtransfigured in the moonlight and the stillness into an unreal landscapeof the dead. The poisonous mists crept over the tops of the cork trees,and flitted across the long vistas in spectral forms, cowled andshrouded for the grave. Beneath the gloom indistinct figures seemed toglide,--the personation of the miasma that made the place so fatal tohuman life.
He turned to enter the room, but even as he turned a sudden change cameover the scene. The deadly glamour of the moonlight faded suddenly, acalm pale solemn light settled over the forest, the distant line o
fhills shone out distinct and clear, the evil mystery of the placedeparted whence it came, a fresh and cooling breeze sprang up and passedthrough the rustling wood, breathing pureness and life. The dayspringwas at hand in the eastern sky.
The rustling breeze was like a whisper from heaven that reminded him ofhis better self. It would seem that hell overdid it; the very stillnessfor miles around, the almost concerted plan, sent flashing through hisbrain the remembrance of another house, equally guarded for a likepurpose--a house at Newnham near Oxford, into which years ago he hadhimself forced his way to render help in such a case as this. Here wasthe same thing happening over again with the actors changed; was itpossible that such a change had been wrought in him? The long past lifeof those days rushed into his mind; the sacramental Sundays, therepeated vows, the light of heaven in the soul, the kneeling forms inLittle Gidding Chapel, the face of Mary Collet, the loveliness thatblessed the earth where she walked, her deathbed, and her dying words.What so rarely happens happened here. The revulsion of feeling, therush of recollection and association, was too powerful for the flesh.The reason and the affections rallied together, and, trained intoefficiency by past discipline, regained the mastery by a supreme effort,even at the very moment of unsatisfied desire. But the struggle wasfierce; he was torn like the demon-haunted child in the gospel story;but, as in that story, the demon was expelled.
He came back into the room. Lauretta lay upon a couch with rich draperyand cushions, her face buried in her hands. The cloak and hood in whichshe had ridden were removed, and the graceful outline of her figure wasrendered more alluring by the attitude in which she lay. As he enteredshe raised her head from her hands, and looked at him with a strange,apprehensive, expectant gaze. He remained for a moment silent, his facevery pale; then he said, slowly and uncertainly, like a man speaking ina dream,--
"The fatal miasma is rising from the plain. Lauretta, this place issafe for neither of us, we had better go on."
* * * * *
The morning was cloudy and chill. They had not ridden far before asplash of thunder-rain fell, and the trees dripped dismally. A sense ofdiscomfort and disappointment took possession of Inglesant, and so farfrom deriving consolation from his conquest, he seemed torn by the demonof discontent. He was half-conscious that his companion was regrettingthe evil and luxurious house they had left. The ride to Pistoia wassilent and depressed. As they passed through the streets, early as itwas, they were watched by two figures half concealed by projectingwalls. One of them was the Cavaliere, the other was tall and dark.Whether it was the devil in the person of Malvolti, or Malvolti himself,is not of much consequence, nor would the difference be great. Ineither case the issue was the same,--the devil's plot had failed. It isnot so easy to ruin him with whom the pressure of Christ's hand yetlingers in the palm.
When Inglesant presented himself again at the Convent grate, after a fewhours' sleepless unrest at an inn, he was refused admittance; nor didrepeated applications during that day and the next meet with a morefavourable response. He became the prey of mortification and disgustthat, having had the prize in his hand, he had of his own free willpassed it into the keeping of another. On the evening of the third day,however, he received a note from Lauretta informing him that her brotherhad consented to postpone her betrothal to Malvolti indefinitely, andthat she, on her part, had promised not to see Inglesant again until thePapal election had been decided. She entreated her lover not to attemptto disturb this compromise, as by so doing he would only injure her whomhe had promised to help. She promised to be true, and did not doubt butthat, having obtained the delay she sought, she should be able to gainher father's consent to their marriage, especially if the Papal electiontook the course they hoped it would.
There was something cold and formal about the wording of this note,which, however, might be explained by its contents having been dictatedto the writer; but, unsatisfactory as it was, Inglesant was compelled toacquiesce in the request it contained. He was angry and disappointed,and it must be admitted that he had some cause. His mistress and hispleasant life at the ducal Court had vanished in the morning mist andrain, like the delusive pleasures of a dream, and the regret which atemptation yielded to would leave behind is not always counterbalancedby a corresponding elation when the trial is overcome. He departed forRome, having sent orders to Florence for his servants and baggage tomeet him on the road, and the same night on which he entered the cityPope Innocent the Tenth expired.