Stories by American Authors Volume VII Part 15

Clearly, San Donato deserved a place of honor, and the salon alone was sufficiently good for him. Cecilia traversed the room slowly, seeking a shrine. The place was dark and silent; draperies of sombre damask shrouded the windows and doorways; chandeliers of Venetian gla.s.s swayed down from the vaulted ceiling like garlands of pale, frozen flowers; the floor was of polished, inlaid woods; the bronze and green tints of the wall were relieved by gilded cornices and columns bearing the shield of the count's ancestors. All was stately, impressive, if a trifle tarnished; and the effect of patrician elegance, everywhere apparent, was heightened by an occasional portrait--a Martellini in cavalier hat, with an angel bearing heavenward the family emblem, a hammer; a Martellini as a nun, with long, pale fingers clasped over a rosary.

Cecilia had not completed her survey when she was startled by the tinkle of a bell and the approach of visitors. One glance a.s.sured her that egress by means of the door was cut off. She darted behind a sofa in the corner beside the window. Here she crouched on the floor, holding San Donato in her arms, and laughed silently. She did not fear to confront these guests. Who then? She dreaded the flash of her own mother's eye. Yes, indeed, her pretty mamma had ceased to love her, banished her more and more from her presence, made sharp or dry responses to her prattle. Cecilia sighed inaudibly as she crouched there. Hark! The visitors approached the window; she could touch one by extending her arm from her hiding-place. Who were they? Oh, some of her mamma's gentlemen friends lounging in for an afternoon call. They spoke in a low, rapid tone, and their conversation only reached her because of her propinquity.

Birds of prey sometimes pa.s.s over the blooming valleys, the waving grain sown with wild flowers, the dove-cote beneath the cottage eaves, uttering their harsh, discordant cries while on the wing.

The English voice, hoa.r.s.e and deep: "It promises to be a slow season--awfully dull. No English coming out this year, I hear. Have you recently made the acquaintance of--la belle Americaine?"

The French voice, clear and crisp in utterance: "Yes, last week, at the Spanish Emba.s.sy. She is really chic, mon ami."

The English voice: "Her dinners are not at all bad. Lots of money, you know, and the count manages the whole establishment, from renting her the apartment of his uncle the Monsignor N---- to selecting the governess of the daughter and the _chef_. Ha! ha! ha!"

The French voice: "Ah, the Count Martellini! And monsieur the husband is at home in America making the money, I suppose. Mon Dieu! How those men over yonder trust their wives! A charming arrangement for the count."

The English voice: "Have you heard the latest rumor? They are actually going off together to the Nile after Christmas. A party is proposed, and that sort of thing, but every one knows that it will result in a dahabeeh to the cataract. Vive l'amour!"

The French voice, changing to a louder key: "Ah, madame is looking so charming to-day!"

Then a soft rustling of silken draperies over the polished floor announced the entrance of Mrs. Denvil, amiable greetings were exchanged, and the gentlemen became deferential and courteous in manner. Buy the respect of the insolent, by all means!

All the same, two birds of prey had wheeled in heavy and sluggish flight over the valley where the grain ripened and the poppies bloomed, uttering their discordant, mocking cry.

Cecilia crouched behind the sofa, bewildered and astonished. What did they mean? She grew hot and cold, her heart throbbed violently, she clinched her little hand. Why had these wicked creatures come here to sing their dreary duet? How their tone changed when the hostess appeared! She experienced the swift, intense indignation of youth at hypocrisy, ignorant that these voices would sound the same notes in every house to which they gained admission, after the manner of society. Instinct taught her they alluded to her own mother, before the allusion to the Nile voyage, of which she had already heard. Her mamma and the count were going, with some friends, up the Nile after Christmas. Why might not she go also? Her lips quivered resentfully.

Only that morning she had found the count in the aviary, petting the birds; she had wound her arms about his neck, and said, "Oh, how beautiful you are! When I have grown as tall and handsome as a woman can be I shall marry you."

The count had showered kisses on her fair hair, and pinched her cheek in his caressing way.

"We need not wait long, carina," he had replied.

Then mamma had appeared on the threshold, a bright spot on each cheek, and that new flash in her eye.

"You are too old for such nonsense, Cecilia. Go back to mademoiselle directly," she had said, in her dry tones.

Cecilia had departed, crest-fallen, mortified, with some vague remembrance of a father who had not thus dismissed her. To be sure, the count had sent her, later in the day, a gift of bonbons as atonement for mamma's snubbing--one of those white satin boots, mounted on a gilded rink skate, from Spillman's, in the Via Condotti.

_He_ was never cross, only a big playfellow, all amiability, little clever tricks, frolic, easily tyrannized over, and serenely content to spin b.a.l.l.s or sift cards all day long for a child's amus.e.m.e.nt. They had known him two or three years; he was their oldest friend abroad; he came and went at all hours. The count was a great gentleman, too, of princely lineage, easy, graceful, and elegant. How kind he was to interest himself in the Denvils, when they were strangers in a foreign land! The young girl had ample leisure for these reflections in her hiding-place. She whispered to the image, demanding what it thought of these croakers. The world was so beautiful, and people so kind. Then the two visitors were replaced by a bevy of ladies, and amid the rustlings of more silken draperies on the floor and the taps of heeled shoes, Cecilia heard her mother exclaim:

"What a horrid man! I am always relieved when he departs, and yet one meets him everywhere. He told me that frightful scandal about Lady B---- (and no doubt it is true, unfortunately) as if he enjoyed the recital."

A moment before Mrs. Denvil had said:

"Going so soon, Major Kettledrum? I am always delighted to see you."

Now the sofa creaked beneath the weight of two dowagers.

"How soon they lose their republican simplicity over here!" said one, sipping a cup of tea.

"Oh, and they say the husband in America would not be presentable--a common sort of man; a carpenter, I believe," retorted the other.

"Hush! A little more sugar, dear Mrs. Denvil. Thanks."

Finally the rustling of dresses and murmur of voices ceased; Cecilia crept out of her retreat unperceived. She no longer sought a niche for San Donato in the salon. It seemed to her that the statue did not belong there. Mademoiselle had a headache; Cecilia ate her supper alone. Heaven had given her the precious gift of a thoughtful consideration for others. She took her own cologne flask to mademoiselle's room and bathed the sufferer's temples.

"Mademoiselle, did St. Cecilia despise the world?"

"Surely. She was a holy woman."

"Are there any living like her now?"

"G.o.d knows," said mademoiselle, with a little bitterness.

Cecilia kissed her governess, and closed the door softly. Her mood was a strange one. She no longer feared her mother. Something had escaped from her nature, as if she had been touched by fire. It was that subtle, perishable essence of being--childhood.

"I will play that I am a ghost, and walk through all the rooms," she said to herself.

Mrs. Denvil found her standing in her dressing-room, calmly regarding her, as she made her toilet for a ball at the Quirinal Palace.

"Why are you not in bed? It is ten o'clock," she said.

Cecilia made no reply. She was gazing at the picture reflected in the cheval-gla.s.s of a very pretty woman in cream-tinted satin robe scarcely retained on her dimpled shoulders by a strap, diamonds and pearls twinkling about her throat and in her hair. The face of the mother, round, soft, with small weak chin and bright eyes, appeared more youthful than that of her child at the moment. The dressing-room was littered with a rainbow of colors, wraps, dresses, cashmere, laces, and jewelry. It smelled of mingled perfumes and singed hair.

Beauty, the poodle, lay coiled up in a tiny white ball on a velvet cushion. How fashionable had Mrs. Denvil become! She never drove out or received company without Beauty tucked under her left arm. At length the daughter inquired in an odd, abrupt way: "Is it very delightful to attend so many b.a.l.l.s?"

Mrs. Denvil laughed nervously and adjusted a bracelet.

"I attend very few b.a.l.l.s, my dear. You will like the dancing, I dare say, when you come out as a young lady." Her tone was propitiatory, even deprecating.

Cecilia did not smile.

"Why does not papa live here with us?" she pursued, steadily, after a pause.

Mrs. Denvil was a weak woman; she moved uneasily, then took refuge in maternal dignity.

"I am in Europe to educate Jack and yourself. Papa and I make the sacrifice of being separated for your good, and that you may acquire the foreign languages," she explained, in an injured tone.

Cecilia's eyebrows contracted.

"Are there no good schools or governesses, then, in America?"

"Go to bed, you impertinent child!" said Mrs. Denvil, sharply.

She was ruffled, embarra.s.sed, strangely disturbed, by the curious scrutiny of her daughter. She would have kissed her but for that last question. Really it was too much to be asked if there were no schools in America! She gave Cecilia a little tap with her fan, and floated away, a lovely vision of glistening satin and jewels, enveloped in an opera cloak, to be presented to the Princess Margherita.

The self-elected ghost was free to roam through the whole apartment, to shed a few tears, and finally return to the small chamber containing San Donato. She had intended to tell her mother about the image, but the confidence had remained frozen on her lips. She did not go to bed. She was lonely, miserable, and disquieted. What would her mother have said if she knew of the hiding behind the sofa in the salon? Cecilia now rested her arms on the table, and gazed at the little wooden figure. Never had any toy possessed equal interest to her.

Suddenly a great light filled the room, and San Donato vanished. She searched for the lost treasure in dismay, and beheld him enter the door. O, great and glorious San Donato! O, serene and holy San Donato! spurning the guise of the old shop, a thing of wood, and appearing to a lonely, neglected child as a swift, strong angel, with unfolded wings, in all thy wondrous celestial beauty! Cecilia fell on her knees, not daring to lift her eyes to the golden pinions, the head crowned with its aureole of martyrdom; but the glorious shape raised her, the door and walls of her chamber vanished, and with a giddy rush through the dark night, which deprived her of breath, she found herself standing on a globe, a world, upheld by her guardian, as the soul stands in Guido Reni's picture of the Capitol. Her raiment was also white and glistening; great pearls clasped her throat and wrists.

She was gravely chidden for touching these in wonder, and then she saw other shapes, resembling San Donato, pa.s.sing rank behind rank in the clouds.

"These through great affliction came, but they never swerved from duty. Are you afraid?" His voice was like the chimes up in St.

Cecilia's campanile ringing for vespers.

"Duty? What does it mean?" cried Cecilia, opening her eyes.