The Patriot Part 21

Luisa had completely forgotten the old sabre of the Empire. Oh, G.o.d! now she recalled it! What if her uncle had forgotten it also? What if he had not given it up in 1848, after the war, when orders had been issued to deliver up all weapons, under pain of death? Had her uncle grasped the fact, in his patriarchal simplicity, that this heir-loom that had lain for six-and-thirty years at the bottom of a drawer, had now become a dangerous and forbidden object? And Franco, Franco who knew nothing!

Luisa was resting her hands on the back of a chair; it creaked sharply under her convulsive pressure. She withdrew her hands, frightened, as if the chair had spoken.

In fancy she saw the adjunct pa.s.s from room to room with his gendarmes, and arrive at that door, open the drawer, and discover the sabre. She made every effort to recall the exact position in which she had seen it, to find some way out of this danger; and she was silent, mechanically following with her eyes the candle which a gendarme, in obedience to his chief's gestures, held close, now to an open drawer or cupboard, now to a picture which the detective had lifted, that he might look behind it.

No, she could think of no remedy. If her uncle had failed to remove the sabre, she could only trust they would not visit that room.

Franco, leaning against the stove, was following every motion of the searchers with a clouded brow. When they plunged their hands into the drawers, his rage was visible in the silent working of his jaws. Nothing was heard save, now and then, a sharp order from the detective, and a low-toned reply from the gendarmes. Nothing moved around them, save their great shadows wavering on the walls. The silence of the Receiver, of Franco and Luisa, was like the silence of those who have risked great sums in a secret gaming-house, and stand about the players who, from time to time, speak some brief word. The sinister face and voice of the detective never changed, although he had not discovered anything. To Luisa he seemed a man sure of achieving his purpose. And not to be able to do anything, not even warn Franco! But perhaps it was better he did not know; perhaps his ignorance would save him.

Having searched the hall and the loggia the detective entered the salon.

He took the candle from the gendarme's hands and swiftly examined the little, ill.u.s.trious men.

Seeing the portraits of Gouvion Saint-Cyr, Marmont, and other generals of Napoleon, he said: "The Engineer-in-Chief Ribera would have done far better to hang the portrait of His Excellency Field-Marshal Radetzky on his walls. Is it here?"

"No," said Franco.

"A nice government official!" said the other contemptuously, and with indescribable arrogance.

"Are government officials bound," Franco burst forth, "to hang the portraits----"

"I am not here to argue with you," the detective said, interrupting him.

Franco was about to answer. "Be quiet, you with your tongue a yard long!" said the Receiver, brutally.

The detective pa.s.sed from the drawing-room into the corridor leading to the stairs. Would he go up or not, Luisa wondered. He went up, and she followed him, not trembling, but imagining with a dizzy rapidity, the many different things that might happen. All the possibilities of the moment, both disastrous and favourable, were whirling, as it were, in her head. If she lingered upon the first, horror carried her with a bound to the second; if she dwelt upon these, fancy returned with perverse eagerness to the first.

Before they had set foot in the corridor of the second floor they heard Maria crying. Franco begged the adjunct to allow his wife to go down to the child, but she protested that she wished to remain. The idea of not being with him when the weapon was discovered, terrified her. Meanwhile the detective had entered a small room where there were some books, and finding a volume printed at Capolago, and bearing the t.i.tle, Literary Writings of a Living Italian, he said: "Who is this living Italian?"

"Padre Cesari," Franco replied boldly. The other, deceived by his prompt answer and the priestly name, a.s.sumed the air of a man of culture, saying: "Ah! I am acquainted with his works." Replacing the book, he inquired where the Engineer-in-Chief slept.

Luisa was too completely dominated by the one great dread to sense anything else, but Franco, when he saw the police-agent and his band enter the uncle's room, which was so clean, so neat, so full of his dear, calm spirit, when he reflected what a blow to the poor old man the news of all this would be, was completely overcome, and could have wept with rage. "It seems to me," he said, "that this one room at least should be respected."

"Keep your observations to yourself," the adjunct retorted, and began by ordering the blankets and mattresses stripped from the bed. Then he demanded the key to the chest of drawers. Franco had it, and went down to his room for it, accompanied by a gendarme. The uncle had entrusted it to him before leaving, telling him that in case of need he would find a small amount of _c.u.m quibus_ in the top drawer. They opened it. It contained a roll of _svanziche_, a few letters and papers, some pocket-books, old note-books, compa.s.ses, pencils, and a small wooden bowl in which were several coins.

The detective examined everything carefully, discovering among the coins in the little bowl a five-franc piece of the time of Carlo Alberto, and a forty-franc piece of the Provisory Government of Lombardy. "The Engineer-in-Chief has preserved these coins with extraordinary care,"

said the detective; "henceforth we will preserve them." He closed the drawer, and, without opening the others, returned the key to Franco.

Then he went out into the corridor and paused, undecided. The Receiver thought he intended to go down, and as the corridor was nearly dark, and the stairs were not visible, he, who was acquainted with the house, started towards the right in the direction of the stairs, saying: "This way." The room where the sabre lay was on the left.

"Wait," said the adjunct. "Let us look in here, also." And turning, he pushed open the fatal door. Luisa, who had been the last in the procession, pressed forward, now that the supreme moment had arrived.

Her heart, which had beat furiously while the adjunct hesitated, now became quiet as by a miracle, and she was cool, daring, and ready.

"Who sleeps here?" the detective asked her.

"No one. My uncle's parents used to occupy this room, but they have been dead these forty years, and no one has slept here since."

The room contained two beds, a sofa, and a chest of drawers. This the detective signed to the gendarmes to open. They tried it, but it was locked. "I think I have the key," said Luisa with the utmost indifference. She went down, accompanied by a gendarme, and returned immediately with a little basket of keys which she offered to the detective.

"I do not know the key," she said. "It is never used. It must be one of these."

He tried them all, but in vain. Then the Receiver tried, and then Franco. The right one was not there.

"Send to S. Mamette for the lock-smith," said Luisa, calmly. The Receiver looked at the detective as if to say: "It seems to me unnecessary," but the detective turned his back upon him and exclaimed to Luisa: "This key must be somewhere!"

The chest of drawers, a piece of _rococo_ furniture, had metal handles to each drawer. One of the gendarmes, the strongest, tried to force the drawers open. He did not succeed either with the top one or with the second. Just at that moment Luisa remembered that she had seen the sabre in the third drawer, together with a roll of drawings. The gendarme seized the handles of the third. "This one is not locked," said he. In fact it opened easily. The detective took the light and bent over to examine it.

Franco had seated himself on the sofa, his eyes fixed on the rafters of the ceiling. When his wife saw the drawer pulled open she sank down beside him, took his hand, and pressed it spasmodically.

She heard some papers rustle, and the Receiver murmured, in a benign voice: "Drawings." Then the detective exclaimed: "Ah!" and the satellites all leaned forward to see. She had the strength to rise and inquire; "What is it?" The detective was holding a long pasteboard case, curved and slim, and bearing a label with an inscription. He had already read the inscription to himself; he now read it aloud with an accent of ineffable sarcasm and satisfaction. "The sabre of Lieutenant Pietro Ribera, killed at Malojaroslavetz in 1812." Franco started to his feet, astounded and incredulous, and at the same moment the adjunct opened the case. From where he stood Franco could not see it, and he glanced at his wife, who could. Her lips were white and he thought it was with fright, although this did not seem possible.

But her lips were white with joy, for the case contained only an empty scabbard. Luisa suddenly drew back into the shadow and sank upon the sofa, struggling with a violent inward trembling, vexed with herself and ashamed of her weakness, which however, she soon conquered. Meanwhile the detective, who had removed the scabbard and examined it on all sides, asked Franco where the sabre was. Franco was about to answer that he did not know, which was perfectly true, but reflecting that this might seem like self-justification, he said--

"In Russia."

The sabre was not in Russia, but fast in the mud, at the bottom of the lake, where Uncle Piero had secretly flung it rather than give it up.

"But why did they write sabre?" inquired the Receiver, wishing to show he also was zealous.

"The writer is dead," said Franco.

"Hand over that key at once!" the detective scolded angrily. And this time Luisa found it, and the two other drawers were opened. One was empty, the other contained some blankets and a little lavender.

The search ended here. The adjunct went down to the drawing-room, and ordered Franco to make ready to follow him in fifteen minutes. "You had better arrest all of us then!" Luisa exclaimed.

The man shrugged his shoulders, and repeated to Franco: "In fifteen minutes. You may go to your room, now, if you wish to." Franco dragged Luisa away entreating her to be silent, to resign herself for love of Maria. He seemed like another man, exhibiting neither grief nor anger, and there was in his voice a ring of serious sweetness, of manly calm.

He put some linen into a bag, together with a volume of Dante and an _Almanach du Jardinier_, which were on the table, bent over Maria for a moment but did not kiss her, for she had gone to sleep, and he feared to wake her. He kissed Luisa, however, but as they were being observed by the gendarmes stationed at either door of the room, he quickly freed himself from her embrace, saying, in French, that they must not provide a spectacle for those gentlemen. Then he took up his bag, and went to place himself at the detective's orders.

The police-adjunct had a boat waiting not fifty paces from Casa Ribera, towards Albogasio, at the landing called _del Canevaa_. Upon issuing from the portico spanned by his house, Franco heard a shutter being thrown open above his head, and saw the light from his bedroom flash against the white facade of the church. He turned towards the window, saying--

"Send for the doctor to-morrow morning. Good-bye."

Luisa did not answer.

When the gendarmes reached the Canevaa with their prisoner, the adjunct ordered them to stop.

"Signor Maironi," said he, "you have had your lesson. This time you may return to your home, and I advise you to learn to respect the Authorities."

Amazement, joy, and indignation welled up in Franco's heart. He controlled himself, however, biting his lips, and started homewards at a leisurely pace. He had not yet turned the corner of the church when Luisa recognised his step, and called, "Franco!"

He sprang forward, and she saw him. Then her shadow vanished from the window. He rushed into the house, flung himself up the stairs, crying, "Free! Free!" while his wife came flying down, exclaiming wildly, "How!

How! How!" They sought each other with eager arms, clung together, pressing close, without further speech.

But afterwards, in the loggia, they talked incessantly for two hours, of all they had heard, seen, and experienced, always coming back to the sabre, the papers, the coins, dwelling upon many trifling details, on the detective's Venetian accent, on the dark-haired gendarme, who seemed a good fellow, and the fair-haired gendarme, who must be a regular cur.

From time to time they would cease speaking, enjoying in silence their sense of security, the sweetness of home, but presently they would begin again. Before going to bed they stepped out on the terrace. The night was dark and warm, the lake motionless. The sultriness, the gloom, the vague and monstrous shapes of the mountains, seemed to their imagination heavy with the mortal weight of Austria. The very air itself seemed full of it. Neither Franco nor Luisa was sleepy, but they must go to bed on account of the servant who was watching with Maria. They entered the room on tiptoe. The child was sleeping, her breathing almost normal.

They also tried to sleep, but could not. They could not refrain from talking, especially Franco. He would ask softly: "Are you asleep?" and upon her answering, "No," the coins, the papers, the sabre, or the bully with his Venetian accent would be discussed once more. By this time there was nothing new to be said on these subjects, and, as Maria began to be restless, and to show signs of waking, towards dawn, Luisa answered, "Yes," the next time Franco inquired softly, "Are you asleep?"

and after that he kept quiet, as if he really believed it.

The day after the search at Casa Ribera, Oria, Albogasio, and S. Mamette were full of whisperings. "Have you heard?--Oh, dear Lord!--Have you heard?--Oh, holy Madonna!" But the loudest whisperings were of course those that communicated the news to Barborin Pasotti. Her husband shouted into her face: "Maironi! Police! Gendarmes! Arrest!" The poor woman concluded an army had swept her friends away, and began to puff--"oh! oh!"--like an engine. Then she groaned and wept, and questioned Pasotti about the child. Pasotti, who was determined not to allow her to go down to Oria and exhibit her affection for the Maironis under these circ.u.mstances, replied with a gesture like the sweep of a broom. Gone! Gone! She also!--But the servant? The servant must surely be there still. The crafty man made another sweeping gesture in the air, and then Barborin grasped the fact that His Imperial and Royal Austrian Majesty had had the servant carried off as well.