Romance of Roman Villas Part 20

Celio bridled with increased importance. "Prince Borghese's specimens of antique sculpture are in the palazzo where, if the Signor will announce himself, he will doubtless be accorded the privilege of seeing them. This palazzita is the private boudoir of the Princess."

"So much the better," the other laughed. "But when she commanded that statue she doubtless contemplated the possibility of its being admired by other eyes than her own. No insult is intended, my young popinjay. It is all in the family. Restrain your indignation and inform the Princess that the King of Naples is waiting here in obedience to her appointment."

The secretary was not pleased with this message, and he liked still less the manner in which it was received, for the Princess hurried to meet her brother-in-law and allowed him to salute her gallantly upon both cheeks, and to address her as "Paulette."

Celio, excused from attendance, had no opportunity, though he stood sentinel in the loggia, to overhear their conversation. Finally the Princess summoned him. "Order my carriage," she commanded, "and the caleche, and ask the attendance of my first lady-in-waiting. Tell Maurice to arrange a lunch-hamper quickly. His Majesty insists he must set out this afternoon for Naples. We will accompany him as far as Mondragone and picnic there."

So they dashed away on the road to Frascati, the Princess lolling alone in her open carriage, for Murat had declined the seat beside her, though he kept his horse recklessly near her wheels, Celio following with the maid of honour and the lunch basket in the caleche, and one of Murat's orderlies (the other had been dispatched to order his suite to meet him at Mondragone) bringing up the rear.

At the wildest and steepest part of the road the party halted, and the Princess alighting announced her intention of taking a short cut across the hills while the carriages followed the more circuitous driveway.

Murat threw his reins to his orderly, and Celio, true to his self-const.i.tuted duties as dragon, left the maid of honour dozing in the caleche and followed his mistress. She had brought a tall staff, knotted with a tri-colour ribbon, which she used as an alpenstock, springing lightly over the steep boulders, while the athletic Murat kept pace with the easy swinging stride of a mountaineer. Suddenly Celio saw him catch the Princess by the arm and both stood as though instantaneously frozen.

Then, as the secretary came panting up, Murat handed the Princess to him, and taking a few steps forward and apparently addressing the landscape, for Celio saw no one said in a voice of calm but inflexible authority: "Lay down your gun, and come from behind that rock."

To Celio's astonishment a villainous appearing brigand advanced and knelt at Murat's feet.

"Why did you not shoot me when I was at the lower turn of the road, my friend?" Murat demanded; "you had the better opportunity then, for I had not discovered you, and I was for several minutes within your range."

"True, your Majesty," replied the bandit, "but I said to myself, 'that is too magnificent a figure of a man to kill, even though he is a king.'"

Murat laughed. "I will return the compliment," he said, writing rapidly on a card. "You have too much discrimination and obey orders too well to be a brigand. I wonder now if you have heard of a secret organisation called the Carbonari? I thought so" (replying by an almost imperceptible gesture to a signal made by the bandit); "you see you have made a mistake, for I also am a member of the order. All in time, my good fellow, and you shall use your rifle against the Austrians. Take this to the recruiting office of the Neapolitan army at Castel di Rocca. Never fear, it is no trap. This young man will read it for you." And the secretary read: "Give this brave fellow a place in the Corps of Calabrian Sharpshooters, and a.s.sure Captain Castiglione that he can be relied upon for expert guerilla service. Giacomo Re."

The man went away trembling with emotion but Murat called to him: "Come back, you have forgotten your gun," and stood carelessly regarding the view with his back turned while the would-be a.s.sa.s.sin regained possession of his weapon.

The Princess clapped her hands. "I understand now," she said, "why you bore a charmed life when you came dashing out of the smoke of the battle-field, sweeping within a few feet of the muzzles of the enemy's guns. It needed not the command of the Czar that you were not to be fired upon,--the gunners could no more have done so than this poor outlaw. I comprehend also how you have managed to augment the roll of your army, which on your accession included but fifty thousand names, to its present list of seventy-five thousand, and at the same time have so marvellously reduced the number of brigands in your kingdom."

"Partly in this way," he acknowledged, lightly, "but the Austrian officers would be surprised to know how many of my best disciplined soldiers have had the advantage of their drilling."

"Deserters?" the Princess asked.

"And whole companies in Northern Italy waiting for the first symptoms of a war with Italy to desert en ma.s.se."

When the party reached Mondragone the custodian, surprised at their coming (for the villa had been long unoccupied), unbarred the shutters and let the light into the dusty salons.

"It is roomy enough for a barracks," Murat remarked as he wandered through suite after suite of the great tenantless rooms.

"I forbid you so to use it," the Princess jested, "though you may occupy Mondragone yourself when you lay siege to Rome."

"It would not be a bad headquarters," he said as they came out upon the terrace. "Imagine a semaph.o.r.e in the place of those monstrous and absurd columns--what are they, by the way? One could waft signals from Rome to Calabria and from the Adriatic to the Tirrenian."

That was an exaggeration, of course, but Mondragone would have been a good station in such a signal service.

"Those absurd columns," the Princess replied, "might themselves serve as semaph.o.r.es. They are chimneys, colossal enough to serve a foundry, though they do duty to simple kitchens, those which prepared the excellent dinners with which Pope Paul V. entertained his guests. When the smoke rises from that one I can see the cloudy column from my windows at Rome."

"And I could see it far on the road from Naples," he mused, and then the two wandered away from their watching dragon and leaning on the bal.u.s.trade with their faces toward the magnificent view earnestly discussed projects which had nothing to do with that unrivalled panorama.

Celio was in torment. What was Murat saying in that low, guarded voice, while his hand clenched and crushed the roses that swarmed over the bal.u.s.trade and scattered their petals to the wind? Why did the Princess's colour come and go as she listened, her cheek much too near his pa.s.sionate lips?

Since there was no way of overhearing this equivocal conversation, it must at all hazards be interrupted, and Celio prematurely announced the _al fresco_ supper. Here, while he fluttered behind them in a pretence of service, he heard both too much for his peace of mind and too little for his complete enlightenment.

At first the talk was of family matters, chiefly of Napoleon at Elba, with whom Pauline begged her brother-in-law to be reconciled, for this was in the summer of 1814, when Murat, foreseeing that Napoleon's star had set, had signed a treaty with the allies.

"One would think I had done enough for your brother," he said, moodily.

"I left my kingdom to lead the cavalry of the _grande armee_ in the Russian campaign. I gained his victories and I commanded the _escadron sacree_ which protected his person in the retreat, and what is my reward?"

"What is your present position?" the Princess asked.

"I am your brother-in-law," Murat replied, "but, as I wrote Napoleon, I conferred as much honour as I received when I married your sister, and, as for my kingship, the Emperor wished only a devoted servant whom he could command, and he has discovered his mistake."

The eyes of Pauline Bonaparte shot fire while the other spoke. "You are very stupid to talk in this way to me, Joachim," she said, commanding herself in time. "You needed Napoleon--you need him now, for your scheme will never succeed unless he supports you. It is your good fortune that he needs you enough to forgive your defection. The family stands or falls together, _mon ami_."

"Evidently your mother does not think so," Murat replied, with pique. "I have just brought Madame Mere a present of eight fine carriage-horses.

She declined them with thanks, and would not see me when I called on her in Rome. As for my loving brother-in-law, your n.o.ble husband----"

"Why should you mind Camillo's sulks since I do not? He and Madame Mere have such amusing ideas. It was not so much Caroline's correspondence with your 'dear Metternich' which offended them and my brother, too.

They have never forgotten that little affair of the silver lemon squeezer. Ah, _mon ami_! you had had too much champagne when you brewed that bowl of punch at the officers' dinner."

"I never said that it was the Empress who taught me the recipe and gave me the lemon squeezer," he retorted, flushing.

"Oh! no; nor told you that oranges and not lemons were used with Jamaica rum in the islands; nor why pretty creoles were like lemons."

"Do you mean to provoke me?" Murat exclaimed, rising quickly.

"No, _mon ami_, though I shared in that suspicion, too, for they called me a creole on my return from San Domingo."

Murat's jaw fell. "Do you mean that your husband thought I meant _you_?"

he asked.

"Prince Borghese is too polite a man to voice such a suspicion, and I am too clever a woman to show that I have guessed it, but that is reason enough why I cannot accept my sister's invitation to take possession of the entrancing Neapolitan villa which you so kindly offer me."

"You are like your mother. You refuse my peace-offerings; you will not visit us?"

"Peace-offerings, yes; but make me some offerings of war, that fine army, for instance; and, by the way, if you will give me a yacht instead of the villa I may consent to be your guest. Meantime we understand each other. I will give immediate orders to my people that no fire is on any account to be lighted in the Pope's kitchens, as the chimneys are unsafe. Should I perceive a column of smoke rising from them I shall know that you are here, and I will come to you. If, on the other hand, I hear that you are in this vicinity on the business of which we spoke, I shall make Mondragone my residence; and should you perceive my smoke signal----"

"Then," he interrupted, speaking very low, but so distinctly that Celio's heart froze as he listened--"then, Paulette, be the danger what it may, heaven nor h.e.l.l shall keep me from you."

They parted in the most commonplace manner, the Princess returning to Rome after the conclusion of the repast, but, though she appeared to sleep all the way, Celio marked when she alighted that her face, illuminated by the strong glare that blazed from the open door of the villa, was haggard as from long vigils.

Deeply distressed, the poor dragon spent a sleepless night, but towards morning an inspiration came to him. He saw his way to saving his lady without arousing the suspicions of her husband. She had forbidden the use of the Pope's chimneys to the guardian of the villa, plainly that they should serve solely as signals between herself and Murat. But the reason which she had given for their disuse, that they were unsafe, furnished the secretary with his pretext, and he wrote his master urging that they should be taken down.

Before the Prince had time to reply the event which he had dreaded took place. The Princess, in direct opposition to her husband's parting request, announced her determination to visit her sister at Naples. It was not in her secretary's province to remonstrate, and he was soon to gain a point of view from which the inexplicable behaviour of his mistress presented a very different aspect.

Arrived at Naples the Princess and her suite were met by Queen Caroline and installed in a charming villa near the city, and on the succeeding day the entire household were taken by the King and Queen for a short cruise in the royal yacht.

Outside the island of Ischia the party landed, and climbing to a ruined tower which commanded an extensive prospect, they plainly discerned in a hidden cove a little craft flying a flag unfamiliar at that time to Celio Benvoglio, a striped red and white pennon studded with golden bees. It was the ensign chosen by Napoleon while lord of Elba, and displayed by the six swift sailing pinnaces which made up the Emperor's little navy.

Pauline now informed her suite that she was about to pay a visit to her brother, which for important reasons must not for the present be suspected. Her maids of honour must therefore return to her Neapolitan villa, and, to keep up the fiction of her presence, announce on the morrow that the Princess had succ.u.mbed to an attack of fever. The Court physician would pay daily visits as would the King and Queen, but no others would be admitted to the secret.

With feminine fondness for intrigue the three maids of honour entered into the plan, while Celio, relieved from his tormenting suspicions accompanied his mistress to Elba.