My Friend Prospero Part 13

And John responded aloud, with fervour, "Indeed, indeed it is."

"And so romantic," she added. "It is like a scene out of some old high musical romance."

"The most romantic scene I know," said he. "All my life I have thought so."

"Oh?" said she, looking surprise. "Have you known it all your life?"

"Well,--very nearly," said he, with half a laugh. "I saw it first when I was ten. Then for long years I lost it,--and only recovered it, by accident, a month ago."

Her face showed her interest. "Oh? How was that? How did it happen?"

"When I was ten," John recounted, half laughing again, "I was travelling with my father, and, among the many places we visited, one seemed to me a very vision of romance made real. A vast and stately castle, in a garden, in a valley, with splendid halls and chambers, and countless beautiful pictures of women. All my life I remembered it, dreamed of it, longed to see it again. But I hadn't a notion where it was, save vaguely that it was somewhere in Italy; and, my poor father being dead, there was no one I could ask. Then, wandering in these parts a month ago, I stumbled upon it, and recognized it. Though shrunken a good deal in size, to be sure, it was still recognizable, and as romantic as ever."

Maria Dolores listened pensively. When he had reached his period, her eyes lighted up. "What a charming adventure!" she said. "And so, for you, besides its general romance, the place has a personal one, all your own. I, too, have known it for long years, but only from photographs. I suppose I should never have seen the real thing, except for a friend of mine coming to live here."

"I wonder," said John, "that the people who own it never live here."

"The Prince of Zelt-Neuminster?" said she. "No,--he doesn't like the Italian Government. Since Lombardy pa.s.sed from Austria to Italy, the family have entirely given up staying at Sant' Alessina."

"In those circ.u.mstances," said John, "practical-minded people, I should think, would get rid of the place."

"Oh," said she, laughing, "the Prince, in some ways, is practical-minded enough. He has this great collection of Italian paintings, which, by Italian law, he mayn't remove from Italian soil; and if he were to get rid of Sant' Alessina, where could he house them? In other ways, though, he is perhaps not so practical. He is one of those Utopians who believe that the present Kingdom of Italy must perforce before long make s.h.i.+pwreck; and I think he holds on to Sant' Alessina in the dream of coming here in triumph, and grandly celebrating that event."

"I see," said John, nodding. "That is a beautiful ideal."

"Good-bye," said she, flas.h.i.+ng a last quick smile into his eyes; and she moved away, down a garden path, towards the pavilion beyond the clock.

III

And now, I should have imagined, for a single session, (and that an initial one), he had had enough. I should have expected him to spend the remainder of his day, a full man, in thankful tranquillity, in agreeable retrospective rumination. But no. Indulgence, it soon appeared, had but whetted his appet.i.te. After a quarter-hour of walking about the garden, during which his jumble of sensations and impressions,--her soft-glowing eyes, her soft-drooping hair, under her wine-red hat; her slender figure, in its fluttering summery muslin, and the faint, faint perfume (like a far-away memory of rose-leaves) that hovered near her; her smile, and the curves, when she smiled, of her rose-red lips, and the gleam of her snow-white teeth; her laugh, her voice, her ivory voice; her pretty crisp-cut English; her appreciation of Annunziata, her disquieting presentiments concerning her; and his deep satisfaction in her propinquity, her "companions.h.i.+p;" and the long shaded fragrant avenue, and the bird-songs, and the gentle weather,--after a quarter-hour of anything but thankful tranquillity, a quarter-hour of unaccountable excitement and exaltation, during which his jumble of impressions and sensations settled themselves, from ebullition, into some sort of quiescence, he began to grow restlessly aware that, so far from having had enough, he had had just a sufficient taste to make him hunger keenly for more and more. It was ridiculous, but he couldn't help it. And as there seemed no manner of likelihood that his hunger would soon be fed, it was trying. At the best, he could not reasonably hope to see her again before to-morrow; and even then--? What ghost of a reason had he to hope that even then he could renew their conversation? He had owed that to-day to the bare hazard of their ways lying together.

To-morrow, very likely, at the best, he might get a bow and a smile.

Very likely it might be days before he should again have anything approaching a real talk with her. And what--a new consideration, that struck a sudden terror to his soul--what if her visit to Frau Brandt was to be a short one? What if to-morrow even, she were to depart? "Her very ease in talking with me, a stranger, may quite well have been due to the fact that she knew she would never see me again," he argued. ...

So he was working himself into a fine state of despondency, and the world was rapidly being resolved into dust and ashes, when Heaven sent him a diversion. Nay, indeed, Heaven sent him two diversions.

IV

There was a sound of wheels on gravel, of horses' hoofs on stone, and Lady Blanchemain's great high-swung barouche, rolling superbly forth from the avenue, drew up before the Castle, Lady Blanchemain herself, big and soft and sumptuous in silks and laces, under a much-befurbelowed, much-befringed, lavender-hued silk sunshade, occupying the seat of honour. John hastened across the garden, hat in hand, to welcome her.

"Jump in," she commanded, with a smile, and an imperious sweep of the arm. "I have come to take you for a drive."

The footman (proud man) held open the door, and John jumped in. But just as the footman (with an air) had closed the door behind him, and before the coachman had touched up his horses, there came a rhythm of running footsteps, and the voice of Annunziata called, insistently, "Prospero!

Prospero!" Then, all out of breath, her pale cheeks pink, her curls in disarray, Annunziata arrived beside the carriage, and, no wise abashed by that magnificent equipage, nor by the magnificent old lady throning in it, (no wise abashed, but, from the roundness of her eyes, a good deal surprised and vastly curious), she explained, gasping, "A telegram," and held up to John a straw-coloured envelope.

"Thank you," said he, taking it, and waving a friendly hand. "But you should not run so fast," he admonished her, with concern.

Whereupon the carriage drove off, Annunziata standing and watching, always round-eyed, till it was out of sight.

"What an interesting-looking child!" said Lady Blanchemain.

"Yes," said John. "I should have liked to introduce her to you."

"Who is she?" asked the lady.

"She's the private detective I told you of. She's my affinity. She's the young limb o' mischief for whom I ravaged your stores of marchpane.

She's the niece of the parroco."

"Hum!" said Lady Blanchemain. "Why does she call you--what was it?--Prospero?"

"She's an optimist. She's a bird of good omen," answered John. "She's satisfied herself, by consulting an oracle, that Fortune has favours up her sleeve for me. She encouragingly antic.i.p.ates them by calling me Prospero before the fact."

Lady Blanchemain softly laughed. "That's very nice of her, and very wise. Aren't you going to read your telegram?"

"I didn't know whether you'd permit," said John.

"Oh pray," said she, with a gesture.

The carriage by this time had left the garden, and the coachman had turned his horses' heads northwards, away from the lake, towards the Alps, where their snowy summits, attenuated by the sun and the distance and the blue air, looked like vapours rising into the sky.

John tore open his envelope, read, frowned, and uttered a half-stifled e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.i.o.n,--something that sounded rather like "I say!" and vaguely like "By Jove!"

"No bad news, I hope?" inquired the lady, sympathetic, and trying to speak as if she didn't know what curiosity meant.

"Excellent news, on the contrary," said John, "but a bolt from the blue." And he offered her the paper.

"Am on my way to Rome," she read aloud. "Could I come to you for a day?

Winthorpe, Hotel Cavour, Milan."--"Winthorpe?" She pursed her lips, as one tasting something. "I don't know the name. Who is he? What's his County?" she demanded,--she, who carried the County Families in her head.

John chuckled. "He hasn't got a County--he's only an American," he said, p.r.o.nouncing that genial British formula with intention.

"Oh," sighed Lady Blanchemain, her expectations dashed; and drawing in her skirts, she sank a little deeper into her corner.

"He hasn't got a County," repeated John. "But he's far and away the greatest swell I know."

"A swell? An American?" Lady Blanchemain pressed down her lips, and gave a movement to her shoulders.

"An aristocrat, a patrician," said John.

"Fudge!" said Lady Blanchemain. "Americans and Australians--they're anything you like, but they're never that."

John laughed. "I adore," he said, "our light and airy British way of tarring Americans and Australians with the same brush,--the descendants of transported convicts and the descendants of the Pilgrim Fathers!"