Here a meagre wood fire smouldered, making much smoke in a badly constructed chimney. The floor was formed of a mosaic of precious marbles, and the ceiling decorated with colored stuccoes and frescoes, representing the arrival of Ganymede at the feast of the gods. It was painted lightly and harmoniously with colors whose brilliancy seemed quite fresh. The graceful figures, the exquisite fancifulness of landscape and architecture, all the pagan charm, in fact, in its very delicacy, spoke of some pupil of Raphael. Below the moulding were hung several portraits. The aristocratic touch of Van Dyck was apparent at the first glance. Beneath the huge canvases antique statues were grouped on the floor, and stools that had once been gilded, shaped like the letter X, and without backs, gave the air of a museum to the salon. The three women could not restrain their admiration.
"How beautiful it is! What treasures!" they cried.
"Look at the Prince," said Corancez, in a whisper to Pierre. "Do you see how disgusted he is? You have got a front seat for a comedy that I can guarantee as amusing. I am going to pay a little attention to my fiancée. Don't lose a word; you will find it worth attention."
"You think this is beautiful?" said the Prince to the Baroness and Miss Marsh, who stood beside him, while Corancez and Madame Bonnacorsi chatted in a corner. "Well, the ceiling is not too bad in its way. Giovanni da Udine painted it. The Fregoso of that time was jealous of the Perino del Vagas of the Doria Palace. That particular head of the house was my namesake, Cardinal Paolo, the one you know who was a pirate—before he was a cardinal. He summoned another of Raphael's pupils, the one who had aided the master at the Vatican.—Each of those gods has a history. That Bacchus is the cardinal himself, and that Apollo, whose only garment is his lute, was the cardinal's coadjutor!—Don't be shocked, Don Fortunato.—Ah, I see, he has gone off to prepare for the marriage sacrament; mene malo.—The Van Dycks, also, are not bad as Van Dycks.—They too have their history. Look at that beautiful woman, with her impenetrable, mysterious smile.—The one holding a scarlet carnation against her green robe.—And then look at that young man, with the same smile, his pourpoint made of the same green material, with the same carnation.—They were lovers, and had their portraits painted in the same costume. The young man was a Fregoso, the lady an Alfani, Donna Maria Alfani.—All this was going on during the absence of the husband, who was a prisoner among the Algerians. They both thought he would never return.—'Chi non muore, si revede,' the cardinal used to like to say, 'He who is not dead always returns.'—The husband came back and slew them both.—These portraits were hidden by the family. But I found them and hung them there."
The two immense pictures, preserved in all their brilliancy by a long exile from the light, smiled down upon the visitors with that enigmatical smile of which the old collector had spoken. A voluptuous, culpable grace shone out of the eyes of Donna Maria Alfani, lingered upon her crimson lips, her pale cheeks, and her dark hair. The delicate visage, so mobile, so subtle, preserved a dangerous, fascinating attraction even up there in the stiff outlines of the lofty green frieze. The passionate pride of a daring lover sparkled in the black eyes of the young man. The perfect similarity in the colors of their costumes, in the hue of the carnations they held in their hands, in the pose of the figures, and in the style of the paintings seemed to prolong their criminal liaison even after death. It seemed like a challenge to the avenger. He had killed them, but not separated them, for they were there, upon the same panel of the same wall, proclaiming aloud their undying devotion, glorified by art's magic, looking at each other, speaking to each other, loving each other.
Ely and Pierre could not resist the temptation to exchange a glance, to look at each other with the tenderness evoked by the meeting of two lovers with the relics of a passion long since passed away. In it could be read how keenly they felt the evanescent nature of their present happiness in the face of this vanished past. Ely was moved more deeply still. The cardinal-pirate's threatening adage, "Chi non muore, si revede," had made her shudder again, had thrilled her with the same terror she had felt upon the boat at the sweetest moment of that heavenly hour. But this terror and melancholy were quickly dissipated like an evil dream when Miss Marsh replied to the commentaries of the Genoese prince:—
"My uncle would pay a big price for those two portraits. You know how fond he is of returning from his visits to the Old World laden with knick-knacks of this kind! He calls them his scalps.—But Your Highness values them very highly, I suppose? They are such beautiful works of art!"
"I value them because they descend to me as heirlooms from my family," replied Fregoso. "But don't profane in that way the great name of Art," he added solemnly. "This and that," he continued, pointing to the vaulted dome and to the picture, "can be called anything you like, brilliant decoration, interesting history, curious illustrated legend, the reproduction of customs of a past age, instructive psychology.—But it is not Art.—There has never been any art except in Greece, and once in modern times, in the works of Dante Alighieri. Never forget that, Miss Marsh."
"Then you prefer these statues to the pictures?" asked Madame de Carlsberg, amused by the tone of his sally.
"These statues?" he replied. He looked around at the white figures ranged along the walls, and the grand lines of his visage took on an expression of extreme contempt. "Those who bought these things did not even know what Greek art was. They knew about as little as the ignoramuses who collected the mediocrities of the Tribune or of the Vatican."