Read Ebook: The Patriot (Piccolo Mondo Antico) by Fogazzaro Antonio Agnetti Mary Prichard Translator

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Ebook has 1694 lines and 130654 words, and 34 pages

"If you will take me," the curate of Puria answered, going down towards the boat. "Well, I never! The Signora Barborin is here also."

The expression of his big face became supremely amiable, his great voice became supremely sweet.

"She is devilish frightened, poor creature!" Pasotti grinned, while the curate was making a series of little bows, and smiling sweetly upon the lady, who was more terrified than ever at the prospect of this added weight. She began to gesticulate silently, as if the others had been more deaf than she herself. She pointed to the lake, to the sail, to the bulk of the enormous curate, raising her eyes to heaven, hiding her face in her hands, or pressing them to her heart.

"I don't weigh so very much," said the curate laughing. "Hold your tongue, will you?" he added, turning to Pin, who had murmured disrespectfully: "A good, big fish!"

"I have a pack," Pin replied. "But they are rather greasy."

For the present, however, playing was out of the question. The boat was being laboriously rowed forward towards the mouth of the river of San Mamette, where they would be able to hoist the sail. The surf, flung back from the shore, clashed with the in-coming waves, and the little boat was tossing about among the seething, foaming crests. The lady was weeping and Pasotti was swearing at Pin, who had not stood out into the lake far enough. At last the fat curate seized a couple of oars, and planting his big person firmly in the middle of the boat, bent to his work with such good will that a few strokes sufficed to send them forward and out of difficulty. Then the sail was hoisted, and the boat glided quietly and smoothly onward, rocking slowly and gently, while the water gurgled softly under its keel. Then the smiling priest sat down beside Signora Barborin, who had closed her eyes and was muttering. But Pasotti drummed impatiently on the table with the cards, and play they must.

"I will throw him into the lake!" said she. She cast a glance towards the prow, and, as an excuse, remarked that they were nearing Cressogno, and that it was time to stop playing.

Her husband fumed awhile, but finally resigned himself to putting on his gloves.

"Trout to-day, curate!" he observed, while his meek wife buttoned them for him. "White truffles, grouse, and wine from Ghemme."

"Then you know!" the curate exclaimed. "I know it also. The cook told me yesterday at Lugano."

"And besides, some ladies have been invited; the Carabellis, mother and daughter. Those Carabellis from Loveno, you know."

Pasotti raised the awning and looked out. At a little distance a boat flying a white and blue flag rose and fell in unison with the weary motion of the waves. In the stern, under the flag, sat Don Franco Maironi, the grandson of the old Marchesa Orsola, who was giving the dinner.

Pasotti saw him rise, grasp the oars, and pull away, rowing slowly towards the upper lake, towards the wild gulf of the Doi, the white and blue flag spread wide, and floating above the boat's trail.

"Where is that eccentric young man going?" said he. And he muttered between his teeth; in the strained and husky voice of a Milanese rough--"A surly fellow!"

"They say he has great talents," the priest observed.

"An empty head," the other declared. "Much arrogance, little learning, no manners!"

"Which?" the curate questioned.

"Why, Signorina Carabelli."

"Mark my words, Signor Controllore! If the grouse and white truffles are meant for that Carabelli girl, they are thrown away!"

"Do you know something?" Pasotti inquired, his eyes flaming with curiosity.

The priest did not answer because, at that point, the bow grated on the gravel, and touched the landing-stage. He got out first; Pasotti, with rapid and imperious gestures, gave his wife some orders of unknown purport. Then he himself left the boat. Last to get out was the poor woman, wrapped in her Indian shawl, bending under the tall, black bonnet with the little, yellow roses, staggering, and stretching out her big hands in the canary-coloured gloves. The two curls, hanging on either side of her meek ugliness, gave her a special air of resignation, under the umbrella of her husband, proprietor, inspector and jealous custodian of so much elegance.

The three went up to the portico, by means of which the little Villa Maironi spans the road leading from the landing-stage to the parish-church of Cressogno. Between two happy sighs, the curate and Pasotti sniffed an indistinct, warm odour, which floated out from the open vestibule of the villa.

Pasotti, who had a keen nose, shook his head, knitting his brows in manifest contempt for that other nose.

Both stopped half way across the vestibule, sniffing the air noisily like a couple of hounds.

She hesitated, not having heard distinctly. Pasotti shrugged his shoulders. "She don't understand anything," said he. "The weather is going to change," and he went up stairs, followed by his wife. The stout curate wished to take another look at Don Franco's boat. "The Carabellis, indeed!" he mused, but he was immediately recalled by Signora Barborin, who begged him to sit beside her at the table; she was so timid, poor creature!

A hideous, lean, little dog trotted, barking, towards Signora Barborin, who was endeavouring to smile, while Pasotti was putting on his most obsequious expression, and the curate, entering last, his big face all sweetness, was really, in his heart, consigning the cursed little beast to hell.

"Friend, come here, Friend!" the old Marchesa said placidly. "Dear Signora, dear Controllore, and the curate!"

Her gruff nasal voice was pitched in the same calm tone to the guests and to the dog. She had risen to receive Signora Barborin, but did not move a step from the sofa, and stood there, a squat figure, with dull, torpid eyes beneath her marble forehead, and her black wig, which rounded out over her temples in the shape of two big snails. Her face must once have been handsome, and still retained in its pallor, tinged with yellow like old marble, a certain cold majesty, which--like her glance and her voice--never varied with the varying emotions of her soul. The big curate, standing at a distance, made her two or three jerky bows, but Pasotti kissed her hand, while Signora Barborin, who felt her blood turn to ice under the old lady's lifeless glance, did not know how to move, nor what to say. Another lady had risen from the sofa when the Marchesa rose, and was staring with an insolent air at Signora Pasotti, at that poor little bundle, old within, and new without! "Signora Pasotti and her husband," said the Marchesa. "Donna Eugenia Carabelli."

Donna Eugenia hardly bowed her head. Her daughter, Donna Carolina, was standing at the window, talking with one of the Marchesa's favourites, the niece of the agent.

The Marchesa did not consider it necessary to disturb her in order to present the new arrivals, and when she had invited them to be seated, she resumed her quiet conversation with Donna Eugenia concerning mutual friends in Milan, while Friend, sniffing and sneezing, circled slowly round Signora Barborin's shawl, which smelt of camphor, or rubbed himself against the curate's calves, studying Pasotti the while, with those pitiful, watery eyes of his, but never once touching him, as if he understood that the master of that Indian shawl, in spite of his amiable expression, would have liked to ring his--Friend's--neck!

On both occasions a shadow of vexation passed over Donna Carabelli's face. Her daughter also turned her eyes swiftly towards the door when it was thrown open, but presently she would begin chatting and laughing again, more gaily than ever.

"And Don Franco, Marchesa? How is Don Franco?" said the cunning Pasotti, in a mellifluous voice, as he offered his open snuff-box to his hostess.

"Don Franco?" said the Marchese. "He is out in his boat. We saw him a few minutes ago, rowing like any boatman."

Donna Eugenia spread her fan open.

"Well done!" said she, fanning furiously. "A most delightful pastime." Then she closed the fan with a bang, and began biting at it with her lips.

"Probably he needed the air," the Marchesa observed, in her unruffled, nasal drawl.

"Probably he needed a wetting," the prefect of the Caravina murmured, his eyes sparkling with fun. "It is raining!"

"Don Franco is coming now, Signora Marchesa," said the agent's niece, after a glance at the lake.

She herself was a native of Padua, and although she had lived in Brescia for half a century, still her Lombard accent was not entirely free from certain chronic suggestions of her Paduan origin. While Pasotti was protesting, with ceremonial horror, that he had only intended to imitate the voice of his beloved friend and neighbour, the door opened a third time. Donna Eugenia, well aware who was coming, did not condescend to look round, but the Marchesa allowed her dull eyes to rest on Don Franco with the greatest unconcern.

"How do you feel, Franco?" his grandmother inquired, and added quickly, without waiting for an answer: "Donna Carolina is anxious to hear that piece by Kalkbrenner."

"Oh! not at all!" said the girl, turning to the young man with an air of indifference. "I did indeed say so, but then I am not fond of Kalkbrenner, I had much rather chat with the young ladies."

The Marchesa preserved her external, marble placidity, though her heart was filled with anger and rancour against her grandson. Two years before he had dared to ask her consent to his marriage with a young girl of Valsolda, of good family, but neither rich nor of noble birth. His grandmother's decided refusal had rendered the union impossible, and indeed the girl's mother had felt obliged to forbid Don Franco the house; but the Marchesa was convinced that those people still had their eyes on her millions. She had therefore determined to find a wife for Franco, at once, in order to avert all danger. She had sought for a girl who should be rich, but not too rich; of noble, but not too noble birth; intelligent, but not too intelligent. Having discovered one of the right sort, she suggested her to Franco who flew into a rage, and declared he had no desire to marry. The answer had a very suspicious ring, and she redoubled her vigilance, watching every movement of her grandson and of that "Madam Trap," that being the pleasing title she had bestowed upon Signorina Luisa Rigey.

The Rigey family, consisting of the two ladies only, lived at Castello, in Valsolda, so it was not difficult to watch their movements. Nevertheless the Marchesa could not discover anything. But one evening Pasotti told her, with much hypocritical hesitation and many horrified comments, that the prefect of the Caravina, while chatting with Pasotti himself, with Signor Giacomo Puttini and with Paolin and Paolon, in the chemist's shop at San Mamette, had made the following remark: "Don Franco is going to keep quiet until the old lady is really dead!" The Marchesa having listened to this delicate piece of wit, answered: "A thousand thanks!" through her placid nose, and changed the subject. Later she learned that Signora Rigey--always more or less of an invalid--was suffering from hypertrophia of the heart, and it appeared to her that Franco's spirits were much affected by this illness. It was then that Signorina Carabelli was suggested to her. Carolina Carabelli was perhaps not entirely to her taste, but with that other danger threatening she could not hesitate. She spoke to Franco. This time he did not fly into a rage, but listened in an absent-minded way, and said he would think the matter over. This was perhaps the one act of hypocrisy of his whole life. Then the Marchesa boldly played a high card, and sent for the Carabellis.

She saw plainly enough now, that the game was lost. Don Franco had not been present when the ladies arrived, and later had appeared only once for a few minutes. During those few minutes his manner had been gracious, but not so his expression. As usual his face had spoken so plainly that--though the Marchesa immediately invented an indisposition for him--no one could have been deceived. But in spite of all this, the old lady was not convinced that she had played her cards unskilfully. Ever since she had reached the age of discretion it had been a rule with her never to recognise in herself a single defect or mistake, never wittingly to wound her own noble and beloved self. Now she preferred to believe that, after her sermon on matrimony, some honeyed but poisonous and ensnaring word had mysteriously reached her grandson. If her disappointment was somewhat mitigated, this was due to the conduct of Signorina Carabelli, whose lively resentment was but ill concealed. This was not pleasing to the Marchesa. The prefect of the Caravina was not mistaken--though he perhaps erred slightly in the form of his discourse, when he said, softly, of her: "She is Austria itself." Like the old Austria of those days, the old Marchesa did not wish for any bold spirits in her empire. Her own iron will would not tolerate others in its neighbourhood. Such an indocile Lombardy-Venice as was Franco was already too much, and the Carabelli girl, who appeared to have a mind and a will of her own, would probably prove a troublesome subject of the house of Maironi, a species of turbulent Hungary.

Dinner was announced. The footman's shaven face, and ill-fitting, grey livery reflected the Marchesa's aristocratic tastes, which, however, had been tempered by habits of economy.

"And where is this Signor Giacomo, Controllore?" she said, without rising.

"I fear he is not coming, Marchesa," Pasotti replied. "I saw him this morning, and said to him: 'Then we shall meet at dinner, Signor Giacomo?' But he squirmed as if he had swallowed a snake. He twisted and turned and at last puffed out: 'Yes, probably. I don't know! Perhaps. I can't say!--Uff! uff. Well really now, my good Controllore, indeed I don't know!--Uff, uff!'--and I could get nothing more out of him."

The Marchesa summoned the footman to her side, and gave him an order in a low tone. He bowed and withdrew. In his longing for the risotto, the curate of Puria was rocking his body to and fro, and stroking his knees. But the Marchesa on her sofa, seemed turned to stone, so he also became petrified. The others gazed mutely at one another.

Poor Signora Barborin, who had seen the footman, and was surprised at this immobility and these astonished faces, arched her eyebrows, questioning with her eyes, first her husband, then Puria, then the prefect, until a lightning glance from Pasotti petrified her as well. "Perhaps the dinner is burnt!" she reflected, assuming an expression of indifference. "If they would only send us home! What luck that would be!" But in a minute or two the servant returned, and bowed.

"Let us go," the Marchesa said, rising.

In the dining-room the company found a new personage; a little, crooked, old man, with kind eyes and a long nose, that drooped towards his chin.

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