"You do not understand me," he said, leading her back to her chair and sitting down beside her. "Oh! no, you fail utterly to understand a heart like mine! You are too much the woman of the world, too politic, and I am too ingenuous, too rough, too uncivilized! You are afraid of wild outbreaks on my part, because you see that I love you madly; but you are not afraid of causing me pain, because you have no conception of the pain your indifference may cause me. You think that a mountaineer of Ætna, a brigand and adventurer, can know only sensual transports; and when I ask you for your heart, you think that you have to defend your person. If I were a duke or marquis, you would listen to me without alarm, you would console me for my grief; and, pointing out to me that your love was out of the question, you would offer me your friendship. And I should be gentle, patient, prostrate at your feet in melancholy and affectionate gratitude. It is because I am of the common people, a peasant, that you deny me even your sympathy! Your pride takes fright because you think that I demand something as a right acquired by my services, and you continue to throw my services at my head as if I relied upon them as entitling me to a recompense from you, as if I remembered them when I am looking at you and talking with you! Alas! I do not know how to express myself; I simply say what I think, without torturing my mind to find a way to convince you of it without saying it. I know nothing of the art of your flatterers; I am no more a courtier of beauty than of power, and the curse that rests upon my life makes it impossible for me to play the attendant cavalier like the Marquis della Serra. I have but an hour at night to come, at the risk of my life, to tell you that I am your slave, and you answer that you do not choose to be my sovereign, but my debtor, my customer, who will pay me handsomely! Fie, fie, signora! you place an ice-cold hand upon a burning heart!"
"If you have in your mind nothing more than friendship," said Agatha, "if you really aspire to be one of my friends simply, I will promise you that that may come about——"
"Let me speak!" rejoined the Piccinino, with renewed animation, his face lighting up with the beauty which was his when he was really moved. "At first I dared not ask you for anything more than your friendship, and it was your childish fright that forced the word love from my lips. Very good! what more can a man say to a woman to restore her courage? I love you, therefore you should not tremble when I take your hand. I respect you, as you see, for we are alone, and I am in perfect control of my passions; but I cannot control my thoughts and the outbursts of my love. I have not my whole life in which to prove it to you. I have but this instant in which to tell you of it, so listen. If I could pass six hours of every day at your feet, like the marquis, I might perhaps be satisfied with the feeling that you have for him; but, as I have only this hour which is passing before me like a vision, I must have your love, or else a despair which I dare not imagine. So let me speak of love; listen to me and do not be afraid. If you say no, it shall be no, but if you would listen to me without thinking of protecting yourself, if you would deign to understand me once for all, if you would forget the world you live in, and the pride which is out of place here, and which has no existence in the sphere in which I live, you would be touched because you would be convinced. Oh! yes. If you were a simple soul, and if you did not put prejudices in the place of the pure inspirations of nature and of truth, you would feel that there is one heart more youthful and more ardent than all those you have spurned, the heart of a lion or tiger with men, but a man's heart with women, a child's heart with you! You would pity me at least. You would see my life as it is: constantly tormented and threatened, a never-ending nightmare! And solitude! Ah! it is solitude of the heart above all else which is killing me, because my heart is even harder to please than my senses. You know how I bore myself with Mila this morning, do you not? She is beautiful, surely, and neither in character nor in mind is she one of the common herd. If I had chosen to love her, and if I had felt for a single moment that I did love her, she would have loved me, she would have been mine all her life. But with her I thought only of you. You are the one whom I love, and you are the only woman I have ever loved, although I have been the lover of many women! Love me then, though it be but for a moment, just long enough to tell me so, or else, when I return to-night by a certain spot called the Destatore's Cross, I shall go mad! I shall dig into the earth with my nails, to insult and cast to the winds the ashes of the man who gave me life."
At these last words Agatha lost all her strength; she turned pale; a shudder ran through her every limb, and she threw herself back in her chair as if a blood-stained spectre had passed before her eyes.
"Oh! hush, hush!" she cried; "you do not know the pain you cause me!"
The Piccinino could not understand the cause of this sudden and intense emotion; he misunderstood it utterly. He had spoken with a vehemence of voice and expression which would have persuaded any other woman than the princess. He had fascinated her with his gleaming eyes; he had intoxicated her with his breath, at all events he thought so. He had been so often justified in thinking so, even when he had not felt a tithe of the desire this woman inspired in him! He believed that she was vanquished, and, putting his arms about her, seeking her lips, he felt sure that her passions, taken by surprise, would do the rest. But Agatha eluded his caresses with unexpected vigor, and as she rushed toward a bell-cord, Michel darted between her and the Piccinino, with blazing eyes and with a dagger in his hand.
XLIV
REVELATIONS
The Piccinino was so taken aback by this unexpected apparition that he stood perfectly still, without a thought of attacking or of defending himself. So that Michel, as he was about to strike him, held his hand, bewildered by his own precipitation; but, with a movement so swift and adroit that it was invisible, the Piccinino's hand was armed when Michel withdrew his.
But the brigand, after a single furious gleam had shot from his eyes, recovered his cold and disdainful attitude.
"Excellent," he said; "I understand everything now, and rather than bring about so absurd a scene, Signora Palmarosa should have carried her confidence so far as to say to me: 'Leave me, I cannot listen to you; I have a lover hidden behind my bed.' I would have retired discreetly, whereas now I must needs administer a lesson to Master Lavoratori, to punish him for having seen me play an absurd rôle. So much the worse for you, signora; the lesson will be a bloody one!"