XIII

"/Zitto/!" said she, stamping her foot, and looking whether her

husband were listening. "Never disturb the peace of mind of that dear

man, as simple as a child, and with whom I can do what I please. He is

under my protection," she added. "If you could know with what

generosity he risked his life and fortune because I was a Liberal! for

he does not share my political opinions. Is not that love, Monsieur

Frenchman?--But they are like that in his family. Emilio's younger

brother was deserted for a handsome youth by the woman he loved. He

thrust his sword through his own heart ten minutes after he had said

to his servant, 'I could of course kill my rival, but that would

grieve the /Diva/ too deeply.' "

This mixture of dignity and banter, of haughtiness and playfulness,

made Francesca at this moment the most fascinating creature in the

world. The dinner and the evening were full of cheerfulness,

justified, indeed, by the relief of the two refugees, but depressing

to Rodolphe.

"Can she be fickle?" he asked himself as he returned to the Stopfers'

house. "She sympathized in my sorrow, and I cannot take part in her

joy!"

He blamed himself, justifying this girl-wife.

"She has no taint of hypocrisy, and is carried away by impulse,"

thought he, "and I want her to be like a Parisian woman."

Next day and the following days, in fact, for twenty days after,

Rodolphe spent all his time at the Bergmanns', watching Francesca

without having determined to watch her. In some souls admiration is

not independent of a certain penetration. The young Frenchman

discerned in Francesca the imprudence of girlhood, the true nature of

a woman as yet unbroken, sometimes struggling against her love, and at

other moments yielding and carried away by it. The old man certainly

behaved to her as a father to his daughter, and Francesca treated him

with a deeply felt gratitude which roused her instinctive nobleness.

The situation and the woman were to Rodolphe an impenetrable enigma,

of which the solution attracted him more and more.

These last days were full of secret joys, alternating with melancholy

moods, with tiffs and quarrels even more delightful than the hours

when Rodolphe and Francesca were of one mind. And he was more and more

fascinated by this tenderness apart from wit, always and in all things

the same, an affection that was jealous of mere nothings--already!

"You care very much for luxury?" said he one evening to Francesca, who

was expressing her wish to get away from Gersau, where she missed many

things.

"I!" cried she. "I love luxury as I love the arts, as I love a picture

by Raphael, a fine horse, a beautiful day, or the Bay of Naples.

Emilio," she went on, "have I ever complained here during our days of

privation."

"You would not have been yourself if you had," replied the old man

gravely.

"After all, is it not in the nature of plain folks to aspire to

grandeur?" she asked, with a mischievous glance at Rodolphe and at her

husband. "Were my feet made for fatigue?" she added, putting out two

pretty little feet. "My hands"--and she held one out to Rodolphe--

"were those hands made to work?--Leave us," she said to her husband;

"I want to speak to him."

The old man went into the drawing-room with sublime good faith; he was

sure of his wife.

"I will not have you come with us to Geneva," she said to Rodolphe.

"It is a gossiping town. Though I am far above the nonsense the world

talks, I do not choose to be calumniated, not for my own sake, but for

his. I make it my pride to be the glory of that old man, who is, after

all, my only protector. We are leaving; stay here a few days. When you

come on to Geneva, call first on my husband, and let him introduce you

to me. Let us hide our great and unchangeable affection from the eyes

of the world. I love you; you know it; but this is how I will prove it

to you-- you shall never discern in my conduct anything whatever that

may arouse your jealousy."

She drew him into a corner of the balcony, kissed him on the forehead,

and fled, leaving him in amazement.

Next day Rodolphe heard that the lodgers at the Bergmanns' had left at

daybreak. It then seemed to him intolerable to remain at Gersau, and

he set out for Vevay by the longest route, starting sooner than was

necessary. Attracted to the waters of the lake where the beautiful

Italian awaited him, he reached Geneva by the end of October. To avoid

the discomforts of the town he took rooms in a house at Eaux-Vives,

outside the walls. As soon as he was settled, his first care was to

ask his landlord, a retired jeweler, whether some Italian refugees

from Milan had not lately come to reside at Geneva.

"Not so far as I know," replied the man. "Prince and Princess Colonna

of Rome have taken Monsieur Jeanrenaud's place for three years; it is

one of the finest on the lake. It is situated between the Villa

Diodati and that of Monsieur Lafin-de-Dieu, let to the Vicomtesse de

Beauseant. Prince Colonna has come to see his daughter and his son-in-

law Prince Gandolphini, a Neopolitan, or if you like, a Sicilian, an

old adherent of King Murat's, and a victim of the last revolution.

These are the last arrivals at Geneva, and they are not Milanese.

Serious steps had to be taken, and the Pope's interest in the Colonna

family was invoked, to obtain permission from the foreign powers and

the King of Naples for the Prince and Princess Gandolphini to live

here. Geneva is anxious to do nothing to displease the Holy Alliance

to which it owes its independence. /Our/ part is not to ruffle foreign

courts; there are many foreigners here, Russians and English."

"Even some Gevenese?"

"Yes, monsieur, our lake is so fine! Lord Byron lived here about seven

years at the Villa Diodati, which every one goes to see now, like

Coppet and Ferney."

"You cannot tell me whether within a week or so a bookseller from

Milan has come with his wife--named Lamporani, one of the leaders of

the last revolution?"

"I could easily find out by going to the Foreigners' Club," said the

jeweler.

Rodolphe's first walk was very naturally to the Villa Diodati, the

residence of Lord Byron, whose recent death added to its

attractiveness: for is not death the consecration of genius?

The road to Eaux-Vives follows the shore of the lake, and, like all

the roads in Switzerland, is very narrow; in some spots, in

consequence of the configuration of the hilly ground, there is

scarcely space for two carriages to pass each other.

At a few yards from the Jeanrenauds' house, which he was approaching

without knowing it, Rodolphe heard the sound of a carriage behind him,

and, finding himself in a sunk road, he climbed to the top of a rock

to leave the road free. Of course he looked at the approaching

carriage--an elegant English phaeton, with a splendid pair of English

horses. He felt quite dizzy as he beheld in this carriage Francesca,

beautifully dressed, by the side of an old lady as hard as a cameo. A

servant blazing with gold lace stood behind. Francesca recognized

Rodolphe, and smiled at seeing him like a statue on a pedestal. The

carriage, which the lover followed with his eyes as he climbed the

hill, turned in at the gate of a country house, towards which he ran.

"Who lives here?" he asked the gardener.

"Prince and Princess Colonna, and Prince and Princess Gandolphini."

"Have they not just driven in?"

"Yes, sir."

In that instant a veil fell from Rodolphe's eyes; he saw clearly the

meaning of the past.

"If only this is her last piece of trickery!" thought the thunder-

struck lover to himself.

He trembled lest he should have been the plaything of a whim, for he

had heard what a /capriccio/ might mean in an Italian. But what a

crime had he committed in the eyes of a woman--in accepting a born

princess as a citizen's wife! in believing that a daughter of one of

the most illustrious houses of the Middle Ages was the wife of a

bookseller! The consciousness of his blunders increased Rodolphe's

desire to know whether he would be ignored and repelled. He asked for

Prince Gandolphini, sending in his card, and was immediately received

by the false Lamparini, who came forward to meet him, welcomed him

with the best possible grace, and took him to walk on a terrace whence

there was a view of Geneva, the Jura, the hills covered with villas,

and below them a wide expanse of the lake.

"My wife is faithful to the lakes, you see," he remarked, after

pointing out the details to his visitor. "We have a sort of concert

this evening," he added, as they returned to the splendid Villa

Jeanrenaud. "I hope you will do me and the Princess the pleasure of

seeing you. Two months of poverty endured in intimacy are equal to

years of friendship."

Though he was consumed by curiosity, Rodolphe dared not ask to see the

Princess; he slowly made his way back to Eaux-Vives, looking forward

to the evening. In a few hours his passion, great as it had already

been, was augmented by his anxiety and by suspense as to future

events. He now understood the necessity for making himself famous,

that he might some day find himself, socially speaking, on a level

with his idol. In his eyes Francesca was made really great by the

simplicity and ease of her conduct at Gersau. Princess Colonna's

haughtiness, so evidently natural to her, alarmed Rodolphe, who would

find enemies in Francesca's father and mother--at least so he might

expect; and the secrecy which Princess Gandolphini had so strictly

enjoined on him now struck him as a wonderful proof of affection. By

not choosing to compromise the future, had she not confessed that she

loved him?

At last nine o'clock struck; Rodolphe could get into a carriage and

say with an emotion that is very intelligible, "To the Villa

Jeanrenaud--to Prince Gandolphini's."

At last he saw Francesca, but without being seen by her. The Princess

was standing quite near the piano. Her beautiful hair, so thick and

long, was bound with a golden fillet. Her face, in the light of wax

candles, had the brilliant pallor peculiar to Italians, and which

looks its best only by artificial light. She was in full evening

dress, showing her fascinating shoulders, the figure of a girl and the

arms of an antique statue. Her sublime beauty was beyond all possible

rivalry, though there were some charming women of Geneva, and other

Italians, among them the dazzling and illustrious Princess Varese, and

the famous singer Tinti, who was at that moment singing.

Rodolphe, leaning against the door-post, looked at the Princess,

turning on her the fixed, tenacious, attracting gaze, charged with the

full, insistent will which is concentrated in the feeling called

desire, and thus assumes the nature of a vehement command. Did the

flame of that gaze reach Francesca? Was Francesca expecting each

instant to see Rodolphe? In a few minutes she stole a glance at the

door, as though magnetized by this current of love, and her eyes,

without reserve, looked deep into Rodolphe's. A slight thrill quivered

through that superb face and beautiful body; the shock to her spirit

reacted: Francesca blushed! Rodolphe felt a whole life in this

exchange of looks, so swift that it can only be compared to a

lightning flash. But to what could his happiness compare? He was

loved. The lofty Princess, in the midst of her world, in this handsome

villa, kept the pledge given by the disguised exile, the capricious

beauty of Bergmanns' lodgings. The intoxication of such a moment

enslaves a man for life! A faint smile, refined and subtle, candid and

triumphant, curled Princess Gandolphini's lips, and at a moment when

she did not feel herself observed she looked at Rodolphe with an

expression which seemed to ask his pardon for having deceived him as

to her rank.

When the song was ended Rodolphe could make his way to the Prince, who

graciously led him to his wife. Rodolphe went through the ceremonial

of a formal introduction to Princess and Prince Colonna, and to

Francesca. When this was over, the Princess had to take part in the

famous quartette, /Mi manca la voce/, which was sung by her with

Tinti, with the famous tenor Genovese, and with a well-known Italian

Prince then in exile, whose voice, if he had not been a Prince, would

have made him one of the Princes of Art.

"Take that seat," said Francesca to Rodolphe, pointing to her own

chair. "/Oime/! I think there is some mistake in my name; I have for

the last minute been Princess Rodolphini."

It was said with the artless grace which revived, in this avowal

hidden beneath a jest, the happy days at Gersau. Rodolphe reveled in

the exquisite sensation of listening to the voice of the woman he

adored, while sitting so close to her that one cheek was almost

touched by the stuff of her dress and the gauze of her scarf. But

when, at such a moment, /Mi manca la voce/ is being sung, and by the

finest voices in Italy, it is easy to understand what it was that

brought the tears to Rodolphe's eyes.

In love, as perhaps in all else, there are certain circumstances,

trivial in themselves, but the outcome of a thousand little previous

incidents, of which the importance is immense, as an epitome of the

past and as a link with the future. A hundred times already we have

felt the preciousness of the one we love; but a trifle--the perfect

touch of two souls united during a walk perhaps by a single word, by

some unlooked-for proof of affection, will carry the feeling to its

supremest pitch. In short, to express this truth by an image which has

been pre-eminently successful from the earliest ages of the world,

there are in a long chain points of attachment needed where the

cohesion is stronger than in the intermediate loops of rings. This

recognition between Rodolphe and Francesca, at this party, in the face

of the world, was one of those intense moments which join the future

to the past, and rivet a real attachment more deeply in the heart. It

was perhaps of these incidental rivets that Bossuet spoke when he

compared to them the rarity of happy moments in our lives--he who had

such a living and secret experience of love.

Next to the pleasure of admiring the woman we love, comes that of

seeing her admired by every one else. Rodolphe was enjoying both at

once. Love is a treasury of memories, and though Rodolphe's was

already full, he added to it pearls of great price; smiles shed aside

for him alone, stolen glances, tones in her singing which Francesca

addressed to him alone, but which made Tinti pale with jealousy, they

were so much applauded. All his strength of desire, the special

expression of his soul, was thrown over the beautiful Roman, who

became unchangeably the beginning and the end of all his thoughts and

actions. Rodolphe loved as every woman may dream of being loved, with

a force, a constancy, a tenacity, which made Francesca the very

substance of his heart; he felt her mingling with his blood as purer

blood, with his soul as a more perfect soul; she would henceforth

underlie the least efforts of his life as the golden sand of the

Mediterranean lies beneath the waves. In short, Rodolphe's lightest

aspiration was now a living hope.

At the end of a few days, Francesca understood this boundless love;

but it was so natural, and so perfectly shared by her, that it did not

surprise her. She was worthy of it.

"What is there that is strange?" said she to Rodolphe, as they walked

on the garden terrace, when he had been betrayed into one of those

outbursts of conceit which come so naturally to Frenchmen in the

expression of their feelings--"what is extraordinary in the fact of

your loving a young and beautiful woman, artist enough to be able to

earn her living like Tinti, and of giving you some of the pleasures of

vanity? What lout but would then become an Amadis? This is not in

question between you and me. What is needed is that we both love

faithfully, persistently; at a distance from each other for years,

with no satisfaction but that of knowing that we are loved."

"Alas!" said Rodolphe, "will you not consider my fidelity as devoid of

all merit when you see me absorbed in the efforts of devouring

ambition? Do you imagine that I can wish to see you one day exchange

the fine name of Gandolphini for that of a man who is a nobody? I want

to become one of the most remarkable men of my country, to be rich,

great--that you may be as proud of my name as of your own name of

Colonna."

"I should be grieved to see you without such sentiments in your

heart," she replied, with a bewitching smile. "But do not wear

yourself out too soon in your ambitious labors. Remain young. They say

that politics soon make a man old."

One of the rarest gifts in women is a certain gaiety which does not

detract from tenderness. This combination of deep feeling with the

lightness of youth added an enchanting grace at this moment to

Francesca's charms. This is the key to her character; she laughs and

she is touched; she becomes enthusiastic, and returns to arch raillery

with a readiness, a facility, which makes her the charming and

exquisite creature she is, and for which her reputation is known

outside Italy. Under the graces of a woman she conceals vast learning,

thanks to the excessively monotonous and almost monastic life she led

in the castle of the old Colonnas.

This rich heiress was at first intended for the cloister, being the

fourth child of Prince and Princess Colonna; but the death of her two

brothers, and of her elder sister, suddenly brought her out of her

retirement, and made her one of the most brilliant matches in the

Papal States. Her elder sister had been betrothed to Prince

Gandolphini, one of the richest landowners in Sicily; and Francesca

was married to him instead, so that nothing might be changed in the

position of the family. The Colonnas and Gandolphinis had always

intermarried.

From the age of nine till she was sixteen, Francesca, under the

direction of a Cardinal of the family, had read all through the

library of the Colonnas, to make weight against her ardent imagination

by studying science, art, and letters. But in these studies she

acquired the taste for independence and liberal ideas, which threw

her, with her husband, into the ranks of the revolution. Rodolphe had

not yet learned that, besides five living languages, Francesca knew

Greek, Latin, and Hebrew. The charming creature perfectly understood

that, for a woman, the first condition of being learned is to keep it

deeply hidden.

Rodolphe spent the whole winter at Geneva. This winter passed like a

day. When spring returned, notwithstanding the infinite delights of

the society of a clever woman, wonderfully well informed, young and

lovely, the lover went through cruel sufferings, endured indeed with

courage, but which were sometimes legible in his countenance, and

betrayed themselves in his manners or speech, perhaps because he

believed that Francesca shared them. Now and again it annoyed him to

admire her calmness. Like an Englishwoman, she seemed to pride herself

on expressing nothing in her face; its serenity defied love; he longed

to see her agitated; he accused her of having no feeling, for he

believed in the tradition which ascribes to Italian women a feverish

excitability.

"I am a Roman!" Francesca gravely replied one day when she took quite

seriously some banter on this subject from Rodolphe.