Our Own Set Part 7

"Ah, here they are--I am sitting on them--now then, children," and she began to read the letter aloud.

"Dear Lotti, you must not take it ill that I so seldom write to you"--the baroness looked up over her spectacles--"so seldom!... she never in her life wrote to me so often as from Rome"--"but you cannot imagine the turmoil in which we live. A dinner-party every day, two evening parties and a ball. We are spending the carnival with the _creme de la creme_ of Roman society. To-morrow we dine with Princess Vulpini--she was a Truyn and is the sister of Truyn of R. The next day we have theatricals, etc., etc. Zinka is an immense success. Nicki Sempaly among others--the brother of Prince Sempaly, the great landed proprietor--is very attentive to her...."

Here she was interrupted by her husband. "Well, I never thought the old goose was quite such a simpleton!" he exclaimed, drumming his fingers angrily on the red and white flowered cloth.

"I cannot imagine how Clotilde allows it!" cried the baroness--"and still less do I understand Cecil."

"Take my advice, Lotti, go to Rome," observed the baron ironically; "go and set their heads straight on their shoulders."

"With the greatest pleasure," replied his wife, taking his irony quite seriously, "but unfortunately we have not the money."

Then she read the letter to the end; like all Clotilde's epistles it ended with the words; "What a pity it is that you should not be here too; it would give us the greatest pleasure to have you with us."

Tea was done; the maid servant cleared the table with a great clatter of cups and spoons, the baron retired to play _Bulka_ with his neighbors in the village inn-parlor; the three who were left sat in meditative mood.

"I must confess that I should like to go to Rome," said the baroness, as she swept the crumbs off her lap on to the floor, "and it would be pleasant, too, to have relations there--for their grand acquaintance I own I do not care a straw."

"I do not see why we should avoid all society if we were there,"

exclaimed Slawa hotly.

"Well, you could do as you liked about it, of course," said the baroness, who held her daughter in the deepest respect, "I could stay at home; you see, my dear Vladimir," she added almost condescendingly to her son-in-law _in spe_, "I am uncomfortable in any company where I cannot get into my slippers in the evening...."

"Mamma!" cried her daughter beside herself, "you really are!..."

The baroness sat abashed and silent--no one spoke. There was not a sound in the room but the crackling of the fire in the huge tiled stove and the snoring of the big hunting-dog that lay sleeping on the tail of his mistress's skirt.

"If we only could sell the Bernini!" murmured the baroness presently, resuming the thread of their conversation.

The Bernini was a bust of Apollo that the baroness had inherited from her mother's family--said to be an adaptation by Bernini from the head of the Apollo Belvedere. Whenever the Wolnitzkys were in any financial straits the Bernini was packed off to some dealer in objects of _vertu_, from which excursions it invariably returned unsold. Not many days previously the travelled Apollo--he had seen New York, London, and St. Petersburg--had come home from a visit to Meyer of Berlin.

"By the bye, Vladimir, you have not seen it yet," said Slawa, "I must show you the bust."

"Is it the head that is said to be so strikingly like you?--that will interest me greatly," said the young Pole, casting an adoring eye on Slawa.

"Bring the lamp, the bust is in the drawing-room."

Vladimir, carrying the lamp, led the way into the drawing-room, a large, scantily-furnished room which was never dusted more than once a month. There, on a marble plinth in a corner, stood the radiant G.o.d--a copy from the Belvedere Apollo no doubt--but by Bernini...?

"The likeness is extraordinary!" cried Vladimir ecstatically, and gazing alternately at the bust and at Slawa. "Oh, it is a gem, a masterpiece! you ought never to part with it."

"Well, but I must say I should very much like to go to Rome," sighed the baroness; but Slawa only bit her lips.

CHAPTER VIII.

"And what shall we do to-morrow?" Sempaly would ask Zinka almost every evening when he met her, fresh and smiling, at some party; he had made it his task to help her to find her lost Rome and devoted himself to it with praiseworthy diligence.

The disappointment that she had experienced in her expedition under the guidance of the _botta_ driver to the ruins of the capital of the Caesars is a common enough phenomenon; it comes over almost everyone who sets out with his fancy crammed with the mystical cobwebs that recent literature has spun round the name of Rome, to see for the first time that dense ma.s.s of splendor and rubbish among the bare modern houses. And the disappointment is greatest in those who come from a long stay in Venice or Verona. Rome has none of the seductive charm of those North Italian cities. Its architecture is sombre and heavy, and the prevailing hues in winter are a sober grey and a dull bluish-green, more suggestive of a subtly toned tempera picture than of a glowing oil painting. It is vain to look for the sheen of the s.h.i.+mmering lagoons or the fantastic outline of the campaniles against the sky of Venice; for the half-ruined frescoes, or amber suns.h.i.+ne of Verona.

"After the cities of North Italy Rome has the effect of a severe choral by Handel after a nocturne by Chopin. The first impression is crus.h.i.+ng," said Sempaly to Zinka; "but one wearies of the nocturne, and never of the choral."

To which Zinka replied: "But the choral is so drowned by trivial hurdy-gurdy tunes that I find it very difficult to follow." To which he laughed and said: "We will speak of that again in a fortnight."

By the end of the fortnight Zinka had thrown two _soldi_ into the Fountain of Trevi to make sure that she should some day see Rome again, and in fanaticism for Rome she outdid even the fanatical General von Klinger. Sempaly had contributed mainly to her conversion. Nothing could be more amusing or more interesting than to explore every nook of the city of ruins under his escort. He was constantly remembering this or that wonderful thing that he must positively show to Zinka. An artistic bas-relief that had been built to some queer orange-colored house above a tobacconist's, or a heathen divinity which had had wings attached to its shoulders to qualify it for admission as an angel into a Christian church. He rode out with her into the Campagna, and pointed out all the most picturesque parts of the Trastevere, and he could find a ridiculous suggestion even in the most reverend things. The halls of the Vatican in which the liberal minded Vicars of Christ have granted a refuge to the pensioners of antiquity, he called the Poor-house of the G.o.ds; and always spoke of St. Peter's, which is commonly known as _la Parocchia dei Forestieri_, as the Papal Grand Hotel. There was not a fountain, a fragment of sculpture, or a picturesque heap of ruins of which he could not relate some history, comic or pathetic, or he invented one; but he never produced the impression that he was giving a lecture. He had in fact a particularly unpretending way of telling an appropriate and not too lengthy anecdote; he never handed it round on a waiter, as it were, for examination, but let it drop quietly out of his pocket. His knowledge of art was but shallow, but his feeling for it, like all his instincts, was amazingly keen. His information on all subjects was miscellaneous and slender, not an article of his intellectual wardrobe--as Charles Lamb has it--was whole; but he draped himself in the rags with audacious grace and made no attempt to hide the holes.

Truyn and his little daughter often joined them in these expeditions, and sometimes Cecil, but only when his mother did not choose to go out, and his demeanor on these occasions--'peripatetic aesthetics' he called their walks--was highly characteristic. He would walk by the side of his sister and Sempaly, or a few steps behind them, sunk in silence but always sharply observant. From time to time he would correct their cicerone in his dates, which Sempaly took with sublime indifference and for which--taking off his hat--he invariably thanked him with princely courtesy. Sterzl only sympathized with the cla.s.sical style of the Renaissance; the real antiques which Zinka raved about he smiled at as caricatures; Guido on the other hand--for whom Sempaly had a weakness, as a Chopin among painters--Sterzl detested. He declared that the Beatrice Cenci had a cold wet bandage on her head, and that the picture was nothing more than a study apparently made from an idiot in a mad-house. When Zinka talked of her favorite antiques or other works in the mystical and sentimental slang of the clique, he laughed at her, but quite good-naturedly. He scorned all extravagance and raptures as cant and affectation. Still he was merciful to his sister, and when she turned from a Francia with tears in her eyes, or turned pale as she quoted Sh.e.l.ley, or spoke of Leonardo's Medusa in Florence, he did no more than shrug his shoulders and say: "Zinka, you are crazy," or gently pull her by the ear. Everything in Zinka was right, even her want of sound common sense.

The baroness had at last found a lodging, almost to her mind: a small palazzo in a side street, off the Corso, "furnished in atrocious taste, but otherwise very nice." The palazetto was in fact a gem in its way, with a simple and elegant stone front and a court surrounded by a colonnade with red camellia shrubs and a fountain in the midst. There were several much injured antique statues too, one of which was a famous and very beautiful Amazon at whose feet a rose-bush bloomed profusely. This Amazon struck Zinka as remarkably picturesque and she sketched her from every point of view without ever reading the warning in her sad face. Alas! Zinka had gazed at the sun and it had blinded her.

But how could Cecil allow this daily-growing intimacy between Sempaly and his sister? Sempaly's elder brother, Prince Sempaly, had been married ten years and was childless, so the attache, as heir presumptive, was in duty bound to make a brilliant marriage. Did not Sterzl know this? Yes, he knew it, but he did not trouble his head about it. He was under no illusion as to the singularity, not to say the improbability of Sempaly marrying a girl of inferior birth; he had no desire that it should be otherwise. He was no democrat; on the contrary, his was a particularly conservative and old world nature, equally remote from cringing or from envy. That Sempaly should marry any other girl not his equal in rank would have struck him as altogether wrong, but Zinka--Zinka was different. He wors.h.i.+pped her as only a strong elder brother call wors.h.i.+p a much younger weaker sister and there was no social elevation of which he deemed her unworthy. And when he saw Sempaly smile down so tenderly and at the same time so respectfully on his 'b.u.t.terfly,' as he called her, he was rejoiced at her good fortune and never for an instant doubted it Zinka was not sentimental. For a long time there was no tinge of any feeling stronger than good fellows.h.i.+p in her intercourse with Sempaly; her talk was all fun, her glance saucy and wilful. By degrees, however, a change came over her; her whole manner softened, there was a gentle dreaminess even in her caprice and when she smiled it was often with tears in her eyes.

Sempaly was not regular in his visits to the palazetto; sometimes for two or three days he failed to appear, then he would call very early--at noon perhaps, join the family unceremoniously at their breakfast, go out driving with the ladies, accept an invitation to stay to dinner, and if Zinka was looking pale or out of spirits, he would pay her fifty kind little attentions to conjure a smile to her lips.

Occasionally he would fall into the melancholy vein and talk of his loveless youth, and let her pity him for it. He would tell her about his elder brother, praising his many n.o.ble qualities, and then add with a shrug: "Yes, he is a splendid fellow, but ... he has ideas!" When Zinka asked what sort of ideas, Sempaly sighed: "I hope you may some day know him and then you can judge for yourself."

But this was in a low tone and he seemed to regret having said it. Then he would frequently allude to this or that picture in his brother's house at Vienna, or to some curious family relic, and say how much he should like some day to show it to Zinka. His favorite theme, however, was Erzburg, the old castle which for numberless generations had been the family summer-retreat of the Sempalys and of which he was pa.s.sionately fond. Excepting as regards this estate he was singularly free from all false or family pride; he declared that his brother's Vienna palace was an unhealthy barrack, scouted at the Sempaly breed of horses, laughed at the Sempaly nose, and praised the traditional Sempaly tokay more in irony than in good faith--but then he came round to Erzburg again and simply raved about it Not about the oriental luxury with which part of the castle was fitted up--not in the best taste--of that he never spoke; indeed, he said more about its deficiencies than its perfections, but in a tone of such loving excuse!

He talked of the large bare rooms where, for years, he had watched for the apparition of the white lady, half longing, half dreading to see her; of the doleful groaning of the weather-c.o.c.k of the _rococo_ statues in the grounds, and of the gloomy pools with their low sad murmur, and their carpet of white waterlilies. The statues were bad, the pools unhealthy he admitted, and yet, as he said it, his usually mocking glance was soft and almost devout Once, when Zinka had grown quite dismal over his reminiscences, he took her hand and pressed it tenderly to his lips: "You must see Erzburg some day," he murmured.

His behavior to her was that of a man who is perfectly clear as to his own intentions but who for some reason is not immediately free to sue for the hand of a girl whom in his heart of hearts he already regards as his own. What did he mean by all this? What was he thinking of? I believe absolutely nothing. He went with the tide. There are many men like him, selfish, luxurious natures who swim with the stream of life and never attempt to steer; they have for the most part happy tempers, they are content with any harbor so long as they reach it without effort or damage, and if in their pa.s.sive course they run down any one else they exclaim with their usual amiable politeness: "Oh! I beg your pardon!" and are quite satisfied that the mishap was due to fate and not to any fault of theirs.

CHAPTER IX.

It was in the end of February, shortly before the close of the carnival. Truyn, going to the Sterzls' with his little girl to take a walk with Zinka, saw at the door of the palazetto a hackney carriage with a small portmanteau on the top. Sterzl's man-servant, an elegant person with close-cut hair, shaved all but a short beard, and wearing an impressive watch-chain, was condescending to exchange a few words with the driver blinking in the suns.h.i.+ne.

The drawing-room into which Truyn and his daughter were admitted unannounced was in the full blaze of light. The motes danced their aimless rainbow-colored dance; in the middle of the room stood Zinka with both hands on a table over which she was bending to gaze at a magnificent basket of flowers. There was something in her att.i.tude, quaint but graceful, in the elegant line of her bust, the pathetic joy of her radiant face, the soft flow of her plain long dress, which stamped the picture once and for ever on Truyn's memory. A sunbeam wantoned in her hair turning it to gold and her whole figure was the embodiment of sweet and happy spring delight The basket of flowers, too, was a masterpiece of its kind--a _capriccio_ of lilies of the valley, gardenias, snow-flakes, and pale-tinted roses, that looked as though the wayward west-wind had blown them into company. Sterzl was standing by, with a pleased smile, and the baroness, in an att.i.tude of affected astonishment, stood a little apart with a visiting-card in her hand. Neither Cecil nor his sister--she absorbed in the flowers and he in gazing at her--had heard Truyn arrive. When he knocked at the door the baroness said "come in," and gave him the tips of her fingers; then, with a wave of her hand towards the basket, she lisped out: "Did you ever see such extravagance!"

Zinka looked up and welcomed him and so did Sterzl. "It is perfect folly ... quite reckless...." sighed the baroness, "such a basket of flowers costs a fortune. Why, only one gardenia...."

Zinka's underlip pouted impatiently and Sterzl said in his dry way:

"My dear mother, do not destroy Zinka's illusions; the basket fell from heaven expressly for her and she does not want to believe that it was bought, just like any other, in the Via Condotti or Babuino. What do you say, Count? Sempaly sent it to her to console her for the departure of her brother. The reason is too absurd, do not you think? I do not believe you would miss me particularly for a few days, child?" and he put his hand affectionately under her chin.

"Where are you off to so suddenly?" asked Truyn very seriously.

"To Naples. Franz Arnsperg has telegraphed to me to ask me to meet him there; he is on his way to Paris from Constantinople, and he is a great friend of mine and has come by way of Naples on purpose that we may meet."

"The Arnsperg-Meiringens; you know their property adjoins ours," the baroness explained. Sterzl, who knew very well that Truyn was far better informed as to the Arnsperg-Meiringens than his mother, was annoyed and uncomfortable. However, he kissed her hand and then turned to his sister:

"G.o.d s.h.i.+eld you, my darling b.u.t.terfly--write me a few lines, or is that too much to ask?" Then he kissed her and whispered: "Mind you have not lost those bright eyes by the time I return."

Truyn accompanied him to the carriage with a very long face; he and General von Klinger had watched Sempaly's conduct with much disquietude, they knew him to be susceptible but not impressionable, alive to every new emotion; and Truyn would ere this have spoken to Sempaly on the subject if he had not been sure that it would merely provoke and irritate him without producing any good effect; the general, on the other hand, could not make up his mind to open Sterzl's eyes to the state of affairs because, like Baron Stockmar, he had an invincible dislike to interfering in matters that did not concern him.

Like that famous man, not for worlds would he have committed an indiscretion to save a friend for whom he would have sacrificed his life; and this terror of being indiscreet is a form of cowardice which is considered meritorious in the fas.h.i.+onable world.