A Siren

by Thomas Adolphus Trollope

  CHAPTER VI

  Paolina at Home

  Ludovico had run up in a hurry to Bianca's lodging, as has been seen,merely because it happened to be in his way, and because he had beendesirous, as he told her, of paying her his compliments on the successof the preceding evening. He was hastening to pay another visit, inwhich his heart was far more interested, and had not intended to remainwith La Lalli above five minutes. The conversation between them hadextended to a greater length; and the Marchesino, eager as he was to getto the dear little room in the Via di Sta. Eufemia, would have made itstill longer, had not the Diva dismissed him.

  The talk between them had become far more interesting than any which hehad thought likely to pass between him and the famous singer. Thishorrible doubt--no, not a doubt--he had not, would not, could not doubt;but this germ of a doubt deposited in his mind by the words she hadspoken? Could she have had any second motive for speaking as she haddone? Surely not; surely all her manner and her words showedsufficiently clearly that she was actuated by kindly feelings towardshim and by no unkindly feeling towards Paolina. Yet unquestionablyPaolina's instinctive prejudice against her would not have beendiminished by a knowledge of what the Diva had said. Ludovico thought ofthe bitter and burning indignation with which his darling would haveheard the expression of the possibility of a doubt of the uncalculatingpurity and earnestness of her love.

  Nevertheless he felt that he should have liked to talk further withBianca on the subject; of course only to convince her of the absoluteinjustice of her suspicions. Still she was a woman, a fellow artist;placed in some respects in the same position in relation to the world towhich he belonged, as his Paolina--in some respects similar; but oh,thank God, how different! Yet women understood each other in a way a mancould never hope to understand them. What immediately struck Bianca,struck her naturally and instinctively in this matter of a marriagebetween him and the Venetian artist, was the idea that Paolina, almostas a matter of course, was at least biassed in her acceptance of hislove by a consideration of the material advantages she would gain by it.It was the natural thing then, the thing a priori to be expected, that agirl in Paolina's position should be so influenced. Ludovico would fainhave questioned and cross-questioned La Bianca, his experiencedmonitress, a little more on this point.

  Yes, to be expected a priori. But when one knew Paolina; when one knewher as he knew her, was it not impossible? Could it be that Paolina,being such as he knew her in his inmost heart to be, should evenadulterate her love with interested calculations? He knew it was not so;and yet--and yet other men had been as certain as he, and had beendeceived. In short the germ of doubt had been planted in his mind. AndBianca well knew what she had been about when she planted it there.

  Why had she done so? She spoke with perfect sincerity when she had toldhim that she would do much and suffer much for his happiness. And yetshe had knowingly placed this thorn in his heart. Why could she not lethim, as Quinto Lalli had expressed it, have his Venetian in peace? Shespoke truly, moreover, when she said that, married to the MarcheseLamberto, she fully purposed to make him a good and true wife; truly,when she declared to old Lalli, and also to her own heart, that shereally did like and admire him much. And yet there was something in thesight of the love of Ludovico and Paolina that was bitter, odious,intolerable to her.

  Ludovico hastened to the house in the Via di Santa Eufemia on quittingthat in the Via di Porta Sisi, not unhappy, not even uneasy; with norecognized doubt, but with a germ of doubt in his mind.

  Signora Orsola had gone out per fare le spese, to make the marketingsfor the day; and he found Paolina alone. Such a tete-a-tete would havebeen altogether contrary to all rules in the more strictly regulatedcircles of Italian society. And it would have been all the more, and byno means the less contrary to rule in consequence of the position inwhich Ludovico and Paolina stood towards each other. But the world towhich Paolina belonged lives under a different code in these matters.And ever since the day in which the memorable conversation between herand her lover, which has been recorded in a former chapter, had takenplace, Paolina had never felt the smallest embarrassment or even shynessin her intercourse with him. And she received him now with openlyexpressed rejoicing, that the chance of Orsola's absence gave them theopportunity of being for a little while alone together.

  "I called at this early hour, tesoro mio," said Ludovico, "mainly totell you that I have made all the necessary arrangements at St.Apollinare in Classe, and you can begin your work there as soon as youlike. What a dreary place it is. To think of my little Paolina working,working away all by herself in that dismal old barn of a church outthere amid the swamps!"

  "Oh, I shan't be a bit afraid. I am so accustomed to work all bymyself."

  "No, there is nothing to be afraid of! Do you think I should let you gothere alone, if there were? You will find the scaffolding all ready foryou."

  "Thanks, dearest, I am so much obliged to you; I should never have beenable to get my task done without your help. Ah, how strange things are!To think, that that Englishman, in sending me here, should have been--"

  "Should have been sending me my destined wife. Who ever in the world didme so great a service as this Signor Vilobe, who never had a thought ofme in his mind."

  "And if I had chanced not to be in the gallery at the Belle Arti thatday," rejoined Paolina, with a shudder at the thought of what theconsequences of such an absence would have been.

  "You will have the great church entirely to yourself, anima mia," saidLudovico; "there is not a soul near the place, save the old monk, whokeeps the keys, and a lay-brother, who was ill, the poor old frate said,when I was there. It is a dreary place, my Paolina, and I am afraid youwill find your task a weary one. I fear it will be cold too."

  "Oh, I don't mind that much! What is more important, is to get the jobdone before the hot weather comes on. They say it is so unhealthy outthere, when the heat comes. What is the old frate like?"

  "He is a very old, old man, and he looks as if fever and ague everysummer and autumn had pretty nearly made an end of him. He seemed quiteinclined to be civil and obliging. If he were not, you could knock himdown with a tap of your maulstick, I should think, though it be wieldedby such a tiny, dainty little bit of a hand," said Ludovico, lifting itto his lips between both his as he spoke. "And now tell me," hecontinued; "what did you think of the third act last night? Did she notsing that finale superbly?"

  "Superbly,--certainly the finest singing I heard. But--"

  "What is the 'but,' anima mia? I confess I thought it perfect."

  "So I suppose it was. But I think that perhaps I should have had morepleasure in hearing a less magnificent singer, who was more simpatica tome. I can't help it, but I do not like her; and I am sure I can't tellwhy. I have no reason; but do you know, Ludovico mio, there was onemoment when, strange as it may seem, our eyes met--hers and mine--in thetheatre last night. It was just as she turned away from your box, whenyou had put the bouquet into her hand. She looked up, and our eyes met;and I can't tell you the strange feeling and impression that her lookmade upon me. And I am quite sure that, for some unaccountable reason orother, she does not like me. She looked at me--it was only half a momentwith a sort of mocking triumph and hatred in her eyes, that quite mademe shudder and turn cold.

  "If it were not so entirely impossible, I should think you were jealous,my little Paolina. If I were to--what shall we say?--if I were to setout on a journey with la Diva, tete-a-tete, to travel from here to Rome,should you be jealous?"

  "With La Bianca?"

  "Yes! with La Bianca."

  "I don't know. I don't think that I should in earnest. I know in myinmost heart, my own love, that you love me truly and entirely; I feelit, I am sure of it. But all the same, I should rather that you did nottravel from here to Rome alone with La Lalli."

  "That means that, to a certain degree, you are jealous, little one. Doyou think I should be uneasy if you were called on to travel under theescort, for example, of our friend th
e Conte Leandro?"

  "The Conte Leandro!" cried Paolina, laughing, "I am sure you ought to beuneasy at the bare thought of such a thing, for you know how terrible itwould be to me. But is it quite the same thing, amico mio? La Lalli isindisputably a very beautiful woman; and the Conte Leandro is--the ConteLeandro. But it is not that she is beautiful. I don't know what it is.There is something about her--ecco, I should not the least mind now yourtravelling to the world's end, or being occupied in any other way, withthe Contessa Violante."

  "She is not a beautiful woman, certainly."

  "She is, at all events, fifty times more pleasing-looking, as well asmore attractive in every way, than the Conte Leandro. But that is notwhat makes the difference. I take it, the difference is, that one feelsthat the Contessa Violante is good, and that nobody would get anythingbut good from her. I have got quite to love her myself."

  "And yet you see, Paolina mia, somehow or other it came to pass that Icould not love her, when I was bid to do so; and, in the place of doingthat, I went and loved somebody else instead. How is that to beaccounted for, eh?"

  "I am sure that is more than I can guess, Ludovico."

  "One thing is clear--and a very good thing it is--that Violante has nomore desire to marry me than I have to marry her. As soon as everCarnival is over, my own darling, I mean to speak definitively to myuncle, and tell him, in the first place, that he must give up all notionof a marriage between Violante and me."

  "As soon as Carnival is over. Why, that will be the day afterto-morrow,"--said Paolina, flushing all over.

  "Exactly so; the day after to-morrow. But I mean only to tell him, inthe first instance, that I cannot make the marriage he would have me.Then, when that is settled--and some little time allowed for him to getover his mortification, il povero zio--will come the announcement of themarriage I can make. I have quite fixed with myself to do it the dayafter to-morrow. But--I don't know what to make of my uncle. He is notin the least like himself. I am afraid he must be ill. I fully expectedthat I should have to fight all through Carnival against constantexhortations to pay my court to the Contessa. But he has never spoken tome a word on the subject."

  "Perhaps he has discovered that the lady likes the proposal no betterthan you do," suggested Paolina, with a wise look of child-like gravityup at her lover's face.

  "No; it's not that. He never dreams of her having any will in the matterapart from that of her family. I can't make him out. There's somethingwrong with him. He looks a dozen years older than he did; and his habitsare changed too."

  "Do you think--that is--it has just come into my head--do you remember,Ludovico, what I said to you last night at the theatre about the way LaLalli sung her love verses at him?"

  "La Lalli again. Why, she has fascinated you at all events. You canthink of nothing else. La Lalli and lo zio. Dio mio! If you only knewhim. All the prime donne in Europe might sing at him, or make eyes athim, or make love to him, in any manner they liked from morning tillnight without making any more impression on him than a hundred years,more or less, on the tomb of the Emperor Theodoric out there. No, animamia, that's not it. No, il povero zio, I am more inclined to think thathe is breaking up. It does happen, sometimes, that your men, who havenever known a day's illness in their lives, break down all of a suddenin that way. Everybody in the city has been saying that he is changedand ill. But I must be off, my darling. I only came to tell you that allwas in readiness for you at St. Apollinare. At least that was my excusefor coming. But now I must go and see about all sorts of things for thereception to-night. We shall have all the world at the Palazzo to-night.And lo zio asked me to see to everything. Addio, Paolina mia. You knowwhere my heart will be all the time. Addio, anima mia."