“A thousand welcomes, Madama!” he said, speaking in English with a scarcely noticeable foreign accent— “Last night I heard you had arrived, but could hardly believe the good fortune! You must have travelled quickly?”
“Never quickly enough for my mind!” she answered— “The whole world moves too slowly for me!”
“You must carry that complaint to the buon Dio!” he said, gaily— “Perhaps He will condescend to spin this rolling planet a little faster! But in my mind, time flies far too rapidly! I have worked — we all have worked — to get this place finished for you, yet much remains to be done—”
She interrupted him.
“The interior is quite perfect” — she said— “You have carried out my instructions more thoroughly than I imagined could be possible. It is now an abode for fairies to live in, — for poets to dream in—”
“For women to love in!” he said, with a sudden warmth in his dark eyes.
She looked at him, laughing.
“You poor Marchese!” — she said— “Still you think of love! I really believe Italians keep all the sentiment of le moyen age in their hearts, — other peoples are gradually letting it go. You are like a child believing in childish things! You imagine I could be happy with a lover — or several lovers! To moon all day and embrace all night! Oh fie! What a waste of time! And in the end nothing is so fatiguing!” She broke off a spray of flowering laurel and hit him with it playfully on the hand. “Don’t moon or spoon, caro amico! What is it all about? Do I leave you nothing on which to write poetry? I find you out in Sicily — a delightful poor nobleman with a family history going back to the Caesars! — handsome, clever, with beautiful ideas — and I choose and commission you to restore and rebuild for me a fairy palace out of a half-ruined ancient one, because you have taste and skill, and I know you can do everything when money is no object — and you have done, and are doing it all perfectly. Why then spoil it by falling in love with me? Fie, fie!”
She laughed again and rising, gave him her hand.
“Hold that!” she said— “And while you hold it, tell me of my other palace — the one with wings!”
He clasped her small white fingers in his own sun-browned palm and walked beside her bare-headed.
“Ah!” And he drew a deep breath— “That is a miracle! What we called your ‘impossible’ plan has been made possible! But who would have thought that a woman—”
“Stop there!” she interrupted— “Do not repeat the old gander-cackle of barbaric man, who, while owing his every comfort as well as the continuance of his race, to woman, denied her every intellectual initiative! ‘Who would have thought that a woman’ — could do anything but bend low before a man with grovelling humility saying ‘My lord, here am I, the waiting vessel of your lordship’s pleasure! — possess me or I die!’ We have changed that beggarly attitude!”
Her eyes flashed, — her voice rang out — the little fingers he held, stiffened resolutely in his clasp. He looked at her with a touch of anxiety.
“Pardon me! — I did not mean—” he stammered.
In a second her mood changed, and she laughed.
“No! — Of course you ‘did not mean’ anything, Marchese! You are naturally surprised that my ‘idea’ which was little more than an idea, has resolved itself into a scientific fact — but you would have been just as surprised if the conception had been that of a man instead of a woman. Only you would not have said so!”
She laughed again, — a laugh of real enjoyment, — then went on —
“Now tell me — what of my White Eagle? — what movement? — what speed?”
“Amazing!” and the Marchese lowered his voice to almost a whisper— “I hardly dare speak of it! — it is like something supernatural! We have carried out your instructions to the letter — the thing is LIVING, in all respects save life. I made the test with the fluid you gave me — I charged the cells secretly — none of the mechanics saw what I did — and when she rose in air they were terrified—”
“Brave souls!” said Morgana, and now she withdrew her hand from his grasp— “So you went up alone?”
“I did. The steering was easy — she obeyed the helm, — it was as though she were a light yacht in a sea, — wind and tide in her favour. But her speed outran every air-ship I have ever known — as also the height to which she ascends.”
“We will take a trip in her to-morrow pour passer le temps” — said Morgana, “You shall choose a place for us to go. Nothing can stop us — nothing on earth or in the air! — and nothing can destroy us. I can guarantee that!”
Giulio Rivardi gazed at her wonderingly, — his dark deep Southern eyes expressed admiration with a questioning doubt commingled.
“You are very sure of yourself” — he said, gently. “Of course one cannot but marvel that your brain should have grasped in so short a time what men all over the world are still trying to discover—”
“Men are slow animals!” she said, lightly. “They spend years in talking instead of in doing. Then again, when one of them really does something, all the rest are up in arms against him, and more years are wasted in trying to prove him right or wrong. I, as a mere woman, ask nobody for an opinion — I risk my own existence — spend my own money — and have nothing to do with governments. If I succeed I shall be sought after fast enough! — but I do not propose to either give or sell my discovery.”
“Surely you will not keep it to yourself?”
“Why not? The world is too full of inventions as it is — and it is not the least grateful to its inventors or explorers. It would make the fool of a film a three-fold millionaire — but it would leave a great scientist or a noble thinker to starve. No, no! Let It swing on its own round — I shall not enlighten it!”
She walked on, gathering a flower here and there, and he kept pace beside her.
“The men who are working here” — he at last ventured to say— “are deeply interested. You can hardly expect them not to talk among each other and in the outside clubs and meeting-places of the wonderful mechanism on which they have been engaged. They have been at it now steadily for fifteen months.”
“Do I not know it?” And she turned her head to him, smiling, “Have I not paid their salaries regularly? — and yours? I do not care how they talk or where, — they have built the White Eagle, but they cannot make her fly! — not without ME! You were as brave as I thought you would be when you decided to fly alone, trusting to the means I gave you and which I alone can give!”
She broke off and was silent for a moment, then laying her hand lightly on his arm, she added —
“I thank you for your confidence in me! As I have said, you were brave! — you must have felt that you risked your life on a chance! — nevertheless, for once, you allowed yourself to believe in a woman!”
“Not only for once but for always would I so believe! — in SUCH a woman — if she would permit me!” he answered in a low tone of intense passion. She smiled.
“Ah! The old story! My dear Marchese, do not fret your intellectual perception uselessly! Think what we have in store for us! — such wonders as none have yet explored, — the mysteries of the high and the low — the light and the dark — and in those far-off spaces strewn with stars, we may even hear things that no mortal has yet heard—”
“And what is the use of it all?” he suddenly demanded.
She opened her deep blue eyes in amaze.
“The use of it?... You ask the use of it?—”
“Yes — the use of it — without love!” he answered, his voice shaken with a sudden emotion— “Madonna, forgive me! — Listen with patience for one moment! — and think of the whole world mastered and possessed — but without anyone to love in it — without anyone to love YOU! Suppose you could command the elements — suppose every force that science could bestow were yours, and yet! — no love for you — no love in yourself for anyone — what would be the use of it all? Think, Madonna!”
She raised her delicate
eyebrows in a little surprise, — a faint smile was on her lips.
“Dear Marchese, I DO think! I HAVE thought!” she answered— “And I have observed! Love — such as I imagined it when I was quite a young girl — does not exist. The passion called by that name is too petty and personal for me. Men have made love to me often — not as prettily perhaps as you do! — but in America at least love means dollars! Yes, truly! Any man would love my dollars, and take me with them, just thrown in! You, perhaps—”
“I should love you if you were quite poor!” he interposed vehemently.
She laughed.
“Would you? Don’t be angry if I doubt it! If I were ‘quite poor’ I could not have given you your big commission here — this house would not have been restored to its former beauty, and the White Eagle would be still a bird of the brain and not of the air! No, you very charming Marchese! — I should not have the same fascination for you without my dollars! — and I may tell you that the only man I ever felt disposed to like, — just a little, — is a kind of rude brute who despises my dollars and me!”
His brows knitted involuntarily.
“Then there IS some man you like?” he asked, stiffly.
“I’m not sure!” she answered, lightly— “I said I felt ‘disposed’ to like him! But that’s only in the spirit of contradiction, because he detests ME! And it’s a sort of duel between us of sheer intellectuality, because he is trying to discover — in the usual slow, laborious, calculating methods of man — the very thing I HAVE discovered! He’s on the verge — But not across it!”
“And so — he may outstrip you?” And the Marchese’s eyes glittered with sudden anger— “He may claim YOUR discovery as his own?”
Morgana smiled. She was ascending the steps of the loggia, and she paused a moment in the full glare of the Sicilian sunshine, her wonderful gold hair shining in it with the hue of a daffodil.
“I think not!” she said— “Though of course it depends on the use he makes of it. He — like all men — wishes to destroy; I, like all women, wish to create!”
One or two of the workmen who were busy polishing the rose-marble pilasters of the loggia, here saluted her — she returned their salutations with an enchanting smile.
“How delightful it all is!” she said— “I feel the real use of dollars at last! This beautiful ‘palazzo,’ in one of the loveliest places in the world — all the delicious flowers running down in garlands to the very shore of the sea-and liberty to enjoy life as one wishes to enjoy it, without hindrance or argument — without even the hindrance and argument of — love!” She laughed, and gave a mirthful upward glance at the Marchese’s somewhat sullen countenance. “Come and have luncheon with me! You are the major-domo for the present — you have engaged the servants and you know the run of the house — you must show me everything and tell me everything! I have quite a nice chaperone — such a dear old English lady ‘of title’ as they say in the ‘Morning Post’ — so it’s all quite right and proper — only she doesn’t know a word of Italian and very little French. But that’s quite British you know!”
She passed, smiling, into the house, and he followed.
CHAPTER VII
Perhaps there is no lovelier effect in all nature than a Sicilian sunset, when the sky is one rich blaze of colour and the sea below reflects every vivid hue as in a mirror, — when the very air breathes voluptuous indolence, and all the restless work of man seems an impertinence rather than a necessity. Morgana, for once in her quick restless life, felt the sudden charm of sweet peace and holy tranquility, as she sat, or rather reclined at ease in a long lounge chair after dinner in her rose-marble loggia facing the sea and watching the intense radiance of the heavens burning into the still waters beneath. She had passed the afternoon going over her whole house and gardens, and to the Marchese Giulio Rivardi had expressed herself completely satisfied, — while he, to whom unlimited means had been entrusted to carry out her wishes, wondered silently as to the real extent of her fortune, and why she should have spent so much in restoring a “palazzo” for herself alone. An occasional thought of “the only man” she had said she was “disposed” to like, teased his brain; but he was not petty-minded or jealous. He was keenly and sincerely interested in her intellectual capacity, and he knew, or thought he knew, the nature of woman. He watched her now as she reclined, a small slim figure in white, with the red glow of the sun playing on the gold uptwisted coil of her hair, — a few people of the neighbourhood had joined her at dinner, and these were seated about, sipping coffee and chatting in the usual frivolous way of after-dinner guests — one or two of them were English who had made their home in Sicily, — the others were travelling Americans.
“I guess you’re pretty satisfied with your location, Miss Royal” — said one of these, a pleasant-faced grey-haired man, who for four or five years past had wintered in Sicily with his wife, a frail little creature always on the verge of the next world— “It would be difficult to match this place anywhere! You only want one thing to complete it!”
Morgana turned her lovely eyes indolently towards him over the top of the soft feather fan she was waving lightly to and fro.
“One thing? What is that?” she queried.
“A husband!”
She smiled.
“The usual appendage!” she said— “To my mind, quite unnecessary, and likely to spoil the most perfect environment! Though the Marchese Rivardi DID ask me to-day what was the use of my pretty ‘palazzo’ and gardens without love! A sort of ethical conundrum!”
She glanced at Rivardi as she spoke — he was rolling a cigarette in his slim brown fingers and his face was impassively intent on his occupation.
“Well, that’s so!” — and her American friend looked at her kindly— “Even a fairy palace and a fairy garden might prove lonesome for one!”
“And boresome for two!” laughed Morgana— “My dear Colonel Boyd! It is not every one who is fitted for matrimony — and there exist so many that ARE, — eminently fitted — we can surely allow a few exceptions! I am one of those exceptions. A husband would be excessively tiresome to me, and very much in my way!”
Colonel Boyd laughed heartily.
“You won’t always think so!” he said— “Such a charming little woman must have a heart somewhere!”
“Oh, yes, dear!” chimed in his fragile invalid wife, “I am sure you have a heart!”
Morgana raised herself on her cushions to a sitting posture and looked round her with a curious little air or defiance.
“A heart I MUST have!” she said— “otherwise I could not live. It is a necessary muscle. But what YOU call ‘heart’ — and what the dear elusive poets write about, is simply brain, — that is to say, an impulsive movement of the brain, suggesting the desirability of a particular person’s companionship — and we elect to call that ‘love’! On that mere impulse people marry.”
“It’s a good impulse” — said Colonel Boyd, still smiling broadly— “It founds families and continues the race!”
“Ah, yes! But I often wonder why the race should be continued at all!” said Morgana— “The time is ripe for a new creation!”
A slow footfall sounded on the garden path, and the tall figure of a man clad in the everyday ecclesiastical garb of the Roman Church ascended the steps of the loggia.
“Don Aloysius!” quickly exclaimed the Marchese, and every one rose to greet the newcomer, Morgana receiving him with a profound reverence. He laid his hand on her head with a kindly touch of benediction.
“So the dreamer has come to her dream!” he said, in soft accents— “And it has not broken like an air-bubble! — it still floats and shines!” As he spoke he courteously saluted all present by a bend of his head, — and stood for a moment gazing at the view of the sea and the dying sunset. He was a very striking figure of a man — tall, and commanding in air and attitude, with a fine face which might be called almost beautiful. The features were such as one sees in classic marbles — the full cl
ear eyes were set somewhat widely apart under shelving brows that denoted a brain with intelligence to use it, and the smile that lightened his expression as he looked from, the sea to his fair hostess was of a benignant sweetness.
“Yes” — he continued— “you have realised your vision of loveliness, have you not? Our friend Giulio Rivardi has carried out all your plans?”
“Everything is perfect!” said Morgana— “Or will be when it is finished. The workmen still have things to do.”
“All workmen always have things to do!” said Don Aloysius, tranquilly— “And nothing is ever finished! And you, dear child! — you are happy?”
She flushed and paled under his deep, steady gaze.
“I — I think so!” she murmured— “I ought to be!”
The priest smiled and after a pause took the chair which the Marchese Rivardi offered him. The other guests in the loggia looked at him with interest, fascinated by his grave charm of manner. Morgana resumed her seat.
“I ought to be happy” — she said— “And of course I am — or I shall be!”
“‘Man never is but always to be blest’!” quoted Colonel Boyd— “And woman the same! I have been telling this lady, reverend father, that maybe she will find her ‘palazzo’ a bit lonesome without some one to share its pleasures.”
Don Aloysius looked round with a questioning glance.
“What does she herself think about it?” he asked, mildly.
“I have not thought at all” — said Morgana, quickly, “I can always fill it with friends. No end of people are glad to winter in Sicily.”
“But will such ‘friends’ care for YOU or YOUR happiness?” suggested the Marchese, pointedly.
Morgana laughed.
“Oh, no, I do not expect that! Nowadays no one really cares for anybody else’s happiness but their own. Besides, I shall be much too busy to want company. I’m bent on all sorts of discoveries, you know! — I want to dive ‘deeper than ever plummet sounded’!”
Delphi Collected Works of Marie Corelli Page 872
