THIRTEEN YEARS LATER.
ONE evening in July, 1846, a few acquaintances
met at Professor Fabrizi's house in Florence to
discuss plans for future political work.
Several of them belonged to the Mazzinian
party and would have been satisfied with nothing
less than a democratic Republic and a United
Italy. Others were Constitutional Monarchists
and Liberals of various shades. On one point,
however, they were all agreed; that of dissatisfaction
with the Tuscan censorship; and the popular
professor had called the meeting in the hope that,
on this one subject at least, the representatives
of the dissentient parties would be able to get
through an hour's discussion without quarrelling.
Only a fortnight had elapsed since the famous
amnesty which Pius IX. had granted, on his accession,
to political offenders in the Papal States; but
the wave of liberal enthusiasm caused by it was
already spreading over Italy. In Tuscany even
the government appeared to have been affected
by the astounding event. It had occurred to
Fabrizi and a few other leading Florentines that
this was a propitious moment for a bold effort to
reform the press-laws.
"Of course," the dramatist Lega had said, when
the subject was first broached to him; "it would
be impossible to start a newspaper till we can
get the press-law changed; we should not bring
out the first number. But we may be able to run
some pamphlets through the censorship already;
and the sooner we begin the sooner we shall get
the law changed."
He was now explaining in Fabrizi's library his
theory of the line which should be taken by liberal
writers at the moment.
"There is no doubt," interposed one of the
company, a gray-haired barrister with a rather
drawling manner of speech, "that in some way
we must take advantage of the moment. We
shall not see such a favourable one again for bringing
forward serious reforms. But I doubt the
pamphlets doing any good. They will only irritate
and frighten the government instead of winning
it over to our side, which is what we really
want to do. If once the authorities begin to think
of us as dangerous agitators our chance of getting
their help is gone."
"Then what would you have us do?"
"Petition."
"To the Grand Duke?"
"Yes; for an augmentation of the liberty of the
press."
A keen-looking, dark man sitting by the window
turned his head round with a laugh.
"You'll get a lot out of petitioning!" he said.
"I should have thought the result of the Renzi
case was enough to cure anybody of going to work
that way."
"My dear sir, I am as much grieved as you are
that we did not succeed in preventing the extradition
of Renzi. But really--I do not wish to
hurt the sensibilities of anyone, but I cannot help
thinking that our failure in that case was largely
due to the impatience and vehemence of some
persons among our number. I should certainly
hesitate----"
"As every Piedmontese always does," the dark
man interrupted sharply. "I don't know where
the vehemence and impatience lay, unless you
found them in the strings of meek petitions we
sent in. That may be vehemence for Tuscany or
Piedmont, but we should not call it particularly
vehement in Naples."
"Fortunately," remarked the Piedmontese,
"Neapolitan vehemence is peculiar to Naples."
"There, there, gentlemen, that will do!" the
professor put in. "Neapolitan customs are very
good things in their way and Piedmontese customs
in theirs; but just now we are in Tuscany,
and the Tuscan custom is to stick to the
matter in hand. Grassini votes for petitions and
Galli against them. What do you think, Dr.
Riccardo?"
"I see no harm in petitions, and if Grassini gets
one up I'll sign it with all the pleasure in life.
But I don't think mere petitioning and nothing
else will accomplish much. Why can't we have
both petitions and pamphlets?"
"Simply because the pamphlets will put the
government into a state of mind in which it won't
grant the petitions," said Grassini.
"It won't do that anyhow." The Neapolitan
rose and came across to the table. "Gentlemen,
you're on the wrong tack. Conciliating the government
will do no good. What we must do is to
rouse the people."
"That's easier said than done; how are you
going to start?"
"Fancy asking Galli that! Of course he'd start
by knocking the censor on the head."
"No, indeed, I shouldn't," said Galli stoutly.
"You always think if a man comes from down
south he must believe in no argument but cold
steel."
"Well, what do you propose, then? Sh! Attention,
gentlemen! Galli has a proposal to make."
The whole company, which had broken up into
little knots of twos and threes, carrying on separate
discussions, collected round the table to
listen. Galli raised his hands in expostulation.
"No, gentlemen, it is not a proposal; it is merely
a suggestion. It appears to me that there is a
great practical danger in all this rejoicing over
the new Pope. People seem to think that, because
he has struck out a new line and granted
this amnesty, we have only to throw ourselves--
all of us, the whole of Italy--into his arms and he
will carry us to the promised land. Now, I am
second to no one in admiration of the Pope's
behaviour; the amnesty was a splendid action."
"I am sure His Holiness ought to feel flattered----"
Grassini began contemptuously.
"There, Grassini, do let the man speak!"
Riccardo interrupted in his turn. "It's a most
extraordinary thing that you two never can
keep from sparring like a cat and dog. Get on,
Galli!"
"What I wanted to say is this," continued the
Neapolitan. "The Holy Father, undoubtedly, is
acting with the best intentions; but how far he
will succeed in carrying his reforms is another
question. Just now it's smooth enough and, of
course, the reactionists all over Italy will lie quiet
for a month or two till the excitement about the
amnesty blows over; but they are not likely to
let the power be taken out of their hands without
a fight, and my own belief is that before the winter
is half over we shall have Jesuits and Gregorians
and Sanfedists and all the rest of the crew about
our ears, plotting and intriguing, and poisoning
off everybody they can't bribe."
"That's likely enough."
"Very well, then; shall we wait here, meekly
sending in petitions, till Lambruschini and his
pack have persuaded the Grand Duke to put us
bodily under Jesuit rule, with perhaps a few Austrian
hussars to patrol the streets and keep us
in order; or shall we forestall them and take advantage
of their momentary discomfiture to strike
the first blow?"
"Tell us first what blow you propose?"
"I would suggest that we start an organized
propaganda and agitation against the Jesuits."
"A pamphleteering declaration of war, in
fact?"
"Yes; exposing their intrigues, ferreting out
their secrets, and calling upon the people to make
common cause against them."
"But there are no Jesuits here to expose."
"Aren't there? Wait three months and see
how many we shall have. It'll be too late to keep
them out then."
"But really to rouse the town against the
Jesuits one must speak plainly; and if you do that
how will you evade the censorship?"
"I wouldn't evade it; I would defy it."
"You would print the pamphlets anonymously?
That's all very well, but the fact is, we have all
seen enough of the clandestine press to know----"
"I did not mean that. I would print the pamphlets
openly, with our names and addresses, and
let them prosecute us if they dare."
"The project is a perfectly mad one," Grassini
exclaimed. "It is simply putting one's head into
the lion's mouth out of sheer wantonness."
"Oh, you needn't be afraid!" Galli cut in
sharply; "we shouldn't ask you to go to prison
for our pamphlets."
"Hold your tongue, Galli!" said Riccardo.
"It's not a question of being afraid; we're all as
ready as you are to go to prison if there's any good
to be got by it, but it is childish to run into danger
for nothing. For my part, I have an amendment
to the proposal to suggest."
"Well, what is it?"
"I think we might contrive, with care, to fight
the Jesuits without coming into collision with the
censorship."
"I don't see how you are going to manage it."
"I think that it is possible to clothe what one
has to say in so roundabout a form that----"
"That the censorship won't understand it?
And then you'll expect every poor artisan and
labourer to find out the meaning by the light of
the ignorance and stupidity that are in him! That
doesn't sound very practicable."
"Martini, what do you think?" asked the professor,
turning to a broad-shouldered man with
a great brown beard, who was sitting beside him.
"I think that I will reserve my opinion till I
have more facts to go upon. It's a question of
trying experiments and seeing what comes of them."
"And you, Sacconi?"
"I should like to hear what Signora Bolla has
to say. Her suggestions are always valuable."
Everyone turned to the only woman in the
room, who had been sitting on the sofa, resting
her chin on one hand and listening in silence to
the discussion. She had deep, serious black eyes,
but as she raised them now there was an unmistakable
gleam of amusement in them.
"I am afraid," she said; "that I disagree with
everybody."
"You always do, and the worst of it is that you
are always right," Riccardo put in.
"I think it is quite true that we must fight the
Jesuits somehow; and if we can't do it with one
weapon we must with another. But mere defiance
is a feeble weapon and evasion a cumbersome
one. As for petitioning, that is a child's toy."
"I hope, signora," Grassini interposed, with
a solemn face; "that you are not suggesting such
methods as--assassination?"
Martini tugged at his big moustache and Galli
sniggered outright. Even the grave young
woman could not repress a smile.
"Believe me," she said, "that if I were ferocious
enough to think of such things I should not be
childish enough to talk about them. But the
deadliest weapon I know is ridicule. If you can
once succeed in rendering the Jesuits ludicrous,
in making people laugh at them and their claims,
you have conquered them without bloodshed."
"I believe you are right, as far as that goes,"
Fabrizi said; "but I don't see how you are going
to carry the thing through."
"Why should we not be able to carry it
through?" asked Martini. "A satirical thing has
a better chance of getting over the censorship
difficulty than a serious one; and, if it must be
cloaked, the average reader is more likely to find
out the double meaning of an apparently silly joke
than of a scientific or economic treatise."
"Then is your suggestion, signora, that we
should issue satirical pamphlets, or attempt to run
a comic paper? That last, I am sure, the censorship
would never allow."
"I don't mean exactly either. I believe a series
of small satirical leaflets, in verse or prose, to be
sold cheap or distributed free about the streets,
would be very useful. If we could find a clever
artist who would enter into the spirit of the thing,
we might have them illustrated."
"It's a capital idea, if only one could carry it
out; but if the thing is to be done at all it must
be well done. We should want a first-class satirist;
and where are we to get him?"
"You see," added Lega, "most of us are
serious writers; and, with all respect to the company,
I am afraid that a general attempt to be
humorous would present the spectacle of an elephant
trying to dance the tarantella."
"I never suggested that we should all rush into
work for which we are unfitted. My idea was
that we should try to find a really gifted satirist--
there must be one to be got somewhere in Italy,
surely--and offer to provide the necessary funds.
Of course we should have to know something of
the man and make sure that he would work on
lines with which we could agree."
"But where are you going to find him? I can
count up the satirists of any real talent on the
fingers of one hand; and none of them are available.
Giusti wouldn't accept; he is fully occupied
as it is. There are one or two good men in
Lombardy, but they write only in the Milanese
dialect----"
"And moreover," said Grassini, "the Tuscan
people can be influenced in better ways than this.
I am sure that it would be felt as, to say the least,
a want of political savoir faire if we were to treat
this solemn question of civil and religious liberty
as a subject for trifling. Florence is not a mere
wilderness of factories and money-getting like
London, nor a haunt of idle luxury like Paris. It
is a city with a great history------"
"So was Athens," she interrupted, smiling;
"but it was 'rather sluggish from its size and
needed a gadfly to rouse it'----"
Riccardo struck his hand upon the table.
"Why, we never thought of the Gadfly! The very man!"
"Who is that?"
"The Gadfly--Felice Rivarez. Don't you remember
him? One of Muratori's band that came
down from the Apennines three years ago?"
"Oh, you knew that set, didn't you? I remember
your travelling with them when they went on
to Paris."
"Yes; I went as far as Leghorn to see Rivarez
off for Marseilles. He wouldn't stop in Tuscany;
he said there was nothing left to do but laugh,
once the insurrection had failed, and so he had
better go to Paris. No doubt he agreed with
Signor Grassini that Tuscany is the wrong place
to laugh in. But I am nearly sure he would come
back if we asked him, now that there is a chance
of doing something in Italy."
"What name did you say?"
"Rivarez. He's a Brazilian, I think. At any
rate, I know he has lived out there. He is one of
the wittiest men I ever came across. Heaven
knows we had nothing to be merry over, that week
in Leghorn; it was enough to break one's heart to
look at poor Lambertini; but there was no keeping
one's countenance when Rivarez was in the
room; it was one perpetual fire of absurdities. He
had a nasty sabre-cut across the face, too; I
remember sewing it up. He's an odd creature;
but I believe he and his nonsense kept some of
those poor lads from breaking down altogether."
"Is that the man who writes political skits
in the French papers under the name of 'Le Taon'?"
"Yes; short paragraphs mostly, and comic
feuilletons. The smugglers up in the Apennines
called him 'the Gadfly' because of his tongue;
and he took the nickname to sign his work
with."
"I know something about this gentleman,"
said Grassini, breaking in upon the conversation
in his slow and stately manner; "and I cannot say
that what I have heard is much to his credit. He
undoubtedly possesses a certain showy, superficial
cleverness, though I think his abilities have been
exaggerated; and possibly he is not lacking in
physical courage; but his reputation in Paris and
Vienna is, I believe, very far from spotless. He
appears to be a gentleman of--a--a--many adventures
and unknown antecedents. It is said that he
was picked up out of charity by Duprez's expedition
somewhere in the wilds of tropical South
America, in a state of inconceivable savagery and
degradation. I believe he has never satisfactorily
explained how he came to be in such a condition.
As for the rising in the Apennines, I fear it is no
secret that persons of all characters took part in
that unfortunate affair. The men who were executed
in Bologna are known to have been nothing
but common malefactors; and the character of
many who escaped will hardly bear description.
Without doubt, SOME of the participators were
men of high character----"
"Some of them were the intimate friends of
several persons in this room!" Riccardo interrupted,
with an angry ring in his voice. "It's all
very well to be particular and exclusive, Grassini;
but these 'common malefactors' died for their
belief, which is more than you or I have done as
yet."
"And another time when people tell you the
stale gossip of Paris," added Galli, "you can tell
them from me that they are mistaken about the
Duprez expedition. I know Duprez's adjutant,
Martel, personally, and have heard the whole story
from him. It's true that they found Rivarez
stranded out there. He had been taken prisoner
in the war, fighting for the Argentine Republic,
and had escaped. He was wandering about the
country in various disguises, trying to get back
to Buenos Ayres. But the story of their taking
him on out of charity is a pure fabrication. Their
interpreter had fallen ill and been obliged to turn
back; and not one of the Frenchmen could speak
the native languages; so they offered him the post,
and he spent the whole three years with them,
exploring the tributaries of the Amazon. Martel
told me he believed they never would have got
through the expedition at all if it had not been
for Rivarez."
"Whatever he may be," said Fabrizi; "there
must be something remarkable about a man who
could lay his 'come hither' on two old campaigners
like Martel and Duprez as he seems to have
done. What do you think, signora?"
"I know nothing about the matter; I was in
England when the fugitives passed through Tuscany.
But I should think that if the companions
who were with a man on a three years' expedition
in savage countries, and the comrades who were
with him through an insurrection, think well of
him, that is recommendation enough to counterbalance
a good deal of boulevard gossip."
"There is no question about the opinion his
comrades had of him," said Riccardo. "From
Muratori and Zambeccari down to the roughest
mountaineers they were all devoted to him.
Moreover, he is a personal friend of Orsini. It's
quite true, on the other hand, that there are endless
cock-and-bull stories of a not very pleasant
kind going about concerning him in Paris; but if
a man doesn't want to make enemies he shouldn't
become a political satirist."
"I'm not quite sure," interposed Lega; "but
it seems to me that I saw him once when
the refugees were here. Was he not hunchbacked,
or crooked, or something of that kind?"
The professor had opened a drawer in his writing-table
and was turning over a heap of papers.
"I think I have his police description somewhere
here," he said. "You remember when they escaped
and hid in the mountain passes their personal
appearance was posted up everywhere, and
that Cardinal--what's the scoundrel's name?--
Spinola, offered a reward for their heads."
"There was a splendid story about Rivarez and
that police paper, by the way. He put on a
soldier's old uniform and tramped across country
as a carabineer wounded in the discharge of his
duty and trying to find his company. He actually
got Spinola's search-party to give him a lift, and
rode the whole day in one of their waggons,
telling them harrowing stories of how he had been
taken captive by the rebels and dragged off into
their haunts in the mountains, and of the fearful
tortures that he had suffered at their hands. They
showed him the description paper, and he told
them all the rubbish he could think of about 'the
fiend they call the Gadfly.' Then at night, when
they were asleep, he poured a bucketful of water
into their powder and decamped, with his pockets
full of provisions and ammunition------"
"Ah, here's the paper," Fabrizi broke in: "'Felice
Rivarez, called: The Gadfly. Age, about 30;
birthplace and parentage, unknown, probably
South American; profession, journalist. Short;
black hair; black beard; dark skin; eyes, blue;
forehead, broad and square; nose, mouth, chin------'
Yes, here it is: 'Special marks: right foot lame;
left arm twisted; two ringers missing on left hand;
recent sabre-cut across face; stammers.' Then
there's a note put: 'Very expert shot; care should
be taken in arresting.'"
"It's an extraordinary thing that he can have
managed to deceive the search-party with such a
formidable list of identification marks."
"It was nothing but sheer audacity that carried
him through, of course. If it had once occurred
to them to suspect him he would have been lost.
But the air of confiding innocence that he can put
on when he chooses would bring a man through
anything. Well, gentlemen, what do you think of
the proposal? Rivarez seems to be pretty well
known to several of the company. Shall we suggest
to him that we should be glad of his help
here or not?"
"I think," said Fabrizi, "that he might be
sounded upon the subject, just to find out whether
he would be inclined to think of the plan."
"Oh, he'll be inclined, you may be sure, once
it's a case of fighting the Jesuits; he is the most
savage anti-clerical I ever met; in fact, he's rather
rabid on the point."
"Then will you write, Riccardo?"
"Certainly. Let me see, where is he now? In
Switzerland, I think. He's the most restless
being; always flitting about. But as for the pamphlet
question----"
They plunged into a long and animated discussion.
When at last the company began to disperse Martini
went up to the quiet young woman.
"I will see you home, Gemma."
"Thanks; I want to have a business talk with
you."
"Anything wrong with the addresses?" he
asked softly.
"Nothing serious; but I think it is time to make
a few alterations. Two letters have been stopped
in the post this week. They were both quite unimportant,
and it may have been accidental; but
we cannot afford to have any risks. If once the
police have begun to suspect any of our addresses,
they must be changed immediately."
"I will come in about that to-morrow. I am
not going to talk business with you to-night;
you look tired."
"I am not tired."
"Then you are depressed again."
"Oh, no; not particularly."
