I blushed in spite of myself, but made a negative sign, as if I did not comprehend her.
“You shake your head, but you know very well what Lorenzo and Mario would have thought, and who knows but my father himself, [pg 466] and everybody else?... Was I not beside you this time also? Did I not bring you ill-luck?... Did not every one around you just now have this idea in their minds, and were they not ready to exclaim, ‘Jettatrice’—‘Jettatrice,’ ” repeated she in a stifled voice—“a name harder to bear than an injury, more difficult to defy than calumny, it is really on her to whom it is applied, and not those she approaches, this fatal influence falls!”
“Livia!” I exclaimed, turning red once more, but trying to laugh, “is it really you, my pious, reasonable sister, who uses such language? The folly to which you allude has more than once vexed me to tears, and I must confess I cannot now bear that you should seriously speak to me in such a way.”
Livia smiled, as she embraced me, and I saw it pleased her to hear me reply in this manner. But she soon resumed more gravely:
“You know very well, Ginevra, what I think of this myself. Therefore for a long time I despised this folly, and endeavored to overcome the cruel impression it left upon me; for,” continued she, her voice trembling with emotion in spite of herself, “it is a peculiarly hard trial, you may suppose, to feel your heart full of tenderness, sympathy, and pity for others, and yet seemingly to bring them danger and misfortune.... For instance, to extend your arms to a child and see its mother hesitate to allow you to take it, or even to look at it. But let us change the subject. I have never alluded to this trial, and, if I speak of it now, it is not to excite your sympathy, but, on the contrary, to tell you I am no longer to be pitied. The hour that has just passed was horrible, it is true, but it put an end to my hesitation and doubt. I see my way clearly now, and peace has returned to my soul.”
Her eyes, though still full of tears, wore an expression of celestial joy. I looked at her with astonishment, but did not try to interrupt her. She continued:
“Gina, my darling sister, you have found your sphere, and I have found mine. May God grant you all the happiness, yes, all the joy, to be found in this world! But it will not equal mine. Pity me no longer, I repeat. It is to me he has given the better part.”
Her voice, her accent, and her looks expressed more than her words. I understood her, and was seized with strange emotion. Yes, very strange! and a feeling very different from what might have been supposed.
I loved Livia, and my approaching separation from her filled me with so much sorrow as to dim my happiness. Now I felt that a barrier even more insurmountable than distance was to come between us. It was not, however, affliction on my part, or pity for her, that I experienced. It was—shall I say it?—an inexplicable feeling of respect and envy—a vague, unreasonable wish to follow her; a mysterious aspiration for something higher, nobler, and more perfect than wealth, position, rank, and the éclat so soon to surround me, and more precious than the love itself that had fallen to my lot!
I remained a long time incapable of making my sister any reply, my eyes, like hers, fastened on the far-off horizon, now tinged with the softest evening hues.