The Cardinal's Snuff-Box Part 37

By and by the Cardinal closed his Breviary, and put it in his pocket.

I suppose he had finished his office for the day. Then he came and sat down in one of the wicker chairs, under the awning. On the table, among the books and things, stood a carafe of water, some tumblers, a silver sugar-bowl, and a crystal dish full of fresh pomegranate seeds. It looked like a dish full of unset rubies. The Cardinal poured some water into a tumbler, added a lump of sugar and a spoonful of pomegranate seeds, stirred the mixture till it became rose-coloured, and drank it off in a series of little sips.

"What is the matter, Beatrice?" he asked, all at once.

Beatrice raised her eyes, perplexed.

"The matter--? Is anything the matter?"

"Yes," said the Cardinal; "something is the matter. You are depressed, you are nervous, you are not yourself. I have noticed it for many days.

Have you something on, your mind?"

"Nothing in the world," Beatrice answered, with an appearance of great candour. "I had not noticed that I was nervous or depressed."

"We are entering October," said the Cardinal. "I must return to Rome. I have been absent too long already. I must return next week. But I should not like to go away with the feeling that you are unhappy."

"If a thing were needed to make me unhappy, it would be the announcement of your intended departure," Beatrice said, smiling. "But otherwise, I am no more unhappy than it is natural to be. Life, after all, is n't such a furiously gay business as to keep one perpetually singing and dancing--is it? But I am not especially unhappy."

"H'm," said the Cardinal. Then, in a minute, "You will come to Rome in November, I suppose?" he asked.

"Yes--towards the end of November, I think," said Beatrice.

The Cardinal rose, and began to walk backwards and forwards again.

In a little while the sound of carriage-wheels could be heard, in the sweep, round the corner of the house.

The Cardinal looked at his watch.

"Here is the carriage," he said. "I must go down and see that poor old woman.... Do you know," he added, after a moment's hesitation, "I think it would be well if you were to go with me."

A shadow came into Beatrice's eyes.

"What good would that do?" she asked.

"It would give her pleasure, no doubt. And besides, she is one of your paris.h.i.+oners, as it were. I think you ought to go. You have never been to see her since she fell ill."

"Oh--well," said Beatrice.

She was plainly unwilling. But she went to put on her things.

In the carriage, when they had pa.s.sed the village and crossed the bridge, as they were bowling along the straight white road that led to the villa, "What a long time it is since Mr. Marchdale has been at Ventirose," remarked the Cardinal.

"Oh--? Is it?" responded Beatrice, with indifference.

"It is more than three weeks, I think--it is nearly a month," the Cardinal said.

"Oh--?" said she.

"He has had his hands full, of course; he has had little leisure," the Cardinal pursued. "His devotion to his poor old servant has been quite admirable. But now that she is practically recovered, he will be freer."

"Yes," said Beatrice.

"He is a young man whom I like very much," said the Cardinal. "He is intelligent; he has good manners; and he has a fine sense of the droll.

Yes, he has wit--a wit that you seldom find in an Anglo-Saxon, a wit that is almost Latin. But you have lost your interest in him? That is because you despair of his conversion?"

"I confess I am not greatly interested in him," Beatrice answered. "And I certainly have no hopes of his conversion."

The Cardinal smiled at his ring. He opened his snuffbox, and inhaled a long deliberate pinch of snuff.

"Ah, well--who can tell?" he said. "But--he will be free now, and it is so long since he has been at the castle--had you not better ask him to luncheon or dinner?"

"Why should I?" answered Beatrice. "If he does not come to Ventirose, it is presumably because he does not care to come. If he does care to come, he needs no invitation. He knows that he is at liberty to call whenever he likes."

"But it would be civil, it would be neighbourly, to ask him to a meal,"

the Cardinal submitted.

"And it would put him in the embarra.s.sing predicament of having either to accept against his will, or to decline and appear ungracious,"

submitted Beatrice. "No, it is evident that Ventirose does not amuse him."

"Bene," said the Cardinal. "Be it as you wish."

But when they reached Villa Floriano, Peter was not at home.

"He has gone to Spiaggia for the day," Emilia informed them.

Beatrice, the Cardinal fancied, looked at once relieved and disappointed.

Marietta was seated in the sun, in a sheltered corner of the garden.

While Beatrice talked with her, the Cardinal walked about.

Now it so happened that on Peter's rustic table a book lay open, face downwards.

The Cardinal saw the book. He halted in his walk, and glanced round the garden, as if to make sure that he was not observed. He tapped his snuff--box, and took a pinch of snuff. Then he appeared to meditate for an instant, the lines about his mouth becoming very marked indeed.

At last, swiftly, stealthily, almost with the air of a man committing felony, he slipped his snuff-box under the open book, well under it, so that it was completely covered up.

On the way back to Ventirose, the Cardinal put his hand in his pocket.

"Dear me!" he suddenly exclaimed. "I have lost my snuff box again." He shook his head, as one who recognises a fatality. "I am always losing it."

"Are you sure you had it with you?" Beatrice asked.

"Oh, yes, I think I had it with me. I should have missed it before this, if I had left it at home. I must have dropped it in Mr. Marchdale's garden."

"In that case it will probably be found," said Beatrice.

Peter had gone to Spiaggia, I imagine, in the hope of meeting Mrs.

O'Donovan Florence; but the printed visitors' list there told him that she had left nearly a fortnight since. On his return to the villa, he was greeted by Marietta with the proud tidings that her Excellency the d.u.c.h.essa di Santangiolo had been to see her.