Through all the lights, all the uproar, and all the tumultuous merry-making, a poor mortal was making his way, agonized with pain, unconsciously pushed about, shouldered, jostled.
CHAPTER IV
Three times they had met on the great road, lined with elms and plane-trees, which skirts the Tiber. She would leave her carriage before it reached the Milvio Bridge, and send her coachman back to wait for her in the Piazza San Pietro. She would cross the bridge on foot, looking about for him at the same time. To-day he had been waiting there for two hours, crazed with impatience and his intense desire of being in her company, walking to and fro opposite the Morteo Tavern, taking a turn in the Via di Tor di Quinto, going back as far as the bridge, reaching the point where the Flaminian Way begins, turning back again, casting restless glances all about, at the green willows bending over the river, at the blossoming almond-trees peering over the hedges of the Farnesina, in vain looking steadily in the direction of the Ponte Milvio, where she was to appear. And when he saw her in the distance, sudden blushes inflamed his pale cheeks; he would not go to meet her, but would wait where he stood, pretending absent-mindedness and unconcern.
She always came after missing three or four appointments, was always an hour or an hour and a half late, never apologized, never even alleged the slightest feminine excuse. And he, who was in despair—who up to the last moment had inwardly been accusing her of coldness and indifference, while he stamped his feet in an irresistible fit of nervousness—when he saw her said not a word, but stared at her quite bewitched, compensated by that moment of intense joy for all the suffering endured.
Their first moments together were always embarrassing; they knew not what to say to one another, and walked slowly beneath the trees, she with eyes downcast, her hands plunged in her muff, so as to have an excuse for not taking his arm, he twisting his extinguished cigar between his fingers, and in a blissful state despite Angelica's severity and melancholy.
The Roman spring was gently pervading the atmosphere among the cypresses of the Monte Mario and the plantains of the Monte Parioli, and from the tall hedges by river-bank and countryside emanated a strong scent of white hawthorn. Angelica's first words usually denoted grief, regret, repentance; brief words they were, but earnest, all of them weighing like lead upon her lover's heart. He would remain humbly silent, at a loss what consolation to proffer to the virtuous and saintly lady, whose conscience was stricken with remorse on his account.
She had never spoken of love to him, and never had he asked her for it. Timidity and shamefacedness perpetually restrained him. Perhaps he feared the answer, an answer that might be cruel in its frankness from a woman who was not in love, and whose deep religiosity would not allow her to lie.
Thus it came to be naturally established, in their singular relationship, that Donna Angelica was to give nothing of her heart, and was not to be asked to give any of it; it was tacitly but plainly understood that she should accept, support, and endure his love without ever being under an obligation to return it. She was the blessed image that vouchsafed to lower gracious eyes upon the faithful one; and the faithful one worshipped her more and more, adored her, and spoke to her of his love. Under the big trees of the Via Angelica, along which wound the silvery stream, as they walked on the hard earth amid the odours of the country, and as the sad rocking of Donna Angelica's voice diminished, with bated breath did he speak to her of his love. First came incoherent sentences, broken up by passion, which hastily recorded his feelings and thoughts since he had last seen her, or those he had before been unable to utter in her presence; and while he ejaculated these jerky, almost violent sentences he looked at her with a madman's eyes, for an instant terrifying her. But at the sound of his own voice Sangiorgio took heart of grace; his speech flowed more smoothly, his ideas connected themselves in logical sequence, his love found expression in such plain and convincing eloquence of sentiment that Donna Angelica was reassured by his humble and pleasing language; her face grew red like a young girl's in the pure enjoyment of amorous homage. Meanwhile, she would be picking long green stalks, or a bunch of bright yellow swallow-wort, or clusters of the tiny white flowerets resembling lacework, or some of the poisonous red berries, so attractive to the eye; and he spoke of love, and she suddenly rejuvenated, picked flowers, and occasionally took a flower from her bunch to give to him. He would hold it in his hand, furiously desiring to bite it, and one day he wanted to eat the red berries, so vivid in hue and so alluring.