“Here’s a fine opportunity for me,” thought Fabrizio. “But I was a little mad when I was sitting by the lake. In my passion for truthfulness I overlooked the fact that my compliment winds up with an impertinence. I should have to say, ‘I regard you with the most devoted friendship, etc., but my heart is not capable of real love.’ Is not that tantamount to saying: ‘I see you are in love with me. But pray take care! I can not return it to you in kind.’ If the duchess has any passion for me, she will be vexed at my having guessed it. If her feeling for me is one of mere friendship she will be disgusted by my impudence, and such offences are never forgiven.”
While he was weighing these important considerations Fabrizio was walking, quite unconsciously, up and down the room, looking grave and proud, like a man who sees misfortune hovering within ten paces of him.
The duchess gazed at him with admiration. This was not the child she had known from his birth, the nephew ever ready to obey her commands. This was a serious man—a man whose love would be an exquisite possession. She rose from the ottoman on which she had been sitting, and threw herself passionately into his arms.
“Are you bent on leaving me?” she cried.
“No,” said he, looking like a Roman emperor, “but I want to behave well.”
The phrase was susceptible of several interpretations. Fabrizio had not courage to go farther, and run the risk of wounding the adorable woman before him. He was too young, too easily moved. His mind did not suggest any well-turned expression which might convey his meaning. In a fit of passion, which was natural enough, and in spite of his reason, he clasped the charming creature in his arms and rained kisses upon her. Just at that moment the count’s carriage was heard in the courtyard, and almost instantly he entered the room. He looked quite affected.
“You inspire very strange devotions,” said he to Fabrizio, who was almost stunned by the phrase. “This evening the archbishop was received in audience by the prince, as he is regularly every Thursday. The prince has just informed me that the archbishop, who seemed greatly agitated, began by making a very prosy speech, evidently learned by heart, of which the prince could make nothing at all. Landriani ended by saying that it was important for the sake of the Church in Parma that Monsignore Fabrizio del Dongo should be appointed his chief grand vicar, and afterward, as soon as he had reached his five-and-twentieth year, his coadjutor, and his ultimate successor.
“This idea alarmed me, I confess,” said the count. “It is somewhat precipitate, and I was afraid it might throw the prince into a fit of ill-humour. But he looked at me and laughed, and said to me in French, ‘Ce sont là vos coups, monsieur!’
“‘I will take my oath before God and your Highness,’ I cried with the utmost possible fervour, ‘that I was utterly ignorant of the idea of the “future succession.”’ Then I went on to tell the real truth, as we talked it over here a few hours since, and I added impulsively that I should have considered his Highness had conferred an overwhelming favour on me if he had ultimately granted you a modest bishopric to begin with. The prince must have believed me, for it pleased him to be gracious. He said to me in the simplest possible way: ‘This is an official affair between me and the archbishop. You have nothing whatever to do with it. The old gentleman has sent me in a very long and tolerably tiresome report, which he winds up with a formal proposal. I replied that the individual was still very young, and more especially a very new arrival at my court; that I should almost look as if I were honouring a letter of credit drawn on me by the Emperor if I bestowed the reversion of so high a dignity on the son of one of the great officials of his Lombardo-Venetian kingdom. The archbishop protested there had been no pressure of any such kind. It was a pretty piece of folly to say that to me. It surprised me in a man who is generally so intelligent. But he always loses his head completely when he talks to me, and to-night he was more nervous than ever, which led me to think he passionately desired what he asked for. I told him that nobody knew better than myself that there had been no attempt in high quarters to put forward Del Dongo, that nobody about my court denied his powers, that his reputation for virtue was a fair one, but that I feared he was capable of enthusiasm, and that I had made a vow I would never place madmen of that kind, on whom rulers never can rely, in any exalted position. Then,’ his Highness continued, ‘I had to endure a pathetic appeal nearly as long as the first. The archbishop sang the praises of enthusiasm for God’s house. “Bungler,” said I to myself, “you are risking the appointment you were very near getting! You should have cut it short, and thanked me fervently.” Not a bit, he went on pouring out his homily with a bravery that was ridiculous. I cast about for an answer that would not be too unfavourable to young Del Dongo’s cause. I found it, and a fairly apposite one, as you will perceive.
“‘“Monsignore,” I said, ”Pius VII was a great Pope, and a great saint. He was the only one of all the sovereigns who dared to say No to the tyrant at whose feet Europe grovelled. Well, he was capable of enthusiasm, and this led him, when he was Bishop of Imola, into writing that famous pastoral of the Citizen-Cardinal Chiaramonti, in support of the Cisalpine Republic.”