"Oh, MINE! I must give up all hope—she will never think of me more than as a workman who has carried out her design. There is something very strange about her—she seems, at certain moments, to withdraw herself from all the interests of mere humanity. To-day, for instance, she looked down from the air-ship on the swarming crowds in the streets of Naples and said 'Poor little microbes! How sad it is to see them crawling about and festering down there! What IS the use of them! I wish I knew!' Then, when I ventured to suggest that possibly they were more than 'microbes,'—they were human beings that loved and worked and thought and created, she looked at me with those wonderful eyes of hers and answered—'Microbes do the same—only we don't take the trouble to think about them! But if we knew their lives and intentions, I dare say we should find they are quite as clever in their own line as we are in ours!' What is one to say to a woman who argues in this way?"
Don Aloysius laughed gently.
"But she argues quite correctly after all! My son, you are like the majority of men—they grow impatient with clever women,—they prefer stupid ones. In fact they deliberately choose stupid ones to be the mothers of their children—hence the ever increasing multitude of fools!" He moved towards the open doors of the beautiful lounge-hall of the Palazzo, Rivardi walking at his side. "But you will grant me a measure of wisdom in the advice I gave you the other day-the little millionairess is unlike other women—she is not capable of loving,—not in the way loving is understood in this world,—therefore do not seek from her what she cannot give!—As for her 'flying alone'—leave that to the fates!—I do not think she will attempt it."
They entered the Palazzo just as a servant was about to announce to them that dinner would be served in a quarter of an hour, and their talk, for the time being, ended. But the thoughts of both men were busy; and unknown to each other, centered round the enigmatical personality of one woman who had become more interesting to them than anything else in the world,—so much so indeed that each in his own private mind wondered what life would be worth without her!
CHAPTER XVI
That evening Morgana was in one of her most bewitching moods—even the old Highland word "fey" scarcely described her many brilliant variations from grave to gay, from gay to romantic, and from romantic to a kind of humorous-satiric vein which moved her to utter quick little witticisms which might have seemed barbed with too sharp a point were they not so quickly covered with a sweetness of manner which deprived them of all malice. She looked her best, too,—she had robed herself in a garment of pale shimmering blue which shone softly like the gleam of moonbeams through crystal—her wonderful hair was twisted up in a coronal held in place by a band of diamonds,—tiny diamonds twinkled in her ears, and a star of diamonds glittered on her breast. Her elfin beauty, totally unlike the beauty of accepted standards, exhaled a subtle influence as a lily exhales fragrance—and the knowledge she had of her own charm combined with her indifference as to its effect upon others gave her a dangerous attractiveness. As she sat at the head of her daintily adorned dinner-table she might have posed for a fairy queen in days when fairies were still believed in and queens were envied,—and Giulio Rivardi's thoughts were swept to and fro in his brain by cross-currents of emotion which were not altogether disinterested or virtuous. For years his spirit had been fretted and galled by poverty,—he, the descendant of a long line of proud Sicilian nobles, had been forced to earn a precarious livelihood as an art decorator and adviser to "newly rich" people who had neither taste nor judgment, teaching them how to build, restore or furnish their houses according to the pure canons of art, in the knowledge of which he excelled,—and now, when chance or providence had thrown Morgana in his way,—Morgana with her millions, and an enchanting personality,—he inwardly demanded why he should not win her to have and to hold for his own? He was a personable man, nobly born, finely educated,—was it possible that he had not sufficient resolution and force of character to take the precious citadel by storm? These ideas flitted vaguely across his mind as he watched his fair hostess talking, now to Don Aloysius, now to Lady Kingswood, and sometimes flinging him a light word of badinage to rally him on what she chose to call his "sulks."
"He can't get over it!" she declared, smiling—"Poor Marchese Giulio! That I should have dared to steer my own air-ship was too much for him, and he can't forgive me!"
"I cannot forgive your putting yourself into danger," said Rivardi—"You ran a great risk—you must pardon me if I hold your life too valuable to be lightly lost."
"It is good of you to think it valuable,"—and her wonderful blue eyes were suddenly shadowed with sadness—"To me it is valueless."