CHAPTER V.
NUMBER FOUR AT THE UNIVERSO HOTEL.
Cesare Trenta is dressed with unusual care. His linen is spotless; his white hair, as fine as silk, is carefully combed; his chin is well shaven. He wears a glossy white hat, and carries his gold-headed cane in his hand. Not that he condescends to use that cane as he mounts the marble staircase of the Universo Hotel (once the Palazzo Buffero) a little stiffly, on his way to keep his appointment with Count Marescotti; oh, no—although the cavaliere is well past eighty, he intends to live much longer; he reserves that cane, therefore, to assist him in his old age. Now he does not want it.
It is quite clear that Trenta is come on a mission of great importance; his sleek air, and the solemnly official expression of his plump rosy face, say so. His glassy blue eyes are without their pleasant twinkle, and his lips, tightly drawn over his teeth, lack their usual benignant smile. Even his fat white hand dimples itself on the top of his cane, so tightly does he clutch it. He has learned below that Count Marescotti lives at No. 4 on the second story; at the door of No. 4 he raps softly. A voice from within asks, "Who is there?"
"I," replies Trenta, and he enters.
The count, who is seated at a table near the window, rises. His tall figure is enveloped in a dark dressing-gown, that folds about him like a toga. He has all the aspect of a man roused out of deep thought; his black hair stands straight up in disordered curls all over his head—he had evidently been digging both his hands into it—his eyes are wild and abstracted. Taken as he is now, unawares, that expression of mingled sternness and sweetness in which he so much resembles Castruccio Castracani is very striking. From the manner he fixes his eyes upon Trenta it is clear he does not at once recognize him. The cavaliere returns his stare with a look of blank dismay.
"Oh, carissimo!" the count exclaims at last, his countenance changing to its usual expression—he holds out both hands to grasp those of the cavaliere—"how I rejoice to see you! Excuse my absence; I had forgotten our appointment at the moment. That book"—and he points to an open volume lying on a table covered with letters, manuscripts, and piles of printed sheets tossed together in wild confusion—"that book must plead my excuse; it has riveted me. The wrongs of persecuted Italy are so eloquently pleaded! Have you read it, my dear cavaliere? If not, allow me to present you with a copy."
Trenta made a motion with his hand, as if putting both the book and the subject from him with a certain disgust: he shakes his head.
"I have not read it, and I do not wish to read it," he replies, curtly.
The poor cavaliere feels that this is a bad beginning; but he quickly consoles himself—he was of a hopeful temperament, and saw life serenely and altogether in rose-color—by remembering that the count is habitually absent, also that he habitually uses strong language, and that he had probably not been so absorbed by the wrongs of Italy as he pretends.
"I fear you have forgotten our appointment, count," recommences the cavaliere, finding that Marescotti is silent, and that his eyes have wandered off to the pages of the open book.
"Not at all, not at all, my dear Trenta. On the contrary, had you not come, I was about to send for you. I have a very important matter to communicate to you."
The cavaliere's face now breaks out all over into smiles. "Send for me," he repeats to himself. "Good, good! I understand." He seats himself with great deliberation in a large, well-stuffed arm-chair, near the table, at which Marescotti still continues standing. He places his cane across his knees, folds his hands together, then looks up in the other's face.
"Yes, yes, my dear count," he answers aloud, "we have much to say to each other—much to say on a most interesting subject." And he gives the count what he intends to be a very meaning glance.
"Interesting!" exclaims the count, his whole countenance lighting up—"enthralling, overwhelming!—a matter to me of life or death!"
As he speaks he turns aside, and begins to stride up and down the room, as was his wont when much moved.
"He! he! my dear count, pray be calm." And Trenta gives a little laugh, and feebly winks. "We hope it is a matter of life, not of death—no—not of death, surely."
"Of death," replied the count, solemnly, and his mobile eyes flash out, and a dark frown gathers on his brow—"of death, I repeat. Do you take me for a trifler? I stake my life on the die."
Trenta felt considerably puzzled. Before he begins, he is anxious to assure himself that the nature of his errand had at least distinctly dawned upon the count's mind, if it had not (as he hoped) been fully understood by him. Should he let Marescotti speak first; or should he, Trenta, address him formally? In order to decide, he again scans the count's face closely. But, after doing so, he is obliged to confess that Marescotti is impenetrable. Now he no longer strode up and down the room, but he has seated himself opposite the cavaliere, and again his speaking eyes have wandered off toward the book which he has been reading. It is evident he is mentally resuming the same train of thought Trenta's entrance had interrupted. Trenta feels therefore that he must begin. He has prepared himself for some transcendentalism on the subject of marriage; but with a man who is so much in love as Count Marescotti, and who was about to send for him and to tell him so, there can be no great difficulty; nor can it matter much who opens the conversation. The cavaliere takes a spotless handkerchief from his pocket, uses it, replaces it, then coughs.
"Count," he begins, in a tone of conscious importance, "when I proposed this meeting, it was to make you a proposal calculated to exercise the utmost influence over your future life, and—the life of another," he adds, in a lower tone. "You appear to have anticipated me by desiring to send for me. You are, of course, aware of my errand?"
As he asks this question, there is, spite of himself, a slight tremor in his voice, and the usual ruddiness of his cheeks pales a little.
"How very mysterious!" exclaims the count, throwing himself back in his chair. "You look like a benevolent conspirator, cavaliere! Surely, my dear old friend, you are not about to change your opinions, and to become a disciple of freedom?"
"Change my opinions! At my age, count!—Chè, chè!"—Trenta waves his hand impatiently. "When a man arrives at my age, he does not change his opinions—no, count, no; it is, if you will permit me to say so, it is yourself in whom the change is to be wrought—yourself only—"
The count, who is still leaning back in his chair in an attitude of polite attention, starts violently, sits straight upright, and fixes his eyes upon Trenta.
"What do you mean, cavaliere? After a life devoted to my country, you cannot imagine I should change? The very idea is offensive to me."
"No, no, my dear count, you misapprehend me," rejoins Trenta, soothingly. (He perceived the mistake into which the word "change" had led Count Marescotti, and dreaded exciting his too susceptible feelings.) "It is no change of that kind I allude to; the change I mean is in the nature of a reward for the life of sacrifice you have led—a reward, a consolation to your fervid spirit. It is to bring you into an atmosphere of peace, happiness, and love. To reconcile you perhaps, as a son, erring, but repentant, with that Holy Mother Church to which you still belong. This is the change I am come to offer you."
As the cavaliere proceeds, the count's expressive eyes follow every word he utters with a look of amazement. He is about to reply, but Trenta places his finger on his lips.
"Let me continue," he says, smiling blandly. "When I have done, you shall answer. In one word, count, it is marriage I am come to propose to you."
The count suddenly rises from his seat, then he hurriedly reseats himself. A look of pain comes into his face.
"Permit me to proceed," urges the cavaliere, watching him anxiously.
"I presume you mean to marry?"
Marescotti was silent. Trenta's naturally piping voice grows shriller as he proceeds, from a certain sense of agitation.
"As the common friend of both parties, I am come to propose a marriage to you, Count Marescotti."
"And who may the lady be?" asks the count, drawing back with a sudden air of reserve. "Who is it that would consent to leave home and friends, perhaps country, to share the lot of a fugitive patriot?"
"Come, come, count, this will not do," answers Trenta, smiling, a certain twinkle returning to his blue eyes. "You are a perfectly free agent. If you are a fugitive, it is because you like change. You bear a great name—you are rich, singularly handsome—an ardent admirer of beauty in art and Nature. Now, ardor on one side excites ardor on the other."
While he is speaking, Trenta had mentally decided that Marescotti was the most impracticable man he had ever encountered in the various phases of his court career.
"A fugitive," he repeats, almost with a sneer. "No, no, count, this will not do with me." The cavaliere pauses and clears his throat.
"You have not yet answered me," says the count, speaking low, a certain suppressed eagerness penetrating the assumed indifference of his manner. "Who is the lady?"
"Who is the lady?" echoes the cavaliere. "Did you not tell me just now you were about to send for me?" Trenta speaks fast, a flush overspreads his cheeks. "Who is the lady?—You astonish me! Per Bacco! There can be but one lady in question between you and me—that lady is Enrica Guinigi." His voice drops. There is a dead silence.
"That the marriage is suitable in all respects," Trenta continues, reassured by the silence—"I need not tell you; else I, Cesare Trenta, would not be here as the ambassador."
Again the stout little cavaliere stops to take breath, under evident agitation; then he draws himself up, and turns his face toward the count. As Trenta proceeds, Marescotti's brow is overclouded with thought—a haggard expression now spreads over his features. His eyes are turned downward on the floor, else the cavaliere might have seen that their brilliancy is dimmed by rising tears. With his elbow resting on the arm of the chair on which he sits, the count passes his other hand from time to time slowly to and fro across his forehead, pushing back the disordered curls that fall upon it.
"To restore and to continue an illustrious race—to unite yourself with a lovely girl just bursting into womanhood." Trenta's voice quivers as he says this. "Ah! lovely indeed, in mind as well as body," he adds, half aloud. "This is a privilege you, Count Marescotti, can appreciate above all other men. That you do appreciate it you have already made evident. There is no need for me to speak about Enrica herself; you have already judged her. You have, before my eyes, approached her with the looks and the language of passionate admiration. It is not given to all men to be so fascinating. I have seen it with delight. I love her"—his voice broke and shook with emotion—"I love her as if she were my own child."
All the enthusiasm of which the old chamberlain is capable passes into his face as he speaks of Enrica. At that moment he really did look as young as he was continually telling every one that he felt.
"Count Marescotti," he continues, a solemn tone in his voice as he slowly pronounces the words, raising his head at the same time, and gazing fixedly into the other's face—Count Marescotti, "I am come here to propose a marriage between you and Enrica Guinigi. The marchesa empowers me to say that she constitutes Enrica her sole heiress, not only of the great Guinigi name, but of the remaining Guinigi palace, with the portrait of our Castruccio, the heirlooms, the castle of Corellia, and lands of—"
"Stop, stop, my dear Trenta!" cries the count, holding up both his hands in remonstrance; "you overwhelm me. I require no such inducements; they horrify me. Enrica Guinigi is sufficient in herself—so bright a jewel requires no golden settings."
At these words the cavaliere beams all over. He rubs his fat hands together, then gently claps them.
"Bravo!—bravo, count! I see you appreciate her. Per Dio! you make me feel young again! I never was so happy in my life! I should like to dance! I will dance by-and-by at the wedding. We will open the state-rooms. There is not a grander suite in all Italy. It is superb. I will dance a quadrille with the marchesa. Bagatella! I shall insist on it. I will execute a solo in the figure of the pastorelle. I will show Baldassare and all the young men the finish of the old style. People did steps then—they did not jump like wild horses—nor knock each other down. No—then dancing was practised as a fine art."
Suddenly the brisk old cavaliere stops. The expression of Marescotti's large, earnest eyes, fixed on him wonderingly, recalls him to himself.
"Excuse me, my dear friend; when you are my age, you will better understand an old man's feelings. We are losing time. Now get your hat, and come with me at once to Casa Guinigi; the marchesa expects you. We will settle the day of the betrothal.—My sweet Enrica, how I long to see you!"
While he is speaking Trenta rises and strikes his cane on the ground with a triumphant air; then he holds out both his hands toward the count.
"Shake hands with me, my dear Marescotti. I congratulate you—with my whole soul I congratulate you! She will be your salvation, the dear, blue-eyed little angel?"
In the tumult of his excitement Trenta had taken every thing for granted. His thoughts had flown off to Enrica. His benevolent heart throbbed with joy at the thought of her emancipation from the thralldom of her home. A vision of the dark-haired, pale-faced Marescotti, and the little blond head, with its shower of golden curls, kneeling together before the altar in the sunshine, danced before his eyes. Marescotti would become a, Christian—a firm pillar of the Church; he would rear up children who would worship God and the Holy Father; he would restore the glory of the Guinigi!
From this roseate dream the poor cavaliere was abruptly roused. His outstretched hand had not been taken by Marescotti. It dropped to his side. Trenta looked up sharply. His countenance suddenly fell; a purple flush covered it from chin to forehead, penetrating even the very roots of his snowy hair. His cane dropped with a loud thud, and rolled away along the uncarpeted floor. He thrust both his hands into his pockets, and stood motionless, with his eyes wide open, like a man stunned.
"Dio buono!—Dio buono!" he muttered, "the man is mad!—the man is mad!" Then, after a few minutes of absolute silence, he asked, in a husky voice, "Marescotti, what does this mean?"
The count had turned away toward the window. At the sound of the cavaliere's husky voice, he moved and faced him. In the space of a few moments he had greatly changed. Suddenly he had grown worn and weary-looking. His eyes were sunk into his head; dark circles had formed round them. His bloodless cheeks, transparent with the pallor of perfect health, were blanched; the corners of his mouth worked convulsively.
"Does the lady—does Enrica Guinigi know of this proposal?" he asked, in a voice so sad that the cavaliere's indignation against him cooled considerably.
"Good God!" exclaimed Trenta, "such a question is an insult to me and to my errand. Can you imagine that I, all my life chamberlain to his highness the Duke of Lucca, am capable of compromising a lady?"
"Thank God!" ejaculated the count, emphatically, clasping his hands together, and raising his eyes—"thank God! Forgive me for asking." His whole voice and manner had changed as rapidly as his aspect. There was a sense of suffering, a quiet resignation about him, so utterly unlike his usual excitable manner that Trenta was puzzled beyond expression—so puzzled, indeed, that he was speechless. Besides, a veteran in etiquette, he felt that it was to himself an explanation was due. Marescotti had been about to send for him. Now he was there, Marescotti had heard his proposal, it was for Marescotti to answer.
That the count felt this also was apparent. There was something solemn in his manner as he turned away from the window and slowly advanced toward the cavaliere. Trenta was still standing immovable on the same spot where he had muttered in the first moment of amazement, "He is mad!"
"My dear old friend," said the count, speaking with evident effort in a dull, sad voice, "there is some mistake. It was not to speak about any lady that I was about to send for you."
"Not about a lady!" cried Trenta, aghast. "Mercy of God!—"
"Let that pass," interrupted the count, waving his hand. "You have asked me for an explanation—an explanation you shall have." He sighed deeply, then proceeded—the cavaliere following every word he uttered with open mouth and wildly-staring eyes: "Of the lady I can say no more than that, on my honor as a gentleman, to me she approaches nearer the divine than any woman I have ever seen—nay, than any woman I have ever dreamed of."
A flash of fire lit up the depths of the count's dark eyes, and there was a tone of melting tenderness in his rich voice as he spoke of Enrica. Then he relapsed into his former weary manner—the manner of a man pronouncing his own death-warrant.
"Of the unspeakable honor you have done me, as has also the excellent Marchesa Guinigi—it does not become me to speak. Believe me, I feel it profoundly." And the count laid his hand upon his heart and bent his grand head. Trenta, with formal politeness, returned the silent salute.
"But"—and here the count's voice faltered, and there was a dimness in his eyes, round which the black circles had deepened—"but it is an honor I must decline."
Trenta, still rooted to the same spot, listened to each word that fell from the count's lips with a look of anguish.
"Sit down, cavaliere—sit down," continued Marescotti, seeing his distress. He put his arm round Trenta's burly, well-filled figure, and drew him down gently into the depths of the arm-chair. "Listen, cavaliere—listen to what I have to say before you altogether condemn me. The sacrifice I am making costs me more than I can express. You hold before my eyes what is to me more precious than life; you tempt me with what every sense within me—heart, soul, manliness—urges me to clutch; yet I dare not accept it."
He paused; so profound a sigh escaped him that it almost formed itself into a groan.
"I don't understand all this," said Trenta, reddening with indignation. He had been by degrees collecting his scattered senses. "I don't understand it at all. You have, count, placed me in a most awkward position; I feel it very much. You speak of a mistake—a misapprehension. I beg to say there has been none on my part; I am not in the habit of making mistakes."—It will be seen that the cavaliere's temper was rising with the sense of the intolerable injury Count Marescotti was inflicting on himself and all concerned.—"I have undertaken a very serious responsibility; I have failed, you tell me. What am I to say to the marchesa?"
His shrill voice rose into an angry cry. Altogether, it was more than he could bear. For a moment, the injury to Enrica was forgotten in his own personal sense of wrong. It was too galling to fail in an official embassy Trenta, who always acted upon mature reflection, abhorred failure.
"Tell her," answered the count, raising his voice, his eyes kindling as he spoke—"tell her I am here in Lucca on a sacred mission. I confide it to her honor. A man sworn to a mission cannot marry. As in the kingdom of heaven they neither marry nor are given in marriage, so I, the anointed priest of the people, dare not marry; it would be sacrilege." His powerful voice rang through the room; he raised his hands aloft, as if invoking some unseen power to whom he belonged. "When you, cavaliere, entered this room, I was about to confide my position to you. I am at Lucca—Lucca, once the foster-mother of progress, and, I pray Heaven, to become so again!—I am at Lucca to found a mission of freedom." A sudden gesture told him how much Trenta was taken aback at this announcement. "We differ in our opinions as widely as the poles," continued the count, warming to his subject, "but you are my old friend—I felt you would not betray me. Now, after what has passed, as a man of honor, I am bound to confide in you. O Italy! my country!" exclaimed the count, clasping his hands, and throwing back his head in a frenzy of enthusiasm, "what sacrifice is too great for thee? Youth, hope, love—nay, life itself—all—all I devote to thee!"
As he was speaking, a ray of sunlight penetrated through the closed windows. It struck like a fiery arrow across the darkened room, and fell full upon the count's upturned face, lighting up every line of his noble countenance. There was a solemn passion in his eyes, a rapt fervor in his gaze, that silenced even the justly-irritated Trenta.
Nevertheless the cavaliere was not a man to be put off by mere words, however imposing they might be. He returned, therefore, to the charge perseveringly.
"You speak of a mission, Count Marescotti; what is the nature of this mission? Nothing political, I hope?"
He stopped abruptly. The count's eyelids dropped over his eyes as he met Trenta's inquiring glance. Then he bowed his head in acquiescence.
"Another revolution may do much for Italy," he answered, in a low tone.
"For the love of God," ejaculated Trenta, stung to the quick by what he looked upon at that particular moment as in itself an aggravation of his wrongs, "don't remind me of your politics, or I shall instantly leave the room. Domine Dio! it is too much. You have just escaped by the veriest good luck (good luck, by-the-way, you did not in the least deserve) a life-long imprisonment at Rome. You had a mission there, too, I believe."
This was spoken in as bitter a sneer as the cavaliere's kindly nature permitted.
"Now pray be satisfied. If you and I are not to part this very instant, don't let me realize you as the 'Red count.' That is a character I cannot tolerate."
Trenta, so seldom roused to anger, shook all over with rage. "I believe sincerely that it is such so-called patriots as yourself, with their devilish missions, that will ruin us all."
"It is because you are ignorant of the grandeur of our cause, it is because you do not understand our principles, that you misjudge us," responded the count, raising his eyes upon Trenta, and speaking with a lofty disregard of his hot words. "Permit me to unfold to you something of our philosophy, a philosophy which will resuscitate our country, and place her again in her ancient position, as intellectual monitress of Europe. You must not, cavaliere, judge either of my mission or of my creed by the yelping of the miserable curs that dog the heels of all great enterprises. There is the penetralia, the esoteric belief, in all great systems of national belief."
The count spoke with emphasis, yet in grave and measured accents; but his lustrous eyes, and the wild confusion of those black locks, that waved, as it were, sympathetic to his humor, showed that his mind was engrossed with thoughts of overwhelming interest.
The cavaliere, after his last indignant outburst, had subsided into the depths of the arm-chair in which Marescotti had placed him; it was so large as almost to swallow up the whole of his stout little person. With his hands joined, his dimpled fingers interlaced and pointing upward, he patiently awaited what the count might say. He felt painfully conscious that he had failed in his errand. This irritated him exceedingly. He had not entered that room—No. 4, at the Universo Hotel—in order to listen to the elaboration of Count Marescotti's mission, but in order to set certain marriage-bells ringing. These marriage-bells were, it seemed, to be forever mute. Still, having demanded an explanation of what he conceived to be the count's most incomprehensible conduct, he was bound, he felt, in common courtesy, to listen to all he had to say.
Now Trenta never in his life was wanting in the very flower of courtesy; he would much sooner have shot himself than be guilty of an ill-bred word. So, under protest, therefore—a protest more distinctly written in the general puckering up of his round, plump face, and a certain sulky swell about his usually smiling mouth—it was clear he meant to listen, cost him what it might. Besides, when he had heard what the count had to say, it was clearly his duty to reason with him. Who could tell that he might not yield to such a process? He avowed that he was deeply enamored of Enrica—a man in love is already half vanquished. Why should Marescotti throw away his chance of happiness for a phantasy—a mere dream? There was no real obstacle. He was versatile and visionary, but the very soul of honor. How, if he—Trenta—could bring Marescotti to see how much it would be to Enrica's advantage that he should transplant her from a dreary home, to become a wife beside him?
Decidedly it was still possible that he, Cesare Trenta, who had arranged satisfactorily so many most difficult royal complications, might yet bring Marescotti to reason. Who could tell that he might not yet be spared the humiliation of returning to impart his failure to the marchesa? A return, be it said, the good Trenta dreaded not a little, remembering the characteristics of his dear friend, and the responsibility of success which he had so confidently taken upon himself before he started.