A Reckless Character, and Other Stories Part 14

It seems to her that she enters a s.p.a.cious room with a low, vaulted ceiling.... She has never seen such a room in her life. All the walls are set with small blue tiles bearing golden patterns; slender carved pillars of alabaster support the marble vault; this vault and the pillars seem semi-transparent.... A pale, rose-coloured light penetrates the room from all directions, illuminating all the objects mysteriously and monotonously; cushions of gold brocade lie on a narrow rug in the very middle of the floor, which is as smooth as a mirror. In the corners, barely visible, two tall incense-burners, representing monstrous animals, are smoking; there are no windows anywhere; the door, screened by a velvet drapery, looms silently black in a niche of the wall. And suddenly this curtain softly slips aside, moves away ... and Muzio enters. He bows, opens his arms, smiles.... His harsh arms encircle Valeria's waist; his dry lips have set her to burning all over.... She falls p.r.o.ne on the cushions....

Moaning with fright, Valeria awoke after long efforts.--Still not comprehending where she is and what is the matter with her, she half raises herself up in bed and looks about her.... A shudder runs through her whole body.... Fabio is lying beside her. He is asleep; but his face, in the light of the round, clear moon, is as pale as that of a corpse ... it is more melancholy than the face of a corpse. Valeria awoke her husband--and no sooner had he cast a glance at her than he exclaimed: "What is the matter with thee?"

"I have seen ... I have seen a dreadful dream," she whispered, still trembling....

But at that moment, from the direction of the pavilion, strong sounds were wafted to them--and both Fabio and Valeria recognised the melody which Muzio had played to them, calling it the Song of Love Triumphant.--Fabio cast a glance of surprise at Valeria.... She closed her eyes, and turned away--and both, holding their breath, listened to the song to the end. When the last sound died away the moon went behind a cloud, it suddenly grew dark in the room.... The husband and wife dropped their heads on their pillows, without exchanging a word, and neither of them noticed when the other fell asleep.

V

On the following morning Muzio came to breakfast; he seemed pleased, and greeted Valeria merrily. She answered him with confusion,-- scrutinised him closely, and was startled by that pleased, merry face, those piercing and curious eyes. Muzio was about to begin his stories again ... but Fabio stopped him at the first word.

"Evidently, thou wert not able to sleep in a new place? My wife and I heard thee playing the song of last night."

"Yes? Did you hear it?"--said Muzio.--"I did play it, in fact; but I had been asleep before that, and I had even had a remarkable dream."

Valeria p.r.i.c.ked up her ears.--"What sort of a dream?" inquired Fabio.

"I seemed," replied Muzio, without taking his eyes from Valeria, "to see myself enter a s.p.a.cious apartment with a vaulted ceiling, decorated in Oriental style. Carved pillars supported the vault; the walls were covered with tiles, and although there were no windows nor candles, yet the whole room was filled with a rosy light, just as though it had all been built of transparent stone. In the corners Chinese incense-burners were smoking; on the floor lay cushions of brocade, along a narrow rug.

I entered through a door hung with a curtain, and from another door directly opposite a woman whom I had once loved made her appearance. And she seemed to me so beautiful that I became all aflame with my love of days gone by...."

Muzio broke off significantly. Valeria sat motionless, only paling slowly ... and her breathing grew more profound.

"Then," pursued Muzio, "I woke up and played that song."

"But who was the woman?" said Fabio.

"Who was she? The wife of an East Indian. I met her in the city of Delhi.... She is no longer among the living. She is dead."

"And her husband?" asked Fabio, without himself knowing why he did so.

"Her husband is dead also, they say. I soon lost sight of them."

"Strange!" remarked Fabio.--"My wife also had a remarkable dream last night--which she did not relate to me," added Fabio.

But at this point Valeria rose and left the room. Immediately after breakfast Muzio also went away, a.s.serting that he was obliged to go to Ferrara on business, and that he should not return before evening.

VI

Several weeks before Muzio's return Fabio had begun a portrait of his wife, depicting her with the attributes of Saint Cecilia.--He had made noteworthy progress in his art; the famous Luini, the pupil of Leonardo da Vinci, had come to him in Ferrara, and aiding him with his own advice, had also imparted to him the precepts of his great master. The portrait was almost finished; it only remained for him to complete the face by a few strokes of the brush, and then Fabio might feel justly proud of his work.

When Muzio departed to Ferrara, Fabio betook himself to his studio, where Valeria was generally awaiting him; but he did not find her there; he called to her--she did not respond. A secret uneasiness took possession of Fabio; he set out in quest of her. She was not in the house; Fabio ran into the garden--and there, in one of the most remote alleys, he descried Valeria. With head bowed upon her breast, and hands clasped on her knees, she was sitting on a bench, and behind her, standing out against the dark green of a cypress, a marble satyr, with face distorted in a malicious smile, was applying his pointed lips to his reed-pipes. Valeria was visibly delighted at her husband's appearance, and in reply to his anxious queries she said that she had a slight headache, but that it was of no consequence, and that she was ready for the sitting. Fabio conducted her to his studio, posed her, and took up his brush; but, to his great vexation, he could not possibly finish the face as he would have liked. And that not because it was somewhat pale and seemed fatigued ... no; but he did not find in it that day the pure, holy expression which he so greatly loved in it, and which had suggested to him the idea of representing Valeria in the form of Saint Cecilia. At last he flung aside his brush, told his wife that he was not in the mood, that ft would do her good to lie down for a while, as she was not feeling quite well, to judge by her looks,--and turned his easel so that the portrait faced the wall. Valeria agreed with him that she ought to rest, and repeating her complaint of headache, she retired to her chamber.

Fabio remained in the studio. He felt a strange agitation which was incomprehensible even to himself. Muzio's sojourn under his roof, a sojourn which he, Fabio, had himself invited, embarra.s.sed him. And it was not that he was jealous ... was it possible to be jealous of Valeria?--but in his friend he did not recognise his former comrade. All that foreign, strange, new element which Muzio had brought with him from those distant lands--and which, apparently, had entered into his very flesh and blood,---all those magical processes, songs, strange beverages, that dumb Malay, even the spicy odour which emanated from Muzio's garments, from his hair, his breath,--all this inspired in Fabio a feeling akin to distrust, nay, even to timidity. And why did that Malay, when serving at table, gaze upon him, Fabio, with such disagreeable intentness? Really, one might suppose that he understood Italian. Muzio had said concerning him, that that Malay, in paying the penalty with his tongue, had made a great sacrifice, and in compensation now possessed great power.--What power? And how could he have acquired it at the cost of his tongue? All this was very strange! Very incomprehensible!

Fabio went to his wife in her chamber; she was lying on the bed fully dressed, but was not asleep.--On hearing his footsteps she started, then rejoiced again to see him, as she had done in the garden. Fabio sat down by the bed, took Valeria's hand, and after a brief pause, he asked her, "What was that remarkable dream which had frightened her during the past night? And had it been in the nature of that dream which Muzio had related?"

Valeria blushed and said hastily--"Oh, no! no! I saw ... some sort of a monster, which tried to rend me."

"A monster? In the form of a man?" inquired Fabio.

"No, a wild beast ... a wild beast!"--And Valeria turned away and hid her flaming face in the pillows. Fabio held his wife's hand for a while longer; silently he raised it to his lips, and withdrew.

The husband and wife pa.s.sed a dreary day. It seemed as though something dark were hanging over their heads ... but what it was, they could not tell. They wanted to be together, as though some danger were menacing them;--but what to say to each other, they did not know. Fabio made an effort to work at the portrait, to read Ariosto, whose poem, which had recently made its appearance in Ferrara, was already famous throughout Italy; but he could do nothing.... Late in the evening, just in time for supper, Muzio returned.

VII

He appeared calm and contented--but related few stories; he chiefly interrogated Fabio concerning their mutual acquaintances of former days, the German campaign, the Emperor Charles; he spoke of his desire to go to Rome, to have a look at the new Pope. Again he offered Valeria wine of Shiraz--and in reply to her refusal he said, as though to himself, "It is not necessary now."

On returning with his wife to their bedroom Fabio speedily fell asleep ... and waking an hour later was able to convince himself that no one shared his couch: Valeria was not with him. He hastily rose, and at the selfsame moment he beheld his wife, in her night-dress, enter the room from the garden. The moon was shining brightly, although not long before a light shower had pa.s.sed over.--With widely-opened eyes, and an expression of secret terror on her impa.s.sive face, Valeria approached the bed, and fumbling for it with her hands, which were outstretched in front of her, she lay down hurriedly and in silence. Fabio asked her a question, but she made no reply; she seemed to be asleep. He touched her, and felt rain-drops on her clothing, on her hair, and grains of sand on the soles of her bare feet. Then he sprang up and rushed into the garden through the half-open door. The moonlight, brilliant to harshness, inundated all objects. Fabio looked about him and descried on the sand of the path traces of two pairs of feet; one pair was bare; and those tracks led to an arbour covered with jasmin, which stood apart, between the pavilion and the house. He stopped short in perplexity; and lo! suddenly the notes of that song which he had heard on the preceding night again rang forth! Fabio shuddered, and rushed into the pavilion.... Muzio was standing in the middle of the room, playing on his violin. Fabio darted to him.

"Thou hast been in the garden, thou hast been out, thy clothing is damp with rain."

"No.... I do not know ... I do not think ... that I have been out of doors ..." replied Muzio, in broken accents, as though astonished at Fabio's advent, and at his agitation.

Fabio grasped him by the arm.--"And why art thou playing that melody again? Hast thou had another dream?"

Muzio glanced at Fabio with the same surprise as before, and made no answer.

"Come, answer me!"

"The moon is steel, like a circular shield....

The river gleams like a snake....

The friend is awake, the enemy sleeps-- The hawk seizes the chicken in his claws....

Help!"

mumbled Muzio, in a singsong, as though in a state of unconsciousness.

Fabio retreated a couple of paces, fixed his eyes on Muzio, meditated for a s.p.a.ce ... and returned to his house, to the bed-chamber.

With her head inclined upon her shoulder, and her arms helplessly outstretched, Valeria was sleeping heavily. He did not speedily succeed in waking her ... but as soon as she saw him she flung herself on his neck, and embraced him convulsively; her whole body was quivering.

"What aileth thee, my dear one, what aileth thee?" said Fabio repeatedly, striving to soothe her.

But she continued to lie as in a swoon on his breast. "Akh, what dreadful visions I see!" she whispered, pressing her face against him.