Enchanter's Nightshade

by Ann Bridge

  Life in Gardone was full of these minor surprises for Miss Prestwich. And she had another, and a rather more severe one, in connection with the visit of the Marchesa Nadia. In England thirty years ago the bare possibility of difficulties or disasters in marriage was as far as possible concealed from girls; divorces only occurred among “people one didn’t know,” unfaithfulness only, and but rarely, in novels, and in the sort of novel one was not supposed to read at that. Looking back, now, to those days, it is difficult to realise how complete, cast-iron and watertight was the English convention of married virtue, how invisible and incredible anything else; only a study of the minor fiction of the late nineties and the early nineteen-hundreds will adequately bring it home to the modern reader. And the mass-suggestion of this innocuous fiction, reinforced by the careful silences of her home, had left Almina Prestwich as intellectually ignorant as a child of three of the darker and more unhappy possibilities of marriage. But that day at Odredo, when she and Marietta and Elena were sitting out under the stone pine after lunch, having coffee at the big square stone table which stood under it, she was suddenly and painfully enlightened. The Count had gone off on an all-day expedition to his estates at Meden, many miles to the East, where he was anxious to put some of his new French theories of growing vines into practice, taking Ospedi, the bailiff, with him; Fräulein Gelsicher had gone too, hoping by her presence to restrain both the foolish enthusiasm of the Count, and the bailiff’s unscrupulous rapacity; Giulio had retired to his room to finish an essay before they went out walking. The three girls were alone, and because they were alone were sewing their under-clothes—those delicate cambric affairs, with ribbons run through slotted embroidery at the waist and rotmd the bust, and broad lace-edged embroidery straps over the shoulders, which they were just learning to call camisoles, and which for the young and fashionable took the place of the woven bodices worn by Fräulein Gelsicher. Rather puffy things, those camisoles were, with a decent fullness over the bosom, produced by fine gathering or by groups of tiny pin-tucks; the ribbon showed coquettishly through thin blouses, but was a terrible job to run in. One carried such work about in large silk bags with hoop handles, or in round flattish sewing-baskets of scented grass, into which the slightly risqué objects could be thrust at the advent of a male relation. The stone table was covered with scraps of lace and embroidery, the resinous shade under the great umbrella pine was full of the hum of insects, broken by fragments of talk and little clear peals of laughter. Presently Elena asked—“And how is Zia Nadia, Marietta? Does she seem depressed?”

  “Not particularly,” Marietta replied, looking a little conscious.

  “There is no sign of Zio Pipo, I suppose?” Elena went on, with a mischievous glance.

  “Elena, of course not! You know he is in Brioni,” Marietta said, in a tone of faint protest. “He would hardly come just now, besides.”

  “No, hardly—and leave his cara amoretta! Well, and what are they all doing? Discussing it, up and down?”

  “Zia Nadia and Bonne-Mama had a long talk this morning, but naturally I don’t know what they said,” Marietta replied.

  “I wonder how they will settle it,” Elena said. “Aspidistra was telling Gela the other day that she believes Zia Nadia means to leave him.” (Aspidistra was the cousins’ impertinent name for the Countess Aspasia.)

  “Surely she could not do that?” Marietta said, looking startled.

  “Oh yes, she could. It would make a great scandal, of course, but it can be done. The Tito Serbellonis had a separation—there was a consiglio di famiglia and all sorts of fuss, but they got one in the end! Only there, it was she,” said Elena significantly.

  “But could they marry again then? No,” said Marietta, wide-eyed.

  “Of course not, dunce! One can never marry twice, unless the other is dead,” Elena said with a superior air. “Not that that will trouble Zio Pipo!” she added, laughing.

  “I think Zio Pipo is horrible!” Marietta burst out, with a sudden passion which startled Almina. “How he can make Zia Nadia so unhappy! She is so kind, and clever, and beautiful—such a darling; and she used to be so gay! It is hateful of him, I think.”

  Almina’s conscientious scruples told her at this point that she ought to intervene in this most unsuitable conversation. She knew, of course, nothing about the Marchesa Nadia’s affairs, and was greatly shocked by Elena’s revelations; casual and elliptical as they were she could not fail to gather the gist of them—and she was scandalised at the open way in which the two girls were discussing a situation which at home would have been a matter for hushed voices and dark hints, even among her elders. However, before she had found a suitable phrase of remonstrance, Elena was off again.

  “I, too, think it most extraordinary that he should prefer La Panelli to Zia Nadia. Have you ever seen her? She’s a little dark stumpy thing, with eyes like boot-buttons, sticking out, and a snub nose, and no teint Her face is like dirty paper. She is very amusing, and has a comic manner—she is really gamine. And she has great chic. But so has Zia Nadia—and she is in addition quite beautiful. Zia Roma says the trouble is that she is too fond of him—though what our Roma knows about men and love, I don’t know,” she ended, looking delightfully malicious.

  “Do men not wish their wives to love them, then?” Marietta asked—and Almina could not tell whether the question was asked in irony or in earnest. That small vivid face was curiously inscrutable at times.

  “Ma! Au fond, yes, I suppose so—but they should not show it too much. Men like to be kept dangling,” Elena said, with a fine air of knowledge, biting off a thread.

  “Elena, do use my scissors—you will ruin your teeth,” Almina put in; she hoped that this nice governessy phrase would make a break.

  “Grazie tanto! Miss Prestwich, do you admire Zia Nadia?”

  “I find the Marchesa most charming,” Almina replied gravely, “but, Elena, I do not think that you and Marietta ought to discuss her affairs.” Gathering courage, she spoke firmly and steadily. “It is no business of ours, and for Marietta at least it is a most improper subject.”

  Elena looked at her in astonishment. “Improper? But how? Everyone knows that there is this trouble between her and Zio Pipo, and that she is come to Vill’ Alta to talk it over with them all, so what harm can it be to speak of it? We have said nothing unkind.”

  “I did not know it, and now I do,” Almina said. “I had rather not have heard about it. It is very terrible and very sad, but none of us is in a position to make a useful judgement on the matter, so I think we should do better to be silent about it. The less said about such things the better.”

  The extreme gravity of her tone and expression, rather than the words of this little homily, impressed Elena in spite of herself. She liked Miss Prestwich, but had hitherto thought her a rather delightful joke. She gave a tiny shrug, now, but then said, with perfect good-temper. “Va bene! Let us talk of something else.”

  At that moment there was an interruption. “The Three Graces! And all at needlework!” exclaimed a loud cheerful voice—looking round, they saw Roffredo di Castellone bearing down upon them.

  “Buon’ giÒrno! Buon’ giÒrno!” he said generally, approaching the table. “You too diligent, Elena? What is it? No, let me see!” he said, grasping the shred of cambric, and laughing at her.

  “It is two pocket handkerchiefs,” Elena said gaily, as he spread it out—the little garment was indeed, in its untrimmed state, sufficiently non-committal.

  “Where is my Uncle?” the young man now asked, seating himself.

  “He is gone to Meden with Gela,” Elena said, “but Giulio is indoors. Did you want Papa?” “I did. Is Ospedi about?”

  “No, he is gone too. We are to grow French wine soon at Meden!” Elena said. “I will fetch Giulio,” and she ran off to find her brother.

  “Well, Signorina, have you found any more rare flowers?” the young Count asked, turning to Almina.

  “We are going to find some today,�
�� Marietta put in. “All sorts of things grow out by the Monte Sant Antonio, and we are going there to see what we can find.”

  “What, where old Trino lives? Is he still alive?” Roffredo asked.

  “Very much so. He is Zio Carlo’s bird-catcher, you know,” she explained to Almina.

  “He is the tenth Trino, father to son, to be bird-catcher to the Castellones,” Roffredo said to Almina—” that is interesting, no?”

  Almina, who had never heard of the profession of bird-catcher, asked if he meant a keeper?

  “Cacciatore? No—not that. He snares the small birds for the table. You had better take Miss Prestwich to see Trino, Marietta, while you are out there. It might amuse her.”

  But when Giulio came down, joyful at the sight of his cousin, and suggested a game of tennis to him, rather to everyone’s surprise the young man said abruptly that it was on the whole too hot, and proposed that they should accompany the girls on their walk. “I should like to see old Trino again,” he said. So the whole party set out, down through the park which lay to the North of the house—not a park in the English sense, with great trees standing formal and noble in rich green pasture, and cropping deer; but a place of rather straggling herbage, with here and there little spinneys and clumps of plantation—larches, willows, poplars—and drifts of tall weeds and tracts of sloes and wild privet. It was all rather untidy, a mixture of the barren and the utilitarian which was rather characteristic of the Italy of those days; but still, in its early summer green, pretty enough, with its weedy lake, overhung with willows, in the middle. Water carts, long narrow wooden barrels slung on wheels, were coming up from the lake towards the house—Elena explained airily that the well was “leaking, or something,” so that the water had to be fetched from there. They made a pretty group, the young people, as they strolled along, the young men in their white flannels, the girls in their pale summer dresses and shady flowery hats. Almina’s hat was a broad-brimmed thing of white straw, with floating green ribbons— it suited her extraordinarily well, and Elena noticed with sly amusement that Roffredo kept his eyes firmly fixed on it and its owner. Passing through a little wood, Miss Prestwich suddenly darted aside, with a cry of pleasure, to pick a flower —it was the white butterfly orchis, with its delicate straggling blossoms writhing like small white limbs.

  “Does it smell?” Roffredo asked her, and took it from her hand. “No, it does not,” he said, giving it back.

  “Not now, but it does at dusk. If you came here in the evening, the whole wood would be sweet with them,” she told him.

  “Then will you bring me here one evening, so that I may smell it? Then I shall believe you,” he said, standing still and smiling down at her; it occurred to him with sudden force that it would be delightful beyond words to wander through a scented copse at dusk with this delicious little creature, with her face as pale as the flower she held, her great grey eyes, and her hair like spring sunshine. And to engage her attention and keep it for himself, he began to pick every flower and weed he could find, and bring them to her to ask their names-common things like scarlet pimpernel, shepherd’s purse, and a small speedwell. With a gravity which charmed him, and without the smallest hesitation, she identified them all—Anagallis arvensis, Capsella bursa-pastoris, Veronica hederaefolia. At last “I believe she is making them up!” the young man cried—“she cannot know so many.”

  “At least she is making them up with the correct Latín genders,” Giulio retorted.

  “You are so ignorant, povero Roffredo!” Elena teased— “you can’t even recognise learning when you meet it.”

  So they wandered on, laughing and picking flowers; Almina found the gay attentions of the two young men very pleasant, so pleasant that for the time she forgot the painful impression which the two girls’ talk about the Marchesa Nadia had made on her. Presently they left the park, which was vaguely bounded, here by a broad weed-filled ditch, there by a straggling and indefinite hedge, and emerged onto open pastures; ahead of them rose a little hill, long, low and green—the Monte Sant Antonio. On the top of it they found the bird-catcher’s house, a rather tumble-down hovel of grey stone, with quite as much rags as glass in its small windows, and an earthen floor. Almina, with her usual astonishment at Italian manners, thought how impossible it would have been that her grandfather, Lord Portledown, should allow an old estate servant to live in so makeshift a place. Old Trino appeared, a small and rather bent old man, incredibly dirty in person, with brilliant black eyes peeping out of a face that was almost all grey hairs and grime-filled wrinkles—he greeted the cousins with enthusiasm, and was delighted to show the English young lady his whole establishment. Out at the back of the house was a square enclosure surrounded by high hornbeam hedges, clipped and trimmed with most un-Italian neatness—the hedges were double, with a four-foot space between, and Trino explained how he hung his nets between the hedges, and showed Almina the wires, cords and pulleys by which, when the enclosure was full of birds, he could pull one large net along over the whole, through holes in the cottage wall, and then show himself and scare the little creatures into the surrounding nets, to be caught at his leisure. He was not using the nets at the moment, he said; the crop of rape which was to lure the birds into the enclosure was not yet ripe—“But the Signor Conte will be able to have uccellini tomorrow,” he said triumphantly to Elena. “I am using my lime.” And he led them off to a bushy place on the eastward slope of the hill, where small grain was strewn on the ground among innocent-looking twigs. But the twigs had a dark glossy surface; they were covered with bird-lime and firmly pegged to the ground—a hedge-sparrow and a couple of chaffinches were entangled among them, fluttering and struggling, their desperate movements only exposing more of their feathers to the cruel clinging glue. Almina, horrified, turned away—the piteous twitterings and helpless Struggles of the little creatures made her feel sick. But the others took it quite calmly—Roffredo touched the lime to test its strength, went to wipe his finger on his handkerchief, and laughed when the linen stuck to his hand, while Elena, always inquisitive, made old Trino show her how he dipped the twigs in the bucket, and the rough brush of coarse grass which he used to spread the viscous stuff on the leaves of bushes where the birds were wont to roost. Trino presently caught the three minute creatures, and with a deft movement wrung their necks. Once all movement in those little bodies was stilled, Almina felt curiously relieved.

  They walked back by the other side of the hill, Roffredo pointing out to the party the pink roof of his new villa, just to be seen in the distance through the trees. He was getting settled in, he told them, bit by bit—“when I am properly installed, you must all come and have lunch with me. You will come too, and bring Marietta, won’t you?” he said, turning his bright glance onto Almina. A little further on, at a cross-path, he left them, turning off eastward to his house, remarking that he should see them again that night, as he was dining at Vill’ Alta—an announcement which caused Almina a sensation of pleasure and expectancy which rather startled her.

  He came, looking more arrogant and handsome than ever in his evening clothes. But the evening brought Almina no special pleasure. Beyond a civil greeting on his arrival, he barely spoke to her. She told herself sensibly that this was only natural. She was the governess, and when his elders were present it was right and proper that his attention should all be given to them. But a slight sensation of discomfort persisted—he had been so empressé in his manner all the afternoon that the contrast was painful. And his conversation with his hostess went almost beyond the usual gallantry—in England, Almina thought, one would have called it a flirtation. The Marchesa Suzy did her share—she was lazily mocking, delicately provocative, and the young man reacted violently to this stimulus. It made Almina rather uncomfortable. All the unpleasant impressions of the day came back to her as she sat in the high salon—the talk of the two girls about the Marchesa Nadia, which had distressed her more than she realised at the time, the struggles of the little birds among the
limed twigs. All the rest of the day, she had not been able to get that picture out of her head—it thrust itself up between her and whatever she saw, unbidden; and now it returned to her with fresh force. She was glad when Marietta’s bedtime came, and she was able to escape with her. But her escape was not complete—our escapes seldom are. She went at once to bed, but only to dream all night of herself caught in a limed thicket, her plumage befouled by something horrible which held her fast, while Roffredo hovered over her, smiling his bright imperious smile, ready to wring her neck.

  Chapter Nine

  The final upshot of all the discussions about the Marchesa Nadia’s affairs was a decision to hold a consiglio di famiglia on the matter. Nadia’s plan of quietly leaving her husband, for good, was scouted as utterly improper by La Vecchia Marchesa; and Suzy had made it clear to the old lady that further private argument was useless. There remained the question of putting individual pressure on Pipo to abandon his liaison with the Countess Panelli; but to this course the Marchese Francesco, rather surprisingly, opposed himself obdurately. He would neither do it himself nor, he said, allow it to be done by anyone under his roof. His wife, on hearing his pronouncement, raised her pretty pencilled eyebrows—the three of them sat in conclave in his study; his mother opened her lips to ask him his reasons, and then closed them again. A possible one had occurred to her—that he was unwilling to enforce on his brother a standard of behaviour which he had refrained from imposing on his wife. If the family as a family, he went on, in council, chose to take that course, well and good. And he did, as head of the family and at the old lady’s instance, write the letter to the Marchese Pipo announcing that this was their intention. So the lawyer was summoned, the date provisionally fixed, the invitations sent out—to the diplomat son, the son who was a cardinal, the playwright son who lived in Paris, and all the rest. And Nadia, meditatively bending her graceful dark head, went back to Bologna till the time came.