“It is but the reflection of the moonlight, Teresa,” said the intruder; “I feel well.” So saying, he scowled on the merry party, and turned as if to slink away.
“No, no,” whispered Teresa, “you must stay a moment and be presented to my guests: there is an Englishman here whom you will like—who will interest you.”
With that she almost dragged him forward, and introduced him to her guests. Signor Cesarini returned their salutations with a mixture of bashfulness and hauteur, half-awkward and half-graceful, and muttering some inaudible greeting, sank into a seat and appeared instantly lost in reverie. Maltravers gazed upon him, and was pleased with his aspect—which, if not handsome, was strange and peculiar. He was extremely slight and thin—his cheeks hollow and colourless, with a profusion of black silken ringlets that almost descended to his shoulders. His eyes, deeply sunk into his head, were large and intensely brilliant; and a thin moustache, curling downwards, gave an additional austerity to his mouth, which was closed with gloomy and half-sarcastic firmness. He was not dressed as people dress in general, but wore a frock of dark camlet, with a large shirt-collar turned down, and a narrow slip of black silk twisted rather than tied round his throat; his nether garments fitted tight to his limbs, and a pair of half-hessians completed his costume. It was evident that the young man (and he was very young—perhaps about nineteen or twenty) indulged that coxcombry of the Picturesque which is the sign of a vainer mind than is the commoner coxcombry of the Mode.
It is astonishing how frequently it happens, that the introduction of a single intruder upon a social party is sufficient to destroy all the familiar harmony that existed there before. We see it even when the intruder is agreeable and communicative—but in the present instance, a ghost could scarcely have been a more unwelcoming or unwelcome visitor. The presence of this shy, speechless, supercilious-looking man threw a damp over the whole group. The gay Tirabaloschi immediately discovered that it was time to depart—it had not struck any one before, but it certainly was late. The Italians began to bustle about, to collect their music, to make fine speeches and fine professions—to bow and to smile—to scramble into their boat, and to push towards the inn at Como, where they had engaged their quarters for the night. As the boat glided away, and while two of them were employed at the oar, the remaining four took up their instruments and sang a parting glee. It was quite midnight—the hush of all things around had grown more intense and profound—there was a wonderful might of silence in the shining air and amidst the shadows thrown by the near banks and the distant hills over the water. So that as the music chiming in with the oars grew fainter and fainter, it is impossible to describe the thrilling and magical effect it produced.
The party ashore did not speak; there was a moisture, a grateful one, in the bright eyes of Teresa, as she leant upon the manly form of De Montaigne, for whom her attachment was, perhaps, yet more deep and pure for the difference of their ages. A girl who once loves a man, not indeed old, but much older than herself, loves him with such a looking up and venerating love! Maltravers stood a little apart from the couple, on the edge of the shelving bank, with folded arms and thoughtful countenance. “How is it,” said he, unconscious that he was speaking half aloud, “that the commonest beings of the world should be able to give us a pleasure so unworldly? What a contrast between those musicians and this music. At this distance their forms are dimly seen, one might almost fancy the creators of those sweet sounds to be of another mould from us. Perhaps even thus the poetry of the Past rings on our ears—the deeper and the diviner, because removed from the clay which made the poets. O Art, Art! how dost thou beautify and exalt us; what is nature without thee!”
“You are a poet, Signor,” said a soft clear voice beside the soliloquist; and Maltravers started to find that he had had unknowingly a listener in the young Cesarini.
“No,” said Maltravers; “I cull the flowers, I do not cultivate the soil.”
“And why not?” said Cesarini, with abrupt energy; “you are an Englishman—you have a public—you have a country—you have a living stage, a breathing audience; we, Italians, have nothing but the dead.”
As he looked on the young man, Maltravers was surprised to see the sudden animation which glowed upon his pale features.
“You asked me a question I would fain put to you,” said the Englishman, after a pause. “You, methinks, are a poet?”