Читать книгу Because of These Things - Bowen Marjorie - Страница 5

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Vittoria Odaleschi had a history as scandalous and romantic as any lady in the scandalous and romantic Italian States. She was the most admired, most criticized, most envied, and most powerful woman in Bologna; nothing honourable was ever said of her, neither during her childhood, when her father, the English Duke, made her, at fourteen, the hostess at his Roman feasts—nor during her brief married life, nor during her gorgeous widowhood; but she had a reputation for wit and shrewdness and daring not to be eclipsed by any reputation in the Papal See.

More money was lost, more marriages made, more rendezvous kept, and, it was added, more crimes planned, under the painted ceiling of the Palazza Odaleschi than in the whole of the rest of Italy. Her beauty was not as famous as it had been twenty years before, but she had still numerous cavaliers, and her mansion boasted the attractions of youth and fresh loveliness in the persons of her two daughters. Her high-reaching schemes to secure a brilliant match for each of her children had roused much profane laughter among her votaries, but this passionate ambition was the most laudable, as it was now the strongest of the feelings that animated her worldly soul.

On the day after the arrival of Mr. Middleton and Mr. Moutray in Bologna, the Contessa received a note from the former gentleman, written in very fair Italian, and asking when he might be received.

Vittoria smiled to think that the Englishman did not know that the Palazzo Odaleschi was always open to young men of good family with money to stake on the gambling tables and to spend on the beautiful women who followed in Vittoria's train.

She put the letter down and thought a little. She had a good memory, and she soon recollected that she had met this Mr. Middleton a year ago in Paris, when she had gone there to sell some property belonging to her late husband. She remembered that she had taken the trouble to have inquiries made about him, and had discovered that he was a rich English esquire with large estates in Surrey and with foreign tastes, unmarried, gay, but prudent. She had liked him, but he was no use to her, and her invitation to the Palazzo Odaleschi had been the mere politeness of a manner by nature and cultivation sweet and flattering.

But in a postscriptum Mr. Middleton reminded her of "her gracious offer of hospitality," and asked, in a way that admitted of no refusal, if he might bring his travelling companion, Francis Moutray, Laird of Glenillich.

Vittoria shrugged and smiled, and sent one of her black pages in a frivolous gilt cabriolet to fetch the two gentlemen and their vails from the inn. She reflected, when her messenger had gone, that she could not any longer afford to be too careless in encouraging the gallants who waited on her. There had been a great feast last night, and she had noticed that the gambling saloon was not so full as usual, and that some of the ladies had lacked cavaliers. There were many women who were her bitter enemies, very willing to do her a mischief, and she perceived, with the practical prudence that was concealed beneath her wanton frivolity, that she was losing ground, and that she would scarcely recover it unless she could bring about the marriage of her daughter Emilia with the son of Prince Orsini.

Occupied with these sombre thoughts, the Odaleschi sat in her private chamber drinking chocolate, and gazing at herself in the small mirror of Venetian glass surrounded with a border of heavy crystal flowers that hung above her ormolu toilet-table.

Everything in the room was luxurious, splendid, ponderous: the lofty ceiling was crowded with bright paintings of cupids, birds, flowers, and fantastic shields displaying the Odaleschi quarterings; the floor and walls were covered in Eastern tapestries, and the bed was hung with heavy draperies of blue and yellow Genoa velvet. Above the bed was an elaborate crucifix in gold and ebony, and beneath it a lamp of lapis-lazuli on a gilt bracket, while on the opposite wall was a painting of the school of Rubens, representing the Rape of Ganymede.

The Contessa's perfumes, lotions, powders, rouges, pomades, Hungary waters, and pastilles were all encased in chased gold; the candlesticks were gold also, and heavy enough and tall enough to light the holy vessels on the altar instead of the toilet of the Odaleschi. She was fond of telling in her mad moments how a cardinal, who was in love with her, had robbed these candlesticks from his church and put gilt in the place of them, with a pound of lead in each to make them heavy.

But she was in no mad humour now but one very pensive, as she sat with her chin propped on her hand and gazed across the profaned gold on her dressing-table at the reflection in the mirror that hung on the wall beyond. No one knew her age, but she had long left her youth behind.

Still the Northern blood of her father had served her well in preserving her beauty long after the period when her Southern rivals faded. Her nut-brown hair was still abundant and glossy, her figure still comely and straight, and if her large dark eyes were no longer perfectly brilliant and no cosmetics could quite disguise the ravages on her soft face, if she kept her throat covered even when her bosom was bare, still, by candlelight, when dressed with art, she was yet a beauty by reason of the delicacy of her features, the grace of her movements, her expression of sweetness and gaiety.

She wore, as she sat before the mirror, a robe of white silk with raised flowers in velvet that fell open over a gown of lawn and lace that swathed her to the chin; heelless slippers of crimson brocade hung on her feet which rested on a small red cushion; on her lap was a silver box full of bonbons wrapped in blue and pink papers.

After a long and intent scrutiny of her reflection she threw back her head with a half-humorous, half-defiant movement.

"Ah, Dio!" she exclaimed, "it is nearly over!"

When her face was utterly bereft of beauty she would be as bankrupt as the merchant who has lived on trading in silver and gold, and one day finds the mines empty and himself ruined, if he has not been prudent enough to save from the fat days.

And the Contessa had not saved a maravedi; her sole investments were her two daughters, and she was hampered there, because, for the first time in her life, she felt proud objection to anything ignoble; when it was a question of her children she was virtuous and rigid. She wished to sell her daughters, but the price was to be marriage, an honourable name, a fine establishment; and the girls had been educated, guarded, kept severely in a convent, for this end.

"When they are married they may do as they please," smiled the Contessa, "but there shall be no breath against them before."

And her smile became bitter when she reflected that she might have married a reigning Duke, had not scandal so persistently connected her name with a Roman noble that her father was glad to give her to the Contestabile Colonna, who took his bride and her dowry without question, which no other of her admirers had been prepared to do; and when for the first time a widow, scandal had prevented her securing a finer second match than a Bolognese noble.

"If I had not been a little fool," thought Vittoria, "I might have been the mistress of a court instead of a burnt-out woman scheming how she may escape penury."

She rose to shake off these recollections, and the forgotten silver box of bonbons fell from her lap, and the blue and pink papers scattered over the floor.

The stiff velvet was pulled aside from the door, and Giovanna Odaleschi entered.

When she saw the scattered bonbons she stooped without a word and began picking them up.

Vittoria watched her daughter with an eager expression touched with fierceness; the younger woman was in the full radiance of opening beauty—a creature of colour, of softness, of sparkle and grace.

Her white, slightly untidy mob showed the long curves of her rounded limbs; her hair, as dull a yellow as amber, was carelessly knotted with a black velvet ribbon. Her warm, flushed, dusky blonde beauty had a peculiar character; her neck was long, her features small, her lips full, her brow low, her eyes large, slow-moving, and of a sleepy look, the deep brown of them veiled by the gold glint of lashes thick and curved. She was lovely and complete in her loveliness, but she was not the classical type then in fashion; there was more in her of the bacchante or nymph than the goddess or the queenly women so admired, and there were those who found the touch of the strange in her far from attractive. The Orsini prince, who was wooing her sister, had likened her, with her long body, long throat, small head, and cluster of yellow hair, to the Medusa changing to the snake.

Her mother caught a little sigh in her throat. Emilia would be safe in the Palazzo Orsini, if human wits could get her there—but how could Giovanna be provided for?

So far she had evoked no offers in the marriage mart of the Odaleschi palace.

"Come here," said Vittoria gravely and with a yearning note.

The girl obeyed and came, her hands full of the sweetmeats. Vittoria put her bleached, perfumed, and cool fingers under her daughter's round chin. Giovanna stood controlled but restive, with shifting eyes.

"Have you a lover, Vanna?" asked Vittoria intently and sadly.

"No," said the girl frankly, "nor am I like to have till you have married Emilia. She will permit no gallant to come within reach of the tip of my fan."

"Is there anyone you want for a lover, Vanna?"

"No."

Vittoria gazed into the small exquisite face. She saw passion there and wit and gaiety, wilfulness and pride, but she did not trace in those fair features the strength of will, the clearness of intelligence, the judgment and penetration that had balanced her own hot-blooded follies and imprudences.

"Trust me, carina," she said rapidly. "I will make you a princess—only wait, be patient, be prudent—Emilia is three years older."

A mischievous look brightened the sleepy brown eyes to a golden flash.

"I have only left the convent six months," returned Giovanna, "and you are always warning me! What do you think I shall do?"

She gently moved her face from her mother's hand and shook the bonbons on to the dressing-table.

Vittoria thought of her own youth.

"You have plenty of temptation to fall in love," she said.

"And if I do?" answered the girl. "I am nineteen. You were married at fifteen."

"Yes," said the Contessa sharply, "that is why I sent you and Emilia to a convent. I did not want you spoilt too."

"Spoilt?" Giovanna laughed lightly and freshly. "Madonna! You have had a lovely life!"

Vittoria looked at her swiftly, then sank into the chair before the dressing-table.

"Listen to me, Vanna," she said coldly. "I have plans for you. I know you are impulsive and impatient, and that is why I speak to you plainly. You are going to marry a great man—there is no one coming here at present good enough for you—you must marry as well as Emilia, if not better—"

"Emilia is not married yet," remarked Giovanna with a touch of malice.

Vittoria glanced over her shoulder, and the vigour and energy that had made her a power in her time showed in her alert face.

"Emilia will marry—as I wish," she said, "and so will you. Amuse yourself with these cavaliers, but go no further with them than compliments."

Giovanna came behind her mother's chair and gazed at the reflection of her glowing face in the thick Venetian mirror.

"How can I," she replied, "when you always have an old woman about me?"

"When you are married," said her mother, "you shall do as you wish."

"Dio!" cried Giovanna, "when will you marry me?"

"When I can find the husband rich enough and powerful enough, Vanna."

She was still turned in her chair, and as she spoke was gazing anxiously into the careless young face above her shoulder.

"Carina," she said, with a sudden deep note in her voice, "you do believe that I love you and am labouring for your good, do you not?"

Giovanna instantly flung her arms about her mother.

"Madre mia!" she cried passionately. "I care for no one at all but you. I will do whatever you tell me. I do not love anyone; no, I do not think I ever shall, either. Find me a good-tempered husband, carissima, and I shall be content."

Vittoria returned the embrace ardently and gazed into her daughter's face with searching eyes. Giovanna's frank innocency of expression put the seal of truth on her simple words; she was untouched as yet by any emotion, plastic to any influences, heart-whole and joyous.

"Jesu and the Holy Virgin protect you," said Vittoria in a trembling voice; she felt that, as she embraced her daughter, she was enfolding her own lost girlhood—and that innocence and light-heartedness which she herself had never known.

Giovanna gravely drew a crucifix of gold and ivory from the bosom of her mob and pressed it reverently to her lips; attached to the fine chain by which this crucifix was fastened to her neck was a little reliquary that contained a lock of the hair of Santa Caterina of Alexandria.

"I am well protected," said the girl, with a serious look. "Santa Caterina guards me! The Reverend Mother said this holy relic would bring a blessing."

"So it will," returned Vittoria; she was still a religious woman, despite everything, and a generous benefactress of the Church. "Keep it, Vanna, always, and pray to the saint every night to give you a good husband; and when you tell your rosary add a prayer to the Holy Virgin to the same purpose."

Giovanna slipped her treasures back into her slender bosom, over her gay young heart, and turning lightly about, snatched up some of the bonbons and began to unwrap them and crack them with her strong white teeth.

"When are you going to give another festa?" she asked.

"When Emilia is married," replied the Contessa firmly.

Giovanna made a grimace.

"Not before?"

"Not a soldi more do I spend on dazzling the Orsini," said Vittoria. "He is in love—let love work his way. Besides, child, it is as well you should know that we have very little money now. Once "—her eyes gleamed—"there was a festa every night for me."

"Ah!" exclaimed Giovanna greedily; she stretched her limbs with a luxurious movement, "will the Orsini give Emilia a festa every night?"

"He is one of the greatest princes in Rome," returned the Contessa drily.

"Find me such a lord!" cried the girl.

"If there is such another in Italy, you shall be his wife," returned her mother, with the old indomitable spirit flushing her faded cheek and restoring something of the lost brilliancy of her beauty.

Giovanna stood thoughtfully silent; the glamour of the dawn of life's spring-time showed in her eyes and in her fresh lips.

"Is it better to be loved or to have a festa every night?" she asked gravely.

The Contessa stretched out her hand for her gilt rouge pot.

"Tell Clarisse to come to me," she said. "I must dress—two strangers are to attend the reception this afternoon—nay, they have produced an old invitation and must stay here—foreigners, Vanna."

"I hate foreigners." Giovanna ate another sweetmeat.

"An Englishman and a Scotchman," continued Vittoria.

"On their way to Rome, to the Palazzo Muti?—the King of England?" demanded Giovanna with some interest.

"I have only met one of these cavaliers," answered the Contessa languidly, "and from what I can recall he was very staunch for the established government in England, and spoke of His Majesty at Rome as the Pretender only."

Giovanna lifted her shoulders.

"I do not know when they will arrive," continued the Contessa, "but if I am not ready, you will receive them—you and Emilia. I believe they are persons of quality," she added.

Giovanna came to her gracefully, kissed her, and left the room with a smiling farewell.

When she was alone Vittoria slipped back in her chair in a weary attitude, and, holding her hand over her brow, began to consider how she could use Emilia's marriage (when it was accomplished) to secure a match as brilliant for Giovanna; the younger girl was nearer her heart, and she forgot her own troubles in dreaming over the gorgeous future she might gain for her tall golden daughter.