“He did but carry out the curse, as all his predecessors had done before him. For more than a year I had not heard from my poor sister, when one day, while still at school, I got a letter from her, postmarked New York—a letter telling me that Bercelloni had left her, that at the time of his marriage with herself he had another wife living, although of course she had not suspected it—telling me also that she was in great destitution, that her three children were all ill with diphtheria, and that she had no money to buy them food or physic, and asking me, for Heaven’s sake, to send her something, to keep her little ones from dying of want.”
“Oh, my dear, what a sad trial for your young heart to bear.”
“No,” said Britomarte, “it was only the family fate. But oh, where was I to get money? I had not a dollar in my purse; I had no jewelry or trinkets such as girls usually have; I had not even a watch; I had only a little gold thimble, the birth-day gift of my sister years before. It had cost six dollars. I sold it for two to a schoolmate. I also sold all my clothing, piece by piece, to the colored people of the neighborhood, so that I had but a single change left. I had to do all this secretly, and at the risk of discovery and expulsion from the school. But by the sacrifice of effects worth perhaps sixty dollars I realized about twenty, which I sent to poor Mona.”
“Ah, Britomarte! To have had the heaviest burdens of life forced upon you when you were a mere school girl!”
“It was the family curse. The women, like the mules, had to bear all the burdens, and like the scapegoats, had to carry all the crimes of the men.”
“That is all past now, Britomarte—forever past. You shall bear no burden, suffer no sorrow that I can intercept and take from you.”
“I know it, Justin. I know it. God make me worthy of you, and grateful for your love.”
“Hush, hush, my dearest. No more of that. Go on with your domestic history. What came next?”
“What came next? Ah, Justin, the money I sent poor Mona only helped to bury her children. They all died. Meanwhile, she found a friend in the widow of the elder Bercelloni. This poor woman had been the second wife of the father, and was therefore only the step-mother of the son. She was entirely dependent on her own exertions for a livelihood, for her selfish step-son would do nothing for her. But the Signora kept poor Mona from starving, and after a while procured her an engagement at the same opera house where she herself was employed as chorus singer. But I weary you with these petty family details.”
“No, no, not in the least. All that in the slightest degree concerns you interests me. Go on, pray.”