The Grandee Part 11

"Where is she?" he cried, without ceasing running.

"In the courtyard by the garden door," shouted the boy in reply.

He arrived breathless at the courtyard, but before opening the door he stopped for an instant to check his presumption. How could he have thought of such a thing? What devil could have put it into his head?...

Notwithstanding he could not dismiss the idea. It was she, it was she--he could not doubt the fact.

He raised the bolt of the large wooden door, painted green, and went in.

The courtyard was large. Several outhouses for working purposes were built against the wall. Tied up to a roughly made wooden kennel was an enormous mastiff, who pulled at his chain as if he would break it in his attempts to get near his master.

There at the other end, near the iron gate communicating with the garden, he actually saw her looking through the bars at the flowers. She had her back to him. She was dressed in a light pink and white striped dress, with a little straw hat trimmed with roses. In her left hand she had a sunshade which matched her dress, and in her right she held some silk gloves.

How these details became engraven in his memory! They were indelibly fixed in his mind!

"You here?" he said, feigning a calmness he was very far from feeling.

"Who would have thought that you were the senora whose arrival the servant just announced to me?"

"Did you really not think it was me?" she asked, looking at him fixedly.

"No, no, Senora."

But he coloured even as he said it, and the lady smiled kindly.

"Very well; now show me the Malmaison roses you told me about."

The count opened the gate, and they both went through to the garden, which was very large and somewhat neglected.

Since the countess had almost entirely given up coming to the Grange, the servants hardly touched it. Luis was more interested in making experiments with new modes of agriculture, breeding cattle, and draining ground, than in gardening. But there were many kinds of flowers, put there when his mother used to tend them every afternoon, and there were great bushes which time, combined with the fertile soil, had transformed into thick trees.

Whilst they pa.s.sed along the walks, which were over-grown with moss, the countess explained in high, clear tones how she came to be there.

She had wished to drive to Bellavista, but pa.s.sing by the little road that led to the Grange, she recollected the beautiful roses, and gave orders to the coachman to go that way. She had never seen the place before, she said; and she became quite enthusiastic over the thick foliage and the intense green of the place. In her country the vegetation was much paler.

"But more fragrant--like the women," said the count with gallantry.

The lady turned to give him a smile of thanks, and went on praising the beauty of the rhododendrons, the azaleas, and the gigantic camellias.

As soon as they had seen the roses, and the count had made her choose some to have sent to her the next day, they directed their steps towards the entrance-gate.

"And are you sure that I only came to see the roses?" said Amalia, suddenly stopping and fixing her eyes upon him.

The count's heart gave a bound, and he commenced to stammer in a lamentable fashion.

"I do not know--this visit, certainly. I should be so pleased if the rose-trees----"

But the lady, taking pity on him, did not let him proceed.

"Well, besides the rose-trees, I came to see the whole place, particularly the wood. And so you can show it to me," she added resolutely, taking him by the arm.

Whereupon the count was conscious of a new and violent emotion, at first painful, and then pleasurable, as he felt the lady's hand upon his arm.

And moved to his inmost being at the honour conferred on him, he showed everything of interest on the estate: the beautiful large meadows, the stables, the new machinery for working the mill, and finally the wood.

She watched him out of the corner of her eye. Sometimes a smile of amus.e.m.e.nt played about her lips. She entered into everything with interest, praised the improvements he had made, and suggested fresh ones. And, in going about, she sometimes let the count's arm drop, and then took it again, which inspired the count with many diverse sensations, all intense and exciting. When she noticed he was getting more at his ease, she made some little sudden mischievous remark which plunged him into fresh confusion and made him blush to the roots of his hair.

"Now, count, when you caught sight of me just now, you said to yourself: 'Amalia has fallen in love with me and she cannot resist the desire to come and see me.'"

"Amalia, _por Dios_! What can make you say that? How could I ever have dared----?"

But the lady, without seeming to notice his distress or to lay any importance on her own words, pa.s.sed immediately to another subject. She seemed to like shocking him, and keeping him agitated and trembling. And in the furtive glances she cast at him there was the touch of superiority and irony of one, who was sure of the game.

The count turned grave under that enigmatical smile. He saw he was playing an awkward part, and, feeling that she was laughing at him, he made heroic efforts to recover his equanimity.

The lady admired, and was more enthusiastic about the wood than anything. It was a ma.s.s of ancient oaks, where the sun never penetrated.

The ground was carpeted with thick turf and quite free from caltrops. No other private property was so richly wooded; it was, perhaps, due to the primitive forest where the monastery had been founded which was the origin of Lancia.

The lady found it pleasant to rest a little under the green bower where the light hardly penetrated. A peace, a pleasant calmness sweeter than the silence and calm of a Gothic cathedral, pervaded the place. She leant her back against a tree and gave a long look at the thick foliage around her.

The count stood near. Both were silent for some time. At last the man felt, without seeing it, that the lady's gaze was fixed upon him. He resisted the magnetic attraction of the look for some minutes. When at last he raised his eyes, he saw that her expression was so merry and daring that he dropped them again. Amalia gave vent to a mischievous laugh, which surprised, confused, and somewhat irritated him; and then seeing that her merriment did not cease, he said with a forced smile:

"At what are you laughing, my friend?"

"Nothing, nothing," she returned, putting her handkerchief to her mouth.

"Take me to see the house."

And then she took his arm again. The house was a large, very old building of yellowish stone, worm-eaten by age, with two little square towers at the sides. Everything about it was shabby or worn out. Some bars were wanting in the stair-rails as well as in the balconies; the ceilings of the rooms were discoloured, the part.i.tion walls cracked, the plaster in holes; the looking-gla.s.ses, so much thought of in bygone days, were so covered with dust that they reflected nothing; the walls were damp and dirty, and the pictures hung thereon were so discoloured that one could not see what the artists had intended to depict; the scanty furniture of the rooms was worn out by the use of past generations. The things were all quite done for. Amalia liked the look of past grandeur. How many different beings had lived in that house! How they must have laughed and wept in these large rooms. Each one had its particular name: one was called the cardinal's room, because in times past a cardinal of the family occupied it when on a visit to the Grange; another the portrait-room, because a few pictures hung on the walls; and another the new room, although it looked as old and even older than the rest of the apartments. Everything bore traces of the private life of a family of bygone ages.

"This is the countess's chamber," said Luis, as he took his friend into a moderate-sized room, which, in spite of the dust and ravages of time, looked better furnished than the others. It was an elegant style of apartment, bearing evidence that past generations had not been dest.i.tute of a love of decoration. There was a Pompadour escritoire, some chairs of the Regency, several pictures in pastel; and painted on the ceiling were cherubs floating in an atmosphere which had once been blue.

"Is this your mother's room?" asked Amalia.

"No," replied the count, smiling; "my mother sleeps on the other side.

It has been called the countess's from time immemorial. Perhaps some old ancestor of mine chose it for herself. I often take my siesta here when the fatigue of going about the estate makes me want to have a sleep."

In one of the corners of the apartment there was a splendid bedstead of carved oak, grown black with age, one of those beds of the fifteenth century that antiquaries go perfectly mad on. The hangings were also very ancient, but there was a modern damask counterpane spread over the mattress.

"So it is here that you retire to think of me to your heart's content, is it not?" said Amalia.

The count looked as stunned as if she had given him a blow on the head.

"I! Amalia! How?"

Then with a sudden a.s.sumption of courage he exclaimed:

"Yes, yes, Amalia, you are quite right! I think of you here as, for some time past, I think of you everywhere I go. I do not know what has come to me: I live in a constant state of excitement, which, as you told me, is a sign of true love. I am in fact madly in love with you. I know that it is an atrocity, a crime, but I cannot help myself. Forgive me."

And, like one of his n.o.ble ancestors of the Middle Ages, the gentleman fell on his knees at the feet of the lady.

She was terribly angry at first. What? Was he not ashamed of such a confession? Did he not understand that it was an insult to address such words to her in his house? How could he suppose that she could quietly listen to such words? It seemed impossible that the Conde of Onis, such a perfect gentleman, could be so wanting in the respect due to a lady and to himself.

The count remained prostrate on his knees under such a storm of invectives. He knew his words had been of grave import, but the anger that they provoked in the lady was not what he had most feared.