Kitabı oku: «The Fortunes Of Glencore», sayfa 12
CHAPTER XX. THE VILLA FOSSOMBRONI
The grounds of the Villa Fossombroni were, at the time we speak of, the Chalk Farm, or the Fifteen Acres of Tuscany. The villa itself, long since deserted by the illustrious family whose name it bore, had fallen into the hands of an old Pied-montese noble, ruined by a long life of excess and dissipation. He had served with gallantry in the imperial army of France, but was dismissed the service for a play transaction in which his conduct was deeply disgraceful; and the Colonel Count Tasseroni, of the 8th Hussars of the Guards, was declared unworthy to wear the uniform of a Frenchman.
For a number of years he had lived so estranged from the world that many believed he had died; but at last it was known that he had gone to reside in a half-ruined villa near Florence, which soon became the resort of a certain class of gamblers whose habits would have speedily attracted notice if practised within the city. The quarrels and altercations, so inseparable from high play, were usually settled on the spot in which they occurred, until at last the villa became famous for these meetings, and the name of Fossombroni, in a discussion, was the watchword for a duel.
It was of a splendid spring morning that the two Englishmen arrived at this spot, which, even on the unpleasant errand that they had come, struck them with surprise and admiration. The villa itself was one of those vast structures which the country about Florence abounds in. Gloomy, stern, and jail-like without, while within, splendid apartments opened into each other in what seems an endless succession. Frescoed walls and gorgeously ornamented ceilings, gilded mouldings and rich tracery, were on every side; and these, too, in chambers where the immense proportions and the vast space recalled the idea of a royal residence. Passing in by a dilapidated “grille” which once had been richly gilded, they entered by a flight of steps a great hall which ran the entire length of the building. Though lighted by a double range of windows, neglect and dirt had so dimmed the panes that the place was almost in deep shadow. Still, they could perceive that the vaulted roof was a mass of stuccoed tracery, and that the colossal divisions of the wall were of brilliant Sienna marble. At one end of this great gallery was a small chapel, now partly despoiled of its religious decorations, which were most irreverently replaced by a variety of swords and sabres of every possible size and shape, and several pairs of pistols, arranged with an evident eye to picturesque grouping.
“What are all these inscriptions here on the walls, Baynton?” cried Selby, as he stood endeavoring to decipher the lines on a little marble slab, a number of which were dotted over the chapel.
“Strange enough this, by Jove!” muttered the other, reading to himself, half aloud, “‘Francesco Ricordi, ucciso da Gieronimo Gazzi, 29 Settembre, 1818.’”
“What does that mean?” asked Selby.
“It is to commemorate some fellow who was killed here in ‘18.”
“Are they all in the same vein?” asked the other.
“It would seem so. Here ‘s one: ‘Gravamente ferito,’ – badly wounded; with a postscript that he died the same night.”
“What’s this large one here, in black marble?” inquired Selby.
“To the memory of Carlo Luigi Guiccidrini, ‘detto il Carnefice,’ called ‘the slaughterer:’ cut down to the forehead by Pietro Baldasseroni, on the night of July 8th, 1819.”
“I confess any other kind of literature would amuse me as well,” said Selby, turning back again into the large hall. Baynton had scarcely joined him when they saw advancing towards them through the gloom a short, thickset man, dressed in a much-worn dressing-gown and slippers.
He removed his skull-cap as he approached, and said, “The Count Tasseroni, at your orders.”
“We have come here by appointment,” said Baynton.
“Yes, yes. I know it all. Volkoffsky sent me word. He was here on Saturday. He gave that French colonel a sharp lesson. Ran the sword clean through the chest. To be sure, he was wounded too, but only through the arm; but ‘La Marque’ has got his passport.”
“You’ll have him up there soon, then,” said Baynton, pointing towards the chapel.
“I think not. We have not done it latterly,” said the Count, musingly. “The authorities don’t seem to like it; and, of course, we respect the authorities!”
“That’s quite evident,” said Baynton, who turned to translate the observation to his friend.
Selby whispered a word in his ear.
“What does the signore say?” inquired the Count.
“My friend thinks that they are behind the time.”
“Per Baccho! Let him be easy as to that. I have known some to think that the Russian came too soon. I never heard of one who wished him earlier! There they are now: they always come by the garden.” And so saying, he hastened off to receive them.
“How is this fellow to handle a sword, if his right arm be wounded?” said Selby.
“Don’t you know that these Russians use the left hand indifferently with the right, in all exercises? It may be awkward for you; but, depend upon it, he’ll not be inconvenienced in the least.”
As he spoke, the others entered the other end of the hall. The Prince no sooner saw the Englishmen than he advanced towards them with his hat off. “My lord,” said he, rapidly, “I have come to make you an apology, and one which I trust you will accept in all the frankness that I offer it. I have learned from your friend the Duc de Brignolles how the incident of yesterday occurred. I see that the only fault committed was my own. Will you pardon, then, a momentary word of ill-temper, occasioned by what I wrongfully believed to be a great injury?”
“Of course, I knew it was all a mistake on your part. I told Colonel Baynton, here, you’d see so yourself, – when it is too late, perhaps.”
“I thank you sincerely,” said the Russian, bowing; “your readiness to accord me this satisfaction makes your forgiveness more precious to me. And now, as another favor, will you permit me to ask you one question?”
“Yes, certainly.”
“Why, when you could have so easily explained this misconception on my part, did you not take the trouble of doing so?”
Selby looked confused, blushed, looked awkwardly from side to side, and then, with a glance towards his friend, seemed to say, “Will you try and answer him?”
“I think you have hit it yourself, Prince,” said Baynton. “It was the trouble, the bore of an explanation, deterred him. He hates writing, and he thought there would be a shower of notes to be replied to, meetings, discussions, and what not; and so he said, ‘Let him have his shot, and have done with it.’”
The Russian looked from one to the other as he listened, and seemed really as if not quite sure whether this speech was uttered in seriousness or sarcasm. The calm, phlegmatic faces of the Englishmen, – the almost apathetic expression they wore, – soon convinced him that the words were truthfully spoken; and he stood actually confounded with amazement before them.
Lord Selby and his friend freely accepted the polite invitation of the Prince to breakfast, and they all adjourned to a small but splendidly decorated room, where everything was already awaiting them. There are few incidents in life which so much predispose to rapid intimacy as the case of an averted duel. The revulsion from animosity is almost certain to lead to, if not actual friendship, what may easily become so. In the present instance, the very diversities of national character gave a zest and enjoyment to the meeting; and while the Englishmen were charmed by the fascination of manners and conversational readiness of their hosts, the Russians were equally struck with a cool imperturbability and impassiveness, of which they had never seen the equal.
By degrees the Russian led the conversation to the question by which their misunderstanding originated. “You know my Lord Glencore, perhaps?” said he.
“Never saw, scarcely ever heard of him,” said Selby, in his dry, laconic tone.
“Is he mad, or a fool?” asked the Prince, half angrily.
“I served in a regiment once where he commanded a troop,” said Baynton; “and they always said he was a good sort of fellow.”
“You read that paragraph this morning, I conclude?” said the Russian. “You saw how he dares to stigmatize the honor of his wife, – to degrade her to the rank of a mistress, – and, at the same time, to bastardize the son who ought to inherit his rank and title?”
“I read it,” said Selby, dryly; “and I had a letter from my lawyer about it this morning.”
“Indeed!” exclaimed he, anxious to hear more, and yet too delicate to venture on a question.
“Yes; he writes to me for some title-deeds or other. I did n’t pay much attention, exactly, to what he says. Glen-core’s man of business had addressed a letter to him.”
The Russian bowed, and waited for him to resume; but, apparently, he had rather fatigued himself by such unusual loquacity, and so he lay back in his chair, and puffed his cigar in indolent enjoyment.
“A goodish sort of thing for you it ought to be,” said Baynton, between the puffs of his tobacco smoke, and with a look towards Selby.
“I suspect it may,” said the other, without the slightest change of tone or demeanor.
“Where is it, – somewhere in the south?”
“Mostly, Devon. There’s something in Wales too, if I remember aright.”
“Nothing Irish?”
“No, thank Heaven, – nothing Irish;” and his grim Lordship made the nearest advance to a smile of which his unplastic features seemed capable.
“Do I understand you aright, my Lord,” said the Prince, “that you receive an accession of fortune by this event?”
“I shall, if I survive Glencore,” was the brief reply.
“You are related, then?”
“Some cousinship, – I forget how it is. Do you remember, Baynton?”
“I’m not quite certain. I think it was a Coventry married one of Jack Conway’s sisters, and she afterwards became the wife of Sir something Massy. Isn’t that it?”
“Yes, that’s it,” muttered the other, in the tone of a man who was tired of a knotty problem.
“And, according to your laws, this Lord Glencore may marry again?” cried the Russian.
“I should think so, if he has no wife living,” said Selby; “but I trust, for my sake, he’ll not.”
“And what if he should, and should be discovered the wedded husband of another?”
“That would be bigamy,” said Selby. “Would they hang him, Baynton?”
“I think not, – scarcely,” rejoined the Colonel.
The Prince tried in various ways to obtain some insight into Lord Glencore’s habits, his tastes and mode of life, but all in vain. They knew, indeed, very little, but even that little they were too indolent to repeat. Lord Selby’s memory was often at fault, too, and Baynton’s had ill supplied the deficiency. Again and again did the Russian mutter curses to himself over the apathy of these stony islanders. At moments he fancied that they suspected his eagerness, and had assumed their most guarded caution against him; but he soon perceived that this manner was natural to them, not prompted in the slightest degree by any distrust whatever.
“After all,” thought the Russian, “how can I hope to stimulate a man who is not excited by his own increase of fortune? Talk of Turkish fatalism, these fellows would shame the Moslem.”
“Do you mean to prolong your stay at Florence, my Lord?” asked the Prince, as they arose from the table.
“I scarcely know. What do you say, Baynton?”
“A week or so, I fancy,” muttered the other.
“And then on to Rome, perhaps?”
The two Englishmen looked at each other with an air of as much confusion as if subjected to a searching examination in science.
“Well, I shouldn’t wonder,” said Selby, at last, with a sigh.
“Yes, it may come to that,” said Baynton, like a man who had just overcome a difficulty.
“You ‘ll be in time for the Holy Week and all the ceremonies,” said the Prince.
“Mind that, Baynton,” said his Lordship, who wasn’t going to carry what he felt to be another man’s load; and Baynton nodded acquiescence.
“And after that comes the season for Naples, – you have a month or six weeks, perhaps, of such weather as nothing in all Europe can vie with.”
“You hear, Baynton!” said Selby.
“I’ve booked it,” muttered the other; and so they took leave of their entertainer, and set out towards Florence. Neither you nor I, dear reader, will gain anything by keeping them company, for they say scarcely a word by the way. They stop at intervals, and cast their eyes over the glorious landscape at their feet. Their glances are thrown over the fairest scene of the fairest of all lands; and whether they turn towards the snow-capt Apennines, by Vall’ombrosa, or trace the sunny vineyards along the Val’ d’ Arno, they behold a picture such as no canvas ever imitated; still, they are mute and uncommunicative. Whatever of pleasure their thoughts suggest, each keeps for himself. Objects of wonder, strange sights and new, may present themselves, but they are not to be startled out of national dignity by so ignoble a sentiment as surprise. And so they jog onward, – doubtless richer in reflection than eloquent in communion; and so we leave them.
Let us not be deemed unjust or ungenerous if we assert that we have met many such as these. They are not individuals, – they are a class; and, strange enough too, a class which almost invariably pertains to a high and distinguished rank in society. It would be presumptuous to ascribe such demeanor to insensibility. There is enough in their general conduct to disprove the assumption. As little is it affectation; it is simply an acquired habit of stoical indifference, supposed to be – why, Heaven knows! – the essential ingredient of the best breeding. If the practice extinguish all emotion, and obliterate all trace of feeling from the heart, we deplore the system. If it only gloss over the working of human sympathy, we pity the men. At all events, they are very uninteresting company, with whom longer dalliance would only be wearisome.
CHAPTER XXI. SOME TRAITS OF LIFE
It was the night Lady Glencore received; and, as usual, the street was crowded with equipages, which somehow seemed to have got into inextricable confusion, – some endeavoring to turn back, while others pressed forward, – the court of the palace being closely packed with carriages which the thronged street held in fast blockade. As the apartments which faced the street were not ever used for these receptions, the dark unlighted windows suggested no remark; but they who had entered the courtyard were struck by the gloomy aspect of the vast building: not only that the entrance and the stairs were in darkness, but the whole suite of rooms, usually brilliant as the day, were now in deep gloom. From every carriage window heads were protruded, wondering at this strange spectacle; and eager inquiries passed on every side for an explanation. The explanation of “sudden illness” was rapidly disseminated, but as rapidly contradicted, and the reply given by the porter to all demands quickly repeated from mouth to mouth, “Her Ladyship will not receive.”
“Can no one explain this mystery?” cried the old Princess Borinsky, as, heavy with fat and diamonds, she hung out of her carriage window. “Oh, there ‘s Major Scaresby; he is certain to know, if it be anything malicious.”
Scaresby was, however, too busy in recounting his news to others to perceive the signals the old Princess held out; and it was only as her chasseur, six feet three of green and gold, bent down to give her Highness’s message, that the Major hurried off, in all the importance of a momentary scandal, to the side of her carriage.
“Here I am, all impatience. What is it, Scaresby? Tell me quickly,” cried she.
“A smash, my dear Princess, – nothing more or less,” said he, in a voice which nature seemed to have invented to utter impertinences, so harsh and grating, and yet so painfully distinct in all its accents, – “as complete a smash as ever I heard of.”
“You can’t mean that her fortune is in peril?”
“I suppose that must suffer also. It is her character – her station as one of us – that’s shipwrecked here.”
“Go on, go on,” cried she, impatiently; “I wish to hear it all.”
“All is very briefly related, then,” said he. “The charming Countess, you remember, ran away with a countryman of mine, young Glencore, of the 8th Hussars; I used to know his father intimately.”
“Never mind his father.”
“That ‘s exactly what Glencore did. He came over here and fell in love with the girl, and they ran off together; but they forgot to get married, Princess. Ha – ha – ha!” And he laughed with a cackle a demon could not have rivalled.
“I don’t believe a word of it, – I’ll never believe it,” cried the Princess.
“That’s exactly what I was recommending to the Mar-quesa Guesteni. I said, you need n’t believe it. Why, how do we go anywhere, nowadays, except by ‘not believing’ the evil stories that are told of our entertainers.”
“Yes, yes; but I repeat that this is an infamous calumny. She, a Countess, of a family second to none in all Italy; her father a Grand d’Espagne. I ‘ll go to her this moment.”
“She’ll not see you. She has just refused to see La Genori,” said the Major, tartly. “Though, if a cracked reputation might have afforded any sympathy, she might have admitted her.”
“What is to be done?” exclaimed the Princess, sorrowfully.
“Just what you suggested a few moments ago, – don’t believe it. Hang me, but good houses and good cooks are growing too scarce to make one credulous of the ills that can be said of their owners.”
“I wish I knew what course to take,” muttered the Princess.
“I’ll tell you, then. Get half a dozen of your own set together to-morrow morning, vote the whole story an atrocious falsehood, and go in a body and tell the Countess your mind. You know as well as I, Princess, that social credit is as great a bubble as commercial; we should all of us be bankrupts if our books were seen. Ay, by Jove! and the similitude goes farther too; for when one old established house breaks, there is generally a crash in the whole community around it.”
While they thus talked, a knot had gathered around the carriage, all eager to hear what opinion the Princess had formed on the catastrophe.
Various were the sentiments expressed by the different speakers, – some sorrowfully deploring the disaster; others more eagerly inveighing against the infamy of the man who had proclaimed it. Many declared that they had come to the determination to discredit the story. Not one, however, sincerely professed that he disbelieved it.
Can it be, as the French moralist asserts, that we have a latent sense of satisfaction in the misfortunes of even our best friends; or is it, as we rather suspect, that true friendship is a rarer thing than is commonly believed, and has little to do with those conventional intimacies which so often bear its name?
Assuredly of all this well-bred, well-dressed, and wellborn company, now thronging the courtyard of the palace and the street in front of it, the tone was as much sarcasm as sorrow, and many a witty epigram and smart speech were launched over a disaster which might have been spared such levity. At length the space slowly began to thin. Slowly carriage after carriage drove off, – the heaviest grief of their occupants often being over a lost soirée, an unprofited occasion to display toilette and jewels; while a few, more reflective, discussed what course was to be followed in future, and what recognition extended to the victim.
The next day Florence sat in committee over the lost Countess. Witnesses were heard and evidence taken as to her case. They all agreed it was a great hardship, – a terrible calamity; but still, if true, what could be done?
Never was there a society less ungenerously prudish, and yet there were cases – this, one of them – which transgressed all conventional rule. Like a crime which no statute had ever contemplated, it stood out self-accused and self-condemned. A few might, perhaps, have been merciful, but they were overborne by numbers. Lady Glencore’s beauty and her vast fortune were now counts in the indictment against her, and many a jealous rival was not sorry at this hour of humiliation. The despotism of beauty is not a very mild sway, after all; and perhaps the Countess had exercised her rule right royally. At all events, it was the young and the good-looking who voted her exclusion, and only those who could not enter into competition with her charms who took the charitable side. They discussed and debated the question all day; but while they hesitated over the reprieve, the prisoner was beyond the law. The gate of the palace, locked and barred all day, refused entrance to every one; at night, it opened to admit the exit of a travelling-carriage. The next morning large bills of sale, posted over the walls, declared that all the furniture and decorations-were to be sold.
The Countess had left Florence, none knew whither.
“I must really have those large Sèvres jars,” said one.
“And I, the small park phaeton,” cried another.
“I hope she has not taken Horace with her; he was the best cook in Italy. Splendid hock she had, – I wonder is there much of it left?”
“I wish we were certain of another bad reputation to replace her,” grunted out Scaresby; “they are the only kind of people who give good dinners, and never ask for returns.”
And thus these dear friends – guests of a hundred brilliant fêtes – discussed the fall of her they once had worshipped.
It may seem small-minded and narrow to stigmatize such conduct as this. Some may say that for the ordinary courtesies of society no pledges of friendship are required, no real gratitude incurred. Be it so. Still, the revulsion, from habits of deference and respect, to disparagement, and even sarcasm, is a sorry evidence of human kindness; and the threshold, over which for years we had only passed as guests, might well suggest sadder thoughts as we tread it to behold desolation.
The fair Countess had been the celebrity of that city for many a day. The stranger of distinction sought her, as much as a matter of course as he sought presentation to the sovereign. Her salons had the double eminence of brilliancy in rank and brilliancy in wit; her entertainments were cited as models of elegance and refinement; and now she was gone! The extreme of regret that followed her was the sorrow of those who were to dine there no more; the grief of him who thought he should never have a house like it.
The respectable vagabonds of society are a large family, much larger than is usually supposed. They are often well born, almost always well mannered, invariably well dressed. They do not, at first blush, appear to discharge any very great or necessary function in life; but we must by no means, from that, infer their inutility. Naturalists tell us that several varieties of insect existence we rashly set down as mere annoyances, have their peculiar spheres of usefulness and good; and, doubtless, these same loungers contribute in some mysterious manner to the welfare of that state which they only seem to burden. We are told that but for flies, for instance, we should be infested with myriads of winged tormentors, insinuating themselves into our meat and drink, and rendering life miserable. Is there not something very similar performed by the respectable class I allude to? Are they not invariably devouring and destroying some vermin a little smaller than themselves, and making thus a healthier atmosphere for their betters? If good society only knew the debt it owes to these defenders of its privileges, a “Vagabonds’ Home and Aged Asylum” would speedily figure amongst bur national charities.
We have been led to these thoughts by observing how distinctly different was Major Scaresby’s tone in talking of the Countess when he addressed his betters or spoke in his own class. To the former he gave vent to all his sarcasm and bitterness; they liked it just because they would n’t condescend to it themselves. To his own he put on the bullying air of one who said, “How should you possibly know what vices such great people have, any more than you know what they have for dinner? I live amongst them, —I understand them, —I am aware that what would be very shocking in you is quite permissible to them. They know how to be wicked; you only know how to be gross.” And thus Scaresby talked, and sneered, and scoffed, making such a hash of good and evil, such a Maelstrom of right and wrong, that it were a subtle moralist who could have extracted one solitary scrap of uncontaminated meaning from all his muddy lucubrations.
He, however, effected this much: he kept the memory of her who had gone, alive by daily calumnies. He embalmed her in poisons, each morning appearing with some new trait of her extravagance, till the world, grown sick of himself and his theme, vowed they would hear no more of either; and so she was forgotten.
Ay, good reader, utterly forgotten! The gay world, for so it likes to be called, has no greater element of enjoyment amongst all its high gifts than its precious power of forgetting. It forgets not only all it owes to others, – gratitude, honor, and esteem, – but even the closer obligations it has contracted with itself. The Palazzo della Torre was for a fortnight the resort of the curious and the idle. At the sale crowds appeared to secure some object of especial value to each; and then the gates were locked, the shutters closed, and a large, ill-written notice on the door announced that any letters for the proprietor were to be addressed to “Pietro Arretini, Via del Sole.”
