THAT afternoon Arthur felt the need of a long
walk. He intrusted his luggage to a fellow-student
and went to Leghorn on foot.
The day was damp and cloudy, but not cold; and
the low, level country seemed to him fairer than he
had ever known it to look before. He had a sense
of delight in the soft elasticity of the wet grass
under his feet and in the shy, wondering eyes of
the wild spring flowers by the roadside. In a
thorn-acacia bush at the edge of a little strip of
wood a bird was building a nest, and flew up as he
passed with a startled cry and a quick fluttering of
brown wings.
He tried to keep his mind fixed upon the devout
meditations proper to the eve of Good Friday.
But thoughts of Montanelli and Gemma got so
much in the way of this devotional exercise that at
last he gave up the attempt and allowed his fancy
to drift away to the wonders and glories of the
coming insurrection, and to the part in it that he
had allotted to his two idols. The Padre was to
be the leader, the apostle, the prophet before
whose sacred wrath the powers of darkness were
to flee, and at whose feet the young defenders of
Liberty were to learn afresh the old doctrines,
the old truths in their new and unimagined
significance.
And Gemma? Oh, Gemma would fight at
the barricades. She was made of the clay from
which heroines are moulded; she would be the
perfect comrade, the maiden undefiled and unafraid,
of whom so many poets have dreamed. She
would stand beside him, shoulder to shoulder,
rejoicing under the winged death-storm; and they
would die together, perhaps in the moment of
victory--without doubt there would be a victory.
Of his love he would tell her nothing; he would say
no word that might disturb her peace or spoil her
tranquil sense of comradeship. She was to him a
holy thing, a spotless victim to be laid upon the
altar as a burnt-offering for the deliverance of the
people; and who was he that he should enter into
the white sanctuary of a soul that knew no other
love than God and Italy?
God and Italy----Then came a sudden drop
from the clouds as he entered the great, dreary
house in the "Street of Palaces," and Julia's butler,
immaculate, calm, and politely disapproving as
ever, confronted him upon the stairs.
"Good-evening, Gibbons; are my brothers in?"
"Mr. Thomas is in, sir; and Mrs. Burton. They
are in the drawing room."
Arthur went in with a dull sense of oppression.
What a dismal house it was! The flood of life
seemed to roll past and leave it always just above
high-water mark. Nothing in it ever changed--
neither the people, nor the family portraits, nor the
heavy furniture and ugly plate, nor the vulgar
ostentation of riches, nor the lifeless aspect of
everything. Even the flowers on the brass stands
looked like painted metal flowers that had never
known the stirring of young sap within them in
the warm spring days. Julia, dressed for dinner,
and waiting for visitors in the drawing room which
was to her the centre of existence, might have sat
for a fashion-plate just as she was, with her wooden
smile and flaxen ringlets, and the lap-dog on her
knee.
"How do you do, Arthur?" she said stiffly, giving
him the tips of her fingers for a moment, and
then transferring them to the more congenial contact
of the lap-dog's silken coat. "I hope you
are quite well and have made satisfactory progress
at college."
Arthur murmured the first commonplace that
he could think of at the moment, and relapsed into
uncomfortable silence. The arrival of James, in his
most pompous mood and accompanied by a stiff,
elderly shipping-agent, did not improve matters;
and when Gibbons announced that dinner was
served, Arthur rose with a little sigh of relief.
"I won't come to dinner, Julia. If you'll excuse
me I will go to my room."
"You're overdoing that fasting, my boy," said
Thomas; "I am sure you'll make yourself ill."
"Oh, no! Good-night."
In the corridor Arthur met the under housemaid
and asked her to knock at his door at six in
the morning.
"The signorino is going to church?"
"Yes. Good-night, Teresa."
He went into his room. It had belonged to his
mother, and the alcove opposite the window had
been fitted up during her long illness as an oratory.
A great crucifix on a black pedestal occupied the
middle of the altar; and before it hung a little
Roman lamp. This was the room where she had
died. Her portrait was on the wall beside the
bed; and on the table stood a china bowl which
had been hers, filled with a great bunch of her
favourite violets. It was just a year since her
death; and the Italian servants had not forgotten
her.
He took out of his portmanteau a framed picture,
carefully wrapped up. It was a crayon portrait
of Montanelli, which had come from Rome
only a few days before. He was unwrapping this
precious treasure when Julia's page brought in a
supper-tray on which the old Italian cook, who had
served Gladys before the harsh, new mistress came,
had placed such little delicacies as she considered
her dear signorino might permit himself to eat
without infringing the rules of the Church.
Arthur refused everything but a piece of bread;
and the page, a nephew of Gibbons, lately arrived
from England, grinned significantly as he carried
out the tray. He had already joined the Protestant
camp in the servants' hall.
Arthur went into the alcove and knelt down
before the crucifix, trying to compose his mind to
the proper attitude for prayer and meditation.
But this he found difficult to accomplish. He had,
as Thomas said, rather overdone the Lenten privations,
and they had gone to his head like strong
wine. Little quivers of excitement went down his
back, and the crucifix swam in a misty cloud before
his eyes. It was only after a long litany, mechanically
repeated, that he succeeded in recalling his
wandering imagination to the mystery of the
Atonement. At last sheer physical weariness
conquered the feverish agitation of his nerves, and
he lay down to sleep in a calm and peaceful mood,
free from all unquiet or disturbing thoughts.
He was fast asleep when a sharp, impatient
knock came at his door. "Ah, Teresa!" he
thought, turning over lazily. The knock was
repeated, and he awoke with a violent start.
"Signorino! signorino!" cried a man's voice in
Italian; "get up for the love of God!"
Arthur jumped out of bed.
"What is the matter? Who is it?"
"It's I, Gian Battista. Get up, quick, for Our
Lady's sake!"
Arthur hurriedly dressed and opened the door.
As he stared in perplexity at the coachman's pale,
terrified face, the sound of tramping feet and
clanking metal came along the corridor, and he
suddenly realized the truth.
"For me?" he asked coolly.
"For you! Oh, signorino, make haste! What
have you to hide? See, I can put----"
"I have nothing to hide. Do my brothers
know?"
The first uniform appeared at the turn of the
passage.
"The signor has been called; all the house is
awake. Alas! what a misfortune--what a terrible
misfortune! And on Good Friday! Holy Saints,
have pity!"
Gian Battista burst into tears. Arthur moved
a few steps forward and waited for the gendarmes,
who came clattering along, followed by a shivering
crowd of servants in various impromptu costumes.
As the soldiers surrounded Arthur, the
master and mistress of the house brought up the
rear of this strange procession; he in dressing
gown and slippers, she in a long peignoir, with her
hair in curlpapers.
"There is, sure, another flood toward, and these
couples are coming to the ark! Here comes a
pair of very strange beasts!"
The quotation flashed across Arthur's mind as
he looked at the grotesque figures. He checked
a laugh with a sense of its jarring incongruity--this
was a time for worthier thoughts. "Ave Maria,
Regina Coeli!" he whispered, and turned his eyes
away, that the bobbing of Julia's curlpapers might
not again tempt him to levity.
"Kindly explain to me," said Mr. Burton, approaching
the officer of gendarmerie, "what is the
meaning of this violent intrusion into a private
house? I warn you that, unless you are prepared
to furnish me with a satisfactory explanation, I
shall feel bound to complain to the English
Ambassador."
"I presume," replied the officer stiffly, "that
you will recognize this as a sufficient explanation;
the English Ambassador certainly will." He
pulled out a warrant for the arrest of Arthur
Burton, student of philosophy, and, handing it to
James, added coldly: "If you wish for any further
explanation, you had better apply in person to the
chief of police."
Julia snatched the paper from her husband,
glanced over it, and flew at Arthur like nothing
else in the world but a fashionable lady in a
rage.
"So it's you that have disgraced the family!"
she screamed; "setting all the rabble in the town
gaping and staring as if the thing were a show?
So you have turned jail-bird, now, with all your
piety! It's what we might have expected from
that Popish woman's child----"
"You must not speak to a prisoner in a foreign
language, madam," the officer interrupted; but
his remonstrance was hardly audible under the torrent
of Julia's vociferous English.
"Just what we might have expected! Fasting
and prayer and saintly meditation; and this is what
was underneath it all! I thought that would be
the end of it."
Dr. Warren had once compared Julia to a salad
into which the cook had upset the vinegar cruet.
The sound of her thin, hard voice set Arthur's
teeth on edge, and the simile suddenly popped up
in his memory.
"There's no use in this kind of talk," he said.
"You need not be afraid of any unpleasantness;
everyone will understand that you are all quite
innocent. I suppose, gentlemen, you want to
search my things. I have nothing to hide."
While the gendarmes ransacked the room, reading
his letters, examining his college papers, and
turning out drawers and boxes, he sat waiting on
the edge of the bed, a little flushed with excitement,
but in no way distressed. The search did
not disquiet him. He had always burned letters
which could possibly compromise anyone, and beyond
a few manuscript verses, half revolutionary,
half mystical, and two or three numbers of Young
Italy, the gendarmes found nothing to repay them
for their trouble. Julia, after a long resistance,
yielded to the entreaties of her brother-in-law and
went back to bed, sweeping past Arthur with
magnificent disdain, James meekly following.
When they had left the room, Thomas, who all
this while had been tramping up and down, trying
to look indifferent, approached the officer and
asked permission to speak to the prisoner.
Receiving a nod in answer, he went up to Arthur
and muttered in a rather husky voice:
"I say; this is an infernally awkward business.
I'm very sorry about it."
Arthur looked up with a face as serene as a summer
morning. "You have always been good to
me," he said. "There's nothing to be sorry
about. I shall be safe enough."
"Look here, Arthur!" Thomas gave his moustache
a hard pull and plunged head first into the
awkward question. "Is--all this anything to do
with--money? Because, if it is, I----"
"With money! Why, no! What could it have
to do----"
"Then it's some political tomfoolery? I
thought so. Well, don't you get down in the
mouth--and never mind all the stuff Julia talks.
It's only her spiteful tongue; and if you want
help,--cash, or anything,--let me know, will
you?"
Arthur held out his hand in silence, and Thomas
left the room with a carefully made-up expression
of unconcern that rendered his face more stolid
than ever.
The gendarmes, meanwhile, had finished their
search, and the officer in charge requested Arthur
to put on his outdoor clothes. He obeyed at once
and turned to leave the room; then stopped with
sudden hesitation. It seemed hard to take leave
of his mother's oratory in the presence of these
officials.
"Have you any objection to leaving the room
for a moment?" he asked. "You see that I cannot
escape and that there is nothing to conceal."
"I am sorry, but it is forbidden to leave a
prisoner alone."
"Very well, it doesn't matter."
He went into the alcove, and, kneeling down,
kissed the feet and pedestal of the crucifix, whispering
softly: "Lord, keep me faithful unto death."
When he rose, the officer was standing by the
table, examining Montanelli's portrait. "Is this
a relative of yours?" he asked.
"No; it is my confessor, the new Bishop of
Brisighella."
On the staircase the Italian servants were waiting,
anxious and sorrowful. They all loved Arthur
for his own sake and his mother's, and crowded
round him, kissing his hands and dress with
passionate grief. Gian Battista stood by, the
tears dripping down his gray moustache. None
of the Burtons came out to take leave of him.
Their coldness accentuated the tenderness and
sympathy of the servants, and Arthur was near to
breaking down as he pressed the hands held out
to him.
"Good-bye, Gian Battista. Kiss the little ones
for me. Good-bye, Teresa. Pray for me, all of
you; and God keep you! Good-bye, good-bye!"
He ran hastily downstairs to the front door. A
moment later only a little group of silent men and
sobbing women stood on the doorstep watching
the carriage as it drove away.
