A tall liveried servant handed me a coroneted missive, and, bowing stiffly, withdrew. Taking the letter mechanically, I sat puffing at my cigarette and dreaming.
The sultry day was over, and the full moon was shining down clear and cool. Genoa had drawn breath again; its streets and piazzas had grown alive with the stir of manifold movement; the broad Via Roma, with its fine shops and garish cafés, echoed with increasing confusion of voices and jest and laughter and song; while the flower-sellers were everywhere, and the newsboys in strident tones cried the Secolo and the Gazzetta. My small and rather shabby room was on the top floor of a great old palazzo in the Via Balbi. The jalousies, wide-open, admitted little gusts of fresh air that blew up from the sea, while the ceaseless babel of tongues, the clip-clap of horses’ hoofs, and the indescribable odour of garlic, fried oil, and the cheap cigars characteristic of an Italian street, was borne in upon me.
Two candles in the sconces of a small Venetian mirror shed their light over the pedestal, upon which was a statue almost finished. It was a representation of a lovely woman in carnival dress, that I had chiselled in marble.
The face was absolutely beautiful, not only because of its perfect harmony, not only winsome in the gentleness of its contour, but it was also masterful by virtue of the freedom and force expressed in all its firmness.
Lazily I opened the letter, and prepared to feast upon its contents. But the few brief words penned in a woman’s hand caused me to start to my feet in anger and dismay; and, holding my breath, I crushed the missive and cast it under my foot. She who had written to me was the original of this statue, which was considered my masterpiece.
The note was cold and formal, unlike her usual graceful letters. It stated that she was leaving Italy that evening; and expressed regret she could not sit again to me. She also enclosed a bank-note for two thousand lire, which she apparently believed would repay me for my trouble.
My trouble! Dio mio! Had it not been a labour of love, when I adored—nay, worshipped her; and she, in her turn, had bestowed smiles and kisses upon me?
Yet she had written and sent me money, as if I were a mere tradesman; and from the tone of her note, it seemed as if our friendship existed no longer. Every day she had come to my studio, bringing with her that breath of stephanotis that always pervaded her; and because she was not averse to a mild flirtation, I had believed she loved me! Bah! I had been fooled! The iron of a wasted love, of a useless sacrifice, was in my heart.
This sudden awakening had crushed me; and I stood gazing aimlessly out of the window, unaware of the presence of a visitor, until I felt a hearty slap on the shoulder, and, turning quickly, faced my old friend, Pietro Barolini.
“Chi vide mái tanto!” he cried cheerily. “Why, my dear fellow, you look as if you’ve got a very bad attack of melancholia. What’s the matter?”