Chapter IX: Part 9

"May my fingers be blistered if I touch them!" said Varro. "Signor, I have only requited the good service you did me on the plains of Apulia, when the Frenchman's plaguy bayonet was at my throat. To any other man than yourself, illustrissimo, I might have behaved like a true sbirro, and allowed him to drink a skinful of la belladonna, if such was the pleasure of his Excellency. 'Tis the third time I have seen these rascally jars produced."

"Then you are the greater rogue, Varro: but as you are deprived of one master, we must find you another. Seek the Cavaliere del Castagno at Crotona, who in my name will enrol you in the Free Corps; where you will do more good service to your country by serving under their colours, than by wearing the livery of these dissipated and tyrannical feudatories, who are a curse to the land they rule."

"Would it please you to see the cavalieressa?" asked Baptistello: "she will be a free woman now, since this last prank of her husband's; and I know a certain capitano who will throw up his cap when he hears of it. A sad life she has endured with him, signor; mewed up in this desolate place, where never a soul was to be seen save a lonely shepherd on the distant mountains, or a stray peasant cutting wood in the valley below. Via! I will quit it this hour, and rather fight under Scarolla than again don the livery and aiguilette of a sbirro."

"Silenca, Varro," said Marco; "silence, and lead on to the apartment of the lady. If it should be so: she whom I loved so much. Basta! I have faced Frenchmen, Turks, and Algerines; but this meeting--forward! It is fitter that she should learn her misfortune, or deliverance, (term it which you may) from the mouth of a gentleman, than from a rabble of serving-men."

We followed Baptistello across the court or quadrangle, and ascending a flight of narrow steps lighted by flickering lamps, arrived at a corridor, where the voices of females and sounds of lamentation became audible.

"This leads to the apartments of the signora," said our guide.

"It seems more like the lighthouse of Messina," I observed, "or the stair to a prison."

"And the poor lady has found it a prison dreary enough," continued the garrulous Italian. "Here she has dwelt for three long years, and seen but seldom the face of her husband. Cattivo! often I have heard her lamenting in the dreary nights, when I kept watch in the gallery: for this is a tower of the villa, and its window commands a view as far as to the Tacina. Then I wished that I was a noble cavalier instead of a poor serving-man, that I might free her from such thraldom. You must know, Signor Marco," and here his voice sank into a very confidential whisper, "the gay captain who used to serenade the cavalieressa at Venice did not die when the hired bravo stabbed him. The wound was inflicted by a glass poniard, and the blade was broken in the wound; it was long of being extracted, and longer of being healed: but he recovered, and is now at Catanzaro; and, having bribed Scarolla, he has made more than one attempt to carry off his mistress: but, by Excellenza's orders, we always kept such close watch----"

"Basta, forward!" exclaimed Marco, impatiently. "Do you take us for brothers of the shoulder-knot, that we are to stand here listening to your household scandal? I must see your lady without delay."

"To judge by what we hear, her women have been beforehand with you, signor," replied Varro, again taking the lead; and as a proof how little the cavalier's treatment of his wife caused her to be respected by his dependants, the sbirro threw open her chamber-door, and without knock or warning ushered us unceremoniously in.

The apartment was elegant: through parted hangings of blue silk and gold, festooned between columns of white marble rising from vases of green jasper, was revealed an inner chamber, where stood a couch formed like a large gilded shell; above it drooped drapery of white satin, edged with the richest lace. Books, music, mandolins, were scattered about, together with work-baskets, flowers, and various gewgaws: everything that taste, wealth, or luxury could wish were there--save happiness. Sadly pale were the careworn but beautiful features of the lady, and strongly they contrasted with the plump, red cheek of her robust Calabrian waiting-woman; who stuck close to her skirts on our entrance.

She started, shook back the heavy ringlets from her snowy brow, and gazed upon us with dark but brilliant eyes, which expressed more astonishment than grief.

"Despina Vignola," exclaimed Castelermo, as he started back apace, and regarded her with a glance rather of deep sorrow than wonder. "Ah, Despina! how little could I once have dreamed we should have met here, and greeted each other thus!"

She gazed alternately at the dark but handsome features of the cavaliere and the broad black velvet cross on the breast of his scarlet uniform; and her glance of wonder gradually changed to one of confusion, recognition, and anger: she covered her blushing features with her pale hand, but for an instant only, and then looking up with an air of hauteur, said--

"This meeting is quite as unexpected to me as it may be to you, Signori Cavalieri. How is it that you have this night slain my dear husband, the Signor Galdino; and within his own house of Belcastro?"

"A cool question!" said Marco, bitterly, gnawing his glove, while his proud spirit was roused by her cold nonchalance; "admirably so! and to be asked by a notary's niece, of a cavaliere of the house of Ruffo Sciglio----"

"Ruffo, the traitor!" said she, scornfully: "but you reply not to my question."

"I will ask but another, Why the devil your amiable sposo slew himself? Basta! he fell into that deadly snare which his deliberate villany and groundless hate prepared for better men. But let me be gentle: perhaps at this moment he is making answer for his misdeeds before that dread tribunal where all men must one day stand--the prince and the peasant, the high-born lord and the homeless lazarone. (Here Marco signed the cross, and all bowed their heads, save myself.) Peace be with his ashes! I shall forget that in the days of my joyous youth he robbed me of my poor patrimony, and deprived me of that which was dearer to me than all the world beside--the love of thee, Despina; forcing me to abandon my country, and serve in the wars of the Maltese knights as a humble musketeer of the galleys. A knight of St. John should bear no enmity to the dead, and wars not with Christian men; unless another's sword is drawn upon him, after which I trust he will stand buffets and blows like a true cavalier of the Rock."

"Bravissimo!" said the lady, affecting to smile scornfully through the tears which glittered in her fine eyes, "a woman's apartment is an excellent place to swagger and bluster in. You have all the manners of a Venetian bravo, signor."

"Those of a Venetian captain might be more pleasing," retorted the excited cavalier. "But I will quit your roof, signora, and travel to Belcastro; though this night Charybdis yawned in my path. Basta! the wearer of such a badge as this cross is scarcely safe in the house of a damsel so famous for her gallantries."

"By the blessed Madonna! Belcastro you shall never see," exclaimed Despina, aroused to passion by his taunts. "Ola, Baptistello! where is the Teniente Guesippe and his sbirri? Here, Signor Guesippe di Gondezani! Dio! I shall burst with fury!"

In a few minutes the teniente, with twelve armed servants at his back, entered the apartment, and surrounded us with levelled musquetoons and fixed bayonets.

"If this adventure ends in blows, I at least shall have one man's life in exchange for my own," said I, drawing my sabre. Castelermo folded his arms beneath the dark military cloak which bore the red cross of his order on the left shoulder, and surveyed the lady and her unscrupulous rabble with a frown of contempt.

"Molest us, if you dare!" said he. "Bear in remembrance, that though the holy office has passed away, he who raises his hand against a Maltese knight commits sacrilege. Insult me, and think how it will be avenged! There are no less than fifty cavaliers of my old commandery scattered through this very province, and in two days they would hurl this mansion into the valley below. Not less will be the vengeance of the British general, if this officer, my friend, is maltreated by those wretches and malefactors who wear your husband's livery. Back, ye scoundrels!" he suddenly exclaimed, and drew his sword; "and you, Baptistello, lead our horses to the gate. Santa notte, la Signora Cavalieressa! we shall not forget our entertainment in this diabolical lazaretto. And good-night to you, Signor Guesippe, and your myrmidons," continued Marco, with fierce irony. "Basta! the malaria of the valley, and the chance of being riddled by the rifles of Scarolla, are preferable to remaining here, where poison and cold lead seem your best welcome to visitors. And so, once more, a most holy night to all this noble company."

We descended to the piazza, where, mounting our half-refreshed horses, we again set forth on our journey; wishing the Villa Belcastro and all its inmates in a hotter place than Italy.

"Signor Marco, I shall be particularly careful how I thrust myself uninvited upon a Calabrian mansion in future," said I, yawning as we descended the hills.

"You have seen Despina, and this night have had the sequel to my story. How little I expected it, when yesterday I whiled away an hour during our ride by a relation of my adventures. I long suspected that Belcastro was my rival; but never had proof of the fact until to-night."

I addressed him once or twice, but he heard me not, and continued to ride on with his head bent forward, and his bridle-hand resting listlessly on the pommel of the saddle. He was, no doubt, deeply immersed in sad thoughts and recollections, which this unexpected interview with the woman he once loved so tenderly had recalled from oblivion.

END OF VOL. I.

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