“A slip of the pen for blessed resurrection, I expect,” said Ponty.
“Boo,” said Lucilla. “It's the message of a man obviously, desperately, in love—yearning to communicate with his loved one—but to save appearances, or from lover-like timidity perhaps, addressing his communication to a third person. That telegram is meant exclusively for Ruth, and you're merely used as a gooseberry. Oh, Ruth, I do congratulate you.” Ruth vaguely laughed.
PART FOURTH
I
FOR quite a week—wasn't it?—obscure little Altronde held the centre of the stage. The newspapers of France and England, as well as those of Italy, had daily paragraphs. Belated details, coming in like stragglers after a battle, gave vividness to the story. Massimiliano, at Paris, plaintively indignant, overflowed in interviews. In interviews also, in speeches, in proclamations, Civillo adumbrated, magniloquently, vaguely, his future policy. There were “Character Sketches,” reminiscent, anecdotal, of Civillo, “By a lifelong Friend,” of Massimiliano, “By a Former Member of his Household,” etc. etc. There were even character sketches of poor Bertram, “By an Old Harrovian,” “By One who knew him at Cambridge,” which I hope he enjoyed reading. In the illustrated papers, of course, there were portraits. And in some of the weightier periodicals the past history of Altronde was recalled, a bleak, monotonous history, little more than a catalogue of murders....
With dagger thrusts and cups of poison, for something like three long sad hundred years, the rival houses of Bertrandoni and Ceresini had played the game of give and take. Finally, there were leading articles condemning the revolution as an act of brigandage, hailing it as a forward step towards liberty and light. And then, at the week's end, the theme was dropped.
We may believe that the newspapers were read with interest at Villa Santa Cecilia, and that to the mistress of that household, on the subject of Altronde, they never seemed to contain enough.
“It's almost as if we'd had a hand in the affair,” she reflected; “but these scrappy newspaper accounts leave us with no more knowledge than as if we were complete outsiders. Why don't they give more particulars? Why aren't they more intime?”