‘Precisely. But the most honourable man in the world may confide matters to his wife which it would be base in him to lay before any one else.’
‘Except a confessor,’ Maria said; but she was not thinking of Schmidt.
‘My confessor was not a man of any business capacity,’ answered Montalto without a smile. ‘Nor is my friend Ippolito Saracinesca either; and I would certainly not consult any one else except my wife.’
‘Thank you.’
He had taken a long time to tell his story about the poor steward, hampered as he was at every step by a conscientious fear of injuring the man. What Maria saw was that he had been unboundedly generous to Schmidt, as he had been to her in a matter much nearer to life and death; and by a sort of unconscious analogical reasoning she felt, rather than concluded, that the steward must be as grateful as she was, and as resolved to be faithful at any cost. Moreover, he had made a favourable impression on her from the first; and though she was a little shocked at what she now learned about him, her ultimate verdict as to his present honesty was a foregone judgment.
After this long talk with Montalto she saw Schmidt often. He showed her the old plans, the position of the former garden, and the fragments of the well and the cloistered walk, and after much consultation with her husband and several evenings spent in the study of Viollet-le-Duc, they determined that the old construction should be restored as far as possible, a conclusion which has no bearing upon this story beyond the fact that it was the means of bringing Maria and the steward together almost daily, and that the execution of the work and his careful economy in the whole affair raised him in the Countess’s estimation; or rather, they confirmed that preconceived good opinion of him which she had formed in the beginning, and on which such grave matters afterwards turned.
Before they left Montalto her husband inquired as to the result of her observation of the man.
‘I cannot help believing that he is now perfectly honest and devoted to your interests,’ she said. ‘That is the impression he makes on me, and I do not think it will change.’
‘Then I shall take him to Rome,’ Montalto answered without hesitation. ‘Our property there is in a disgraceful state and is not yielding much more than the half of what it should. Schmidt is the only man I have under my hand who can set matters right, and he shall go to work at once.’
‘I agree with you,’ Maria said quietly. ‘I thought so last spring when I first saw him.’