Works of E F Benson

by E. F. Benson

  Lucia had to say something. A further exposure was at hand, quite inevitably. It was no use for her and Peppino to recollect a previous engagement.

  “Oh, my Italian is terribly rusty,” she said, knowing that Mrs Weston’s eye was on her…. Why had she not sent Mrs Weston a handsome wedding-present that morning?

  “Rusty? We will ask Cortese about that when you’ve had a good talk to him. Ah, here he is!”

  Cortese came into the room, florid and loquacious, pouring out a stream of apology for his lateness to Olga, none of which was the least intelligible to Lucia. She guessed what he was saying, and next moment Olga, who apparently understood him perfectly, and told him with an enviable fluency that he was not late at all, was introducing him to her, and explaining that “la Signora” (Lucia understood this) and her husband talked Italian. She did not need to reply to some torrent of amiable words from him, addressed to her, for he was taken on and introduced to Mrs Weston, and the Colonel. But he instantly whirled round to her again, and asked her something. Not knowing the least what he meant, she replied:

  “Si: tante grazie.”

  He looked puzzled for a moment and then repeated his question in English.

  “In what deestrict of Italy ‘ave you voyaged most?”

  Lucia understood that: so did Mrs Weston, and Lucia pulled herself together.

  “In Rome,” she said. “Che bella citta! Adoro Roma, e il mio marito. Non e vere, Peppino?”

  Peppino cordially assented: the familiar ring of this fine intelligible Italian restored his confidence, and he asked Cortese whether he was not very fond of music….

  Dinner seemed interminable to Lucia. She kept a watchful eye on Cortese, and if she saw he was about to speak to her, she turned hastily to Colonel Boucher, who sat on her other side, and asked him something about his cari cani, which she translated to him. While he answered she made up another sentence in Italian about the blue sky or Venice, or very meanly said her husband had been there, hoping to direct the torrent of Italian eloquence to him. But she knew that, as an Italian conversationalist, neither she nor Peppino had a rag of reputation left them, and she dismally regretted that they had not chosen French, of which they both knew about as much, instead of Italian, for the vehicle of their linguistic distinction.

  Olga meantime continued to understand all that Cortese said, and to reply to it with odious fluency, and at the last, Cortese having said something to her which made her laugh, he turned to Lucia.

  “I’ve said to Meesis Shottlewort” … and he proceeded to explain his joke in English.

  “Molto bene,” said Lucia with a dying flicker. “Molto divertente. Non e vero, Peppino.”

  “Si, si,” said Peppino miserably.

  And then the final disgrace came, and it was something of a relief to have it over. Cortese, in excellent spirits with his dinner and his wine and the prospect of Olga taking the part of Lucretia, turned beamingly to Lucia again.

  “Now we will all spick English,” he said. “This is one very pleasant evening. I enjoy me very much. Ecco!”

  Just once more Lucia shot up into flame.

  “Parlate Inglese molto bene,” she said, and except when Cortese spoke to Olga, there was no more Italian that night.

  Even the unique excitement of hearing Olga “try over” the great scene in the last act could not quite absorb Lucia’s attention after this awful fiasco, and though she sat leaning forward with her chin in her hand, and the far-away look in her eyes, her mind was furiously busy as to how to make anything whatever out of so bad a job. Everyone present knew that her Italian, as a medium for conversation, had suffered a complete break-down, and it was no longer any real use, when Olga did not quite catch the rhythm of a passage, to murmur “Uno, due, tre” unconsciously to herself; she might just as well have said “one, two, three” for any effect it had on Mrs Weston. The story would be all over Riseholme next day, and she felt sure that Mrs Weston, that excellent observer and superb reporter, had not failed to take it all in, and would not fail to do justice to it. Blow after blow had been rained upon her palace door, it was little wonder that the whole building was a-quiver. She had thought of starting a Dante-class this winter, for printed Italian, if you had a dictionary and a translation in order to prepare for the class, could be easily interpreted: it was the spoken word which you had to understand without any preparation at all, and not in the least knowing what was coming, that had presented such insurmountable difficulties. And yet who, when the story of this evening was known, would seek instruction from a teacher of that sort? Would Mrs Weston come to her Dante-class? Would she? Would she? No, she would not.

  Lucia lay long awake that night, tossing and turning in her bed in that delightful apartment in “Midsummer Night’s Dream,” and reviewing the fell array of these unlucky affairs. As she eyed them, black shapes against the glow of her firelight, it struck her that the same malevolent influence inspired them all. For what had caused the failure and flatness of her tableaux (omitting the unfortunate incident about the lamp) but the absence of Olga? Who was it who had occasioned her unfortunate remark about the Spanish Quartet but Olga, whose clear duty it had been, when she sent the invitation for the musical party, to state (so that there could be no mistake about it) that those eminent performers were to entrance them? Who could have guessed that she would have gone to the staggering expense of having them down from London? The Brinton quartet was the utmost that any sane imagination could have pictured, and Lucia’s extremely sane imagination had pictured just that, with such extreme vividness that it had never occurred to her that it could be anybody else. Certainly Olga should have put “Spanish Quartet” in the bottom left-hand corner instead of “Music” and then Lucia would have known all about it, and have been speechless with emotion when they had finished the Beethoven, and wiped her eyes, and pulled herself together again. It really looked as if Olga had laid a trap for her….

  Even more like a trap were the horrid events of this evening. Trap was not at all too strong a word for them. To ask her to the house, and then suddenly spring upon her the fact that she was expected to talk Italian…. Was that an open, an honourable proceeding? What if Lucia had actually told Olga (and she seemed to recollect it) that she and Peppino often talked Italian at home? That was no reason why she should be expected, off-hand like that, to talk Italian anywhere else. She should have been told what was expected of her, so as to give her the chance of having a previous engagement. Lucia hated underhand ways, and they were particularly odious in one whom she had been willing to educate and refine up to the highest standards of Riseholme. Indeed it looked as if Olga’s nature was actually incapable of receiving cultivation. She went on her own rough independent lines, giving a romp one night, and not coming to the tableaux on another, and getting the Spanish Quartet without consultation on a third, and springing this dreadful Pentecostal party on them on a fourth. Olga clearly meant mischief: she wanted to set herself up as leader of Art and Culture in Riseholme. Her conduct admitted of no other explanation.

  Lucia’s benevolent scheme of educating and refining vanished like morning mists, and through her drooping eyelids, the firelight seemed strangely red…. She had been too kind, too encouraging: now she must collect her forces round her and be stern. As she dozed off to sleep, she reminded herself to ask Georgie to lunch next day. He and Peppino and she must have a serious talk. She had seen Georgie comparatively little just lately, and she drowsily and uneasily wondered how that was.

  Georgie by this time had quite got over the desolation of the moment when standing in the road opposite Mrs Quantock’s mulberry-tree he had given vent to that bitter cry of “More misery: more unhappiness!” His nerves on that occasion had been worn to fiddlestrings with all the fuss and fiasco of planning the tableaux, and thus fancying himself in love had been just the last straw. But the fact that he had been Olga’s chosen confidant in her wonderful scheme of causing Mrs Weston and the Colonel to get engaged, and the distinction of be
ing singled out by Olga to this friendly intimacy, had proved a great tonic. It was quite clear that the existence of Mr Shuttleworth constituted a hopeless bar to the fruition of his passion, and, if he was completely honest with himself, he was aware that he did not really hate Mr Shuttleworth for standing in his path. Georgie was gentle in all his ways, and his manner of falling in love was very gentle, too. He admired Olga immensely, he found her stimulating and amusing, and since it was out of the question really to be her lover, he would have enjoyed next best to that, being her brother, and such little pangs of jealousy as he might experience from time to time, were rather in the nature of small electric shocks voluntarily received. He was devoted to her with a warmth that his supposed devotion to Lucia had never kindled in him; he even went so far as to dream about her in an agitated though respectful manner. Without being conscious of any unreality about his sentiments, he really wanted to dress up as a lover rather than to be one, for he could form no notion at present of what it felt to be absorbed in anyone else. Life was so full as it was: there really was no room for anything else, especially if that something else must be of the quality which rendered everything else colourless.

  This state of mind, this quality of emotion was wholly pleasurable and quite exciting, and instead of crying out “More misery! more unhappiness!” he could now, as he passed the mulberry, say to himself “More pleasures! more happiness!”

  Yet as he ran down the road to lunch with Lucia he was conscious that she was likely to stand, an angel perhaps, but certainly one with a flaming sword, between him and all the interests of the new life which was undoubtedly beginning to bubble in Riseholme, and to which Georgie found it so pleasant to take his little mug, and have it filled with exhilarating liquid. And if Lucia proved to be standing in his path, forbidding his approach, he, too, was armed for combat, with a revolutionary weapon, consisting of a rolled-up copy of some of Debussy’s music for the piano — Olga had lent it him a few days, — and he had been very busy over “Poissons d’or.” He was further armed by the complete knowledge of the Italian debacle of last night, which, from his knowledge of Lucia, he judged must constitute a crisis. Something would have to happen…. Several times lately Olga had, so to speak, run full-tilt into Lucia, and had passed on leaving a staggering form behind her. And in each case, so Georgie clearly perceived, Olga had not intended to butt into or stagger anybody. Each time, she had knocked Lucia down purely by accident, but if these accidents occurred with such awful frequency, it was to be expected that Lucia would find another name for them: they would have to be christened. With all his Riseholme appetite for complications and events Georgie guessed that he was not likely to go empty away from this lunch. In addition there were other topics of extraordinary interest, for really there had been very odd experiences at Mrs Quantock’s last night, when the Italian debacle was going on, a little way up the road. But he was not going to bring that out at once.

  Lucia hailed him with her most cordial manner, and with a superb effrontery began to talk Italian just as usual, though she must have guessed that Georgie knew all about last night.

  “Bon arrivato, amico mio,” she said. “Why, it must be three days since we met. Che la falto il signorino? And what have you got there?”

  Georgie, having escaped being caught over Italian, had made up his mind not to talk any more ever.

  “Oh, they are some little things by Debussy,” he said. “I want to play one of them to you afterwards. I’ve just been glancing through it.”

  “Bene, molto bene!” said she. “Come in to lunch. But I can’t promise to like it, Georgino. Isn’t Debussy the man who always makes me want to howl like a dog at the sound of the gong? Where did you get these from?”

  “Olga lent me them,” said Georgie negligently. He really did call her Olga to her face now, by request.

  Lucia’s bugles began to sound.

  “Yes, I should think Miss Bracely would admire that sort of music,” she said. “I suppose I am too old-fashioned, though I will not condemn your little pieces of Debussy before I have heard them. Old-fashioned! Yes! I was certainly too old-fashioned for the music she gave us last night. Dio mi!”

  “Oh, didn’t you enjoy it?” asked he.

  Lucia sat down, without waiting for Peppino.

  “Poor Miss Bracely!” she said. “It was very kind of her in intention to ask me, but she would have been kinder to have asked Mrs Antrobus instead, and have told her not to bring her ear-trumpet. To hear that lovely voice, for I do her justice, and there are lovely notes in her voice, lovely, to hear that voice shrieking and screaming away, in what she called the great scene, was simply pitiful. There was no melody, and above all there was no form. A musical composition is like an architectural building; it must be built up and constructed. How often have I said that! You must have colour, and you must have line, otherwise I cannot concede you the right to say you have music.”

  Lucia finished her egg in a hurry, and put her elbows on the table.

  “I hope I am not hide-bound and limited,” she said, “and I think you will acknowledge, Georgie, that I am not. Even in the divinest music of all, I am not blind to defects, if there are defects. The Moonlight Sonata, for instance. You have often heard me say that the two last movements do not approach the first in perfection of form. And if I am permitted to criticise Beethoven, I hope I may be allowed to suggest that Mr Cortese has not produced an opera which will render Fidelio ridiculous. But really I am chiefly sorry for Miss Bracely. I should have thought it worth her while to render herself not unworthy to interpret Fidelio, whatever time and trouble that cost her, rather than to seek notoriety by helping to foist on to the world a fresh combination of engine-whistles and grunts. Non e vero, Peppino? How late you are.”

  Lucia had not determined on this declaration of war without anxious consideration. But it was quite obvious to her that the enemy was daily gaining strength, and therefore the sooner she came to open hostilities the better, for it was equally obvious to her mind that Olga was a pretender to the throne she had occupied for so long. It was time to mobilise, and she had first to state her views and her plan of campaign to the chief of her staff.

  “No, we did not quite like our evening, Peppino and I, did we, caro?” she went on. “And Mr Cortese! His appearance! He is like a huge hairdresser. His touch on the piano. If you can imagine a wild bull butting at the keys, you will have some idea of it. And above all, his Italian! I gathered that he was a Neapolitan, and we all know what Neapolitan dialect is like. Tuscans and Romans, who between them I believe — Lingua Toscano in Bocca Romana, you remember — know how to speak their own tongue, find Neapolitans totally unintelligible. For myself, and I speak for mio sposo as well, I do not want to understand what Romans do not understand. La bella lingua is sufficient for me.”

  “I hear that Olga could understand him quite well,” said Georgie betraying his complete knowledge of all that had happened.

  “That may be so,” said Lucia. “I hope she understood his English too, and his music. He had not an ‘h’ when he spoke English, and I have not the slightest doubt in my own mind that his Italian was equally illiterate. It does not matter; I do not see that Mr Cortese’s linguistic accomplishments concern us. But his music does, if poor Miss Bracely, with her lovely notes, is going to study it, and appear as Lucretia. I am sorry if that is so. Any news?”

  Really it was rather magnificent, and it was war as well; of that there could not be the slightest doubt. All Riseholme, by this time, knew that Lucia and Peppino had not been able to understand a word of what Cortese had said, and here was the answer to the back-biting suggestion, vividly put forward by Mrs Weston on the green that morning, that the explanation was that Lucia and Peppino did not know Italian. They could not reasonably be expected to know Neapolitan dialect; the language of Dante satisfied their humble needs. They found it difficult to understand Cortese when he spoke English, but that did not imply that they did not know English. Dante’s tongue and Sha
kespeare’s tongue sufficed them….

  “And what were the words of the libretto like?” asked Georgie.

  Lucia fixed him with her beady eyes, ready and eager to show how delighted she was to bestow approbation wherever it was deserved.

  “Wonderful!” she said. “I felt, and so did Peppino, that the words were as utterly wasted on that formless music as was poor Miss Bracely’s voice. How did it go, Peppino? Let me think!”

  Lucia raised her head again with the far-away look.

  “Amore misterio!” she said. “Amore profondo! Amore profondo del vasto mar.” “Ah, there was our poor bella lingua again. I wonder who wrote the libretto.”

  “Mr Cortese wrote the libretto,” said Georgie.

  Lucia did not hesitate for a moment, but gave her silvery laugh.

  “Oh, dear me, no,” she said. “If you had heard him talk you would know he could not have. Well, have we not had enough of Mr Cortese and his works? Any news? What did you do last night, when Peppino and I were in our purgatorio?”

  Georgie was almost equally glad to get off the subject of Italian. The less said in or of Italian the better.

  “I was dining with Mrs Quantock,” he said. “She had a very interesting Russian woman staying with her, Princess Popoffski.”

  Lucia laughed again.

  “Dear Daisy!” she said. “Tell me about the Russian princess. Was she a Guru? Dear me, how easily some people are taken in! The Guru! Well, we were all in the same boat there. We took the Guru on poor Daisy’s valuation, and I still believe he had very remarkable gifts, curry-cook or not. But Princess Popoffski now — —”

  “We had a seance,” said Georgie.