The Serapion Brethren Volume I Part 38

"'"I must see her; I must see her," the Doge cried. The portrait of her, limned by the astute Bodoeri, came back to his mind's eye.

"'His wish was gratified that same day; for scarce had he returned from the Council to his own abode when Bodoeri (who had abundant reasons of his own for desiring to see his niece Dogaressa) brought the lovely Annunziata to him in private. When old Falieri saw this beautiful young creature he was astounded at her marvellous loveliness, and was scarcely able, in stammering, unintelligible words, to ask her to marry him. Annunziata, doubtless schooled beforehand by Bodoeri, fell on her knees before the aged prince, with deep blushes on her cheeks. She took his hand, pressed it to her lips, and said:

"'"Oh, my liege! would you so far honour me as to raise me to your side on this throne? I will revere you from the depths of my soul, and be your true maid and servant till my life's end."

"'Old Falieri was beside himself with rapture. When she took his hand he felt all his members thrill; and then he began so to shake and tremble with his head, and all his body, that he had to seat himself in his great chair as quickly as ever he could. It seemed as though Bodoeri's views concerning the greenness of the Doge's age were about to be controverted. And he could not repress a strange smile which twitched about his lips. The innocent Annunziata remarked nothing, and there was no one present besides. It may have been that old Falieri felt the undesirability of posing before the populace as the bridegroom of a girl of nineteen; that a sense arose within him that there was a certain risk in furnishing the Venetians--fond of fun and jesting--with a subject such as this for their sallies; and that it was best to keep the critical point of the date of his marriage in the shade. At all events, it was determined, with Bodoeri's consent, that the wedding should be celebrated in the profoundest secrecy, and that the Dogaressa should, some days afterwards, be presented to the Signoria and populace as having been long since married to Falieri, and recently come from Treviso, where she had been waiting whilst he was absent on his mission to the Papal Court.

"'Let us turn our glance to this well-dressed young gentleman, cla.s.sically handsome, who is walking up and down the Rialto, with a purse of _zecchini_ in his hand, talking with Jews, Turks, Greeks, and Armenians; who turns aside his gloomy brow, stops, and at last steps into a gondola and bids the gondoliers take him to the Palazzo di San Marco. Arrived there, he strolls up and down, with folded arms, and devious, uncertain step, with eyes fixed on the ground, un.o.bservant, not dreaming that many a whisper, many a clearing of the throat, from many a window, and many a richly-draped balcony, are love-signals directed to his address. It is not so very easy to recognize in this youth the Antonio who, a few days ago, was lying in rags, poor and miserable, on the marble pavement of the Dogana.

"'"Little son!--my golden little son Antonio!--good-day! good-day!" the old beggar-woman called out to him from the steps of St. Mark's, where she was sitting, as he was pacing past her without taking any notice of her. Turning quickly round and seeing her, he put his hand in his purse and brought it out full of _zecchini_, which he was about to throw to her.

"'"Let your money stay where it is," she cried, with her usual cackling laughter. "What do I want it for? Am I not rich enough? If you really want to do me a kindness, get me a new hood; this one won't hold out much longer against wind and weather. Yes! do that, my golden little son. But keep away from the Fontego!--keep away from the Fontego!"

"'He stared into her pale yellow face, where the wrinkles were all twitching and working in a strange, gruesome fashion; and, as she went on clapping her withered, "bony hands, and gabbling out, in a whining tone, accompanied with her odd, repulsive chuckling,

"'"Keep away from the Fontego!"

"'Antonio cried,

"'"Will nothing induce you to cease your idiotic nonsense, and behave like a reasonable being, you old witch?"

"'But the instant he uttered this, the old woman rolled from the top to the bottom of the flight of lofty marble steps where she was sitting, as if struck by a flash of lightning. Antonio darted up to her and caught her in his arms, breaking her heavy fall.

"'"Oh, little son! what a terrible word you used!" cried the old woman, in a faint, tearful voice. "Oh! kill me rather than say that terrible word again! Ah! you do not know how dreadfully you hurt me!--me, who bear you so faithfully in my heart. Ah! you do not know----"

"'She broke off suddenly, covered her head with the corner of her old cloak, and sighed and whimpered as in the deepest sorrow. Antonio was strangely moved: he took her in his arms, and carried her up the steps to the portico of the church, where he set her down on a marble bench.

"'"You were very kind to me," he said, releasing her head from the folds of the cloak. "You were very kind to me. It is you whom I have to thank for my good fortune. For if you had not helped me in my dire necessity I should have been at the bottom of the sea at this moment. I should never have rescued the Doge; I should never have got the _zecchini_. But even if you never had done anything for me, I feel that I must always have a strange, strong liking for you all my days, though that extraordinary cackle of yours and your senseless style of behaviour often make me feel plenty of inward gruesomeness with regard to you. The fact is, old woman, that in the days when I was gaining a mere livelihood by portering and rowing I always felt that I must work harder than I otherwise should have had to do, just that I might have a spare _quattrino_ now and then to give to you."

"'"Oh, my Tonino! my golden little son!" she cried, lifting her hands to heaven, so that her staff fell clattering down the marble steps, and rolled far away; "oh, my Tonino! I know that, whatever you think, you must always be devoted to me with your whole heart, because----silence--silence--silence!"

"'She bent stiffly down, in search of her staff; Antonio fetched it; she leant her sharp chin upon it, and, fixing her eyes on the ground, said, in a subdued, hollow voice:

"'"Tell me, my child, have you no remembrance of the earlier time?--how it pa.s.sed?--how things were with you before you became a poor wretched fellow here, scarce able to keep body and soul together?"

"'Antonio heaved a profound sigh, sat down beside her, and said:

"'"Ah, mother! I know but too well that my parents were in the most prosperous circ.u.mstances; but as to who they were, or how I lost them, not the faintest remembrance remains to me, or could remain to me. I distinctly remember a tall, handsome man, who used to take me up in his arms, and pet me, and give me sweetmeats; and also I recollect a kind, pretty woman, who dressed me and undressed me, put me into a little soft bed every evening, and was good to me in every way. They both talked to me in a rich-sounding foreign language, and I myself used to stammer many words of this language after them. In the days when I was a boatman, my comrades--who hated me--used to say always that, from my hair, my eyes, and the build of my body, I must be of German blood. I think so too, and I have little doubt that the language of those people who cared for me (I am certain the man was my father) was German. My most vivid remembrance of those times is a picture of terror; of a night when I was roused from a deep sleep by screams of anguish. People were hurrying up and down in the house; doors kept opening and shutting. I grew terribly frightened, and began to cry. Then the woman who took care of me came rushing in, lifted me from my bed, stopped my mouth, wrapped me in clothes, and ran with me from thence. From that moment my memory is a blank, till I find myself again in a fine house, surrounded by beautiful country. The image of a man comes out, whom I called 'father,' and who was a stately gentleman, n.o.ble-looking and kind. He, and every one in the house, spoke Italian. Once, when there had been several weeks when I had not seen him, a day came when repulsive-looking strangers arrived, who made a great disturbance, turning everything upside down. When they saw me they asked who I was, and what I was doing there. I said I was Antonio, the son of the house.

On my repeating this they laughed in my face, tore the clothes off my back, and turned me out of doors, telling me that I should be beaten if I showed my face there any more. I ran away, crying loudly. Scarce a hundred paces from the house an old man met me whom I recognized as one of my foster-father's servants. 'Come, Antonio; come, poor boy!' he cried, taking me by the hand. 'That house is closed to both of us for ever. We must do the best we can to get a bit of bread.' This old man brought me here. Scarce had we come when I saw that he pulled out _zecchini_ from his ragged doublet, and went up and down all day on the Rialto, doing business, sometimes as a broker, sometimes as a merchant.

I had to be always close at his heels; and whenever he did a bit of business, he always asked for a trifle for the _figliulo_, as he called me. Everybody whom I looked boldly in the eyes would pull out a _quattrino_ or two, which he used to pocket with much satisfaction, stroking my cheeks, and saying he was saving them up to buy me a new doublet. I was happy enough with this old man, whom people called 'Father Bluenose,' I don't know why.

"'"You remember that terrible time when one day the earth began to tremble; when the palaces and the towers wavered backwards and forwards as if shaken to their foundations, and the bells tolled as if swayed by invisible giant arms. It must be about seven years ago; or not quite so long. Fortunately the old man and I escaped in safety from the house where we were living; it fell almost about our ears. But this terrible event was merely the announcement of the coming of the monster which soon breathed its poison over town and country. It was known that the plague, which had been brought to Sicily from the Levant, had reached Tuscany. Venice was still free from it. One day Father Bluenose was bargaining on the Rialto with an Armenian. They settled their business, and shook hands warmly. Bluenose had sold some goods at a favourable rate to the Armenian, and, as usual, asked for a trifle for the '_figliulo_.' The Armenian--a big strong man, with a thick, curly beard (I see him before me at this moment)--looked kindly at me, kissed me, and took out a _zecchino_ or two, which he put into my hand, and which I quickly pocketed. We took a gondola to go over to San Marco. As we were crossing, the old man asked me to give him the money, and I don't know why it was that I came to maintain that I ought to keep it myself, because the Armenian had wished me to do so. The old man was angry; but, as he was arguing with me, I noticed that his face took on a horrible, earthy-yellow colour, and that he mixed up all sorts of wild incoherent things in what he was saying. When we landed at the Piazza he staggered about like a drunken man, till, just in front of the Ducal Palazzo, he fell down dead. I threw myself on his body with loud outcries of grief. The people came running up; but the terrible cry 'The plague! the plague!' broke out, and they all went scattering away in every direction. At the same instant I was seized by a dull stupefaction, and my senses left me. When I awoke from this condition I found myself in a s.p.a.cious chamber, on a little mattress, covered with a woollen rug. Around me some twenty or thirty pale forms were lying, on similar mattresses. Afterwards I learned that some compa.s.sionate monks, who happened to be pa.s.sing at the time of my seizure, finding some traces of life in me, had taken me to a gondola and over to the Monastery of San Giorgio Maggiore, where the Benedictines had established an hospital. But how can I ever describe to you, old woman, that moment when I came back to consciousness? The fury of the disease had completely taken away from me all memory of the past. As if life had suddenly come to some statue, I possessed only the consciousness of the present moment, knitted on to nothing besides. You may fancy what disconsolateness this condition--only to be called a consciousness floating in vacant s.p.a.ce, with nothing to hold on to--brought to me.

The monks could only tell me that I had been found beside Father Bluenose, whose son I was supposed to be. My thoughts collected themselves by slow degrees, so that I remembered something of my former life. But what I have told you is all I know of it; nothing but one or two detached pictures, without connection or coherency. Alas! this disconsolate sense of being alone in the world keeps me from all happiness, well as things are going with me now."

"'"Tonino, my dear! content yourself with what the bright present-time affords you," the old woman said.

"'"Be quiet," he answered. "There is something more, which makes my life wretched, continually tortures me, and will, sooner or later, be my destruction. Ever since I awoke to consciousness in the hospital, an unutterable longing, a yearning, which consumes my very heart, for a something which I can neither name nor understand, has continually filled my whole being. When I used to throw myself down at night on my hard bed, poor and wretched, worn and broken by the bitter labour of the day, there came a dream, fanning my fevered brow, and giving back to me, in gentle whisperings, all the bliss of a brief moment of utter happiness, which the Eternal Power permitted me to realize in my fancy--for the consciousness that I did once possess it rests ever in the depths of my heart. I sleep on soft cushions now, and bitter labour no longer consumes my strength. But when I awake from my dream, or when, in the waking state, the consciousness of that moment comes into my soul, I feel that my poor, wretched existence is, to me, now as then, an unbearable burden which I long to shake away from me. All reflection, all researching, are in vain. I can not fathom what, so gorgeously happy, occurred to me in my early life, of which the dim reflected echo--incomprehensible to me, alas!--fills me with such delight. But this delight becomes burning torture when I am compelled to recognize the truth that every hope of finding that Eden again--nay, of even searching for it--is over. Can there be traces of that which has disappeared _without_ a trace?"

"'Antonio ceased speaking, and sighed profoundly from the depths of his heart.

"'During his narration the old woman had borne herself as one who is wholly carried away by the pain of another, and, like a mirror, reflects every movement to which that other is constrained by his suffering.

"'"Tonino! dear Tonino!" she now said, in a tearful voice; "why do you despair because something delightful, of which you have lost the memory, happened to you in early life? Silly boy! Silly boy! Listen!

he, he, he."

"'And she commenced her usual disagreeable kickering and laughing, as she danced about on the marble pavement. People came--she crouched down again--they gave her alms.

"'"Antonio, Antonio!" she cried, "take me to the sea, take me to the sea!"

"'Antonio, scarce knowing what he was doing, lifted her in his arms and carried her slowly across the Piazza di San Marco. As they went, she murmured, softly and solemnly--

"'"Antonio, you see those dark stains of blood on the ground here? Yes, yes; quant.i.ties of blood, everywhere! But he, he, he! out of the blood grow roses--beautiful red roses! garlands for you, for your darling!

Oh, thou Lord of Life! what a beautiful angel comes to him, with the loveliest smiles, opening her lily arms to take him to her heart! Oh, Antonio, fortunate boy, play the man, play the man! and myrtle shall you gather in the sweet evening tide. Myrtle for your bride--for the virgin widow--he, he, he! Myrtle gathered in the red light of evening, to blossom in the deep midnight. List to the whisper of the night wind, to the longing sighs of the summer sea! Row! Row! Work your oar, doughty boatman! Row, row! st.u.r.dily on!"

"'Antonio was filled with a sense of deep awe at those words of the old woman, which she murmured in a strange voice, different from her usual one, chuckling all the while. They had come to the pillar which bears the Adriatic Lion. The old woman, murmuring still, wanted to be carried further; but Antonio, pained at her behaviour, and jeered at by the pa.s.sers-by on the score of this strange 'dama' of his, stopped, and said, rather harshly--

"'"There, old woman! I shall set you down on those steps. Oh _do_ stop that chatter of yours! I feel as though it would turn my head! It is true you saw my _zecchini_ in the flame-pictures of the clouds; but just for that reason, what are you chattering of an angel, a bride, a virgin widow, roses, myrtles? Would you befool me, horrible creature, so that some mad deed shall hurl me down into the abyss? A new cloak you shall have, bread, _zecchini_, everything you want. But let _me_ alone!"

"'He was making rapidly off, but she seized him by the mantle, and cried out in piercing tones--

"'"Tonino, my Tonino, only look at me carefully once again, or I must crawl to the brink of the Piazza there, and throw myself into the sea."

"'Antonio, to avoid drawing more enquiring regards upon him than those which were bent upon him already, paused in his flight.

"'"Tonino," she said, "sit down beside me here. It is breaking my heart. I _must_ tell it to you. Oh, sit down here beside me!"

"'He sat down therefore on the steps with his back turned to her, and took out his pocket-book, of which the blank leaves shewed how little attention he paid to his business transactions on the Rialto.

"'"Tonino," she said, "when you look at this wrinkled face of mine, does not the faintest gleam dawn within you of a sense that you may have known me in your very early days?"

"'"I have told you already," he answered, in a whisper like her own, "that I feel drawn to you in a manner inexplicable to myself; but your ill-favoured, wrinkled face has nothing to do with that. Rather, when I look at your strange black flashing eyes, your pointed nose, your blue lips, your long chin, your streaming ice-grey hair--when I listen to your horrible cackling and laughing, and the strange, incoherent things you say, I could almost turn from you with horror, and fancy that it is some unholy art which you have at your command that draws me to you."

"'"Oh, Lord of Heaven!" she cried; "what evil spirit of h.e.l.l suggests such thoughts to you? Ah, Tonino! the woman who cared for you and tended you in your infancy, who saved your life on that night of terror, was I!"

"'In the sudden terror of his amazement he turned quickly round. But when he looked in her horrible face, he angrily cried--

"'"Do you think you can befool me thus, you wicked old lunatic? The few pictures from my childhood which remain with me are vivid and fresh.

That fine, handsome woman who took care of me--oh! I see her before my eyes distinctly. She had a full face, with a rich colour, eyes with a gentle, mild look in them, beautiful dark-brown hair, pretty hands; she could not have been more than thirty; and you--an old hag of ninety----"

"'"Oh, all ye saints!" she interrupted, with sobs; "what am I to do to get my Tonino to believe that I am his faithful Margareta?"

"'"'Margareta'!" murmured Antonio; "'Margareta'! the name falls upon my ear like music heard long ago, and long forgotten. But can it be possible? It _cannot_ be possible."

"'She went on more tranquilly, with eyes fixed on the ground, on which she traced marks and figures with the point of her staff. "The tall, handsome man who petted you, carried you in his arms, and gave you sweetmeats really was your father, Antonio; and it _was_ the beautiful rich-toned German that we spoke. He was a well-known merchant of Augsburg. His beautiful wife died when you were born. He left the place because he could not bear to stay where she was buried, and came to Venice, bringing one, your nurse, your faithful foster-mother, with him. On that terrible night, which you remember, your father sank beneath a dreadful fate, which threatened you also. I managed to save you. A Venetian n.o.ble adopted you; and as I had nothing to live on, I was obliged to stay on in Venice. My father, a surgeon, whom people accused of practising forbidden arts as well, taught me hidden secrets of Nature. As we roamed through the fields and meadows he told me the properties of many a health-giving plant, of many an insignificant-looking moss, the hours when they ought to be gathered, the different ways of mingling their juices. But to this knowledge was added a special gift, with which Heaven, in its inscrutable providence, has endowed me. I have the power of often seeing future events, as it were, in a far-away dim mirror; and, almost without any will of my own, at such times the unknown Power, which I cannot resist, constrains me to speak what I thus see, in words often unintelligible to myself. Left alone in Venice, abandoned by all the world, I bethought me of gaining my bread by this power of mine. I cured the most dangerous diseases and maladies in a very short time; and as the mere sight of me produced a favourable effect upon the sick, a gentle stroking with my hands often brought on a favourable crisis in a few moments. So my fame was soon noised abroad through the place, and abundance of money flowed in upon me. Then awoke the envy of the doctors, the _ciarlatani_, who sold their pills and potions on the Rialto, the Piazza di San Marco, and the Zecca, and poisoned the sick instead of curing them. They said I was in league with the Evil One, and the superst.i.tious folk believed them.

Soon I was apprehended, and brought before the ecclesiastical tribunals. Oh, my Antonio! how terrible were the tortures with which they tried to make me admit that this accusation was true. But I was steadfast. My hair turned white, my body crumpled up to a mummy, my feet and my hands were paralysed. Then came the rack--that most ingenious of all inventions of the Spirit of h.e.l.l. And this dragged from me an avowal at the thought of which I still shudder with horror.

They were going to burn me; but when the earthquake shook the foundations of the palaces and the great prison, the doors of the underground cell where I was opened of themselves, and I tottered out of that deep grave through among the stones and rubbish. Ah, Tonino!

you called me an old hag of ninety; but I am scarcely more than fifty at this day. This skeleton of a body, these crippled feet, this snow-white hair--ah! not years, but unspeakable tortures transformed the strong robust woman to a scarecrow in a few moons. And this repulsive cackling laughter was forced out of me by that final terrible torture, at the remembrance of which my hair still stands on end, and my body burns as in a coat of red-hot mail. Ever since then it comes upon me involuntarily, like a continual, irresistible spasm. Don't be afraid of me any more, my Tonino. Ah, your heart told you long since that you lay upon my breast as a little boy."